Destroy Jin and conquer Song, and carry the Northern Expedition through to the end

Chapter 267: A Horse Can’t Get Fat Without Overnight Grass

In a sense, happiness is conserved.

For example, now, how sad Meng Tian is about defending the country, how excited Liu Huai is.

After cleaning the battlefield, gathering troops, and treating the wounded, and being busy for most of the night, Liu Huai finally had time to count the gains of this battle.

The biggest and most important thing is, of course, armor.

The Wuxing Army has a large number of armored soldiers and cavalry, and there are about 1,500 relatively complete sets of armor. If the damaged ones or those scattered on the battlefield are included, this number is likely to reach 4,000.

Even if some of it is distributed to the Tianping Army, the Zhongyi Army will still gain 3,000 sets of heavy armor.

If we count the second-rate light armor and leather armor, the number would be even greater, so much so that it would be impossible to count them all without a few days of rest.

The second largest harvest was war horses.

There were about 2,100 intact main war horses, and about 4,000 inferior horses to serve as saddle horses for knights.

The reason for such a large number of spare horses was simple. He Boqiu had directly breached the Jin army camp and immediately took control of the stables, gathering the more than 3,000 spare horses that had not been deployed.

As for the number of injured or dead horses, they were countless. In the past two days, the entire army could not finish eating all the meat, and the cooks in the army had to smoke it quickly.

The weather had turned cold by then, but meat still could not be preserved for long. Liu Huai even planned to recruit butchers from Linyi, but he didn't know if it would be too late.

The third piece of fat meat is the large number of craftsmen accompanying the Wuxing Army.

The most valuable technical talents among them are naturally the blacksmiths, who number about 300, basically all Han people from Hebei and Shandong, and a few are Han people from Liaodong.

Among the remaining more than a thousand craftsmen, some could make siege weapons, some were leatherworkers who could process raw hides, some could repair bows and arrows and armor, and there were even strong women who accompanied them to wash clothes. Among them, more than a dozen were Northeastern women who came from Liaodong.

As for the signed troops who had certain experience in fighting and setting up camps, there were more than 2,000 of them.

Liu Huai even discovered slave traders among these people, which is truly amazing.

In the game Mount & Blade, you have to find a tavern to sell prisoners! The Jin army can actually sell them directly in the army, which is really convenient.

Of course, this was purely because Liu Huai was unfamiliar with the subject.

In fact, as a hugely profitable business, human trafficking doesn't require waiting for customers to come. While you're at it, all the good slaves are bought up on the spot by diligent merchants!

Moreover, the practice of slave traders accompanying the army was not the first of its kind in the Jin army; it was a traditional tactic in East Asian warfare.

When Li Shimin conquered Goguryeo and returned to the court victorious, he found 50,000 Goguryeo people being sold as slaves in Youzhou. Li Shimin was moved by sympathy and bought them all, granting them the status of freemen.

Where did these slaves come from?
Isn't it the frontline army that attacks and captures people along the way, and then the slave traders resell them along the way?
"General, please look, these are the good stuff that the Wuxing Army looted along the way." The slave trader named Zhao Chang led Liu Huai and others, and peeled off a pile of skins as if presenting treasures, revealing a huge wooden box inside.

After the wooden box was opened, gold, silver and other valuables were piled up in piles, there was a dazzling array of red jade and jadeite, and all kinds of gold and silver jewelry stained with blood were available, which was dazzling.

"These ten carts may appear to be made of leather, but the boxes underneath are filled with gold, silver, and other valuables. I now present them to you, the Grand Marshal."

Liu Huai just glanced at the box and didn't even bother to go forward and check it out.

Among the generals who followed along the way, only Shi Qilang showed a look of desire, while the others all looked impatient. Even Zhang Baiyu simply stepped forward to check the skins, as if these smelly furs were much more valuable than gold, beads and silver.

The world is in such a mess, and military force is the only guarantee of everything. With soldiers, you can have everything. How can mere gold and silver dazzle these generals?

"Zhao Chang, I have a question for you," Liu Huai said, pointing at the gold and silver. "Whose gold and silver are they? Why are they in the frontline camp? Shouldn't they be in Yishui County?"

Zhao Chang saw that Liu Huai had hit the point, and his eyes flashed before he said, "The Grand Commandant is truly discerning. Actually, I have another business, which is distributing goods to the homes of soldiers and charging a certain amount of money."

Liu Huai nodded silently. Although he was somewhat surprised to see the prototype of the postal industry in the 12th century, after going through so much, Liu Huai no longer dared to treat the ancients as fools.

Even if the ancients did not know the direction of historical development, they would still invent some new things to make life convenient, such as the bills issued by these military merchants. If they were on a larger scale, it would be equivalent to issuing paper money.

"Zhao Chang, don't forget that you are now a prisoner of our army. All the gold, silver and valuables will naturally belong to our army after we kill you." Liu Huai took the piece of leather thrown by Zhang Baiyu, looked at it carefully, and found that it should be a piece of cowhide, and it was the hard leather from the back. Although it could not be made into clothes to keep warm, it could still be made into leather armor, wrist guards and other armor. He nodded repeatedly.

