Huaiyu is slightly cool

The Qiang Kingdom has long been wary of the increasingly powerful Zhou Huai, but it was Wu Mingtai who protected him at the beginning, and they failed several times when they sent people to infiltrate or buy people around Zhou Huai.But now that Zhou Huai has completely controlled the Northwest Army, politics, and business, and Zhou Huai, who has strong soldiers and good generals and strange weapons, obviously wants to fight back, but they can't beat each other, so they simply avoid it.

"The exercise is not over yet, why are you in such a hurry to leave?"

Liao Qiwei, who was still wearing a long red dress, sat in the carriage, opened the curtain with his slender fingers, looked at the people on the road ahead who were at war, and said with a smile.

Of the 3000 people Zhou Huai brought, she only took away [-], and the rest were handed over to Liao Qiwei.And Liao Qiwei led these two thousand elites to surround the Xirong and Qiang troops. In the dark night when the moon was in the sky and the surrounding fields were quiet, under the light of thousands of flashlights, bows, arrows, knives and axes faced the black machine guns and guns. mouth.Then just threw a few grenades, and the opponent only persisted for a quarter of an hour before abandoning their arms and surrendering.

Liao Qiwei asked the specially trained battlefield inspectors to test their power. Among those detained, it was found that only Prince Xirong did not see the Qiang king and the national teacher.

Liao Qiwei did not pursue the princes and national teachers of the Qiang Kingdom according to the order, but none of the Xirong Kingdom escaped, and even lost the backing of the Qiang Kingdom, because the Qiang King Xiao Tuo, who was careful to take a long way and wanted to return from Xirong, died in the hospital. After entering the territory of Xirong, Xi Yuanjing, the national teacher, also disappeared from their cell.

However, Zhou Huai and Mo Ziqi's [-] elite troops who were exercising at the border did not withdraw, and the Qiang army also gathered at the border, but they did not dare to take a step forward. Zhou Huai, don't care about how much Xirong will be robbed by Zhou Huai, anyway, it's better than Zhou Huai robbing his own country.

The eldest princess and Mo Ziqi took advantage of the fire to rob, and together with Liao Qiwei forced Xirong to sign an unequal treaty.

The treaty drafted and signed by Zhou Huai required Xirong to pay tribute to 20 slaves aged over 14 to under 35 every year within five years. As long as they were healthy, men and women were not limited.And the condition given to the other party is that within these five years, all Jing Guo's troops will never take the initiative to attack Xirong.

The royal family in power in Xirong said that these are nothing. Anyway, they have little farming. As long as Zhou Huai does not help Yan Hong return to Xirong to seize the throne, they are still willing to sign a friendly trade treaty with Zhou Huai, including the iron mine that Zhou Huai wants And jade minerals, as well as precious Chinese medicinal materials such as snow lotus and cistanche are willing to sell to Jingguo.

Everyone was surprised by Xirong's obedience, and also surprised by Zhou Huai's big appetite, but thinking about Zhou Huai's thriving career that is blooming everywhere, there is indeed a serious shortage of people.

In the past few years, the Northwest has rapidly started a heat wave of research and development of emerging industries, and under the leadership and support of Zhou Huai, agriculture and commerce have developed in a blowout manner, but the population growth cannot keep up with the development speed.

In the hands of Wu Yunhao, Jingguo changed from the original system of three lords and six ministers to the system of three provinces and six ministries, and the national boundaries were re-divided and governed by the three-level system of state, county, and county. The country is divided into 26 states, and each state has its own government. There are 15 to 20 counties, and each county has 10 to 20 counties under its jurisdiction.The total population of the country is about 2000 million, which is only equivalent to the resident population of a modern capital of Zhou Huai.

However, under the leadership of Zhou Huai, the northwest economy has developed unprecedentedly in agriculture and trade. The annual tax payment reaches one million taels of silver, accounting for one-third of Jingguo's annual tax revenue, but the population only accounts for 2000 million of Jingguo's total population. one tenth.Later, due to Zhou Huai's reform of the household registration system, a large number of merchants, farmers, and new households moved to the northwest, but there were still more merchants than farmers, and more land than people.

Zhou Huai used to find a large number of refugees from Zhao State, but now after Mo Ziqi's founding, a lot of things are waiting to be done, and a large number of refugees have returned to the country.Although Zhou Huai has a total of millions of laborers in his hands, and has integrated about 5 troops in the northwest, and has even developed and produced countless convenient heavy industry tools, every year due to construction accidents and diseases, as well as private fights and turmoil, he dies. The number of deaths is still between 10 and [-], among which shops and factories are the least, while prisoners of war and criminals who serve in hard labor to repair roads, open up wasteland, mine ore, and build energy towers die the most.Even though Zhou Huai vigorously supports the research and development of medicines, due to the temperature and climate in the northwest, the death toll remains high, and it is difficult to recruit enough workers for these jobs even with high salaries.

Zhou Huai is actually not short of money.The iron, salt, and tea that the imperial court restricts monopoly operations are sold by her in the northwest on behalf of the imperial court. Even the minerals in the northwest are hers, including several gold mines and copper mines. She has mining rights. One can imagine the benefits.But the most important thing now is that there are not enough people. The most worrying thing is that the production cannot keep up. After all, there are gold and silver mountains that have to be dug by people. It is not easy to grab several 10 people for labor.

The eldest princess is not as domineering as Liao Qiwei, she doesn't want people, she only wants money, but she doesn't ask Xirong to become a subsidiary state of Jingguo, she just asks Xirong to pay 1/3 of the country's total tax every year, and the period is also five years.Of course, the eldest princess also added that if any natural or man-made disasters occurred in Xirong in the past five years and needed to spend money, then if the money is not enough, it can be paid for with food.

