Red Mansion: Seizing Jiangdong, starting with pirates

Chapter 147: Storm is Coming (End)
Datong.

There were no problems with the long-haul route.

After giving enough benefits, the people responsible for defending the passes all turned a blind eye.

Twelve thousand war horses were divided into dozens of waves and passed through the defense line of this important town safely.

The defending general Deng Ren was actually a patriot. He hated this kind of smuggling, but he was a subordinate of the old Duke. The other party had a seal from the Duke of She, and he could not forget his roots, so he could only accept the banknote with tears.

The horses were transported all the way to Zezhou.

If it was still concealed elsewhere, it became completely blatant when the horses arrived in Zezhou.

Jia Lian looked at the caravan with a bitter expression.

Twelve thousand horses, seemingly endless at a glance, plus a large number of people looking after the horses, and even military escorts. If you didn't know, you would have thought it was the grassland army heading south!
If this is discovered by the higher-ups, he won't have enough heads to chop off even if he has nine!
The person in charge of the business this time was Xue Ke.

There were many horses this time and the task was urgent. Xue San was old and it was not convenient for him to travel long distances all the time, so Fang Yong gave the task to Xue Ke.

Xue Ke saw Jia Lian's distress and said to him with a smile:
"Don't worry. We have people everywhere. The bribes we give to the court are worth more than the total value of these horses. Even if something goes wrong, we can suppress it!"

Jia Lian smiled bitterly and said:
"Having said that, I really have no idea what's going on if this continues."

Xue Ke said: "If something really happens, Lord Jia can come directly to Huaizhou. The general values friendship the most and will never forget your contribution!"

Jia Lian immediately showed joy when he heard this. With these words, he felt relieved.

The caravan left Zezhou smoothly.

Afterwards, although the remaining routes have been prepared, they cannot be as ostentatious as Zezhou.

The horses were broken down into smaller pieces and shipped out in batches.

The greater the number, the longer it will take.

The last time, it took about half a year to successfully transport 8,000 war horses to Xuzhou, and this time, the 12,000 war horses will undoubtedly take longer.

The manpower and material resources consumed during this period were astronomical figures, and only Fang Yong's vast territory and the Xue Chamber of Commerce's strong mobilization capabilities could support it.

Moreover, this time Fang Yong also asked Xue Ke to transport the horses back as much as possible before the late rice harvest, that is, to transport them to Huaizhou around November, which was another huge challenge for the caravan.

In Huaizhou, the early rice was harvested smoothly.

Previously, a large number of fish died in the waters from Xuzhou to Huaizhou, and due to continuous rainfall, the water level of the river also rose sharply several times.

After discussion, Fang Yong's men concluded that it was an earthquake or a flood, so they asked the people in the area to harvest rice and other crops in advance.

But in the end the disaster did not happen.

Now the water level is dropping rapidly again, and it has dropped much more than the lowest water level in previous years. It seems that there is no danger anymore.

The grain was harvested successfully, and the granary was filled up again with last year's grain before it was used up.

The grain harvest in Huizhou starts a little later than in Suzhou, but it also soon reaches the harvest season.

Seeing the harvest which was twice as much as before, the people's worship of Fang Yong began to grow without limit.

There is nothing more real than a real harvest.

Especially those people who were displaced by the new policy.

Only after losing something do we know how to cherish it.

They know very well who helped them rebuild their homes, who gave them land to cultivate, and who kept them fed.

Hunan.

He Ai led the people to worship Fang Yong's statue. In the past, the people were somewhat perfunctory about it, but now, they worshiped more sincerely than anyone else.

Even in Jiangxi, Hubei, Hunan and Zhejiang, people have started selling Fang Yong's statues.

The appearance of the statue is about 40% similar to Fang Yong. He wears a priest's robe or a general's robe, holds a magic bow and a sword, rides a unicorn, and is in charge of rain, farming, livestock, etc.

In the Huaizhou area, people directly addressed the statue as "General" when they worshipped it. In those areas that were recovered later, such as Huizhou and Gusu, some called it "Marquis of Huaiyin" and some called it "Duke of Yonghuai".

However, in the areas under the jurisdiction of the imperial court, these titles were not very convenient, so the people created a title called the Great God of Rain and the God of Agriculture and the True Lord of Blessing the Thick Earth.

However, no matter how much you worship, in these areas that are not controlled by Fang Yong, even if you worship Fang Yong’s statue, you cannot get double the harvest.

Therefore, there are still many people who believe that those so-called rumors about Tianyou were fabricated by the Huaiyin thieves in order to confuse the people.

During this period, Xu Shaobao from Zhejiang once again asked Fang Yong for money and food.

He said that he had bribed the captain of the Hangzhou city gate, and he only needed to recruit a few more people to launch an uprising in Hangzhou and break through the city. By then, the Huaiyin army could take advantage of the situation and attack Zhejiang without any effort!

Xu Shaobao asked Fang Yong for 500 taels of silver to recruit his men, and also asked for pieces of sword equipment, plus bows and crossbows.

Fang Yong shook his head after receiving the news.

This is the third big pie that Xu Shaobao has painted for him.

Before this, Xu Shaobao had asked for money and food from him twice.

The first time he gave five thousand taels, plus some food support.

The second time he gave 10,000 taels, plus a lot of weapons.

This time the other party wanted another 20,000 taels, and Fang Yong absolutely could not agree to it.

So they sent someone to write a reply, saying that unless the other party could produce actual results, they would stop supporting them.

mid-July.

Xu Feng went to the countryside to inspect the fields as usual.

He is the magistrate of Feng County, which is located in the northernmost part of Xuzhou, close to Jizhou, Shandong. From a regional perspective, it is close to the north. Most of the crops grown here are wheat, which matures slightly different from that in Lianghuai. The harvest was completed a month ago.

The next task is mainly to tidy up the fields. In this era, there are no chemical fertilizers, so the fields must be well taken care of after the grain harvest. Otherwise, once the soil fertility is lost in large quantities, good fields will become poor fields, and poor fields will become waste fields.

Stepping into the fields and walking on the green stalks, the people saw Xu Feng's figure and greeted him one after another.

Xu Feng smiled and waved, continuing walking. Not far away there was a wide river called Xiaosha River, which was a tributary of the "Dasha River" and was also the source of food and clothing for the people of Feng County.

Once upon a time, the military advisor defeated the government army here, laying the foundation for the opportunity to capture Xuzhou.

This time, Xu Feng set foot here again, but found that the situation in Xiaosha River seemed something was wrong.

From a distance, it seems that there is no difference, but when you get closer, you can clearly see that the water level of Xiaosha River has dropped a lot, but its height has not dropped, but has risen instead.

It turned out that a large amount of silt had accumulated in the Xiaosha River, causing the water level to rise, but the amount of water decreased!

So where did the water go?
Xu Feng looked towards the location of "Dashaha River" in the distance.

Dashaha River is a nickname given by local people.

Generally speaking, the people of China are more accustomed to calling it,

Yellow River!

(End of this chapter)