Damn it, I'm in the garbage book I wrote

Chapter 348 Spending or losing money, zero-sum game
It is said that a cannon shot is worth a thousand taels of gold, and fighting a war is not just talk. For example, Xia Lin dispatched 20,000 people and 2,000 heavy cavalry this time. Their total military expenditure would cost about 150,000 taels, not counting the equipment damage, casualties and so on.

Fifteen thousand taels of silver is roughly equivalent to the annual or even one and a half years' tax revenue of a medium-sized county. Considering that most counties in Wei now collect 30% tax each year, this means that a single expedition would cost a medium-sized county half a year's worth of GDP.

Xia Lin is poor. He has already emptied his family's savings to support his scientific research unit and military unit, so he can't be asked to pay this money, right?
Based on the experience of the last house search in Guangzhou, anyone plotting a rebellion usually needs to prepare several years or even more than ten years in advance, and gold, silver, treasures, food, etc. are all necessary. Xia Lin is not looking to make much money here, so he will deduct some of his hard work fees and military expenses from the spoils after confiscating the spoils.

According to the market price, the food cost per person per day is 5 taels of silver, right? The horses cost 50 taels of silver per day, right? Then the travel expenses per person are 2 taels of silver per day, right? And if you work hard for others, you must be rewarded with military work, right? Ten taels of silver per person is the minimum, right? Those who stand out may even get 100 taels of silver, and that is not even taken into account.

As a third-party labor dispatch, the labor fee should be settled, right? And killing so many people must have caused mental damage, so mental damage compensation should be paid, right?

And… well, Xia Lin was threatened and bullied by Duke Dingguo here, should this wimp be counted in the calculation? And there is also the compensation bonus for separating him from his newlywed wife. Oh, the rabbits he raised must have starved to death, so the money for these two rabbits must also be reimbursed.

As the saying goes, an emperor does not send out hungry soldiers. These are all reasonable and legal charges. It only amounts to 1.5 million taels. There are some additional military rewards and so on, so 2 million is the minimum. And those miscellaneous items like armor and swords don't matter. They are valuable, but Xia Lin is not greedy, so these things will be given to the court.

As for the wife and daughter of Duke Dingguo, they were all packed up and sent to the prince anyway, and he could do whatever he wanted with them, whether to keep them for fun or send them to the Ministry of Education. As for the state treasury, Xia Lin didn't know, and who knew where Duke Dingguo had embezzled the money for the rebellion.

This is just like picking up a wallet on a bus. When you find it, there are only various documents inside. You don't know where the money has gone. That's it.

After settling the accounts, Xia Lin's subordinates and the staff officers who followed the army began to celebrate in advance, but were stopped by Xia Lin.

"Don't open the champagne for me at halftime."

They didn't understand what champagne was, but they understood the half-time, so even though they stopped cheering on the surface, the corners of everyone's mouth were harder to suppress than an AK without accessories.

The team that went out to "suppress bandits" returned triumphantly. The small mission was nothing special, and everyone received five taels of silver and a meal of fried meatballs as a reward.

Xia Lin cordially visited the only two players who were injured in the line of duty, but they were lying there, one with his face covered by his hands and the other with his head covered by a blanket. In any case, they were too embarrassed to see anyone.

"Very good." Xia Lin stood with his hands behind his back, looking at the two conspicuous bags: "Come on, come on, lieutenant general, come here. These two people will be reported to the whole army tomorrow. They were bravely injured. Go to the parade ground tomorrow and tell everyone about your achievements."

The two boys were about to cry. There were more than two thousand brothers and they were the only ones lying there. Just now, the brothers from the same camp came to laugh at them once, and now even the general came. They could not live like this anymore.

Especially when they heard the noise of drinking and eating meat outside, they felt even more sad. At this moment, the young man's blushing face was worth a thousand words.

On the other side, the fleeing "water bandits" had already run for dozens of miles. With the help of adrenaline, they even broke the limits of human beings. The journey that would normally take a day was completed in three hours...

After arriving at the provincial capital, the two wounded and ragged pirates rushed into the gate of the Duke Dingguo's Mansion. The people inside didn't know what was going on and were about to drive them away when they heard one of them lying on the ground raising his hand with difficulty: "Hurry, hurry... Duke... Duke... something big has happened..."

After careful identification, it was discovered that the person who spoke was Chang Kai, one of the three phantom gods under Duke Dingguo, known as the God of War of Wuyue. The Duke's Mansion was immediately in a panic, and Duke Dingguo was also called out.

After feeding them water, they finally calmed down a bit. Then they heard General Chang say, "It's bad, Duke. All our troops were wiped out... Only a few of us escaped."

Duke Dingguo was clearly dazed after hearing this: "The whole army..."

"That's right... That's right. Duke, the new army that defeated the enemy was clearly well prepared and had already ambushed us on the road. These soldiers were well-trained and heavily armored. We were no match for them. When I was trying to escape, I heard some of the soldiers shouting that we had contributed to suppressing the rebellion and that we would be rewarded accordingly."

