Chapter 577 The Real Capital

Chapter 577 The Real Capital

Chapter 577 The Real Capital

On May 315, , the ninth year of the Yongjia reign of the Jin Dynasty, it was sunny.

There were 5,000 soldiers stationed in the vicinity of Kaocheng. They were captives who had been farming in Guangchengze. They were later pardoned and sent to Kaocheng to farm at the junction of Jiyang, Jiyin and Liangguo.

When they first arrived, there were 5,000 bachelors, but now more than 2,000 have married. The targets of intermarriage are mainly refugees, beggars, and widows of fortresses whose husbands died in the war - this is difficult in the first place, but the garrison soldiers marry them privately, and the fortress owners dare not come and snatch them back.

Once you have a family, your mind will be settled. We are just floating around in this chaotic world, but having a piece of land, a home, and family is better than anything else.

Today is the day for winter wheat harvest.

In the farmland near the military camp, Liu Ling held a sickle and harvested bundles of wheat like a human harvester, sorting them out and laying them aside.

Yang Qin followed behind him and bundled the wheat, while other soldiers were responsible for delivering it to the roadside.

Shao Xun stood beside the carriage and stacked bundles of wheat into the carriage of the donkey cart.

This is a piece of fragmented land located at a river bend, only about a dozen acres in size.

The banks of the stream are covered with reeds. Opposite the reeds, another piece of farmland can be vaguely seen. The terrain is relatively higher, about less than 20 acres, and the harvest has been completed in advance.

These more than 30 acres of land belonged to a soldier of the military garrison named Zhang Zhong.

He married a widow from Yuanju County, Jiyin Prefecture. The widow's husband was killed by the Xiongnu during the Battle of Gaoping. She later married Zhang Zhong and gave birth to a son.

Last year, Zhang Zhong also died in battle in Hebei. The widow had to raise three children alone, and life was very difficult.

Before leaving, Shao Xun inspected the military base in Kaocheng. After hearing about this, he brought his personal soldiers to help and quickly harvested the widow's land.

"Husband." Yu Wenjun lifted her skirt and walked carefully to Shao Xun on the farmland full of stubble.

Shao Xun stopped what he was doing and went over to meet him.

He found himself to be "cheap".

On the first day he arrived, Yu Wenjun's expression, demeanor and depressed mood made him very melancholy.

After a few days, the clingy person he once was slowly coming back, and Shao Xun felt the joy of regaining what he had lost. Now he accompanies his wife every day, and seeing the smiles on Wenjun's face growing more and more, he also becomes happy.

It was obvious that Shao, who was well versed in the art of pulling, was pulled by the woman this time.

"My husband, I asked someone to buy some iron farm tools and a working ox and sent them to this family." Yu Wenjun had an expression on her face that showed she was seeking credit.

Shao Xun looked around and saw that no one was paying attention, so he kissed his wife and said, "If it weren't for my good wife, I would have almost forgotten about it."

The corners of Yu Wenjun's mouth were raised, and her curved eyes were squinted habitually, obviously she was in a very good mood.

Shao Xun took her hand and went to a cool place to rest.

Yu Wenjun opened the cowhide water bag and handed the cooled water to her husband.

Shao Xun took it casually, took a sip, looked at the sweat on his wife's forehead, wiped it for her with his sleeve, and then handed the water bag to her.

Yu Wenjun took the water bag, took a sip with a red face, and then leaned her head gently on her husband's shoulder.

"These are my foundation." Shao Xun said, pointing to a golden wheat field near the military camp.

The days of bargaining with the Henan gentry made him very bored, extremely bored!

In comparison, he was more pleased with his own farmhands, soldiers stationed in the fields, and self-employed farmers.

The food and silk of one's own estate are at one's own disposal.

The military farming army was governed by military law, they grew and harvested their own food, and they could provide some surplus grain from time to time, which was easy to collect.

It is not as easy to collect food and silk from self-cultivating farmers as it is from the military farming army, but it is not that difficult either.

