At the same time as the Qingyuan battlefield ended, the Ming army that counterattacked on the battlefield in eastern Guangdong seized Meizhou, and Zhong Xiang, the governor of Fujian and Zhejiang, led the remnants to the direction of Longyan to rout, and even the Luo Outline Department that attacked from Guilin also conquered Hezhou, so far Guangdong except for Shaoguan and Yingde was still under the control of the Qing army, and all other places were occupied by the Ming army.

As for Shaoguan......

"God Emperor, Zhou Tianjue has run away!"

Chen Liuxing in the Guangzhou General Staff said excitedly.

Well, Zhou Tianjue, the governor of Huguang who stayed in Shaoguan, did not hesitate to abandon Shaoguan and flee before the Ming army's warships arrived in Yingde.

He can't run if he doesn't run!

There are still a total of 5,000 old and weak green battalions under his command who act as logistics, and the hundreds of thousands of troops in Yishan on the front line have all been wiped out, and more than a dozen brigades of Ming troops are marching up along the Beijiang River.

"Run, run!"

Yang Feng said casually.

Zhou Tianjue's remaining choice is nothing more than to retreat to Chenzhou to defend the gate of Hunan, in addition to the Qing army in Jiangxi to guard Meiling, and Yongzhou to resist the Luo Outline Department, the Qing army on the northern front has these three points, and then the Qing army in Yunnan blocked the victory pass, that is, Hechi, and the periphery of his control area is these strategic points. As for the eastern front, there is no need to waste troops attacking by land, reinforcing a few brigades to Fuzhou, from there along the Min River, and then inserting Jiangxi by land, which can be regarded as a partial division, and the Qing army in the mountainous areas around Longyan does not need to be taken care of first, just take the coastal Quanzhou and Xiamen and then slowly expand inland.

His main direction of attack has to be Hunan.

The main force went out of Shaoguan to attack Chenzhou, the West Route Army attacked Yongzhou, the two roads marched into Hengyang, the other side of the division attacked Meiling into Jiangxi, and then there was a side division to the direction of Yunnan.

Other directions are contained, and Hunan is the main target.

These strategies are simple, and they are the only ones available.

Of course, this is the responsibility of the front-line generals, Yang Feng will not lead the troops to recruit in person, he is planning another way of the Northern Expedition, last time he has already practiced a crow, of course he will play two crows next, but he still needs to make some preparations, mainly because he has to build a ship first, after all, three battleships are definitely not enough.

In addition, as commander-in-chief, he needs to solve another, more important problem for the front.

That is, the issue of logistical support.

At this time, the Ming army was inseparable from logistics, and his logistics relied on inland water transportation, the north of the river shipping ended at Wujiang, Lechang's Pingshi is the end of this transportation line, and in Pingshi to the north along the Baisha River in small boats to Yizhang Baishidu, and then land to Chenzhou and in Chenzhou to the north of Wayaoping, and in Wayaoping for a big boat along the Leishui into the Xiangjiang River system to start a long journey through the Yangtze River, this is the strategic route of the Ming army's northern expedition to the south of the Lingnan, Yang Feng next needs to make a large number of steam-powered small river boats, the arms and materials produced in Guangzhou were continuously transported to Pingshi along the line of the Dongjiang River and the Wujiang River, and then along the Xiangjiang River water system to support the operation, but ......

There is also a break in the middle.

That is, it is less than a hundred miles from Yizhang to Chenzhou, and this break must be connected by land transportation.

"Railroad?"

Yang Feng asked his cabinet ministers.

It is said that at this time, Yang Feng also has his own cabinet, after all, he is now sitting on the vast territory of the two provinces, but the prime minister does not have it, but all the ministers have been appointed, all of them are the group of people who used to be his secretary, these people are all taught by his words and deeds and have been thoroughly brained by him, they are all real fanatics, when Yang Feng is there, they perform their own duties, and when Yang Feng is not there, Chen Liu, the chief of the general staff who holds the military command, is the main one.

But big things need to be voted on in a meeting.

These people are similar to the elders.

Including Dongwang, after a period of surprise training, he also served as a secretary of the ministry, which is actually equivalent to joining the cabinet as the head of the organization department.

In addition to him, there is also Li Wenmao is the head of the household department or the minister of civil affairs, and at present, the two newcomers in the cabinet are in the army, and the others are in the army, as for the remaining cabinet members, they all followed him back from Nanyang, but most of them are recruited locally, but fortunately, the ancestral home of these cabinet scholars is Fujian in addition to Liangguang, but they are still united. After all, they are all fanatical believers of Yang Feng, such as the difference between Tuke and Ke no longer exists, and now all those who believe in the God Emperor are brothers and sisters, I have to say that religion is still very useful at this point, the best way to bridge the contradiction is to give them a god, and they may divide it again in the future, but at least at the beginning this god is very effective.

Especially during the rise of the empire.

"God Emperor, this railway does have to be repaired, but it takes too long, and our talents have not been cultivated, it is better to try to build a steel mill in the port first to practice workers, and then go to repair other places."

He Kun, the secretary of his Ministry of Industry, said.

