The rainy season has just ended, and it has turned into a dry season.
Autumn is the beginning of the cooler season, the most comfortable dry season of the year.
In the paddy fields, the late rice has also begun to turn yellow, and heavy ears of rice are spread all over the banks of the river.
The water surface on the Red River is wide, and the rainy season is only over, and the current of the Red River is still very large.
Li Chao has renamed this river the Red River, the red river, named the Red River is very vivid, which makes people think of the Yellow River in the Central Plains at once.
Li Chao led 5,000 men and horses up the Red River.
On the wide water, the fleet sailed forward.
Li Chao originally wanted Cheng Qian to stay in Jiaozhou, but Cheng Qian insisted on going to the fiefdom with him.
In the end, Li Chao thought about it and brought him with him, this operation, if not expected, would not be dangerous.
After leaving Jiaozhou, the fleet headed northwest and entered Fengzhou.
After a night's rest in Xinchang City, Fengzhou, the next day outside the city into the Heishui River, a tributary of the Red River.
The Red River has two major tributaries in Xinchang, one is the Red River and the other is the Heishui River.
Li Chao's fiefdom is in the Heishui River.
For convenience, Li Chao also changed the name of Heishui River to Heihe.
The water of the Black River is black.
After leaving Xinchang, the fleet traveled about 100 miles south, and the river turned to the northwest, and the Heihe River and the Red River flowed side by side about 100 miles.
This section of the river that runs to the south for hundreds of miles is also the border between Jiaozhou, Fengzhou and Zhao.
"From now on, go to the northwest, two hundred miles wide on both sides of the Heihe River, and seven hundred miles long, this place is the fief of Zhao State."
The fiefdom of Zhao is still very large, and Li Shimin took a circle of the map and assigned this place to Li Chao.
The main demarcation of this fief is the Heihe River Basin, which is located between the Red River and the Ma River.
To the north is the watershed of the mountains between the Red River and the Heihe River, to the south is the watershed of the mountains between the Heihe River and the Majiang River, to the southeast is the section of the Heihe River that flows into the Red River in the north-south direction, and to the east is Jiaozhou.
The northwest end of the fiefdom is bounded by a relatively large north-south tributary of the Heihe River.
This is also the original border of Zhenla, and further north, there is a small tribal country in Yunnan.
Li Shimin casually circled and demarcated such a place for Li Chao.
Li Chao sent someone to carefully survey and measure it afterwards, and obtained that it was 200 miles wide from north to south and 700 miles long from east to west, and the entire territory was in such an oblique shape from northwest to southeast.
The Heihe River accounts for nearly half of the Red River, and Li Chao's territory is the Heishui River basin sandwiched between the two mountains.
However, although the place is large, the banks of the Black River are incomparable with the banks of the Red River.
The two banks of the Red River are river beach plains, and the Black River, the two banks are generally more than 100 zhang above the river surface, and even more than 200 zhang in some places, the river valley is narrow and deep, and the water is black.
Moreover, this thousand-mile-long river has dozens of waterfalls with large drops.
This makes it a problem for navigation on the Heihe River, and it can only be navigable in sections.
This is what Li Chao did not expect at the beginning, the Heishui River can be connected to large ships in later generations, because in later generations, there are hydropower stations and locks that can be used for ships, but now there is not.
The forests in the territory are the most abundant, and only a few small river valleys are suitable for farming.
If you look at it from a traditional point of view, Li Chao is simply a big fool, such a piece of territory far away in the south of the sky, or the inland territory of Guangnan, is a poor mountain and evil mountain.
The fleet sailed less than two hundred miles on the Black River and could not advance.
In front of it is a waterfall with a huge drop.
Everyone can only get off the boat and go ashore here, Cheng Qian watched the high waterfall fall like the Milky Way, and kept shaking his head.
"Teacher, this fiefdom is too bad."
He thought that this place was the same as Jiaozhou, a flat plain.
Who knew it would be such a poor mountain and bad water.
The team camped by the river.
On this piece of land that is more than 200 miles wide and more than 700 miles long, there are actually not many residents, and in such a vast place, there are only a few towns, and then there are residential villages in the mountains.
The army stationed here was less than 500 people.
The day after Li Chao and the others arrived, the defenders of the nearby town took the initiative to surrender.
The people in the town came to greet Wang Shi one after another.
This attitude made Cheng Qian speechless in shock.
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I thought it would be a difficult battle in the mountains.
Li Chao is not strange at all, what is so strange.
For Zhenla, this is the far northern border, and because they are all deep mountains, the roads are difficult to travel, and there is no actual rule here, mainly because the tribes here surrender to Zhenla, and they just pay some tribute every year.
On the contrary, in recent years, Datang has strengthened its operation in Jiaozhou, especially Li Chao, who came to Jiaozhou to develop the sugar industry, and the people here have also been stained with light.
Taking advantage of the Heihe, many Jiaozhou merchants came to trade along the river, giving them a lot of convenience.
On this basis, the people here are still very friendly to the Tang people, and the impression is good.
And Li Chao got a fief a few years ago, and he has only come now, but he has already sent many people over before.
In the name of trading, he has gained a lot of relationships with the people here, and the united front work has been done well.
Therefore, when Li Chao came, these people all looked happy to welcome Wang Shi.
Even the five hundred Zhenla soldiers stationed here directly surrendered to Li Chao, in fact, these five hundred soldiers are also natives here.