Suppress the rebellion.

These two words hit Duke Dingguo's heart like a big hammer.

Yes, if the imperial court really wanted to suppress the pirates, why would they cede a county to Xia Lin? If the imperial court really wanted to suppress the pirates, why would they have heavy armored infantry?

Is this aimed at the pirates? This is obviously aimed at me!

Duke Dingguo suddenly realized what was going on at this moment, but now that things had come to this point, there was no turning back. He could no longer sit still. At this point, he only had two options: immediately send troops to completely wipe out Xia Lin and his group, and announce to the outside world that they were killed by the pirates and not a single body was left.

Another option is to keep the troops in place and first ask the King of Tang what his opinion is. Once the King of Tang gives the order, they will directly form a siege from the north and south and seize the capital first. By then, Xia Lin will be an easy capture.

It was just a matter of life and death to send troops directly. Even if Xia Lin and his group were killed, since he dared to come, he must have had some intention. If he died, let alone being killed by the pirates, even if he choked to death while eating or drowned while swimming, the crime would be counted on his head. Once suspicion arises, the crime is established.

So he did not act rashly, but sent a pigeon to the Li family as soon as possible. However, they did not receive a reply in the next ten days.

The anxious waiting every day did not bring the expected results. Duke Dingguo sat there blankly. He knew that he was probably finished. There was no other hope except a desperate battle.

The farewell of adults is actually very interesting. No answer is the best answer. Li Yuan must have given up on him at this moment, and when his pigeon letter arrived, Li Yuan probably had already started the separation plan that had been circling in his mind for a long time.

They would cut off everything related to Duke Dingguo to protect themselves, but Duke Dingguo had no way to prove that he was in cahoots with Li Yuan except with his mouth.

Politics is so cruel. He will definitely have to bear the consequences of exposing himself in advance, and everyone has the desire to survive.

After sitting quietly in the room all night, Duke Dingguo stood up at dawn and slammed the table: "Pass the order down, call up the generals in the camp! Go to the battle!"

At the same time, Xia Lin did not take any action for ten days. He did not hold the pirates accountable nor communicate with Duke Dingguo. He was waiting for his army to arrive.

Of course, he understood that even a cornered rabbit would bite, and the smoke bomb he released was intended to make Duke Dingguo lose his composure. With inconvenient transportation, the Li family in the north did not have the energy to respond to Duke Dingguo's cause of founding his own country.

After all, if nothing unexpected happens, the internal fight between Erfeng and Li Jiancheng has reached a white-hot stage, just waiting for the drama to unfold in front of the Xuanwu Gate.

But Duke Dingguo might not be able to wait any longer. He must be very afraid because he is too far away from Li Yuan and too close to the capital. If he reveals the slightest intention and is suspected by the court, then he can't deal with Li Yuan, but what about Dou Wu?

So Xia Lin wanted to force him to lose his composure. He had already committed treason, so the Military Honor Group couldn't possibly excuse him, right?

Again, investigation requires evidence, but suppression of a rebellion only requires coordinates.

On the eleventh day, spies reported that the army of Yangzhou Prefecture was gathering and would arrive soon.

Xia Lin was not panicked, because he could see layers of white sails in the distance on the sea under the blue sky.

The main force of the new army to defeat the enemy has arrived.

Fifty troop transports arrived, large and small, even filling the bay. However, this was only the first batch, and the second batch would arrive in the evening.

This is the transport capacity of the Tang family, Jiujiang Shipyard and Fuliang Shipping Bureau, with a total of 23,500 people, fully equipped and fully armored.

Xia Lin has emptied out all his family assets this time, but as a show of force, this is understandable. However, when Duke Dingguo's wallet is handed over to the court, I'm afraid that only his identity card will be left.

A team of two thousand people was already earth-shaking, and now a team of more than twenty thousand people seemed like the arrival of gods to the local people, especially when the horses that were bought from the Western Regions and carefully raised were led out and dressed in armor, they looked like giant divine soldiers.

The two thousand heavily-armored cavalrymen were extremely eye-catching in the crowd. They were the result of Xia Lin's hard work. A lot of money and energy were spent on them.

The leader of the team was none other than Du Fuwei, the commander-in-chief of the Fuliang camp. He saluted Xia Lin and said, "General, the elite troops of Fuliang have arrived. They will be ready for battle after a day's rest!"

Xia Lin nodded slightly and looked sideways. He saw the armor shining brightly in the sunlight, the horses looking energetic, and the knights' morale high.

"We've spent so much money, Lao Du, you have to perform well this time."

Du Fuwei was so excited that his pupils dilated at this moment. He nodded vigorously, his eyes filled with a desire to achieve great things.

"Okay, now that you're here, I have nothing to do." Xia Lin stuffed the black jade tiger talisman into Du Fuwei's hand and said, "Let's go and have a good meal first. Everyone has worked hard on the road."

(End of this chapter)