Chapter 124: The Precursor of the Fubing System (4k)
Dugu entered Huaishuo Town as he wished, and went to the town commander's mansion with a letter asking for help. Gao Huan hurried home to see his wife Lou Zhaojun, whom he had been separated from for a long time.
After returning from Luoyang this time, Huaishuo Town seemed much more desolate. Gao Huan led his horse, looked at the dilapidated city walls and the beacon smoke outside the city, and thought of the prosperity of Luoyang again. Gao Huan couldn't help but recall the scene of the Yulin Rebellion that night, and quickened his pace towards home.
Gao Huan was more clear about this idea because his roots were in the Six Garrisons.
The next day, Sima Ziru saw Gao Huan, whose thighs were trembling, and could not help but joked, "It seems that my sister-in-law wants to collect the public grain that she owes these days, including the principal and interest."
Gao Huan punched Sima Ziru, then looked at his crooked crown and said, "Why do you wear a crooked crown?"
Sima Ziru's face also turned red. He whispered, "You don't know, this is the latest popular style in the town. Yesterday, Dugu Ruyuan wore a crooked hat when he entered the town. It suddenly became the latest trend. Everyone wears hats like this now."
Seeing Sima Ziru's expression, Gao Huan couldn't help but say, "The war in the Six Garrisons is already like this, and you still have the time to do this? Ziru, you have also studied, don't you know idioms?"
"What idiom?"
"Learning to walk in Handan, and Dong Shi imitating Xi Shi."
"He Liuhun you!"
But when he saw Gao Huan's handsome face and thought of Dugu Ruyuan's handsome face, Sima Ziru, who only looked like an ordinary person, straightened his crown and said to Gao Huan in a serious tone: "Yang Zhen will see you."
"Let's go."
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On the other hand, the imperial army had been moving very slowly since leaving Luoyang, and it took them nearly twenty days to march northward before they reached the vicinity of Jinyang.
It was not that Su Ze's front army could not move fast, but that Li Chong's central army had to protect the King of Rouran and Princess Shouyang, and also had to carry the princess's dowry carriages and horses, so it really could not move fast.
Since the army was moving slowly, Su Ze led the rangers to wander around Bingzhou. Whenever he arrived at a place, he would visit the surrounding villages, light up the map of Bingzhou, and learn about the situation in Bingzhou from the local villagers.
Bingzhou is the Hedong region. The so-called Hedong is the Hedong County in the Qin Dynasty, Jizhou in the Han Dynasty, Bingzhou, Sizhou and other states in the Northern Wei Dynasty, and the Shanxi region in later generations.
Since Emperor Xiaowen moved the capital to Luoyang, the Xianbei upper echelons and the Hedong gentry have been constantly intermarrying and integrating. The Hedong gentry were the biggest beneficiaries of the entire sinicization reform, especially the five Han surnames that reaped huge dividends from the separate surname reforms, many of which came from the Hedong region.
In Su Ze's stereotype, Hedong should be full of wealthy families, the rich should have fields and hills, and the poor should have no place to stand.
But after arriving in Bingzhou, Su Ze discovered that this was not the case.
The village where Su Ze is stationed today is a "Sanchang Village" in Bingzhou.
Su Suan was appointed as the Sima of Tunqiying by Su Ze. Su Ze did not let Tunqiying enter the village, but stationed them outside the village. He also asked Su Suan to take Dongxiqu to exchange meat with the villagers and publicize the name of Tunqiying.
Speaking of the 10,000 imperial troops who went on the expedition, in fact, including the conscripted civilians and the local county soldiers who were responsible for assisting them, the entire team had more than 50,000 people.
It would be very terrifying to see these 50,000 people marching together. If they were all tied together, they could eat up all the supplies along the way like locusts.
Therefore, when an ancient army of this scale set out, it was often the case that each army would act separately and then agree to regroup at a certain strategic location.
As the captain of Tunqi, Su Ze commanded the Tunqi Camp, the Caiguan Camp and two other imperial army camps, with a total of one thousand people as the vanguard. The food and dry food they carried could only fill their stomachs. If they wanted to eat something good, they had to ask the surrounding people for it.
The teams with poor military discipline would naturally just rob and leave, but there were also teams with good military discipline like Su Ze, who would exchange things every time they asked for food.
Su Ze did this naturally for the sake of his reputation in Bingzhou. Sure enough, when Su Suan brought the three leaders of the village back to meet Su Ze, the three of them had heard of Su Ze's reputation and had already prepared wine and livestock to entertain the troops.
The Three Chiefs System was proposed by Li Chong, a minister during the reign of Emperor Xiaowen. This system was intended to suppress the Han Chinese warlords who had been entrenched in the north for hundreds of years and had annexed land, thus establishing grassroots organizations.
