Chongzhen Daming: Starting from Coal Mountain

Chapter 384 Sending troops to Yunnan
"Okay, have guts."

Chongzhen began to admire the two young businessmen, and said: "Now let's quote a price, how much silver do you need? Or it can be converted into food and other materials."

Wang Pingshan asked again: "May I ask you, is the 60 shi army rations all shipped from the Wuchang warehouse, or can they be purchased along the way and then transported to Pu'an Prefecture?"

"It's up to you." Chongzhen said, "If you think you can buy enough grain along the way, then buy grain. If you can't buy too much grain along the way, you can also ship it from Wuchang. Anyway, Wuchang has enough grain. "

When Zuo Liangyu was entrenched in Wuchang, he hoarded a lot of food, and when the new army came to Wuchang, they brought a lot of food.

Up to now, the grain hoarded in the Wuchang official warehouse has exceeded 100 million shi, and there is no problem in transferring 60 shi to Pu'an Prefecture to quell the chaos in Shadingzhou.

Wang Pingshan said: "Your Majesty, can you allow Caomin and others to do the calculation first?"

"No problem." Chongzhen said, "You will do the calculation here."

Wang Pingshan and Hu Renzhi untied their backpacks, and each took out an exquisite small abacus from them.

The two chattered for a long time in front of Chongzhen, and then whispered a few words to each other.

Finally, Wang Pingshan said: "Your Majesty, we need a total of 240 million taels of silver, or we can deliver grain, cotton cloth or silk of corresponding value."

"What?" Zhu Cijiong was furious.

"Transporting 60 shi of grain, you guys dare to ask for 240 million taels of silver?!"

"His Royal Highness Ding Wang." Wang Pingshan said calmly, "The cost of transporting 60 shi of grain to Pu'an within three months, and 240 million grains of silver is already very low, and it cannot be lowered."

"It's just a joke." Zhu Cijiong said with a sneer, "The 60 shi grains are only worth 60 taels of silver, but you ask for 240 million taels. Doesn't this mean that it is not enough to give you all the 60 shi grains for free? If you want to find 180 million shi of grain for the two of you, how can there be such absurd things in the world."

Wang Pingshan said: "Prince Ding, the accounts are not calculated like you do."

Hu Renzhi said: "It is true that a stone of grain only sells for one tael of silver in Wuchang, but if it is transported to Pu'an by water and dry road, it will no longer be priced at one stone and one tael, but at least five taels."

"One stone, five taels?" Zhu Cijiong said angrily, "Are the people in Pu'an crazy, would they buy such expensive food?"

Wang Pingshan said: "Therefore, it is not profitable to sell grain from Wuchang to Pu'an. Only selling tea, wine, cotton cloth or silk can be profitable."

Zhu Cijiong stopped talking.

Through this incident, he already had an intuitive impression of the transfer of grain to the border.

Chongzhen smiled, and then said to Wang Pingshan and the two: "It's settled, for the total price of 240 million taels of silver, 60 shi of military rations will be transferred to Pu'an within three months! But I have something to say first, if If you cannot transfer 60 shi of military rations to Pu'an within three months, I will never let you off lightly."

"Caomin and others lead the order." Wang Pingshan and Hu Renzhi responded solemnly, "If 60 shi of military rations cannot be transferred to Pu'an Prefecture within three months, Caomin and others are willing to lead the military law."

Chongzhen nodded lightly, and asked again: "Is there any other request?"

"Yes." Wang Pingshan hesitated for a while, and then asked, "My lord, can I pay a part of the fee in advance?"

"Caomin and others intend to divide the 60 shi of military rations into two parts, of which 30 shi will be shipped from Wuchang, and the other 30 shi will be purchased from grain merchants in the counties along the way."

"It's just such a large transaction, the price of food will definitely rise."

"Even if the market price is doubled, 30 shi of grain would require 60 taels of silver."

After a short pause, Wang Pingshan said again: "In addition to the expenses of hiring grain boats, trackers and mule and horse porters along the way, it would cost a million taels at least. The grassmen and others really can't afford so much."

"There is no problem with the advance payment." After Chongzhen finished speaking, he said to Gao Qiqian, "Gao Banban, aren't the silk, cotton cloth, antique calligraphy and paintings seized from the rebel army still in the warehouse? You go and count them and get the value out of them." 80 taels of goods, and 40 taels of cash will be transferred from the account of the Royal Bank and delivered to Wang Weng and Hu Weng."

"The old slave takes the order." Gao Qiqian received the order and said to Hu Renzhi and Wang Pingshan, "You two please come with our house."

Before leaving, Hu Renzhi suddenly turned around and asked Chongzhen, "Your Majesty, the grassroots have another question. On the way to Kunming, Yunnan, did you follow the army?"

"Of course." Chongzhen said without thinking.

"Otherwise, I won't worry about handing over the food to you for transshipment."

