The pork butcher is smoother than a pig butcher!

Chapter 398 Dreams come true
The grand wedding of the Gan family in the border town lasted for three days with a continuous feast.

Almost every household in the entire border town sent someone to participate.

We are not qualified to enter the Prince's Mansion, but we can still go to the Gan family's residence.

Gan Hongzhen stated directly that everyone should come to the banquet, and the Gan family would not accept any gifts!

It's not that I don't value money.

Rather, they were afraid of these people giving them lavish gifts.

How many lives has your daughter saved?

They are just her family members; what right do they have to use their daughter's favors to make money?
Moreover.

The Gan family doesn't lack these things.

Not only did they not keep a ledger for accepting gifts, they also served the guests at the wedding banquet the signature dishes of Ganweixian and Zuixiangju.

Ordinary military dependents are lucky if they can occasionally treat themselves to a meal at these two restaurants.

These expensive dishes, which used to be too pricey for them, were served at the banquet, and they could eat as much as they wanted.

Wine and fruit wine are plentiful.

The children's pockets were also filled to the brim with dried fruit and various kinds of preserved fruit.

The most direct impression of all the guests who have attended the banquet is:
No wonder the prince was willing to marry his eldest daughter to that boy Gan Mingfu. The cost of the wedding banquet for Gan's daughter-in-law exceeded the expenses of all the young people in the border town who got married this year.

But in the eyes of her mother-in-law, Gan: Who can compare to our daughter-in-law? She's the future princess.

Before her son got married, Gan's mother had visited the Divine Beast Temple on Junma Mountain to pray.

Yes.

The people of the border town were not satisfied with simply erecting stone sculptures of the Rat King at the four city gates or worshipping him at home.

Junma Mountain now has a temple dedicated to mythical beasts.

Everyone says it's very effective.

Even Gan's mother was not immune to this custom.

I never imagined that the grand ambition I made just a month ago would come true so quickly!

The day after the newlyweds returned to their parents' home, a major piece of news came from Huaiqing Prefecture.

Gan Mingfu's father-in-law has ascended the throne and become emperor in Shangdu!
It was both expected and unexpected!

It turns out that this had happened as early as half a month ago.

King Lai Suzhi of Youzhou, King Zhao Muyun of the Northwest, and King Chen Liangyou of Lingnan, each leading tens of thousands of elite troops, met near a prefecture three hundred li from Shangdu.

The three armies immediately deployed their forces and built offensive and defensive fortifications on the nearby hills.

All three commanders who established themselves as kings rose to their positions step by step through military achievements.

You understand military strategy, and so do I.

I can understand the elaborate formations you've arranged.

Evenly matched!

If a war breaks out, it will be an exceptionally difficult and tough battle.

For a time, none of the three parties dared to make any rash moves.

Actually.

Lai Suzhi and Zhao Muyun had cooperated a few years ago to transfer 600,000 shi of grain. Later, Youzhou continued to purchase saxaul seedlings from the border city for several years.

They corresponded frequently even before they became kings.

We have exchanged views on military training and sand control on more than one occasion.

There is a strong sense of camaraderie among heroes.

The King of Lingnan also knew that these two were generals who guarded the northern border. His subordinates repeatedly reminded him, fearing that the two armies would join forces to deal with their Lingnan troops.

They are on high alert. They wish they could stay far away from both armies.

This stalemate lasted for several days.

During this period, the scouts sent by the three parties to Shangdu successively brought back news.

It turns out that the most outstanding son of the Miao king in the southwest led more than 10,000 mountain people into the commercial capital before the new year.

Perhaps this was the condition for him being made a king.

And all the forces that had invaded Shangdu over the past year had died at the hands of these mountain people.

The scouts all believed that the mountain people must have used the legendary Gu poison.

Zhao Muyun feared that if this dragged on, the Miao mountain people would eat him.

At his urging, the three kings chose a middle ground for peace talks.

He said as soon as he came in:

"There can only be one throne. Why should we fight for it in a way that results in a lose-lose situation, allowing the eunuchs of Shangdu to reap the benefits?"

Youzhou has vast fertile lands, and to the north of Youzhou are endless pastures.

Those Jurchen tribes and Tatars have never ceased their ambitions for the Central Plains for many years. But what if all the territories of those nomadic peoples fell into the hands of us Han people?

There's also Lingnan, which is protected by the Hundred Thousand Mountains and has the sea outside the mountains. It's said that people who live by the mountains live off the mountains and people who live by the sea live off the sea!
Compared to the perennially arid Northwest, the lives of the people in Lingnan are not so bad. As long as Lingnan has soldiers, cannons, and ships, it is not impossible for them to achieve great things at sea.

In the Central Plains, after more than three years of peasant uprisings and the rise of eunuchs, the people were displaced, and seven or eight out of ten had abandoned their farms. Restoring the livelihood of the people was extremely difficult! Extremely difficult! Extremely difficult!

There's another crucial question looming ahead: how much of our resources will be wiped out when our three armies fight each other? We brothers only have one life each!
Even if they ultimately emerge victorious, what chance do they have against the Miao mountain people who fight using poisonous insects?

Lai Suzhi's face darkened. "So what? The King of the Northwest wants to divide up the territory after taking over Shangdu?"

Zhao Muyun spread his hands:
"It's fine if we don't divide it up. We can draw lots later. Whoever draws the lot gets to choose between Youzhou, the Central Plains, and Lingnan. We can incorporate the Northwest into the Central Plains!"

King Lai Su of Youzhou and King Chen Liangyou of Lingnan exchanged a glance, both cursing inwardly, "What a coward!"

Let them draw lots?
Why would someone willingly give up their family business, which they've run for generations, to someone else?

They don't care about the sandy northwest!

Youzhou is flat, vast and fertile, suitable for both farming and animal husbandry. If we could seize the territories of the Tatar and Jurchen tribes, how large would our combined territory be?
Even the most prosperous Jiangnan region in the Central Plains is now nearly empty, and there are hundreds of thousands of Jiangnan immigrants in Youzhou.

If we want to get these people who have fled their homeland back to their ancestral homes and help them resume production, let alone three to five years, there is no hope within ten years.

But what would it be like if we devoted ourselves to managing Youzhou and the area north of Youzhou for ten years?
This is what Lai Suzhi thought.

Chen Liangyou has become even more Buddhist-like.

The reason he, the King of Lingnan, was forced to come and seize the throne was because he feared that the new ruler would not tolerate the Lingnan faction after the change of dynasties.

His ultimate goal in raising an army in Shangdu was to enable Lingnan to have autonomy.

You can't draw lots.

In the end, the three kings' peace talks resulted in the three armies joining forces to attack the Shang capital and behead Emperor Zhongxing, who had changed the dynasty.

The King of Lingnan had lived in the mountains for generations, and he was no pushover.

Although he didn't understand Gu poison, he brought a lot of poisons and medicinal herbs with pungent smells.

This is where it came in handy.

The Miao people's invincible poisonous insects soon came back to haunt them when they encountered the King of Lingnan, who used poison against poison.
The news reached the border town.

Gan's father's heart trembled uncontrollably:
"Old woman, did I hear that right? Our in-laws are now emperors, and their mothers-in-law are empresses? Your eldest daughter-in-law will soon be a princess!"

Mother Gan was in a daze, feeling lightheaded: "Heavens above, the Divine Beast Temple truly grants your prayers!"

Her dream has come true!

Two days later.

Xiao Jin brought back this big headline news.

Half an hour later, deafening cheers erupted from the General's Mansion in Hami City.
(End of this chapter)