Emperor Ming Dynasty

Chapter 907 The State of Qi
After entering the wharf, Gu Yuan knew that the place was named Linzi.

"Why is there such a name?"

"The governor thinks that the king of Qi is similar to Qi in the Warring States period, so his city also imitated it, and it is more convenient to name it."

Wang Chengyi reported: "Besides, this is just a nickname. Everything will have to wait until His Royal Highness King Qi personally picks it up. It will be more convenient for me to replace it with Linzi."

Immediately afterwards, he introduced himself again, but he was just a commander of Luzon, responsible for the development of this place.

While listening, Gu Yuan raised his eyes and observed the situation in Linzi city.

It is said to be a city, but it is actually just a wooden village. There are only some fences near the pier, and there is only one trestle bridge, which looks empty.

The wharf and the city are connected together, and the houses, large and small, can be seen at a glance, which looks extraordinarily bleak.

Some Han people were either chopping firewood, or went out of the city to hunt and farm, and their clothes were thin. Although they were not skinny, their faces were sallow.

Hundreds of houses are all made of wood, and the two-foot-high wooden fence is also made of wood.

If this is set on fire, the huge state of Qi may be destroyed in one fell swoop.

"I heard from the governor that there are 10 people here?" Gu Yuan sighed, "Looking at it today, I'm afraid there are no more than a thousand people!"

Wang Cheng chuckled, and said: "There are nearly a thousand immigrants and soldiers in Linzi city, while outside the city, there are hundreds of tribes attached to them. It's not a hundred thousand, but there are still thirty to fifty thousand."

Hearing this, Gu Yuan smiled wryly.

This Lu Song has been tossing for more than a year, and let thousands of people come to open up the land. It is said that Qi's household registration is rich, which is simply fooling people.

I really came to the right trip this time.

If they were still dragged in Beijing, when King Qi came to the feudal vassal, seeing this thousand people, big and small, would make him feel angry.

The king of Qin has tens of thousands of people in Saigon, and he took down Champa, with hundreds of thousands of people under his command. The majestic state of Qi is only a fraction of him. Who can accept this?
"Luzon is really deceiving people too much."

Gu Yuan couldn't help cursing.

He had a bad temper and was sensitive, but now he erupted without any scruples.

After all, he is a private minister of Qi State, and no matter how powerful the governor is, he cannot be dealt with.

However, Wang Cheng and other generals on the side bowed their heads in silence, as if they didn't hear them. After all, they were still soldiers of the Governor's Mansion in name.

Gu Yuan was not restrained, he just sat down and asked about soldiers and horses.

The civil servants and warriors who followed him naturally accepted the power of the entire Linzi.

Wang Cheng was detained in front of him, and he could only watch helplessly as the other party withdrew his power. Everyone had a love for power, but he was helpless.

Because this is the right of others.

However, he was quite happy at the same time.

Because it means he can go home.

"There are about [-] soldiers and horses, including [-] musketeers and [-] longbowmen. The rest are only able to wield blades and spears."

Wang Cheng said softly: "There is no shortage of food and weapons, but there is very little gunpowder. For us, it is quite restrictive."

"Why is gunpowder scarce?"

"Because those indigenous barbarians are not afraid of bows and arrows, nor are they afraid of big knives, they are only afraid of muskets, so the consumption of gunpowder is huge, and the governor's mansion is not rich in money and food..."

Hearing this, Gu Yuan said coldly: "I heard in the capital that Luzon is not inferior to Taiwan, and even more prosperous. There are many Dingkou, but there are 5000 sailors, which is almost the same as the South China Sea Navy."

"Lack of money? Impossible, it's just that our Governor Jin doesn't want to spend it on Qi."

Having said that, Gu Yuan couldn't help but sigh.

After all, Qi State has nothing to do with Lu Song, and some relief is just to deal with the court.

At night, Gu Yuan, as the special envoy of the King of Qi, held a special meeting, and all the powerful people had arrived.

Gu Yuan has military and political power over the current Linzi, so although the civil and military people who followed him had some objections to him, they could only bow their heads and listen to him.

"Everyone, we are all future ministers of the Qi Kingdom. Now that His Royal Highness is getting married in Beijing, we are here to prepare for His Royal Highness King Qi to become a feudal clan."

"I don't know what everyone thinks?"

Gu Yuangao sat with a serious face.

On both sides of him, Wen and Wu sat in a row, and there were about thirty people.