"There is no problem with the grassroots waiting." Hu Renzhi and Gao Qiqian left.

However, Zhu Cijiong sighed softly and said, "Father, my ministers now know that fighting a war is really costly. In order to transfer 60 shi of military rations to Kunming, it costs 240 million shi!"

"What is this cost?" Chongzhen waved his hand and said, "Transporting military rations to the grasslands or from land to Liaodong is really expensive. During the Sui and Tang Dynasties, when Goguryeo was conquered, only one stone of military rations was transferred to Liaodong. Up! In order to guarantee the [-] Sui troops to fight, Emperor Yang of Sui actually recruited [-] million civilians!"

After a short pause, he said again: "In the end, I was stunned to drag down the mighty Tai Sui alive."

Zhu Cijiong said in disbelief: "There is only one liter of military rations transferred to Liaodong? This loss is too high."

Chongzhen said: "The transfer of military rations to Liaodong in this dynasty is also the same. Only after the Dengzhou shipping was opened up, the loss was finally reduced. This time, the transfer of military rations to Kunming is mainly by water. Walking over three thousand miles on land, at least it would consume more than ten times the amount of military rations!"

Zhu Cijiong said: "That is to say, at least 600 million shi of military rations must be prepared."

"Yes." Chongzhen said solemnly, "If the government along the way is to transfer, at least 600 million shi of military rations must be prepared, and finally 60 shi of military rations can be transferred to Kunming."

"Father, so you have saved half of it?"

Zhu Cijiong was a little astonished when he heard the words, he did not expect this to be true.

Chongzhen said: "If it wasn't like this, why did the emperor find Wang Pingshan and the other two?"

One is to save money, and the other is to improve efficiency. It is courting death for the government along the way to transfer military rations, and it will be played to death by the inefficiency and drift of the government along the way.

……

Let's talk about Hu Renzhi and Wang Pingshan later.

After accepting this big business, the two immediately split up and got busy.

"Brother Hu, in order to save time, we have to split up." Wang Pingshan said, "I will leave all the transshipment in Wuchang to you. I will take the shop assistants to Hunan and northern Guangxi to buy grain first."

"In addition to buying grain from Hunan and northern Guangxi, we also need to recruit as many porters as possible."

"The amount of military rations to be transported this time is too large and the time is tight, so at least [-] porters are needed!"

"However, the area of ​​Tongguwei is small and sparsely populated, so I have to go to nearby Liping, Jingzhou and other places to find people. I guess I can almost find enough porters when you arrive in Tonggu."

"Okay, leave Wuchang to me." Hu Renzhi said, "Brother Wang, you must pay attention to safety. The place in Guizhou is very chaotic, so don't make any trouble."

"It's okay." Wang Pingshan said, "As long as you don't encounter such unfortunate things as the chieftain's rebellion, I am afraid that ordinary thieves will not be able to deal with the servants of our Wang family. Besides, it is not the first time for me to go to Guizhou Tongguwei. Menlu, in short, brother Hu, you just take care of Wuchang’s affairs.”

Hu Renzhi sent Wang Pingshan out of the Shezhou Guild Hall, and called together more than a dozen shopkeepers, more than fifty shopkeepers, and more than a hundred servants of the firm.

This time when they came to Wuhan, the Hu family was also mobilized.

It has to be said that the businessman's vision is vicious.

Both the Hu family and the Wang family could see that this was an opportunity.

Whether you can become a top merchant depends on this vote.

After the meeting, the shopkeeper, clerks and servants of the Hu family shop separated and left. Those who were looking for boats looked for boats, those who were looking for trackers looked for trackers, and the shopkeeper took the clerks to the road ahead to make arrangements. A servant is like a part of a machine, running at high speed in an instant.

This is why it is more efficient to transfer military rations through grain merchants.

Because the government lacks subjective initiative in handling affairs, if the boss asks to find a boat, the subordinates will only do the step of looking for a boat, and will never take the initiative to negotiate the price first, let alone set it first.

And grain merchants will put efficiency first when doing things.

Because efficiency means time, but also means profit.

……

On the first day of June in the [-]th year of Chongzhen, Chongzhen left Wuchang.

Along with Chongzhen, there were [-] new troops, [-] cavalry, [-] barbarians, and [-] female soldiers.

Before Chongzhen left Wuchang, more than [-] local soldiers from the west of Hunan and Hubei had already set off in advance, taking the land route, but marching along the south bank of the Yangtze River.

The vanguard of the army is the nine thousand new army led by Xu Yingwei and Yan Yingyuan.

The Nine Thousand New Army was the first to set out, starting from Wuchang on May [-]th. When Chongzhen left on the first day of June, Xu Yingwei and the others had already reached Baling.