This Shangshu was actually a Javanese Chinese, and he was also a merchant sailor, and even went to Europe with the Dutch, and he had seen railroads.

"Okay, then let's build roads, and send all the Tartar horses we captured to the front line, and then let these horses pull the wagons, and let the vehicle factory make a large number of special load-carrying four-wheeled carriages, and send those green battalions and regimental training that have surrendered to build roads. Let those political commissars explain to them more about the significance of this road, and tell them that there are countless rice piled up in our port waiting to be transported over, if this road is repaired and our logistics and transportation are unimpeded, then I can promise that after the army enters Hunan, the people of Hunan will not eat a grain of rice, and the people of Hunan will be exempted from grain for three years! ”

Yang Feng said.

He can't expect to rely solely on land reform to solve the resistance that will inevitably occur in Hunan, land reform is only a means, the key is to achieve food and clothing for the common people, as long as the people who have been allocated land are immediately fed, then no matter how agitated those gentry, don't expect to become the ones who have shaved their heads.

Land reform cannot do this all at once.

To truly solve the problem of food and clothing, we must rely on improved seeds, new agricultural technology, new agricultural tools, and perfect water conservancy facilities.

And these take time.

After the land reform in Guangdong, the common people immediately achieved food and clothing, because he collected less, and at the same time collected as little food as possible from the common people, he also used the money from fighting local tyrants in Guangdong to buy a large amount of grain from Nanyang, especially Annam, Siam, and Burma, to supply the army and the non-agricultural population. It is a large influx of grain from outside, so that Guangdong and Guangxi can have enough food and clothing while experiencing the war, and he is still ready to continue to play this strategy, that is to say, after entering Hunan, he will continue to transport grain to supply the army and those non-agricultural populations while reforming and dividing land, that is to say, he will not collect grain on the spot in Hunan.

He didn't believe that there were still common people being deceived by the gentry.

On the one hand, the land reform allows the people to get the land they dream of, and on the other hand, the tax reduction allows the people to immediately feel the sunshine of the new era.

In this way, you can avoid having your head shaved.

Then this transportation problem is very important, it is easy for him to buy grain and transport grain from Nanyang, because the Chinese everywhere in Nanyang can do this for him, in fact, there are millions of Nanyang Chinese behind Emperor Yang to support his war.

But he put these grains, there are good varieties of agricultural machinery and even fertilizers in the future, it is said that he has already begun to dig guano, and there is no shortage of these things on the islands of the South China Sea, in short, he needs a real blood transfusion line from Guangdong to Hunan, relying on continuous blood transfusion to disintegrate the power of the gentry, in the final analysis, he is still jealous of Zeng Shaved Head, at this time Zeng Shaved Head has already entered the Hanlin Academy, Hu Linyi is even earlier than him, Zuo Zongtang ......

Well, Zuo Zongtang didn't pass the exam again.

He had to be very careful about the province of Hunan.

Now the construction of the railway is indeed a bit exaggerated, after all, it is the time to repair the Guangdong-Hanzhou railway, this section is also notoriously difficult to repair, you have to build bridges and dig tunnels, but a modern highway is much simpler, you can run a four-wheeled horse-drawn carriage, anyway, a total of less than a hundred miles, and can only be said to be hilly and not really mountainous.

Let those green battalions understand the significance of this road, and after repairing this road, the Ming army will not collect grain from the local area in Hunan......

They'll give it their all.

"Your Majesty, British Negotiator Davis has arrived!"

At this time, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs Shangshu Qian Feng reported.

"Ah, here comes the one who brought us silver!"

Yang Feng said happily.

Half an hour later.

"Your Majesty, the United Kingdom will not pay you a pound sterling, you must release our soldiers and ships at once, or you will have to pay for it, and the Royal Navy will use the cannons of the Victory to let you know the consequences of offending the flag of St. George."

Yilu's former predecessor, Davis, a Chinese Tong who had been to Beijing as an envoy, said angrily.

He was a little out of control.

This god emperor who is said to be a demon or a wizard is simply crazy, and his mouth is 21 million taels of silver, which is almost equivalent to nearly 7 million pounds, and the British Empire has not spent so much in a year at this time, and this money can rebuild the Royal Navy once, and the cost of a first-class battleship is only 100,000, although the British Empire has just made a windfall, but the problem is that this windfall has not yet arrived, and Davis is also very worried about whether he can get it in the future.

And this bastard is going to do it now.

"You're talking to me?"

Yang Feng's face sank and he instantly came to Davis, and then he pointed his finger, Davis screamed and his left ear fell off, and the poor negotiator covered the bloodless wound, looking at the ear on the ground with a confused expression, obviously not understanding how it fell.

"Drag him over, and dare to scare me with the Victory, is an old coffin board that is almost ninety very majestic? I'll show you what is the new era, what is a real battleship, and what is the master of the sea! St. George's flag? Keep polishing your boots for the future! Royal Navy? Let's chop it as firewood in the future! Your time has long passed, the era of sail battleships is over, your glory is gone! ”

Yang Feng shouted emotionally.

Then he took Davis to the shipyard.