The world of counterfeit magistrates competes in the world

Chapter 488 Cao Ji died of illness

Just when Hengshan was doing his best to stabilize Huazhou, Cao Ji had already run out of fuel in Weiguo's fiefdom.

After experiencing the defeat in Huazhou, Cao Ji, who was already old, suffered a major blow. After returning to the fief, he couldn't afford to be ill.

After Cao Ziyan heard that his father was seriously ill, he no longer wanted to attack Leizhou.After leaving the garrison soldiers and horses, he immediately led the army to the fief to see his father for the last time.

In the ward, Cao Ji was lying on the bed with a gloomy face. In the room, apart from the imperial doctor, there were all the dignified officials and the princes.

Cao Ji opened his eyes slightly, tilted his head to look at the crowd, and shouted weakly: "Ziyan, where is Ziyan?"

"Father, my son is here." Cao Ziyan rushed forward immediately, with tears in his eyes and a sad face, tightly grasping Cao Ji's cold hand.

Cao Ji squinted his eyes slightly, and finally saw his son's face clearly. A gleam of brilliance suddenly appeared on his dull and dull face, "Ziyan, it's good to be back, it's good to be back."

"Father, you must take good care of your illness, and you will be fine." Cao Ziyan cried.

"Hey, I know about my father's body. Ziyan, I'm afraid I won't be able to support my father." Cao Ji patted his hand lightly, shaking his head slightly. "While I am sober now, I must arrange my funeral."

As he spoke, he grabbed Cao Ziyan and motioned him to help him up.

Cao Ziyan quickly helped Cao Ji sit up, and then knelt down beside the bed.

Cao Ji took a few breaths fiercely, then calmed down, looked at the crowd and said, "Shen Li, draw up an edict for Gu."

"Obey." Shen Li accepted the order with a sad face.

When Shen Li was ready, Cao Jicai continued, "Everyone who loves you, I can no longer be alone. I have a few things to tell you today. First, after Gu's death, Ziyan will be established as the new king, and all the ministers should do their best to assist you. Ziyan, revive the strength of our prestige country. Second, the defeat of Huazhou this time is the crime of loneliness. Now Hengshan's strength has soared. With our prestige alone, there is no chance of winning. We must unite with Yanming and Mingzhou. Co-resist against Hengshan. Thirdly, in order to fight civil strife at the beginning, we had no choice but to open a recruitment order to allow wealthy families from all over the country to recruit troops. This is a hidden danger for our country, and must be strictly prohibited, and the power of powerful families in various places should be weakened and cut off, and the centralization of power should be strengthened. Fourth, Hengshan The system is the root of the rise of Hengshan. In the future, our country will learn from the system of Hengshan and implement reforms. These four policies are the foundation of our country's future governance. The new monarch and all ministers must strictly follow them and not violate them. Do you know?"

"Chen and others (children) Jin Jin obeyed the imperial edict." Everyone bowed together.

Cao Ji nodded slightly, stretched out his hand to grab Cao Ziyan, made him come to his side, and said softly: "Ziyan, that's all you can do as a father. From now on, when you become king, you must listen to Shen Li's love. Also, I know you and Lin Yifan have old grievances, but military and state affairs, you must not follow your heart, everything should be the authority, you know?"

Cao Ziyan cried: "Father, my son knows."

"Okay, Ziyan, the Cao family will rely on you from now on, you, you want..." Cao Ji's voice became smaller and smaller, and finally opened his mouth, but never closed it again.

"Father!" Cao Ziyan threw himself on Cao Ji, crying bitterly.

On that day, Cao Ji, a hero of a generation, died of illness.His fifth son, Cao Ziyan, ascended the throne as the new king and announced it to the world.

Soon, according to Cao Ji's last words, the envoys of Weiguo immediately went to Yanming and Mingzhou.At the same time, in order to express his sincerity, Cao Ziyan accepted Shen Li's suggestion and, in the name of the Son of Heaven, canonized Qi Rui of Yanzhou as the King of Yan, and Yang Mingyuan of Mingzhou as the King of Ming, on an equal footing with himself.

