Chapter 751 Missed Opportunity
Chapter 751 Missed Opportunity
Feihu Pass is the seventh of the eight passes in Taihang Mountains and is currently controlled by the Sui army. There is a Feihu County in Feihu Pass, which is a place for rest and supply in Feihu Pass. Its location is relatively hidden. The county town is not big and is guarded by only 500 Sui troops.
That afternoon, a 3,000-man Sui army arrived at Feihu County. After the army entered the city, the leading general Zhang Yuanfeng shouted to the city guard Chen An: "Someone reported that you accepted bribes and endangered the army. I have been ordered to investigate and suspend your post!"
Chen An's face turned pale, and Zhang Yuanfeng waved his hand, "Take him away!"
The general was taken away, and Zhang Yuanfeng immediately ordered: "Search the whole city!"
A few days ago, a letter of complaint from a grassroots level was delivered to Li Jing, stating that some Hu people from the grassland had hidden salt in bags and entered Feihu County, and Lang Jiang Chen An accepted bribes of hundreds of strings of cash to conceal the matter for them.
Li Jing took this letter of accusation very seriously and immediately sent General Zhang Yuanfeng to lead 3,000 soldiers to Feihu County for investigation.
Feihu County was very small, and the county was searched thoroughly in just one hour. Large boxes wrapped tightly in cloth were piled up in front of the county government office. Hundreds of Hu merchants were dejected. They were the merchants from Zhuo County, who had bought up more than 18,000 stones of salt in the markets of Zhuo County, Shanggu County and Yuyang County. They were afraid of being found by Luo Yi, so they transported the salt to Feihu County controlled by the Sui army and hid it. Unexpectedly, they were still seized by the Sui army.
Lang Jiang Chen An was dismissed from his post, and the Hu merchants and salt were escorted back to Taiyuan. Li Jing received the express news and immediately wrote a pigeon letter and sent it to Luoyang.
Liu Wenjing and Zhang Yunqiu walked quickly into the imperial study, only to see Emperor Xiao Xia fiddling with something in a large box. Liu Wenjing smiled and said, "Your Highness doesn't seem to be paying much attention to the situation in Youzhou."
Xiao Xia raised his head and smiled, "Luo Yi didn't find the salt from the Hu merchant, so he won't be able to hold on for much longer. I have already made arrangements. I am just waiting for him to leave the city and surrender. Naturally, I don't need to pay too much attention to him."
"Your Majesty, is there something important that you want us to do?"
Xiao Xia nodded and opened the box. Liu Wenjing was shocked to see that the big box was filled with various coins.
"Your Majesty, this is"
"These are the coins that the Intelligence Department collected from various places. There are more than 160 kinds in total, including copper, iron, cloth, leather, and everything else. There are also coins worth 10 coins and 50 coins. The most outrageous one is the one minted by Wang Shichong, which is worth 500 coins. It's simply cruel plunder."
Liu Wenjing and Zhang Yunqiu looked at each other and they immediately understood that His Majesty was going to start with the coins. Liu Wenjing bowed and said, "Your Majesty, although there are many kinds of coins in various places, in fact, the Daye Tongbao coins we minted have become the mainstream. Merchants no longer recognize those messy coins. Now the market only recognizes three kinds of coins, Kaihuang Wuzhu coins, our Daye Tongbao coins, and cloth. Even the Daye Wuzhu coins minted by the previous emperor are not recognized much."
Xiao Xia nodded. The Daye Wuzhu coins cast by the previous emperor were okay in the early stage, but the copper content was obviously insufficient in the later stage. After he obtained the right to cast coins, in order to distinguish it from the Daye Wuzhu coins, Xiao Xia designed the Daye Tongbao. Ten years after Daye, the Daye Tongbao coins they cast surpassed the Daye Wuzhu coins and were more accepted by the market. For this reason, Yu Shiji even impeached himself, accusing himself of tampering with the national foundation.
"So we need to unify the currency, mint the Daye Tongbao, gradually cancel the Daye Wuzhu and Kaihuang Wuzhu, and completely cancel other miscellaneous coins."
Liu Wenjing smiled bitterly and said, "Your Majesty, this involves too many interests of the people. Many people have the miscellaneous money that Your Majesty mentioned. Once it is cancelled, the people will suffer heavy losses!"
Zhang Yunqiu also said: "The coins on the market are far more complicated than we thought. There are also coins from the Northern Zhou and Northern Wei dynasties in circulation. They are also official coins, not miscellaneous coins."
Xiao Xia pondered for a moment and said, "If it is official money, it can be exchanged at a one-to-one ratio, including Daye Wuzhu coins that do not contain enough copper. For other miscellaneous coins, each household is allowed to exchange up to three strings of silver. Large coins are not allowed to be exchanged."
