Lin Jue didn't dwell on this matter, there was another important thing in his heart, that is, about the situation of Gao Muqing in Funiu Mountain, and the solution to the crisis.

Since Liang Qi came to Hangzhou, Lin Jue thought of this matter from time to time, and whenever he thought of the situation of Gao Muqing and others, Lin Jue felt depressed. Before, he was busy with the Qiu Yu exam, Lin Jue did not systematically sort out the context and solutions of the whole thing, and now after the Qiu Yu is over, Lin Jue thinks that he must think about it seriously. I must not stay out of this matter.

Liang Qi came to Hangzhou, although he gave him silver to buy materials and bring them into the mountains, but Lin Jue knew that this was just an expedient measure. If everything goes well, the food and supplies purchased by more than 10,000 taels of silver can alleviate the urgent needs on the mountain, and can allow more than 1,000 people in the Luoyan Valley to survive this cold winter, but it will not solve the fundamental problem.

The fundamental problem is actually the problem that Gao Muqing and others will really take root in the future. It is by no means a matter of providing a batch of food, cotton clothes, and other materials to sit back and relax. Next spring, the Funiu Mountain cottages, which have already offended the anger of the public, will definitely unite again to deal with the people in the Luoyan Valley, and that is the most fatal time. With the strength of more than 300 people that Gao Muqing's subordinates now have, they simply cannot resist the joint attack of other cottages. These 300 men and more than 1,000 people will eventually be driven out of Funiu Mountain, and there will be no place to live. And once they leave Funiu Mountain, these people will have no way to live, and the government will not be able to tolerate them.

Therefore, how to get them to stand firm is already an extremely urgent and life-and-death issue.

After careful consideration, Lin Jue believes that there are only two ways to solve the problem. Either you have to make a compromise with the bandits in Funiu Mountain, or you have the strength to resist their attacks and defeat them.

Reaching a compromise with other cottages in Funiu Mountain seems to be an excellent solution, but in fact it is almost impossible. Because in the case of poor strength, and losing the blessing of the Shiren Mountain Cottage, the only possibility for Gao Muqing and others to reach a compromise is to take refuge in a certain cottage and become a vassal of others. In that case, the people of Guishan Island, who came to Gao Muqing, would be the first to be expelled and slaughtered. Because it is impossible for any cottage to raise these people in vain. It is precisely because of this that Gao Muqing resolutely decided to lay down his own territory and turn his face with Zuo Zongdao, because Gao Muqing would never abandon these people.

In this case, it is actually a dead end that cannot be compromised. Moreover, if you surrender to others, the Guishan Island cottage will cease to exist, which is by no means acceptable to those die-hard people who follow Gao Muqing. Therefore, this first and seemingly mild solution is actually the most unlikely one.

In contrast, there seems to be no hope for the second solution, which seems to have no chance of success, but there is a glimmer of hope.

On the surface, Gao Muqing's existing manpower of more than 300 people could not withstand the full attack of the mountain bandits. Even if the bandits in Funiu Mountain are not elite divisions, and their equipment and combat power are not excellent, the three hundred people under Gao Muqing are still unable to protect themselves. If you want to rely on these more than 300 people to gain a firm foothold in Funiu Mountain and resist the attack of the mountain bandits, I am afraid that several conditions need to be met.

The soldiers and horses are well trained, and the combat measures must be properly planned, coupled with the excellent equipment and weapons. These are the three important elements that Lin Jue thinks a soldier can become an elite. If Gao Muqing and her three hundred men could meet these three conditions, then although these three hundred people were scarce, they were definitely not something that those rabble mountain bandits could contend with. However, for the time being, Gao Muqing's manpower does not possess these three elements at all.

In terms of combat ability, these more than 300 people may be more clever than the mountain bandits. After all, these 300 people can be regarded as the elite manpower left behind in the cottage on Guishan Island. Most of these people have some ability, otherwise it would be absolutely impossible for the officers and men to escape bloody after they have landed on the island. In the time that followed, these people also experienced many large and small battles, and it can be said that they are already a polished quasi-elite soldiers. The mountain bandits of Funiu Mountain are incomparable to these more than 300 people, which is also an important reason why they were able to successfully repel the attack of Bao Meng's thousands of mountain bandits in the previous battle.