In the eyes of these people, there is no concept of a country, they just think that compared with Zhenla, the Tang people are better.
Li Chao warmly received the natives of the town who came to greet them and entertained them to drink.
Good wine, good food, good tea, and some gifts were given to each person.
Li Chao proposed to register for naturalization and let them all become the people of the Tang Dynasty, and the representatives of the local people who were slightly drunk also patted their chests and agreed.
In response, Li Chao said that after they became naturalized, the original land, property, slaves, and livestock still belonged to them, which was sacred and inviolable.
The land is tax-free for the first three years, the second half of the tax, and then taxed according to the two tax laws of the imperial court, and explained the two tax laws and tax rates, but these people did not think it was too high, so they agreed.
In the past, they paid tribute to the king of Zhenla, which was also a large burden, and it was much higher than these two taxes.
After some negotiations, this town officially became the first town under the rule of Zhao State of the Tang Dynasty.
Li Chao gave the name of Loyal Town.
It's just a small town with less than 1,000 people, and the surrounding villages are only about 5,000 people.
But it is already the largest town in Li Chao's territory.
A victorious start.
Cheng Qian is still in a trance, and that's fine There is no war, no conquest and no resistance "Your Highness, why did they resist when we came, and we didn't take their money or kill their children, everything is as usual here, and we don't even have to pay tribute to King Zhenla in the future.
Our arrival has also made the life of the people here more convenient and better, why should they oppose us," Li Chao asked with a smile.
Cheng Qian couldn't answer.
I always feel that something is wrong, but I can't say it.
And in fact, the people here are indeed welcoming the king, and you can see that everyone is singing and dancing around the fire.
The next day, Li Chao's team arrived at Loyalty Town.
Saying it's a town, it feels more like a village.
There are stilted buildings everywhere, especially since this town is actually built on the hillside, this is a mountain town.
There is only one street, and most of the people who do business here are Han merchants, and there are many stilted buildings scattered around.
From the map, this is only at the southern end of the territory.
Li Chao planned to build his own royal city in the center of the territory, which was also conducive to management.
"The Black River is not good for traffic, but we found another route, which is a tributary of the Black River, known locally as the Shanluo River, which has a calm flow and a flat bank around it, with a lot of land suitable for farming.
And this river is very long, and it flows in the northwest and southeast directions, which is navigable, and there is no kind of drop waterfall. ” The natives in this territory are also mostly concentrated on both sides of this river.
The Shan Luo River is navigable, and there is also an easy road next to it.
"Very good, then we will sail along the Shanluo River, and in the future, we will also set up immigrant tunbao and commercial towns on both sides of the Shanluo River."
The people sent by Li Chao in the early stage were very efficient.
The fleet continued to go up along the Shanluo River, and the natives along the shore greeted it one after another.
At the first place, Li Chao and the others were all greeted lively.
Everywhere Li Chao went, he was also generously rewarded and gifted, sent money and food, and then made an appointment with them for three chapters, and then registered them for naturalization.
From the Heihe River to the mouth of the Red River, he sailed all the way for 800 miles to reach the northwest border, and it took Li Chao a month.
The Shanluo River is also only passable in the southern part of the territory, and enters the Heihe River in the central part, and finally changes to the land route, and then changes to boats, and changes between the Mo River and several tributaries.
It was also very difficult to reach the northern border all the way.
In November, Li Chao began to walk back, and when he came back, it was much faster.
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The main thing is to take the Heishui River, and when you encounter the waterfall section, you will go ashore and take the land route, and after walking through this section, you will change boats in the next river section.
Li Chao's 5,000 soldiers and horses had already been stationed in the territory of 700 miles along the way, with one battalion for every 500 people, and Li Chao set up ten battalions.
The royal city was set up on a basin in the center of the territory, and the city was planned and built, and the castle was not designed to be large, and it was named Quang Ninh City.
After this trip, Li Chao also has a very clear understanding of his territory.
This place is indeed backward, with a fiefdom of 700 miles, and the combined population is only more than 50,000.
It is not as large as the population of a county in the Central Plains, and these 50,000 people are scattered in the mountains of seven hundred miles, and many tribes are still very primitive and backward, although they have accepted Li Chao, the king of Zhao, but to develop, they really have to start from scratch.
Li Chao has already made a plan.
In the center of the territory, Guangning Fort, the city of the king of Zhao, should be built, and ten merchant towns should be built, and at the same time, ten military forts should be built on the edge of the merchant towns as the garrison of the ten battalions of government soldiers.
On the banks of the Black River, wharves should be built, and roads should be built to connect various navigable rivers so that water and land can be interchanged.
Some navigable tributaries such as Shanluo also have to build post stations.
Divide the land among the soldiers, and set up logging factories, medicine pickers, farms, and so on.
There is so much to do.
But at least from now on, this has become a new territory of Datang, and his Li Chao's feudal state can be regarded as officially in hand.
"Teacher, won't the country of Zhenla send troops to come?"
"I'm not afraid of Zhenla, and now Zhenla himself is also fighting, and he is inseparable from Funandou.
Moreover, these mountains are continuous, and it is not easy to fight them.
There are 5,000 soldiers, enough to deal with them.
What I have to think about now is how to move the families of these 5,000 soldiers.
If we don't move their families earlier, I'm afraid that these people will be unstable.
This poor and remote place really tests people. ” t1706231537: