Tibet

That night, Li Lin led the army to retreat eastward. After all, he was a prince who grew up in a deep palace and had never seen the cruelty of war. A fire burned him to the point of despair, and his confidence was completely burned away by the fire.

The eldest son, Li Xi, encountered 20,000 cavalrymen led by Nan Jiyun in Tanzhou. They were defeated in a battle. Almost all the 30,000 troops were destroyed. Li Xiang only led a few hundred people to escape back to Hongzhou in embarrassment. Li Ye's army entered. Yuanzhou.

Li Lin had realized that there was no room for two tigers in one mountain, and the other party completely controlled Ezhou, and also captured the prefectures and counties around Dongting Lake and along the Xiangjiang River, including Tanzhou, Hengzhou, Chenzhou, Yongzhou, Shaozhou, Langzhou, Fengzhou and other places, and then entered Yuanzhou. Zhouzhou, the next step is for the warships to capture Jiangzhou and surround Hongzhou.

This time, without the persuasion of Xue Yu and Li Taiqing, Li Lin decided to abandon Hongzhou and move eastward to Xuanzhou, leading his army to Jiangnan East Road and Huainan Road. Although his troops were unknown, Li Lin couldn't care less.

Yuzhang County was in chaos. Hundreds of warehouses were opened on the Ganjiang pier, and soldiers carried large wooden boxes onto warships. They were all filled with copper ingots, weighing millions of kilograms.

Since the Sui Dynasty, the area around Poyang Lake and along the Gan River has been one of the most important mineral areas for the imperial court, including Hongzhou, Raozhou, Qianzhou, Jizhou, Jiangzhou, Yuanzhou, Fuzhou, Xinzhou, etc., in all states. The large mines are managed by Yongping Supervisor.

By the Kaiyuan period, the mining industry in Jiangnan West Road reached its peak. Hundreds of thousands of people were mining in the pits day and night, and then transported them to Hongzhou and Raozhou for smelting.

The Tang Dynasty also set up coin minting stations in Yongping and Yuzhang to cast coins on site and then transport the copper coins to Chang'an.

The mining industry in the early and mid-Tang Dynasty was all privately operated. The law clearly stipulated that "where copper and iron are produced in all states in the world, people can mine them privately, and the officials will collect taxes." ’

But these private individuals were not ordinary people. They were basically dignitaries in the capital and local powerful people. The court not only taxed them, but also purchased some of their copper ingots.

There was no restraint in private mining and smelting, but the imperial court had custom-made coins, and there were regulations on how much money should be minted each year. Therefore, there were mountains of crude copper ingots in the warehouse, as well as crude silver, which needed to be further refined to obtain high-purity copper and silver.

Yuzhang County has always been an extremely important transit point. There are hundreds of warehouses beside the Gan River, owned by the imperial court and private individuals. All kinds of metal and wood are piled up inside. Li Lin has taken them all as his own. Now he wants to evacuate. Of course he had to transport these strategic supplies to Hongzhou. To this end, he recruited thousands of ships to transport the supplies for him.

Ji Guangchen also came to the warehouse group to check the situation. He has now been appointed as the governor of Hongzhou, and his military power has been deprived by Li Lin. Jiangxia was defeated miserably. Li Lin said that he had nothing to do with him, but in fact, he took all the responsibilities and exempted him. The position of commander-in-chief of the right army.

The person responsible for transferring the supplies was Wei Zichun, the transshipment envoy of Jiangnan West Road, who was also Li Lin's confidant.

"Some of the food went with the army overland, and the rest went by water. There are also these coarse coppers and coarse silvers. The quantity is too much, and it must be loaded on at least a thousand ships."

"I remember there is still some gold?" Ji Guangchen asked.

Wei Zichun smiled and said: "The prince has to carry more than 1,800 kilograms of gold with the army, which is 20,000 taels. If it were not for carrying a large amount of military rations, the prince would have to carry even coarse silver ingots with the army. There is no way, the quantity is too large It’s too big to be taken away, so it can only be transported by water.”

The two came to a huge warehouse again. Ji Guangchen looked around and saw that there were huge trees inside, about dozens of feet long and one foot thick. These were the wood used to build palaces. The buildings of the Sui and Tang Dynasties were all about grandeur, especially It is the imperial palace, Luoyang and Chang'an, each one is more spectacular than the other.

For example, the central wooden pillars used in the Paradise and Mingtang built by Wu Zetian in Luoyang far exceed the tallest trees in the country today.

Where did these giant trees for the palace come from? According to historical records, almost all of them came from Yuzhang County. Of course, they were not only produced in Yuzhang, but also transported from Yuzhang County. The source was the deep mountains and old forests of Jiangnan West Road. They are currently stored in the warehouse. It is not surprising that there are thousands of giant trees.

"Aren't these giant trees transported away?"

Ji Guangchen smiled and said: "You can put them in the river and let them float down by themselves."