However, the advantage of these 300 people is not enough to ignore the advantages and disadvantages of the number of people. If we survive this winter, the offensive will be even more fierce next spring. Bao Meng has already lost hundreds of men, and he is absolutely unwilling to give up. And Zuo Zongdao of that Shiren Mountain Dazhai also gave an ultimatum, and the attack next spring is likely to be Bao Meng in the northwest and Zuo Zongdao in the south. Because Bao Meng will definitely ask for Zuo Zongdao's assistance at the cost of recognizing Laojunling's territory belonging to Zuo Zongdao. For Zuo Zongdao, this not only allowed him to justifiably incorporate the territory of Laojunling Cottage that he occupied not long ago into his own territory, but also forced Bao Meng to admit this. At the same time, it is also a punishment and revenge for Gao Muqing and others who betrayed him. This deal is the easiest to close in the current situation.

Therefore, under the huge advantage of numbers, Gao Muqing's Luoyan Valley is absolutely undefensible. They may be forced to retreat east from the Funiu Mountain boundary. However, they also have no way to survive when they leave the Funiu Mountain Realm, because the soldiers and horses of the imperial court outside the mountain will never be merciful to them.

One of the conditions is that they are well-trained, and it is obvious that the 300 people who are currently born as lake bandits on Guishan Island cannot have them. A bandit is a bandit, no matter how prosperous the Guishan Island cottage is, no matter how strong the strength is, and how many rules there are, it is just a cottage. On the contrary, because of the complexity of the source of personnel, there are many unruly outlaws in the cottage of Guishan Island, and most of these people are doing their own thing, where can we talk about what is well-trained and disciplined?

This was also evident after the officers and men went to the island. When the officers and soldiers broke their promises and began to kill, these people became scattered and could not organize an effective counterattack. In the end, only a small part of the men escaped.

Training a disciplined, prohibitive, and powerful army is not an overnight task. Gao Muqing: Even if they have the will, they don't have time to realize it. Even if you start training now, you won't be able to see the results without at least a few months of polishing. It is impossible to become an elite force overnight. Therefore, the first condition to quickly make Gao Muqing's manpower strong is not available.

The second condition is that those who command the combat must have superb combat strategy. This is particularly important in the case of fighting more with less. A good leader can keenly capture the fighter and step down. He knows when to attack, when to retreat, and how to use the only manpower at hand to create maximum combat power. It will set various traps to design opponents and use various favorable factors to inflict heavy damage on opponents. It's an art, and it's definitely not something that you can do.

Lin Jue didn't underestimate Gao Muqing, but he knew that Gao Muqing didn't have this ability at the moment. This can't blame Gao Muqing, after all, she is just a woman, and neither the old village owner nor herself has the will to become the owner of the big village. Gao Muqing has always wanted to be an ordinary woman and want to get rid of the identity of a bandit. The owner of the old village Gao also didn't want his daughter to go his own way, and the successor he was looking for was definitely not his daughter.

It's just that the creation makes people, great changes have occurred in the cottage on Guishan Island, Qiu Biao seized power and killed Gao Yuankui, and the old man in the cottage who was aware of it was also suspicious of Qiu Biao, so he tried his best to push Gao Muqing to the position of the master of the village. But in fact, Gao Muqing is still a novice in terms of leadership, planning ability, scheming, and ability to lead troops to fight. It's just that fate forced her to become a banner of the Guishan Island cottage and the leader of everyone.

Therefore, it is obviously too difficult to ask Gao Muqing to be able to strategize and show superb skills in leading the battle. Again, this kind of ability cannot be achieved overnight, but requires the accumulation of talent and theoretical and practical experience.

The first two of the three conditions are difficult to meet, and there is only one last one left, which is to improve the weapons and equipment of these three hundred people, so that they have the powerful equipment to crush their opponents. The first two are soft power, and this one is hard power. The improvement of soft power is the most difficult, and it requires the most time and experience. But if it can be successful, it will be a permanent combat power, and it will be the least likely to dissipate. Improving soft power is the most difficult and the least immediate, but the improvement of hard power is different, it is the fastest and most effective method, which can raise the combat effectiveness of a soldier to a fairly high level in a short period of time.

It's like two groups of people fighting each other with their bare hands, and the side with fewer people will naturally suffer. However, if the side with fewer people has rich experience in group fighting, makes good use of the terrain, protects each other effectively, and has rules for advancing and retreating, then even if there are few people, it may not suffer. On the contrary, if they don't have the ability to fight indiscriminately, because there are few people, they will obviously be beaten. The synergy of these fighting experiences and rules can be called soft power.

However, if they have no rules and regulations, and do not know how to advance and retreat and take advantage of advantageous conditions, the way to win this battle is very simple, that is, to put a steel knife in each of them. This steel knife can be called hard power. With a steel knife in hand, a weak person can defeat an opponent who is several times his own with his bare hands, and a boy with a drooping hair can beat a big man with his bare hands. This is the way to quickly increase combat effectiveness in a short period of time.