Johime Three Kingdoms

Chapter 388 Shishi
In the palace of the King of Chu, Shi Yizheng and Bai Tu bid farewell.

At this time, most of the envoys from various princes had left. Wu Shuo also left in dejection after Wu Xiong was walked around, and did not even come to see Bai Tu again.

"Don't worry, Governor Shi. The place where the Shi family protects Jiaozhou is not only civilized and polite by the local Tu people, but also in troubled times, the people do not lose their jobs. The people who are detained are also honored by the Shi family. I will keep these things in mind, Shi. When the prefect goes back, don't forget to thank your brother on behalf of the king." Bai Tu said to Shi Yi familiarly.

That's right, Shi Yi is the clan brother of that Shi Xie.

At this time, Jiaozhou was one of the very few Han people who had not been involved in the troubled times.

The area of ​​Jiaozhou is not small, and it is also the land of Lingnan in a narrow sense. The level of governance before the troubled times was very low. After all... the level of governance in Jingnan and the southeast of the Yangtze River is not high, let alone Lingnan further south, which is blocked by five ridges. ?

It is also known as the land of hundreds of people and the land of hundreds of barbarians. In other words, the locals have many habits that are different from those of the Han Dynasty.

However, in troubled times, firstly, Shi Xie, who was the governor of Jiaozhi at that time, was stable enough, and secondly, many Han people fled to Lingnan, causing the population of Jiaozhou to rise instead of falling.

The governor of Jiaozhou at that time, I don't know if he wanted to take advantage of the troubled times to make progress, but instead imposed heavy taxes on Jiaozhou, and eventually died at the hands of the rebels.

With the geographical location of Jiaozhou, if you catch up with ambitious people, it will actually be easy to split off at this time. Just like at the end of Qin Dynasty, Zhao Tuo founded the Nanyue Kingdom here, and it was not until Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty that it was re-incorporated into the territory of the Han Dynasty. .

Just like Yuan Shao and Cao Cao had no idea about Hetao, if Jiaozhou split away at this time, it would probably not attract much attention.

When the world is in chaos, such a place with a low level of governance and a large number of "foreign races" is useless.

Fortunately, Shi Xie not only has the means to entangle Jiaozhou, but also doesn't have so many thoughts, or he doesn't want to be comfortable for a while...

"The king's gratitude and previous suggestions must be brought by the foreign minister. My brother has always admired the king. I believe that it won't be long before the foreign minister may still bother him." Shi Yi did not protest against Bai Tu's "infringement".

Although the Shi clan took advantage of the troubled times to dominate a state and became a true separatist warlord, they did not stand on their own like Zhao Tuo, nor did they have the imagination to rush out of Jiaozhou and compete for world hegemony.

Instead, he took advantage of the opportunity of being able to be the master in Jiaozhou, educated the barbarians here, cultivated the people's strength, and accepted the people and talents who had fled to Jiaozhou, so that this place could avoid the flames of war.

Compared with the Xiongnu and Xianbei, which are northern ethnic groups that can only be regarded as belonging to China after counting the Five Emperors in ancient times, the Jiaozhou barbarians are closer to the Han people, and they are even Han people in a broad sense... The so-called Han people now are just "Han people" The people of the dynasty”.

In the pre-Qin period hundreds of years ago, the cultures of all countries in the world were very different, even among the feudal states that belonged to the Zhou Dynasty. After all, they were still in the transition period from tribe to country.

In the past few hundred years, from the successive reforms and strengthening of centralization in the Warring States period to the unification of the Qin and Han Dynasties, the internal culture of the dynasty has converged, but in some places... the trend has been slower.

Bai Tu responded enthusiastically to Shi Yi's overtures. In addition to not using too much Rainbow Source on Shi Yi himself, his enthusiasm was even greater than that of the envoy from the Marquis of Shu!
In history without the White Rabbit Effect, Shi Xie surrendered to Soochow after the Battle of Chibi, sent his clansmen to Soochow as hostages, accepted the governorship appointed by Sun Quan, and made contributions every year without any thoughts of raising an army...