"Your Majesty, if some people with ulterior motives take the opportunity to counterfeit substandard official coins at a low price and then use them to exchange for our Tongbao, there will be huge profits involved. We must find a way to plug the loophole. I suggest that official coins with insufficient copper content can only be exchanged for Daye Tongbao with a corresponding 70% copper content."
Xiao Xia nodded, "You can make a detailed plan according to my ideas. In addition, we need to speed up the casting of Daye Tongbao coins, as well as the manufacturing plans for gold and silver coins."
The two men agreed, bowed and left.
At the beginning, Luo Yi cooperated with the Guanlong nobles to assassinate Li Jing and won the position of Youzhou Governor. He took out the appointment edict which was a fake imperial edict, and used it to kill his competitor Zhao Shizhu. Another competitor, Jin Wenyan, had to kneel down and acknowledge Luo Yi's success under the pressure of the situation.
Many years passed in a flash, and as Emperor Yang Guang recognized Luo Yi as the governor of Youzhou, the disgrace of his ascension to the position gradually faded away.
But not everyone will forget the past humiliation, including General Jin Wenyan.
Later, he learned the truth. The imperial edict Luo Yi took out was a fake one, and he also got Li Jing's Shangfang Tianzi Sword, which meant that Li Jing was probably killed by Luo Yi. Jin Wenyan was a trusted general promoted by Li Jing. After learning the truth, he suppressed his hatred in his heart and fawned on Luo Yi. He was also highly valued by Luo Yi and was one of the three deputy generals under Luo Yi, commanding 10,000 troops.
Although he had an army of 10,000, the external conditions were not met and he could not surrender to the Turks or Dou Jiande, so Jin Wenyan remained patient and waited for an opportunity.
But since the Sui army occupied Beiping County, Jin Wenyan knew that his opportunity was coming.
He secretly sent his son Jin Kuan out of the city to meet the Sui army commander Luo Shixin in Beiping County.
At noon that day, Jin Wenyan was handling official business in the army. The army was running out of salt in the next two days, and each soldier only had one penny of salt a day, which caused great dissatisfaction in the army. At this time, 130,000 Sui troops surrounded Ji County.
Jin Wenyan was anxious because his son Jin Kuan had been in Beiping County for almost a month, but there was no news yet.
At this moment, the guards reported at the door of the tent, "The young master is back!"
Jin Wenyan was overjoyed and hurriedly said, "Let him in!"
After a while, his son Jin Kuan walked in quickly, knelt down and bowed, "My son pays respect to my father!"
Jin Wenyan complained to his son, "Why have you been gone for so long without any news?"
"Reporting to my father, I went to Luoyang and was received by the emperor!"
Jin Wenyan was immediately surprised and delighted, "You saw the emperor?"
"Exactly!"
Jin Kuan took out a letter and handed it to his father, "This is a handwritten letter from the emperor to you!"
Jin Wenyan hurriedly took the letter and read it carefully. In the letter, the emperor hoped that he would take the lead in opening the city and surrendering, and promised to confer him the title of third-rank Silver and Green Guanglu Doctor and appoint him as the Governor of Zhuo County.
"The emperor actually asked me to transfer to a civil servant position!"
"Father, this is my request. When the world is stable in the future, civil officials will begin to become active. Father was originally a civil official, but he changed his job to become a military commander. If he changes back to being a civil official, wouldn't that fulfill his wish?"
Jin Wenyan nodded. He was originally a military officer in the Youzhou General's Office and a civil servant. Later he was promoted to a military general by Li Jing. It was of course his wish to become a civil servant again.
"I understand. You go out of the city again tonight and contact Luo Shixin for me. My army will be responsible for guarding the East City Gate tomorrow afternoon. I will formally surrender to him."
On January 25th, Luo Yi's army began to run out of salt and morale was boiling. At this time, the general Jin Wenyan who was guarding the East City led 10,000 troops to open the city and surrender. Upon hearing the news, Luo Yi regretted it deeply. He knew that the situation was hopeless and had to order the entire army to surrender.
Luo Yi eventually paid a heavy price for his greed. He could have obtained a very good official position, but he wanted to continue to be the king of Youzhou, which eventually made Xiao Xia lose patience with him.
Luo Yi was conferred the title of Duke of Beiping County and General of the Right Guard by Xiao Xia. Luo Yi became disheartened and resigned from his official position. He returned to his hometown of Xiangyang to retire. He was depressed all day long and died of illness a few years later.
But his son Luo Cheng was highly regarded by Emperor Xiao Xia, who appointed him as General Yunhui and succeeded his father as General Youwei, becoming Luo Shixin's subordinate.
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[I have something to do at home today, so I will take a day off. There will be no update at noon, but I will update as usual in the evening. Thank you everyone! ]
(End of this chapter)