Long before Chongzhen left Wuchang, he had already issued an edict to Ding Kuichu, governor of Guangdong and Guangxi, ordering Ding Kuichu to recruit [-] wolf soldiers from Guangxi to Yunnan to help in the war.

The edict said one hundred thousand wolf soldiers.

But it's hard to say how many wolf soldiers Ding Kuichu can recruit.

Chongzhen even gave Ding Kuichu a secret plan.

……

From the end of May to the end of August, the whole three months were marches.

By the end of August, the forward new army led by Xu Yingwei and Yan Yingyuan finally arrived at Pingyiwei in eastern Yunnan.

At this time, except for a small area west of Chuxiong Prefecture, most of the entire Yunnan area has been captured by the rebellious army in Shadingzhou, or has been attached to Shadingzhou.

Sha Dingzhou had long been wary that the imperial court would dispatch troops to suppress it.

Therefore, a thousand Mongolian soldiers were stationed at Pingyiwei, the traffic hub from Guizhou to Yunnan.

Seeing the sun and moon flag of Ming Dynasty appearing on the official road in the east, the Mengzi native soldiers who were sentry on the top of Pingyi City hurriedly blew the horns, and the next moment, teams of Mengzi native soldiers rushed to Pingyi City. Yichengtou.

After going up to the top of the city, they saw the army of Daming officers coming along the official road.

The front of the team had already driven a mile outside Pingyi City, but the end of the team was still coiling in the mountains. Judging from the situation, there were at least tens of thousands of people.

With so many officers and troops, it is obvious that a mere thousand Mongolian soldiers cannot contend.

The leader of the Mengzi native officials ordered the native soldiers to guard the city gates, and at the same time sent horses to Qujing and Kunming for help.

At this time, Sha Dingzhou was leading a large army to besiege Chuxiong. A total of [-] rebels set up seventy-two company battalions, besieging the entire Chuxiong city.

But this time Sha Dingzhou encountered a hard stubble.

As the saying goes, the true qualities of a hero can only be shown when the sea is crossing the river. When the rebel army in Shadingzhou swept across central Yunnan like a tide, Yang Weizhi, the deputy envoy of Jincang military preparations of the Ming Dynasty, became a reef blocking the way of the rebel army.

Originally, Sha Dingzhou had a chance to solve Yang Weizhi with a snap of his fingers.

In December last year, Sha Dingzhou attacked Kunming unexpectedly, and Mu Tianbo fled with only a few relatives.

Naturally, Sha Dingzhou would not let Mu Tianbo go, and chased and killed Chuxiong all the way. At this time, Yang Weizhi, who was stationed in Chuxiong, only had [-] pacesetters under his command, and Chuxiong's city defenses were not reinforced.

If Sha Dingzhou attacked Chuxiong at this time, Yang Weizhi would definitely lose.

However, Sha Dingzhou was caught by Yang Weizhi's plan to slow down the army. Yang Weizhi said, Mu Tianbo has already fled to Jianchang, so you should go after Mu Tianbo. I will admit it later, anyway, I don't have the guts to fight against you, but if you attack now, then for the sake of my reputation, I might have to fight you to the death, my lord, think about it clearly.

When Sha Dingzhou thought it made sense, he bypassed Chu Xiong and went after Mu Tianbo.

As a result, the trip lasted for a month. Yang Weizhi used this time to quickly recruit [-] local soldiers, at the same time strengthen the city defense facilities of Chuxiong, and then began to send troops to harass the food roads in Shadingzhou.

Only then did Sha Dingzhou realize that he had been duped, and in a rage he turned around and beat Chuxiong.

As a result, the onslaught was not captured for many days, so they had to break through the siege and attack elsewhere.

In July, the rebels successively captured Dali Mansion, Menghua Mansion, etc., and at the same time made an emergency landing on various chieftains in eastern Yunnan and southern Yunnan. It swelled to [-] people.

So Sha Dingzhou turned around and attacked Chuxiong again with [-] rebels, and set up [-] company battalions outside the city, encircling the entire Chuxiong city.

However, in the past six months or so, Yang Weizhi strengthened the city defense again.

The rebels stormed Chuxiong for more than a month until the end of August, but they still did not break through the city.

Seeing that it was too late to win Chuxiong, Sha Dingzhou gradually became anxious.

When the news of Pingyiwei arrived, Sha Dingzhou was trying to persuade Wang Xigun, asking Wang Xigun to write a letter to the court, saying that it was Mu Tianbo, the Duke of Qian, who started the rebellion, and then Sha Dingzhou put down Mu Tianbo's rebellion. The imperial court suggested that the Sha family could replace the Mu family to guard Yunnan for generations.

It must be admitted that Sha Dingzhou still has a bit of vision.

There is still an essential difference between this guy and Wu Bikui. Wu Bikui is a pure martial artist, so he was suppressed by Mu Tianbo without a few thumps, but Sha Dingzhou is much more powerful.

(End of this chapter)