It can be said that these people are not only his help, but also a kind of surveillance for him.

After all, the Qi State is currently the smallest, but it is the foundation of the King of Qi, so it cannot be ignored.

"I would like to report to the Prime Minister, although the whole of Linzi is in our hands today, but we must establish prestige to completely take it down, or even develop it."

At this time, a burly man stood up and said with his head held high.

Prime Minister is Gu Yuan's official position in Qi State. Now that he arrives in Qi State, he will naturally be called according to his official position.

And these people, of course, have official positions in their hands, which is a complete bureaucratic system.

"you say--"

Gu Yuan said.

"The lower officials think that the best thing to do now is to conquer the natives. Firstly, it can plunder gold, silver, money and food, and secondly, it can also have the effect of developing soldiers."

The man said seriously: "It's not okay to open up casually like last year, but to fight as much as possible, conquer the natives, and use the land to lure immigrants."

"Only when the number of people reaches [-] can we be worthy of the king and the state of Qi."

As for how to lure the people, there is no need to say much.

The nearby Luzon Road, Fujian and other places are their main sources of immigration.

Jia Bu continued: "Relocating the people, rescuing the people instead of urgently, conquering the aborigines, and turning barbarians into summer is the fastest way at present."

"His Royal Highness will be a vassal, just in the past two or three years, we should work hard."

Gu Yuan agrees with this.

This made him understand that this person was born as a military commander, and he had a background in the martial arts hall, so he would definitely ask for the mobilization of troops.

But at this time, this is the most effective method.

farming?Not advisable also.

Immediately, everyone set a goal: to expand the current territory of Qi State by ten times, and increase the number of people to [-].

Financially, it is the cultivation of cotton, rice, and most importantly, sugarcane.

This is the basic condition for King Qi to become a vassal.

A few days later, Gu Yuan bid farewell to Jia Bu, watching him lead hundreds of troops to march, leaving only a hundred soldiers to guard the city.

Soon, under the leadership of Wang Cheng, a group of people came to an indigenous tribe a hundred miles away from the pier.

Here is a hillside, surrounded by trees, and there is a small village. Although it is a village, it is just a house made of wood.

It can't even be regarded as a house, it can only be regarded as a rain shelter of a civil structure.

There are some livestock near the entrance of the village, which are obviously their means of transportation and agricultural tools.

Downstream of the village, this is a piece of land.

The rice is sparse, and at a rough glance, ten mu of land may not be able to harvest a stone.

What came into view was a piled up plain of more than a thousand mu of land.

This made Jia Bu very happy.

Not long in the distance, a big camp has been set up, this is the rule of the martial arts hall he learned from himself, there are boundaries between wooden fences, patrols, and tents, and strict laws and regulations.

Teams of Ming troops entered and left the camp by themselves, carrying water for cooking or feeding horses.

After investigating the military situation, Jia Bu came back directly and set off with the army.

Two miles in front of the sight of the soldiers, there are a large number of indigenous people, about a few hundred people are dancing and praying together, as if they are performing some kind of celebration ceremony.

"kill--"

Suddenly, seeing an enemy haunting them, the natives were frightened, and quickly raised their weapons to fight.

"Shoot!" In the air ten meters above the head, dark clouds of arrow haze flitted past, and flew down a distance of half a mile, pouring into the indigenous formation.

The natives are very agile and vigorous in this land, and their advance is fast, but not as fast as the rain of arrows.

"Puff!" The arrow rain fell, and the natives who were only halfway down fell down one after another, screaming.

At this time, a cavalry of more than ten people took advantage of the momentum and charged into the enemy's formation. Even if there were few cavalry in the formation, it was impossible for these poorly organized natives to contain them. It doesn't work either.

In this case, they are not a united enemy at all.

Soon the natives surrendered.

As for muskets, they were of no use at all.

This made Wang Cheng, who was watching the battle, exclaim: "It's different to have cavalry—"

That's right, this cavalry was transported from Luzon.

As for those cavalry, they were naturally recruited from the Mongols at the Naadam Conference.

Before, how could Luzon support the war horse?
And these war horses were transported from Luzon.

In fact, at the beginning, King Qi also wanted to transport war horses from the mainland. When there are thousands of miles of sea area, there are no war horses in ten, so it is better to buy them directly in Luzon.