Wei Zichun shook his head, "Short-distance is fine, but long-distance will be used by the villagers along the way. The prince said that there is a lot of wood in Yangzhou and it is no longer needed, so I will leave it to Li Ye and ask him to treat the people of Hongzhou kindly."

‘Be kind to the people! ’

Ji Guangchen sneered in his heart. If Li Lin was willing to treat the people well, he would forcefully commandeer all the ships in more than a dozen states? He also forced tens of thousands of civilians to transport food for him. He was just afraid of being pursued by Li Ye's cavalry, so he left some supplies that could not be transported to bribe the other party.

"When will we set off?" Ji Guangchen asked again.

"We still have to wait for a batch of rough copper from Raozhou to arrive. Our ship has just left for Raozhou. It will take about seven or eight days to get here. It is estimated that it will take ten days to leave."

"The prince seems to be leaving in ten days!"

Wei Zichun nodded, "It must have been that time! There are many things to do when moving, and it's not something you can just leave."

It was already late. After Ji Guangchen inspected the warehouse group, he returned directly to the official residence. He hesitated in his heart and paced back and forth in the study.

Ji Guangchen was about forty-five or six years old. He was a Jinshi in the 22nd year of Kaiyuan. He had been an official in the northwest for many years and was very familiar with military affairs. He later served as the governor of Jing. Li Lin learned that he was both civil and military and admired him quite a lot. He was immediately appointed governor of Ezhou and promoted to marshal of the right army. Ji Guangchen was deeply moved by Li Lin's important use.

But a battle in Jiangxia made Ji Guangchen wake up completely and let him see through Li Lin. Li Lin said that he valued talents, but in fact he was selfish. Zhuang joined the army with lofty ambitions on the surface, but in fact he was Yuan Shao's second best. He forgot his righteousness when he saw small profits and cherished his life when doing big things. He was fierce and timid. After losing to Li Ye after a few battles, he was frightened and wanted to give up Hong Kong. The state moved eastward.

What dissatisfied Ji Guangchen the most was the defeat of Jiangxia. It was clearly Xue Liu's plan. Li Lin made the decision personally. He tried to persuade him not to listen, so he only listened to Xue Liu's advice. In the end, the siege failed miserably, but he blamed it on Ji Guangchen was deeply chilled by the fact that Xue Yu had nothing to do with him and was promoted to the position of mastermind.

Now Li Lin wants to seize Yangzhou and Jiangnan East Road. This is completely against the imperial court. If he can succeed, Ji Guangchen is willing to follow, but he is not optimistic about Li Lin at all. This is not a prince who can do great things, and he will be defeated sooner or later.

Ji Guangchen decided to leave Li Lin and find another way out. Birds choose good trees to perch. Ji Guangchen's eyes fell on Lu King Li Ye. The battle of Jiangxia also made him understand Li Ye. Li Ye's strategy is to drive away but not destroy. Driving Li Lin to the south of the Yangtze River to contain the imperial court's energy and lay the groundwork for future eastward expansion can be said to kill two birds with one stone. The strategy is very clever. This kind of hero is the one he wants to defect to!

Especially since Li Ye came from Anxi, Ji Guangchen, who had been an official in the northwest for a long time, felt a cordial feeling from the bottom of his heart.

Ji Guangchen decided to submit a certificate of surrender and join Li Ye.

At this time, a young man hurried into the study, bowed and saluted, "See you, father!"

This young man is Ji Guangchen's second son Ji Chunzhi. Ji Guangchen has two sons and one daughter. The eldest son Ji Shouzhi serves as the magistrate of Pingxiang County in Yuanzhou, and the second son Ji Chunzhi stays with him to share some state affairs for him. He also has a The youngest daughter married the eldest son of Wei Zhongxi in Jingzhou the year before last, but he did not tell Li Lin about this.

Ji Guangchen took out a letter and handed it to his second son Ji Chunzhi, telling him: "Go to Hanyang and give this letter to His Royal Highness King Lu. You must hand it over to him personally. You go by boat. If you find someone following you, Destroy the letter immediately, do you understand?"

Ji Chunzhi nodded, "I understand, kid!"

He hesitated and asked again: "Father doesn't plan to go to Yangzhou?"

Ji Guangchen sighed and said: "Sooner or later, following Li Lin will lead to ruin, so why bother?"

"But Li Lin is the biological brother of the Emperor's mother, so that's not the case!"

Ji Guangchen sneered, "In the Li family, even father and son can fight in the same room, let alone brothers, go ahead! Be careful on the road."

Ji Chunzhi came to his senses and quickly bowed and said, "I understand, kid, let's set off now!"

Ji Chunzhi left in a hurry, and Ji Guangchen stared at the Jingxiang map for a long time. In fact, he also knew that Li Ye was not equal to the imperial court, and he needed to make a choice.