Entrepreneurship in the Late Tang Dynasty

Chapter 67 Old Friend
When Zhao Huaian asked Dong Gongsu how old his daughter was, the old Dong said:
"twelve."

This age immediately extinguished Zhao Huaian's restless heart. Twelve, so actually he is only eleven years old?

Wow, although I know that our ancestors got married early, this is too early.

So Zhao Huaian hurriedly shook his head and said a few words like "How can a man take care of his family if he hasn't accomplished anything?", and finally shut Dong Gongsu up.

In fact, the reason why Zhao Huaian refused was not just because of the huge age gap. In fact, in this era, this has never been a reason.

More importantly, Zhao Huaian had to take the initiative in the cooperation. Although he lacked a steady stream of money, it didn't mean that Dong Gongsu was an impossible person. At most, he could make a fortune from the war. Although this was risky, it was not impossible.

Therefore, he was unwilling to compromise on such matters.

As a rising young military leader, although Zhao Huaian does not have many soldiers and horses, he has enough self-awareness as a military leader.

If Dong Gongsu is to be a marriage partner, he is obviously not qualified at this moment. It is not enough to be rich, but he must have sufficient social resources to help Zhao Da.

But no matter how rich Dong Gongsu is, to put it bluntly, he is just a local tycoon who sells illegal salt. He is too far away from the center of power and cannot provide political resources to Zhao Huaian at all. So how could Zhao Huaian agree to this?
In this era, one can have many concubines but only one wife. If he is deeply bound to Dong Gongsu at this time, it means that he is not looking for Dong Gongsu as a sucker, but that he is the sucker and is taken advantage of by Dong Gongsu.

Moreover, he firmly believed that even without this marriage as a connection, Dong Gongsu would still invest in him.

As expected, seeing Zhao Huaian's polite refusal, Dong Gongsu did not mention the matter again.

Instead, he began to take the initiative to ask Zhao Huaian to introduce him to the heroes and warriors in his army. After seeing that the Baoyi generals were either strong, profound, brave, or resolute, he felt that this little Baoyi was full of hidden dragons and crouching tigers.

This Zhao Huaian is not only magnanimous, but also lucky. All the heroes and warriors under his command have good physiognomy. It seems that this Zhao Da may really achieve great things.

Therefore, although Dong Gongsu still felt very sorry that his daughter was not married and was deeply bound to Zhao Da, he was not in a hurry. His daughter was indeed young now. In a few years, if Zhao Da really became rich, even if she could not be his wife, she could be a concubine.

In short, Dong Gongsu has decided to board Zhao Da's ship.

So Dong Gongsu promised Zhao Huaian without hesitation that he would provide Zhao Huaian's Baoyi City with half a year's military pay, and then provide it once every six months.

If Baoyi needs to expand in the future and he finds it difficult to fund it alone, he will also recruit some wealthy people from Shu to join. In short, he told Zhao Huaian, "You just take care of the battle matters, and he will take care of all the future needs."

Zhao Huaian quickly gave Dong Gongsu a thumbs up, praising him for being worthy of being called "Mengchang" and being heroic.

But in his heart, Zhao Huaian was very vigilant.

This is just a stopgap measure. Relying on some businessmen to support the army, it is not certain who will own this army in the end. His ultimate goal is to seize a piece of land, so that he can have a stable base and a steady supply of supplies.

By that time, Zhao Huaian had established a foundation.

But there is no need to rush this matter now. He does not have many achievements now, so he still needs to make more contributions in this Nanzhao War before he can have a future.

……

With the in-depth cooperation, the transfer of military rations in Baoyi was much smoother. This time they would probably transport 3,000 stones of military rations to the Qionglai front line.

There, Yang Qingfu led an army of more than 10,000 and surrounded the small city of Qionglai.

Due to lack of sufficient information, Zhao Huaian did not know why Yang Qingfu had been besieging the city without attacking, but instead sat outside the city, wasting money and food.

