Lin'an, the palace of the king of Chu. Pen, fun, and www.biquge.info

Li Chuyuan's face turned pale, and he threw the battle report that came back to the ground.

"It's been half a month, and 6,000 people have died but not even a single Wu County has been defeated, this Jiang Ying is really a waste, if so, I don't know if it is the Year of the Ox and the month of the horse after taking Suzhou City."

When he spoke, Li Chuyuan looked very irritable.

He couldn't help but be in a hurry now, in order to buy flintlock pistols and ammunition, the Chu State spent 12 million taels of silver in this year's time, and he was also forced to ask for the silver taels to be exchanged for the dragon coins of the Great Yu Kingdom, and the unequal proportion of the exchange made the second layer of the money be stripped of the second layer.

In the past, when he was the prince of the king of Chu, he didn't understand, but now that he has become the king of Chu, he understands that this tea, rice, oil, and salt are expensive.

Although Jiangnan is rich in the world, and Chu is rich in Jiangnan, but so much silver is enough to make him feel distressed, but as long as he can defeat the merchant council and pay this price, it doesn't matter.

But the current state of the war clearly displeased him.

Sima Hao sat under Li Chuyuan, after the Cao family fled to Suzhou, he immediately united with the wealthy families of Chu to send Li Chuyuan to the throne, and within a few days, the holy decree of the imperial court also arrived, at this time Li Chuyuan was justified in both the imperial court and the Chu state.

Gently brushing his beard, Sima Hao looked indifferent, he said: "Your Highness don't worry, war is not an overnight thing, this Jiang Ying is from a family of famous generals, compared to other generals is still very good, as far as I know, the parliamentary army is very cunning, they dug a lot of trenches in Wu County, built a lot of earthen walls, it is by relying on trenches and earthen walls that they can stop Jiang Ying's attack, in the opinion of the lower officials, they must find a way to overcome the trenches." “

"Hey, today's Holy Northern Expedition army only took a few days to conquer Pingzhou, and Jinzhou is not more than a few days, why is it our turn to fight this battle so hard." Li Kaiyuan sighed deeply.

Sima Hao shook his head slightly, "This matter is actually very simple, because the firearms sold to us by the emperor are all eliminated by the royal army. ”

"This king knows, but even so, this obsolete weapon is more advanced than that of the merchant council, after all, in addition to the smoothbore flintlock pistol, we also bought rifled flintlock pistols, no, the problem is not the musket, but the artillery, the artillery we use is left by our father, and the artillery used by the merchant council was sold to them by the French." Li Chuyuan suddenly realized.

Sima Hao pondered for a moment, and he said: "It seems that this is the truth, Jiang Ying's battle report said that the range of our artillery is not as good as that of the Merchant Council. ”

Li Chuyuan suddenly stood up when he heard this, and he said: "In the past, my father bought the earliest artillery in Qingzhou, and these cannons could sweep the kings at that time, but now they are not of much use, and now we must buy artillery with a longer range and greater power from Qingzhou." ”

"Your Highness, these 80,000 muskets are still so expensive, if you buy more artillery, I'm afraid that most of the silver in the treasury will be consumed, which is equivalent to a hundred years of accumulation in the Chu State and a day to the royal family." Sima Hao was a little painful.

Although the state of Chu is rich, the treasury is not inexhaustible, not to mention that most of the wealth in Jiangnan is in the hands of the wealthy families.

Li Chuyuan immediately laughed evilly when he heard this, and he said, "Doesn't my uncle want to buy some artillery for the Sima family's troops?" “

As soon as these words came out, Sima Hao's pupils dilated a little.

Now that Jiangnan has become a pot of porridge, the biggest reliance on the Hao clan is not Li Chuyuan but their subordinates, so they have been coveting muskets and artillery for a long time.

"Your Highness is ready to lift the ban on firearms?" Sima Hao was shocked and said that when the king of Lai Chu was alive, he had ordered that the Hao clan tribes were strictly forbidden to possess firearms.

Li Chuyuan nodded affirmatively, "The Merchant Council relies on the giant merchants and rich people, and the folk group exercises to confront this king, why can't this king rely on the Hao clan tribe to deal with them?" ”

Sima Hao's eyes turned, since the death of the old King of Chu, in fact, the Sima family has no reverence for the Li family at all, and the reason why Li Chuyuan is the king of Chu is really a helpless move at present.

After all, there are still some wealthy families in the Chu State who support Li Chuyuan, if it weren't for this, the Sima clan would have already taken his place, so why bother to be subservient to others.

Coughing lightly, he said, "Your Highness is eloquent and strategic, and such a strategy is really admired by the lower officials. ”

"Uncle praised it falsely, this is just a helpless move by this king." Li Chuyuan's smile was a little complicated.

Sima Hao was a little excited, and he said: "If this is the case, Sima is willing to bear a hundred old-style cannons for His Highness, but these old cannons lack range and power, and His Highness can't sell them to us at the price he once bought." ”

Li Chuyuan nodded, and he said: "In the past, when my father bought these artillery, it cost almost tens of thousands of taels of silver, but now five thousand taels can always be sold, after all, although the range of these cannons is insufficient, it is still enough within a few hundred meters, and generally speaking, the artillery shoots best in this range." ”

Sima Hao's heart was bright, he had long coveted firearms, so he said: "Well, five or twenty thousand is not a large amount for the Sima family, but it is obviously not enough to have artillery, it would be better if there were muskets, can Your Highness buy muskets from Qingzhou on my behalf?" ”

"Uncle's business is the king's business, of course." Li Chuyuan laughed.

Sima Hao echoed and laughed, he couldn't wait, "Then Xia Guan will go back to prepare the silver." ”

With that, Sima Hao saluted Li Chuyuan and turned to leave.

Seeing Sima Hao disappear into the main hall, Li Chuyuan punched the table in front of him fiercely.

"Bastard, do you really think this king is a fool!" Li Chuyuan's eyes carried a hint of despair.

Just now he was just testing Sima Hao, but the results he got made him see the reality clearly, almost everything he did in the past year would be constrained, and he knew who was making trouble behind it.

After living in Qingzhou for two years and coming back again, he lost all his roots, and he finally understood why Xiao Ming asked him that sentence in the imperial study.

It turned out that even if he came back, he would not be able to return to the sky, and could only become a puppet of the Sima clan.

"You forced me to do this." Li Chuyuan muttered in his mouth, maybe he was lucky to be able to restore the Chu State, but now he just wants to fight for a rich second half of his life, after all, he already has a wife and children.

This time, he lifted the ban on firearms in order to test Sima Hao and also to show favor to Xiao Ming, before the Chu State was destroyed, through the arms deal, the wealth of the Chu State would be transferred to Qingzhou, with his understanding of this emperor, he would definitely be very happy.

However, he is not without conditions, after the larger firearms trade begins, he will let Xiao Ming leave a way for himself to escape.

Thinking of this, he immediately drew up an excerpt and asked Xiao Ming to send officials to Lin'an to negotiate.

Four days later, the excerpt arrived in Qingzhou.