Among the three parties, Mo Ziqi was the most sincere. He only asked Xirong to return the once-occupied city of Zhaoguo, and agreed to pay Zhaoguo a large sum of compensation at one time, so he generously let Xirong go.

However, the [-] troops from this cooperative exercise were stationed in the recovered cities for ten years, and took this opportunity to develop the Silk Road on land.Of course, according to Zhou Huai's words, it is all the way to the west, starting the road of conquest.

Zhou Huai decided to share the 5 newly formed military salaries and subsidies between Zhao Kingdom and Northwest at a ratio of seven to three, and it was based on the military salaries and supplies of Zhou Northwest’s [-] people. The Northwest Army and General Welfare have always been the leaders of all countries, and they are not as important as other countries. The key point is that the huge Northwest has a small number of troops on the surface.So does this count as Northwest sucking blood from Zhao Kingdom in a disguised form?

At the end of June, after officially signing the contract and affixing the seal, the eldest princess was ready to leave for Beijing.

Liao Qiwei handed over the remaining insignificant follow-up matters to Mo Ziqi, the new Emperor Zhaoxin, and took the initiative to meet with the eldest princess who had been keeping an eye on her, and sincerely treated the eldest princess who had shown killing intent Said: "I was just a small criminal slave by Missy's side, barely able to help Missy share some trivial matters, and now I am ordered to help Missy take care of the property in Zhao Kingdom, if the famous Princess Princess is right now It may not be the right time for me to do it, because the eldest lady has issued strict orders, and I don't want any more troubles during this period of time. Of course, I also saw that the eldest princess and the eldest princess had been separated for eight years and had no contact. I was afraid that the eldest princess would not know the eldest lady. With my current temper, I just want to remind you one or two, lest Your Highness lose more than you gain."

The eldest princess looked at the flamboyant red dress in front of her, but her attitude was unusually humble, but both in and out of her words showed that she was someone Zhou Huai valued, so she squinted her eyes: "The mountains are high and the waters are long, and the sky is long, so there is no need to rush .”

"Eldest Princess is wise, here is a handwritten letter left by the Eldest Miss, asking me to deliver it to you in person, and asking me to accompany the Eldest Princess as a guide all the way, and take someone to protect Her Highness' safety."

The eldest princess took the letter paper lightly and saw Liao Qiwei staring at the letter paper without saying goodbye or saying anything, so she opened it and looked at it, her expression fluctuating.

There are only two lines of regular script on the letterhead: Come to Huaiyuan to choose the betrothal gift you want, and by the way, I have a relationship I want to talk to you about.

threaten?Incentives?The eldest princess looked up and down a dozen times before looking up at Liao Qiwei, and then smiled: "When will we leave?"

Liao Qiwei replied calmly: "Miss hopes to see His Highness as soon as possible."

The eldest princess nodded: "Then let's set off tomorrow morning at Chenshi."

After Liao Qiwei agreed to withdraw, the eldest princess immediately summoned Xiao Yu.

"Your Highness, the affairs of the capital are still waiting for you to deal with, Huai Yuan can't go there."

Xiao Yu frowned to dissuade the Eldest Princess, but the Eldest Princess obviously made up her mind: "If she can't get the medicines that are priced in gold and those weird weapons, Jing Guo will be in her pocket. "

Xiao Yu also understands that in the economic, military, and political comparison of the Northwest, the gap between the North and the South is getting bigger and bigger, and Jingguo's national reform is imperative, but Zhou Huai is not a person who is easy to negotiate, and Yunlong never stops diving. , Zhou Huai's thoughts, the entire Northwest can't satisfy or trap her.Xiao Yu thought about it, and couldn't help worrying: "But what if she has ulterior motives?" How can she suppress her big intention to take advantage of the opportunity?

After scanning the letter paper, the eldest princess's eyes became a little darker, and she said slowly: "I can only gamble. I can just go to the palace for this matter. Master Xiao will return to Beijing with the agreement and hand it over to the prince, and then discuss with Cousin Wei." Just help the prince stabilize the situation in the court together, and I will take over the layout of the northwest side."

After the eldest princess finished speaking, seeing Xiao Yu's frown returned to normal, she paused and said, "I will be in charge of everything in the northwest. After Mr. Xiao returns to the capital, he will try his best to persuade the prince to stop those petty actions. With His Majesty here, Zhou Huai will not initiate civil strife, but if she is angered, it will be easy to clean up those people in the capital."

The treaty between Xirong and Jingguo is made in triplicate, one for the northwest and one for the capital.The eldest princess wanted Xiao Yu to return to Beijing with the contract first, and she went to Huaiyuan to meet Zhou Huai.But Xiao Yu felt uneasy. He always felt that something would happen if the eldest princess went to the northwest. Although the blueprints of weapons and medicines in the northwest were very important, Xiao Yu was not optimistic about the move of the eldest princess, so he heard the warning from the eldest princess at this time. Suddenly, his gaze sank slightly, indicating that the eldest princess and even her personal servants were sent out of the house, and then she carefully took out a square of yellow silk from her wide sleeves, knelt down and said: "This letter of alliance with the imperial seal is the secret signal left by the Qiang State Master before leaving. Let the minister find it. His Majesty the Qiang Kingdom wants to cooperate with the crown prince and send troops to attack the northwest. For the sake of safety, the minister originally wanted to leave this place and present it to His Highness. It is more than [-]% sure that the eldest princess will take the risk herself. Besides, Zhou Huai's ambition is obvious, but His Majesty's health in the palace is deteriorating. At this time, let’s quickly cut through the chaos and take advantage of the strength of the Qiang Kingdom to attack the northwest, and I ask the Eldest Princess to decide.”