Chapter 1060 Princess of the Three Kingdoms, Attacking Shu

The first day of June.

It was five o'clock in the morning and it was still dark.

As the eunuchs kept calling him, Su Mingzhe finally remembered that he had to attend the morning court today. He hurriedly patted the beauty in his arms, signaling her to move.

Princess Emei of Shu Kingdom moaned and slowly opened her beautiful eyes. She felt the man's warm hands wandering on her back. She looked at the man with innocent eyes and reminded him softly:
"Your Majesty, it's time to pay attention to Sister Zhenning."

It took Su Mingzhe a while to react, and then he was amused by the woman:
"I'll see your sister Zhen Ning in the evening. Now I have to go to the morning court."

Princess Zhenning of Liang State was a light sleeper. When she heard someone calling her name in a daze, she opened her eyes.

A few seconds later, Princess Zhenning knew that the man was going to attend court, so she climbed down from the bed, called the palace maid, brought the Han emperor's crown and dragon robe into the bedroom, and had the man change into them.

Princess Yining of the Tang Dynasty, who was sleeping in the bed, was so tired that she did not even open her eyes until the man left.

Su Mingzhe rode on a sedan chair and arrived at Taiji Palace before the first rays of dawn.

The Han Dynasty held a grand court meeting at the beginning and middle of each month.

The small court meeting is held every fifth day.

The topics of this grand meeting were mainly "summer floods" and "conquering Shu".

From May to August, it has always been the peak period of summer flood disasters in the Yellow River Basin.

Since the Sui and Tang Dynasties, the vegetation in the middle and upper reaches of the Yellow River has begun to be destroyed on a large scale.

Soil erosion on the Loess Plateau is becoming increasingly serious, and the climate crisis is becoming more severe.

According to the previously surveyed data, Su Mingzhe arranged the Minister of Works Duan Lianshan to be in charge of the summer flood control work.

Duan Lianshan, although he has no political stance and is the type of person who sits on the fence, has a very serious attitude towards work and outstanding abilities.

Let Duan Lianshan be in charge of the summer flood work and give him a little spiritual encouragement, and Su Mingzhe will feel much more at ease.

Afterwards, the Minister of Rites reported back that the Shu Emperor Yan resisted the Han Dynasty's call for surrender.

"I knew that Wang Yan would not be so obedient. In this case, at the beginning of next month, I will personally lead the army to attack Shu."

Su Mingzhe knew what kind of person Wang Yan was before sending out the envoy.

The reason why envoys were sent to Shu to persuade it to surrender was entirely for the sake of Princess Du Juan of Emei, to give Wang Yan another choice.

Since Emperor Yan of Shu was unwilling to accept the favor and insisted on making a fuss, Su Mingzhe was not reluctant to make the trip.

Coincidentally, Su Mingzhe also wanted to see what kind of beauties the two "Ladies Huarui" of Shu Kingdom were like.

During the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms period, there were five extremely beautiful ladies, whose names were passed down to later generations under the names of "Lady Huarui" and "Queen Zhou".

The first Lady Huarui was Empress Dowager Xu, the mother of Emperor Wang Yan of Shu.

The Queen Mother of Shu was already in her mid-forties, five or six years older than the Queen Mother of Tang, Princess Zhenning of Liang (the mother of Yuanjie and Yuancheng).

The second Lady Huarui, Fei, is still in her teens and has not yet married Meng Chang, the ruler of Later Shu.

The third Lady Huarui, and the two Queens Zhou, the elder and the younger, were all concubines of the last emperor of Southern Tang.

Thinking of the last emperor of Southern Tang, Su Mingzhe suddenly remembered something.

Li Bian, the founding emperor of Southern Tang, whose current name is Xu Zhigao, originally held power in Southern Wu together with his adoptive father Xu Wen.

Xu Wen died of illness last winter.

Now in Southern Wu, Li Sheng is the only one who holds the power in the court.

A few years later, Li Sheng would first proclaim himself Emperor of Qi and then change the country's name to Tang, which is known in history as Southern Tang.