While he was transporting grain in the rear, he heard that some people were already impeaching Yang Qingfu, saying that Yang Qingfu was afraid of the enemy like a tiger and would not dare to take the initiative to attack until the Nanzhao army withdrew on its own.

Zhao Huaian naturally didn't believe such words, but he really couldn't understand why Yang Qingfu sat there in silence.

Forget it, this kind of thing is not something a mere general like him can consider.

Let’s send these three thousand shi of military rations to the camp first.

This batch of military rations was not of a single kind, but included millet, wheat, buckwheat, soybeans, peas, and sorghum.

The grain cultivation at that time was different from the commercial grain cultivation in later generations. Whatever was harvested was what it was.

The three thousand dan of military rations filled three hundred and sixty carts. These carts were two-wheeled and pulled by donkeys or mules. Each cart could carry about a thousand kilograms.

With so many carts, and nearly a thousand villagers carrying the loads, it's no wonder that Zhao Huaian, the bodyguard, is needed to escort them.

But even with such a large army being mobilized to escort more than 300 supply carts, in fact, these 3,000 dan of grain were only enough to feed the more than 10,000 troops on the front line for half a month.

But how many households would be required to pay the full 3,000 dan of autumn grain? Assuming an average of 2 dan per household, that would be 1,500 households.

Alas, these people don’t even know if they have a surplus of seven or eight shi of grain in a year, but they have to pay two or three shi. This is just one tax, and there are all kinds of miscellaneous taxes and additional levies.

In short, the common people of the Tang Dynasty were indeed like cattle and horses.

These were all said by Wang Duo and Zhao Huaian. This man came from a humble family and relied on his hard work to climb to his current position as a tax clerk, but his heart still stood on the side of the common people and he had not forgotten his roots.

And this may be the most fundamental reason why Zhao Huaian admires him.

Here, Zhao Huaian was lamenting how much the march and war consumed the country's strength, while over there, Wang Duo and Lao Liu had already loaded the military rations onto the trucks.

After signing the seal, Dong Gongsu wanted to invite Zhao Da to have a drink and introduce him to some heroes in his army.

But Zhao Huaian still had a clear mind. He declined the kindness of Old Dong, took Baoyi Du, and escorted more than 300 carts of military supplies to Qionglai in the west.

……

There were a lot of traffic, and Guo Congyun and Ding Huaiyi were taking turns scouting ahead with more than 20 riders in their team.

Zhao Da, Lao Liu, Wang Duo, Zhang Guinian, and Xue Hang rode a donkey cart, swaying along in the center of the convoy. In front and behind, the officers and soldiers of Baoyi City, though they had unloaded their armor onto the carts, held their bows and crossbows in their hands, watching their surroundings warily.

Zhao Huaian saw it and felt happy.

Yes, this team has to fight more battles. Now these soldiers are not only more united, but also more vigilant.

It seems that they also know how they attacked the Nanzhao army, and now they are afraid of being attacked in the same way by others.

After walking for most of the day, the team finally saw Tang An.

But Zhao Huaian saw from afar that the flag of the Nanzhao Army was still flying on the top of Tang'an City Wall. He frowned and asked Zhang Guinian and others:

"Why is Tang'an still in the hands of the Nanzhao people? Didn't I already wipe out their external forces? Why keep Tang'an, which is almost like a deserted city?"

"What do you think Yang Shuai is thinking? It's fine if he's just surrounding Qionglai, but why is he also surrounding Tang An in the back? Aren't you afraid that the longer the night, the more trouble he'll have?"

Lao Liu shrugged and said disdainfully:

"So I said those cowards couldn't accomplish anything. The same goes for General Yang. He insisted on sending us to get military rations. If we were to fight Tang An, we could defeat him in half a day."

Yes, our Lao Liu has experienced several small and big battles, and his self-confidence has grown. He can talk like this at will.

Wang Duo didn't know anything about military affairs. He just frowned and said worriedly:

"If General Yang continues to besiege without attacking, I'm afraid the people of western Sichuan will suffer again."