The only regret is that Shi Xie's descendants are a bit arrogant, and Sun Quan is really ruthless.

After Shi Xie's death, the Shi family rebelled. Not only were the rebels wiped out, but a group of people who were hostages at the time were also implicated.

Bai Tu also knew Shi Xie's thoughts, so he also looked at Shi Yi in a different light - it was possible for him to submit directly, but of course he was treated differently from other envoys!

The gifts sent by Chen Shixie this time were also very heavy. In addition to the local specialties of Jiaozhou, pearls, jade, tortoise shells, colored glaze and other treasures, there were also ivory, rhinoceros horns, which were not recommended, and even bananas and coconuts specially sent by fast horses. , longan and other fruits...

For Shi's goodwill, Bai Tu accepted everything and gave gifts in return, such as a large amount of artificial glass, salt, books, and ironware. He also expressed the hope of appointing officials from the Ministry of Civil Affairs to support the development of Jiaozhou.

Facing Shi Yi, Bai Tu acted as if he had regarded Jiaozhou as his own territory and "thanked" Shi Xie for his contribution to Jiaozhou!
However, Shiyi was not embarrassed by this. Instead, he accepted the comment politely and even expressed his suggestion to Bai Tu that he would discuss it with his brother in detail when he went back. He also emphasized that Shi Xie also admired Bai Tu.

Obviously this has reached the stage of flirting and we can start negotiating the price right away...

After all, Shi Xie didn't expect to compete in the world with Jiaozhou. Although there were many local products, the overall level of civilization in Jiaozhou was low and the population was small. Most of them were barbarians who had low identification with the Han Dynasty.

Although these barbarians admired Shi Xie, in the future, Shi Xie's posthumous status in Lingnan would be close to that of Zhao Tuo who established the Nanyue Kingdom, but...

Use them to conquer the world?

It’s better to stop dreaming.

As for the separatist side...

Shi Xie thinks his generation should be fine, but what about the next generation?

After the reunification of the Central Plains, can we continue to separate the regime?Didn’t you see what happened to South Vietnam in the end?
Although he is actually a warlord, Shi Xie still has a family mentality at heart and does not want to risk future generations...

Nowadays, the power of the Chu State is much stronger than that of Soochow after the Battle of Chibi. When the country was founded, the knighthood of Liu Cong and Mrs. Cai also made Shi Xie feel at ease.

He sent his younger brother Shi Yi here with the intention of testing him - not to test his strength, but to test his treatment after surrender!

Is it equivalent to Liu Cong?
That's a bit unsatisfactory. Shi Xie doesn't want a false title.

Bai Tu also understood that Shishi was indeed different from Mrs. Cai. In terms of contribution, Mrs. Cai took advantage of her position to attack Huanglong and directly controlled the Xiangyang center, and then took advantage of the chaos to return. But if Shishi Surrender, this is a real surrender...

But like Soochow, still using the Shi family to rule Jiaozhou, and even giving him the capital to rebel, just waiting for them to take action and then clean up again... This is not what Bai Tu wants to do.

Exactly how the two sides will get along is yet to be discussed. Right now, they are only in contact with each other in good faith.

Shi Xie was not in a hurry, and neither was Bai Tu. Anyway, with the gradual development of the Wuling land and the gradual naturalization of the Shanyue and Wuling barbarians, Jiaozhou would only get closer and closer to Chu.

"Chunhua, you can go to the Ministry of Rites later and double the gifts you bring back to the prefect." Bai Tu said to Zhang Chunhua who was standing aside.

"Thank you, Your Majesty for your love..." Shi Yi's title can also be seen. Although he also calls himself a foreign minister, he is not called "King of Chu", but "King" who is more recognized.

This is not because it is easy to pronounce. Because of this title, Shi Yi didn’t know how many glares he got from Wu Shuo...

After seeing off Shi Yi, Zhang Chunhua also went to the Ministry of Rites, leaving only Bai Tu... and Lu Lingqi, who had returned from vacation. The latter asked expressionlessly: "Chunhua? When did you address her so enthusiastically?"

(End of this chapter)