These are his true strengths.

The money, food, and population controlled by the nobles and powerful families are just lent to them and can be taken back at any time.

From this perspective, Henan's current map is very strange.

The nine counties around Luoyang, including Yiyang, Luhun, Xincheng, Liangxian, Yangdi, Yangcheng, Luyang, Ye, and Duyang, plus Guangchengze, have been controlled by him for many years and have been rectified for many years. His control is very strong and they are considered his foundation.

From this area to the east, it extends to the seven counties of Xiangcheng, which is also his base, and then it is interrupted by Yingchuan.

Going south from Xiangcheng, you enter Runan. In this area, the territory actually controlled by Shao Xun and the territory controlled by the nobles and powerful families are intertwined.

To the east of Runan, the control over Nandun and Xincai counties was also very deep, and most of the people there were self-cultivating farmers.

Further east, except for the five counties of Chen County, other areas were the territories of the nobles and powerful families.

To the east of Chen County, except for Liang County (Liang State) which was still undergoing reform and trying its best to register the people, the vast areas of Ruyin, Qiao, Pei, and Lu were not only the iron bastion of the gentry and powerful, but even the officials and the army were their people, and they had been local tyrants since the end of the Han Dynasty.

They can rebel at any time, and after the rebellion, there will not be much noise in the local area.

Shao Xun has always focused on winning over these people - mainly the Yang family.

As for Chen County and the two counties of Yiyang and Anfeng south of Runan, they were also completely delegated.

To the north of Chenjun, Chenliu, Jiyin and Jiyang are where the gentry gather, with a large number of big and small turtles. Although they cannot be completely delegated to rule, they still need to be discussed.

Puyang, to the north of these three counties, was completely cut off and isolated on the bank of the Yellow River. However, the five counties of Puyang were the territories that Shao Xun had directly taken over in recent years. He stationed three thousand soldiers and also carried out a round of household registration in the local area - in fact, there were not many civilians left.

To the east of Jiyin are the four counties of Gaoping, Dongping, Jibei and Taishan, which have basically nothing to do with Shao Xun and are of a vassal nature.

Among these four counties, Gaoping County, where Yu Hua served as the prefect, had 6,000 soldiers, which was considered a place with relatively deep control, but it could not be compared with western Henan.

Dongping is one of the recent business focuses, and 3,000 soldiers are stationed there. The counties have been repeatedly invaded and plundered and are in ruins. Shao Xun took the opportunity to clear the household registration and measure the land, but the progress was relatively slow.

There is no need to mention Jibei and Taishan, one is the fiefdom of Xun family, and the other is similar to the fiefdom of Yang family.

Judging from the map, the core ruling area has been cut into pieces - to put it nicely, it is "spread all over the place."

In fact, it was not easy to achieve this in ten years, and it was also thanks to the help of the Xiongnu. Now that the Xiongnu can no longer attack Henan, the local power structure will not change greatly in a short period of time, so it is necessary to spend a lot of energy and do it bit by bit.

But if the Xiongnu were allowed to attack, not only would it lose prestige, but it would also cause unrest and disunity in the region, and the population would plummet, which was not worth it. You know, the troops of Puyang and Dongping counties have not yet been fully equipped.

It is not easy to add more soldiers to the government as all the conditions are not yet mature.

He was destined to live a life of love and hatred with the nobles and powerful people.

"Husband, do you have any opinion about scholars?" Yu Wenjun suddenly asked.

"How could that be?" Shao Xun said with a smile, "If I didn't like scholars, why would I marry you?"

"It's different..." Yu Wenjun said in a low voice.

"In fact, I'm just disappointed in many people." Shao Xun said, "I have done so much for them, even personally fighting in the battlefield, exterminating the bandits and expelling the Huns, but they sit back and enjoy the fruits of my labor, yet they secretly fight with me and say strange things. What's even worse is that some people even laugh at my background in private."