The three-chief system means that five households appoint a neighborhood chief, five neighborhoods appoint a village chief, and five villages appoint a party chief.
Heading north from Luoyang, Su Ze saw two types of villages.
One type is the fortress built by aristocratic families. The characteristic of these villages is that they all have a manor similar to a castle. The fortress and manor are inhabited by local tyrants. The land in the village basically belongs to these tyrants, and the land extending outward from the fortress and manor is rented to tenants for cultivation.
In addition to paying taxes from the imperial court, tenants also had to pay rent for the land they leased. However, they could avoid some of the labor imposed by the government by relying on powerful people for support. In times of chaos, they could also escape to a fortress to survive. The owners of the fortress would often train private soldiers to fight against bandits around the fortress.
When encountering such a fortress village, even an army with poor military discipline would not dare to plunder it. They could only send people to communicate with the owner of the fortress. No one knew what kind of relatives or backers these local tyrants had in the court. If they robbed them, they would be reported to the court officials, and by then even Li Chong would not forgive those military leaders.
The other is the Sanchang Village set up by Emperor Xiaowen.
Sanchang villages generally do not have forts. These villages are natural settlements of the people. These lands were granted by Emperor Xiaowen after the sinicization of China. Decades ago, they were all forests or wastelands, which were far less fertile than those in the fort villages.
However, the land in these Sanchang villages is better cultivated than that in Wubao Village, because the crops are their own and they are naturally taken extra care in taking care of them.
The three heads were all wealthy families in the village, but they were not at the level of powerful landlords. They could only be considered rich peasants with a slightly larger population and slightly more land.
The three chiefs were responsible for collecting taxes and assigning labor, so they had more prestige in the village, but it was just prestige, and they could not reach the level of being able to cover the sky with one hand like the landlords and powerful people.
In recent years, the situation has become increasingly unstable. Sanchang Village would also train during the slack season and form a militia to resist bandits.
But compared to the powerful fortresses, the combat effectiveness of Sanchang Village is a little lower. The villages that have been looted by officers and soldiers recently are basically all from Sanchang Village.
At this time, the usefulness of reputation was also reflected. Su Ze had been controlling the team along the way, and his reputation had spread to some villages in Bingzhou. For example, Yanhu Village in front of him took the initiative to send people to send supplies to entertain the troops. Su Ze personally received the supplies, and asked the [stealing Yu Lin cook] and [the blood-sick Yu Lin cook's kitchen helper] to drag the food down, and began to prepare the food on the spot, cooking today's dinner.
As for the personal gift that the third leader sent to Su Ze, after accepting it, Su Ze also asked Su Suan to return a gift of equal value. Su Ze also assured the party leader of Yanhu Village that he would leave people in the village and inform other teams that Yanhu Village had already performed the labor service to pay the soldiers and they did not need to continue to bear the burden.
The party chief of Yanhu Village was naturally very grateful. At this time, the aroma of the dishes prepared by the Yulin cook was already wafting out.
As expected, it is a blue follower with negative attributes, and its business ability is comparable to that of a purple follower.
No matter how bad the food is along the way, even if there is no village, [the stealing Yulin cook] can always cook delicious food with the wild vegetables and fruits collected along the way.
Also because of the delicious food, the army led by Su Ze had the highest morale and was willing to be controlled by Su Ze.
The three leaders of Yanhu Village also smelled the fragrance of the dishes, and they couldn't help swallowing their saliva.
Su Ze said, "Party leader, let's invite the villagers to join the feast."
This was also one of the means that Su Ze used to win people's hearts along the way. These rural villages had never smelled such delicious food. Soon, villagers came out of the village, staring at the steaming pot.
[The strict military judge] took the personal soldiers around Su Ze to distribute tonight's food. As an orange follower, [The strict military judge] enforced the law strictly and never showed favoritism, and soon gained the recognition of the soldiers.
He is responsible for distributing food. During today's march, the teams that do not strictly enforce military discipline will be punished, while the teams that strictly enforce military discipline will be rewarded. At the same time, he will also deal with disputes within the barracks before meals. The reason why Su Ze's military orders can be strictly enforced is also due to the [strict law enforcement military judge].
The three leaders and villagers of Yanhu Village had never eaten such delicious food. After eating, the leader of Yanhu Village looked at Su Ze and couldn't help crying and said, "Since the death of Emperor Xiaowen, we have never seen such a large army of the imperial court."
Su Ze hurriedly helped the old man up. It turned out that the old man was once a Han soldier from the Dai tribe. When he followed Emperor Xiaowen to move the capital from Pingcheng to Luoyang, he was left behind in the local area due to illness. Later, he was granted land and appointed as the party leader.
After that, every time the court went north to send troops, the old party leader received them, but no team could compare with Su Ze's.