"I despise unscrupulous business. If I can kill someone, I will kill him. You'd better be able to buy his life with something I don't know."

"General, spare my life!" Zhao Chang fell to his knees with a plop, kowtowed repeatedly, and in his heart of panic, he cursed Meng Tian's eight generations of ancestors who had defended the country. "General, we don't want to harm anyone. We are just doing some hard work and traveling. How can we be evil? General, if we were here, the soldiers would still spare the lives of innocent people for the sake of the money they made. If we were not here, the officers and soldiers... the Jin thieves would probably just kill without stopping. Being a slave is at least a way to survive, better than dying directly. General, it's not us who are evil, it's this world!"

The generals who were following Liu Huai in patrolling the camp had different expressions. Among them, Wang Shilong was a little angry. Just as he was about to say something, Liu Huai had already scolded him.

As a seasoned politician, Liu Huai wasn't afraid of anyone's rhetoric. "You talk as if you were a victim, but you've forgotten that it's precisely because of you slave traders who aided and abetted the tyranny that the Jin thieves' towns and villages, which they could have attacked or not, became targets for attack; and counties, which they could have plundered or not, became targets for plunder. It's precisely because of you that human trafficking has become profitable, and that the entire slave trade has a market. With wealthy families owning slaves, there will naturally be slave-grabbing thieves!"

Zhao Chang found it difficult to argue and could only kowtow.

"So, if you think you have any words that can buy your life, say it now..." Liu Huai threw the cowhide back onto the cart and said, holding the knife, "If you can't redeem yourself from your crimes, our Loyalty Army's words of establishing principles and rules to help the people are not in vain!"

Zhao Chang hesitated for a moment, and finally turned around and opened the interlayer on the wooden board of a cart. Liu Huai stretched his head to look, but saw only a pile of account books.

"This... this is the address of the Wuxing Army soldiers' homes, as well as the account book for sending things back." Zhao Chang knew that doing this was equivalent to selling all the Wuxing Army's pants. No one in the Wuxing Army who could survive would let him go.

But when he was at his wit's end, Zhao Chang steeled himself and personally picked up an account book, turned to a page, and said to Liu Huai, "Taiwei, please look, this man is called Zhao Xing, a squad leader of the Fourth Meng'an. His family is in Zhaojiazhuang, Suning County, Hejian Prefecture, the second household at the entrance of the village. He has parents, three brothers, and a pair of children."

Liu Huai took the account book and looked at it carefully.

It does record a large amount of soldiers' personal information, which is for the accurate delivery of money and goods to the soldiers' homes in the rear, and also for the delivery person and the soldiers' family to compare with each other to prevent misunderstandings.

Liu Huai threw the account books back into the box and said, "Guan Qilang, take your men and deliver these account books to Mr. Lu. See if you can find anything useful inside."

As he spoke, Liu Dalang sighed again: "I don't expect to be able to persuade those diehards to surrender, but it would be nice to scare them."

About three thousand Wuxing Army soldiers were captured, most of whom were Jurchen soldiers, and only a small number were Han people.

These Jurchens were all Meng'an Mouke households, belonging to the rentier class. As long as their hometowns were not conquered, they were very loyal to the Jin Dynasty and would not surrender easily.

The way to deal with these people has been roughly decided. First, all those with blood on their hands will be beheaded, and then the remaining people will be beaten to death on a five-point scale. Finally, after scaring them a little, they will be sent to the salt fields in the rear for labor reform and to work as coolies.

"Commander-in-Chief." At this time, a military envoy came to look for him. Seeing the officers behind Liu Huai, he was slightly surprised, then bowed and said, "The generals are here too. The marshal summoned the commander-in-chief to discuss important matters with the generals."

Liu Huai held his belt and smiled, "This is a serious military discussion. Zhao Chang, you have made some contributions today. Although it cannot be said that the merits and demerits are offset, you have saved your life. But no matter what, it is wartime now, and I cannot let you go. Chen Liulang, keep this fellow under guard!"

Chen Wenben grabbed Zhao Chang's shoulders and dragged him into the prisoner-of-war camp amid his screams.

Liu Huaifu stroked his chin again, looking at the boxes of gold, silver and treasure. "Wu Lang, your Tianping Army should send an accountant to register the treasure with my Zhongyi Army. I intend to use this treasure as a reward for the entire army. Officers will take double, and civilians will take half. What do you think?"

The three generals of the Tianping Army, who had been following Liu Huai for the whole morning, bowed one after another without any nonsense.

These were all unexpected gains, and the rewards for merit were calculated separately, so Xin Qiji simply accepted them.

Although according to the custom of the Loyal Army, the decision would most likely be made immediately, and the rewards would be distributed in front of Wei Sheng or Liu Huai, which felt like buying people's hearts.

But how did you say that?

The common people are not destined to follow us.

If the soldiers of the Tianping Army can be won over by a single reward, it means that the reward and punishment system is not done well. If the soldiers do not leave now, they will leave tomorrow, and no one else can be blamed.

(End of this chapter)