"Husband..." Yu Wenjun looked at him and said.

"Forget it, they are just a bunch of rats." Shao Xun sighed.

Liu Yu, who was as powerful as a tiger and almost invincible in the world, was always criticized for his background.

Liu Yu's grandfather was a governor, and his father was a county official, but they fell into decline in his generation. However, he was still from a broadly defined aristocratic family, just from a humble family. Even this made people look down on him, and the noble families were very reluctant to submit to him. Under the overt and covert contempt, Liu Yu was also very insecure.

Even though he had great power, scholars were still rude to him and would often attack him relentlessly when they had free time, leaving Liu Yu "at a loss for words and unable to reason". In the end, he could only mock himself, "I have no knowledge of skills and my words are even shallow" - he was somewhat infuriated when he said this.

He was a military genius, a powerful official who actually held power in the Eastern Jin Dynasty, but the scholars were so rude to him and despised his culture and background. This shows a lot.

Fortunately, this is the north, where scholars are more realistic and not as exaggerated as those in the southern dynasties. But throughout Shao Xun's life, his background issue would definitely be repeatedly ridiculed and despised in private.

This is no small matter.

If scholars despise you, it means they do not have strong centripetal force to support you. They are only temporarily attached to you out of helplessness and will make trouble as soon as they get the chance.

He and Liu Yu faced similar problems in this regard.

Shao Xun's background was lower than Liu Yu's, but his cultural level was much higher than Liu Yu's. At least he had good calligraphy and could write some decent poems.

In addition, he can speak Luoyang dialect, which is one of the signs of a "superior person".

I have some understanding of metaphysics and music theory, but I am not proficient in them.

In fact, he already possessed what the lower-ranking scholars understood, but his background was not good enough.

Liu Yu didn't even know what a scholar from a poor family needed to master, but he came from a good family.

Shao Xun knew very well that he and the scholars were not of the same kind after all.

and so--

He took Yu Wenjun's hand, stood up, looked at the vast fields and the soldiers who were full of joy after the harvest, and said, "This is my real foundation, and the real capital that will allow me to stand up straight in the future."

At this point, he leaned close to Yu Wenjun's ear and whispered, "It is also our child's real capital."

Yu Wenjun's face was flushed with shame, but her heart was filled with indescribable sweetness.

The two walked along the country dirt road.

Along the way, they met some soldiers from the garrison army, and they all stopped to salute.

Men are harvesting, transporting and threshing.

The women were winnowing and drying the wheat in the leeward direction.

The children rushed into the fields, laughing and playing while picking up wheat ears.

The old man was carrying a bamboo basket filled with picked mulberry leaves, ready to go back and feed the silkworms.

The cattle and sheep stood in the stable, sometimes lowering their heads to chew, sometimes looking outside.

Lotus flowers are flourishing in the small river beside the field.

In the pond dug by the farmer, the water chestnut leaves are fresh and green.

From time to time, fish jump out of the water, and their pale yellow scales sparkle in the sun.

The couple stopped unconsciously.

The wind blew quietly, passing through this pure land in this troubled world.

"This group of soldiers stationed in the fields can be gradually incorporated into civilian households," Shao Xun said.

The boredom caused by dealing with scholars had mostly dissipated by now.

As Shao Xun watched, he felt that everything he had done was not meaningless.

Perhaps, whenever he feels bored, he will take a tour of his "kingdom". When a sense of satisfaction arises naturally, he will be full of motivation again.

Otherwise, he was afraid that he would not be able to control himself and kill someone.

"Now, these foundations of mine that are not constrained by the aristocratic families need an heir." Shao Xun looked at his wife and said softly.

Yu Wenjun buried her face in his arms.

She felt dizzy with happiness again, and at the same time secretly encouraged herself to help her husband manage the household business.

My husband has a hard time too. Some things, forget it...

Shao Xun gently embraced Yu Wenjun with a smile on his face.

Everything is under control.

(End of this chapter)