Su Ze's reputation rose rapidly among these three long villages. He asked the [Yulin scouts with superb riding skills] to find the three long villages to stop along the way, just to boost the reputation of these three long villages.
The reason why Su Ze only improved the reputation of the three long villages in Bingzhou area was because he saw the future of these villages.
The land grant law and the three-chief system implemented by Emperor Xiaowen were actually the predecessors of the equal-field system of the Sui and Tang dynasties. These families who were granted land had a better-known name in later generations - the "Fubing Liangjiazi".
The extremely powerful army of the Sui and Tang dynasties was composed of these good family boys.
They fight for military merit and land. They are an army with a strong sense of honor and strong combat effectiveness. They are the best soldiers.
Li Chong's army moved very slowly, which gave Su Ze the opportunity to build up his reputation among these three long villages. These reputations are of no use now, but as long as the world becomes chaotic, these reputations can be transformed into tangible benefits. When he occupies this area in the future, these three long villages will be able to bring soldiers and taxes to Su Ze.
Su Ze was also thinking about how to assassinate the King of Rouran on the way, and was also happy to slowly build up his reputation in Bingzhou.
After having dinner with the three elders in the village, Su Ze called the [Blind Pharmacist] to provide free medical treatment to the villagers. The next day, he visited the village elders again and gave them some simple gifts. The reputation of Captain Su Ze immediately spread in the village.
When Su Ze was about to lead his troops to leave, the old party leader held Su Ze's hand reluctantly and gave him an extra gift before letting Su Ze leave.
Su Ze marked the strongholds of those powerful families on the map. Whenever he needed supplies, he would just send his soldiers to get them. He was too lazy to deal with these local powerful people.
These local tyrants all have their own retainers and followers. When times get turbulent, they move at the first sign of trouble. When they meet a strong person, they bring their followers to join them. Once someone declines, they immediately rebel. There is no loyalty at all.
This was especially true for the Hedong warlords in Bingzhou. In the historical struggle between Northern Qi and Western Wei for hegemony, one of the areas that was repeatedly fought over was the Bingzhou area. The powerful families here jumped back and forth repeatedly, and even took advantage of the struggle between the two powers to bet on both sides and made a lot of profits.
Therefore, Su Ze had no interest in improving the reputation of these powerful families. He was not in the same circle as them, and trying to please them to improve his reputation would only result in half the effort and twice the results.
The long-term war not only weakened the imperial power, but also severely weakened the aristocratic families.
The super-large estates in the south are rare even in the north. The big families like Wang Dun and Huan Wen in the Eastern Jin Dynasty who were able to slap the imperial power in the face have long ceased to exist in either the north or the south.
For example, the Qinghe Cui, one of the five surnames, now has ministers like Cui Guang and Minister of Personnel Cui Liang in the court, and there are also many provincial governors and prefects from the Cui family in the local area. However, the previous head of the Cui family, Cui Hao, a famous Han official who had assisted three dynasties, was executed by Emperor Taiwu on the charge of "exposing national history" because he published the early dark history of the Tuoba clan when compiling the national history. At the same time, the five clans of the Cui family were exterminated.
Today's aristocratic families are no longer complete families that both command troops and possess knowledge. Such aristocratic families have gradually disintegrated in both the north and the south.
Those who truly replaced the aristocratic families were not the poor scholars from the so-called poor small landlord class, but the poor military men who rose to power during the period of division between the Northern and Southern Dynasties.
It was actually Liu Yu of the Northern Army who allowed the swallows from the Wang and Xie halls to fly into the homes of ordinary people.
After such a slow march, the army finally arrived at Jinyang City.
Seeing the tall and sturdy Jinyang City, Su Ze finally understood why Jinyang could become the birthplace of Li Tang and the center of disputes in the late Northern Dynasties.
From Jinyang, the capital of Bingzhou, to Luoyang in the south, the entire Luoyang is almost indefensible. If you control Bingzhou, you can enter Guanzhong to the west, go to the prosperous Hedong and Shandong to the east, and control Hengzhou, Yanzhou and Youzhou to the north. The strategic importance of Jinyang is unquestionable.
In history, his sworn brother Erzhu Rong, after hosting the Heyin Diving Competition in Luoyang, withdrew his main forces from Luoyang to Bingzhou, and controlled the court through Bingzhou's strategic deterrence to Luoyang.
Just after arriving outside Jinyang City, Yu Jin, who served as a military officer beside Li Chong, came to Su Ze's camp and brought a message to Su Ze:
"The general will hold a banquet in Jinyang, and the King of Rouran and Princess Shouyang will personally thank the troops."
Transition chapter, please read it, don't worry, I won't write for too long on the way
(End of this chapter)