Only Zhang Guinian suddenly said:
"Perhaps, Yang Shuai is waiting for something."

Then Zhao Huaian wanted to ask for more details, but Zhang Guinian couldn't explain anything.

Hey, the more it was like this, the more Zhao Huaian missed his adopted elder brother. When Xian Yu Yue was around, he knew almost everything.

It was also at this time that Zhao Huaian felt more and more the importance of information.

At this time, his position was too low, and everything around him was an information fog. No matter how experienced he was, he could not judge the situation, let alone seize the opportunity.

Well, I still have to make more military achievements and climb up.

At this moment, on the dirt road ahead, a rider suddenly appeared, carrying a yellow-dyed bamboo tube on his back and holding a letter with a feather stuck in it, and galloped along the dirt road.

As he was running, he suddenly saw a grain transport convoy on the dirt road and shouted:

"Victory news, victory news! The envoy has issued a proclamation to the west: the Changwu Army has taken Yazhou, captured and killed dozens of chieftains, and the Nanzhao Army has been completely routed."

After hearing this, Zhao Huaian and others all changed color.

They never expected that Prime Minister Gao Pian would dare to leave Qionglai alone and go deep into the enemy's territory to pursue the Nanzhao army, and even conquer Yazhou in one battle. Is this person really a genius in using troops?

The messenger on the other side shouted a few more times, then bypassed Zhao Huaian's convoy and rushed towards Chengdu.

Lingqi left, Zhao Huaian felt particularly bitter, and he tried hard to force a smile:

"Don't worry, there's still a fight to be fought. The Nanzhao army has withdrawn from Yazhou, but there's still Lizhou behind us. There's no rush. Once we return to the front lines in Qionglai, I'll challenge General Yang to a fight. In short, there are plenty of opportunities to make a fortune."

But Zhao Huaian's words obviously did not boost morale much. After all, Shi Xiang Gao had defeated the main force of the Nanzhao army. Even if there was a battle, it would not be a big one.

Hey, they just got investors, and the battle is over? What bad luck.

On this side, the convoy approached Tang An dejectedly, only to find that a fight had broken out on Tang An's side.

Then Zhao Huaian saw that the Tang army was like a tiger, rushing straight to the city and capturing Tang'an City in a moment.

Seeing the flag of the "Zhongwu" army quickly replaced on the top of the city wall, Zhao Huaian seemed to understand something and sighed:
"I think our General Yang really wants to advance. He had to make great contributions to Prime Minister Gao before allowing the Zhongwu Army to break into the city. Alas, it's true that climbing to a high position is not easy."

After hearing what Zhao Huaian said, Zhao Liu and the others understood what he meant. They could only sigh like Zhao Huaian and say that they wanted to make progress too much.

Originally, Zhao Huaian planned to continue moving forward, but when he saw the flag of the "Zhongwu" Army erected on the top of the city wall, he wondered if there was an old friend there.

Then at this time, more than a dozen riders rushed out from the camp outside the city. They rushed out from the smoke and dust, and the leader was actually the thief Wang Jian who had drunk with Zhao Huaian.

When this person saw Zhao Huaian from a distance, he shouted:

"Zhao Da, Envoy Song is calling you."

Hearing that the person in Tang'an was actually his first mentor, Zhao Huaian was extremely happy and jumped off the ox cart to greet Wang Jian and the others.

But he didn't notice Zhao Liu in the car, and his face looked quite miserable.

Hey, Zhao Da, Zhao Da, you haven't heard any of the rumors in the army.

After thinking about it, Zhao Liu still couldn't bear it, so he ran over and pulled Zhao Da, reminding him:
"Zhao Da, if Envoy Song thinks you're dirty and tells you to take a shower, remember, don't do anything and just run back."

Zhao Huaian was stunned for a moment, then glared at Zhao Liu and cursed:
"Strange talk, full of bullshit."

Then he walked away as if it wasn't a serious matter, leaving Zhao Liu alone sighing and looking reluctant.

(End of this chapter)