As a colony of Spain for hundreds of years, the horses in Luzon are all purchased from European and Arabian war horses, and there are even some Indian horses. The population is very rich and the number is quite large.

In the eyes of the natives who were still in the form of primitive tribes and had not even entered the slave society, these cavalrymen were heavenly soldiers, and their fear filled their hearts.

On the contrary, they are very familiar with those long guns, bows and arrows; muskets, in the dense rainforest grassland, can only scare people, but they are not very powerful.

"It's only two or three hundred people, since they dare to resist."

Jia Bu sneered and walked into the indigenous tribe.

After a rough tidying up, there are a lot of animal hides and some dried meat, and the rest are close to nothing.

"Remember this place."

Looking at the thousands of acres of rice fields here, they are sparse and sparse. If you don't carefully identify them, they are no different from weeds in the mountains.

Perhaps it was because of this flat land that the tribe gathered here and possessed such great strength.

These lands are also indispensable to Qi.

Jia Bu looked at Wang Cheng who was still in shock, and said with a smile, "What? How did you fight before?"

"Before I waited, I used muskets as a deterrent. This group of people fled very quickly and were familiar with the terrain, so they couldn't be caught at all."

Wang Cheng smiled wryly and said, "Three or four months of fighting here and there, disabled more than a dozen large tribes, and only captured about two hundred people, shocking the tribes with a radius of two to three hundred miles."

"So, many tribes had to sue for peace, online some grain and animal skins, and pay tribute."

When Jia Bu heard this, he suddenly realized, "No wonder there are only so few people in the whole of Linzi."

Good guy, it is because there are no horses to catch people, resulting in defeat and indestructibility, and the population cannot grow naturally if the pot is not connected.

Escorting the remaining population back to Linzi City, the whole town rejoiced.

This battle is directly equivalent to the harvest of the past year.

After summarizing at night, Jia Bu said bluntly: "The advantage of cavalry is that although they can't run amok in the mountains and forests, they can be quickly captured on the battlefield, so that they won't be in vain."

In other words, cavalry are good for arresting people, not for fighting on the battlefield.

Especially in the dense rainforest, this is a big taboo.

"The victory of muskets is most suitable in the rainforest."

Finally, Jia Bu came back: "In the future, whether it is cavalry or muskets, both are indispensable."

Gu Yuan nodded, and after a few words of praise, he said: "Then, I have to work hard for the general recently."

"Two hundred slaves are not enough, we need more."

"I want to expand Linzi two or three times, and burn bricks and stones to build a real city."

Gu Yuan excitedly said: "At that time, we will have to open up wasteland and farm, log and build farms. There are not tens of thousands, or even tens of thousands of slaves. This cannot be solved."

Jia Bu could only obey without complaint.

In the next month, he continued to lead the army to attack.

The loss is not big, but the gain is less and less.

In the beginning, there could be hundreds of people, but in the end, they didn't even want land and houses, and fled directly to the mountains to dawdle.

Jia Bu didn't know much about the local terrain, so naturally he didn't dare to go deep into the mountains and forests, so he had to return in vain.

In the end, after working hard for a month, only about [-] people were caught.

These are not enough to build a city.

Jia Bu smiled wryly and said, "These natives are very smart. They knew they couldn't beat us, so they hid far away. The island is so big, why don't they have a place to eat?"

As a result, everyone was worried.

In the end, it was Wang Cheng who came up with the idea:
"In Linzi, many subjugated tribes often send people to exchange things. They exchange grain and animal skins for some salt, pottery and other things. There are even many people who trade captives."

"These tribes had a lot of conflicts, conquered each other, and never agreed with each other. That's why Linzi City was established."

"Since we can't catch it, why not use their money to buy it? Especially salt, which is the most scarce thing for them."

These words, like enlightenment, awakened everyone.

Gu Yuan exclaimed: "We know how to boil salt in sea water, but those natives don't know it. They can only lick rocks in the mountains and forests, which can be described as hard work."

"Salt is plentiful for us, but they are in short supply."

"It would be great to be able to buy people with salt."

After all, everyone reached a consensus: two catties of salt in exchange for one prisoner.

After the news spread, the tribes with a radius of hundreds of miles were inexplicably happy, and the tribal conflicts involuntarily expanded, and not only tribes were destroyed.

A large number of prisoners were escorted to Linzi.

In just three months, more than 5000 slaves were exchanged. As the news spread, the more tribes were learned, the more captives naturally became.

(End of this chapter)