"Nowadays, apart from Qi State, Dingnan Army, Uighur Tribe, and Tang State which were annexed by the Han State, there are still more than a dozen vassal states in the world that claim to be kings and emperors. They are Liang (Later Liang), Chu (Ma Chu), Nanping, Han (Southern Han), Nanzhao, Wu (Southern Wu), Wuyue, Min, Guiyi Army (Jinshan State of the Western Han Dynasty), Wu (Nanyue region), Pei State, Qi State, Xing State, Tubo, Khitan, Bohai, etc." If Su Mingzhe wants to conquer so many kingdoms and vassal states one by one, it will really take some effort.

Finally, the grand court meeting was over.

Su Mingzhe did not return to the harem to continue his absurd behavior, but stayed in the imperial study of Taiji Palace and began to review memorials.

After successively destroying Qi State, Dingnan Army, Uighurs, and Tang State, plus the six states previously seized from Liang State, the current area of ​​Han State is almost equivalent to one-fourth of the territory of the Central Plains region of the Tang Dynasty.

Of course, although the territory is one-fourth of that, the population is less than one-tenth of that.

In the past hundred years, various bandits and military governors have appeared one after another.

Since the Eastern Han Dynasty, local prominent families and thousand-year-old families have been a "difficult problem" for the imperial court. When faced with these unreasonable soldiers, they all became weaklings and fat sheep, and were completely unable to protect the local area.

At this time, "Soldiers pass by like combs, and bandits pass by like rakes" has become the most true portrayal.

Since Su Mingzhe ascended the throne, he has ordered local prefectures, cities and counties to carry out household registration.

After accepting the Tang Kingdom's household registration in April this year, the total population of the Han Kingdom has just exceeded six million.

You should know that during the most prosperous period of the Tang Dynasty, there were 15 million households. If you include hidden populations and unregistered slaves, the total population was close to 80 million.

Today, the Han Kingdom occupies one-fourteenth of the Tang Dynasty's Central Plains territory, but only one-fourteenth of the population.

The population is small, and there are no prominent families, noble families, or powerful families to bully others.

The local administration of the Han Dynasty was exceptionally clean and honest.

In addition, after Su Mingzhe exempted the adult tax and other exorbitant levies, and only collected one tenth of the land tax, the people who had been wandering and fleeing everywhere gradually settled down.

In the blink of an eye, it's the end of the month.

Seeing that the man was about to go to the war, Cui Yingying took Hongniang and Chuntao to sleep with him.

Su Mingzhe originally planned to confer the title of "Yan Fei" on Hongniang, but Hongniang was unwilling to leave Cui Yingying, and finally only accepted the title of "Yanpin".

The four of them are considered an old couple, and they are very warm after the wedding.

The next day was July 1st.

The Han army marched to attack Shu.

When Emperor Yan of Shu learned that the Han army was coming to attack, he was terrified. He immediately ordered the Shu army to relocate the Shu people outside the Shu Road back to Sichuan. He then destroyed the Shu Road, sealed the Jianmen Pass, and prepared to use the most conservative defense method - clearing the fields and fighting the Han army to the end.

Fortifying the city and clearing the fields really works.

Su Mingzhe led the Han army to repair the road while advancing. The Shu Road, which could have been traveled in a dozen days, took more than a month to reach Jiange County.

At this time, the Han army's food supply route had stretched to thousands of miles.

Logically speaking, it is extremely dangerous to have such a long grain route.

But Su Mingzhe dared to do this.

When the army arrived at Jiange County, ten miles outside Jianmen Pass, the captain of the front scout camp came to report:

"Your Majesty, the Shu army has completely sealed off Jianmen Pass, and there is no way out. General Wei ordered me to come and report. Please make a decision as soon as possible!"

"Order the front troops to find a camp five miles outside of Jiange!"

Although the Shu army had sealed the Jianmen Pass, the Han army still had to strictly abide by the rules when setting up camp and could not be careless in the slightest.

This has nothing to do with whether Su Mingzhe is afraid of being ambushed or not; it’s a matter of habit.

(End of this chapter)