Since the defeat of Huazhou, the 30 troops have withdrawn less than 10. In addition to the losses in the Battle of Leizhou, the 60 troops have lost more than 20, and their strength has been greatly reduced.Rebellions in various places took advantage of this opportunity to make a comeback.

Cao Ziyan immediately ordered the recruitment of 30 new troops to make up for the previous losses.And these 30 new troops will follow the will of the former king and adopt the method of Hengshan training for training.In fact, after several years of association with Hengshan, all major forces have obtained Hengshan's military training methods, but they know that they know it, and it is very difficult to implement it.They simply don't have the financial resources to conduct high-intensity training almost every day like the Hengshan Army.We can only settle for the next best thing and adopt this training method in some internal direct troops.It's a pity that they only learned a little superficially, and they don't know anything about the whole set of training methods, and what they learn is all in appearance but without spirit.

When the news of Cao Ji's death and Cao Ziyan's proclaimed king reached Lin Yifan, he was planning how to deal with the large number of prisoners captured on the battlefield.In the Battle of Huazhou, Cao Ji's army captured 13 soldiers and horses, and the Yan-Ming coalition forces captured more than 20 people, a total of nearly [-] prisoners.Lin Yifan didn't have any hatred for these captives, after all, soldiers were just following orders.However, it is impossible to let them go back. Since they are captured, they must have the awareness of being captives.

Lin Yifan planned to disperse these people to various parts of Hengshan as hard labor to contribute to the construction of Hengshan.Of course, he would not treat him like a prisoner of a foreign race. As long as he worked hard for a few years, he would not only earn a lot of money, but also be released and become a free citizen of Hengshan.At the same time, if they can persuade their family members to move here, they will be able to get rid of hard labor immediately and become Hengshan citizens.

Facing the 20 captives, Lin Yifan also knew that there must be many elite soldiers among them, but unfortunately, he couldn't take all of them for his own use, otherwise, if he was secretly instigated, he might abscond and return home.Or be instigated to lurk in the army and steal information.

As for Huazhou's 20 surrendered troops, Lin Yifan was much more at ease.It was decided to eliminate the disabled and the weak, reorganize a new army of 20, and form three infantry divisions and two cavalry divisions for training.Now that Huazhou's Hengshan has been won, 10 troops are no longer enough to support the defense of various places, especially Huazhou, where there are three major forces standing side by side in the east, and they must be suppressed with heavy troops in order to rest easy.Therefore, Lin Yifan decided to expand the regular army by another 30 troops, bringing the total strength of Hengshan to [-].

These [-] new recruits, Lin Yifan planned to stay and reorganize with the [-] garrison troops stationed in Huazhou and the [-] regularized reserve troops. After the reorganization is completed, the [-] troops will be responsible for stationing Huazhou.

After finishing the official document, Lin Yifan breathed a sigh of relief, rubbed the corners of his eyes tiredly, and inadvertently caught a glimpse of a piece of information on the corner of the table, picked it up and read it immediately.At a glance, the brows could not help but wrinkle,
Cao Ji is actually dead?Lin Yifan sighed slightly. The opponent he valued the most all this time has become a thing of the past like this, which is really embarrassing.But this is good news for Hengshan.Although his son Cao Ziyan is quite capable, compared with Cao Ji, he is a little bit worse.

While watching, Lin Yifan wondered if he might take the opportunity to seize the Jingtian Pass at the time of Lord Cao's new funeral, and realized that he had underestimated Cao's father and son.They actually sent envoys to persuade Yanming and Mingzhou to form an alliance with the Cao family at the first time. In order to achieve their goal, they did not hesitate to present the prince as a gift.

After reading it, Lin Yifan put down the information, and his face gradually became serious. He thought that this war would greatly weaken the strength of the Cao family, but he didn't want it to trigger the prelude to the reform of the Cao family. It is even more difficult to contend for hegemony in the Central Plains.It's a pity that Hengshan now needs time to digest Huazhou, coupled with Yan Ming's obstruction, and the consumption of money and food, makes him temporarily unable to launch the Eastern Expedition Raiders.

"Forget it, Hengshan has more important things to do, and the Central Plains will let you make trouble for a few more years." Lin Yifan turned his head to look north and murmured.

(End of this chapter)