Among the crowds of people leaving the Chenyang Hall of Shoushan Palace, various news has spread everywhere. "Xiangyang was lost!!" "How could Xiangyang be lost" "That was the great city of Jingbei built by the two major forces, a hub of all roads" "Isn't it because the Han River is dangerous? . . . The boat divisions were guarding and traveling. "There were no problems during the two Northern Expeditions and Fanhu went south. How could it be that the enemy came from Shu?" "First, we cut off many strongholds along the coast, and then drove directly from the road to Xiangyang's back road" "The morale of the troops in the front was in great confusion. Although the commander-in-chief suppressed them, they focused on one thing and lost the other" "Although tens of thousands of soldiers and civilians gathered in the city, But they are short of food, pay, and equipment." "As for the boat division, it is already a thing of the past." "Since the disbandment of Jingbei Xingsi and the disintegration of the armies, most of the boat division has been sent downstream to protect Jiangning. ." "The rest were dispersed as water bandits nearby." "The local naval commander, Sun Yichen, raised more than 20 large and small ferries to carry troops to the upper reaches of Fancheng. They launched a fire attack and most of them were burned and capsized in the river. "Since then, there was no help inside and outside Fancheng and it was trapped." "After losing several battles and forcing them to retreat, they began to break through." "Jingnan will be destroyed soon." , the western thieves will be able to reach the bank of the river." "From then on, the north of the river is no longer owned by the country." For others, it is "drawing troops together to cause trouble." The strategy of "leading to the east" was completely bankrupt. The northern territory that the imperial court took the initiative to shrink the defense line and retreated did not allow those Western thieves and Huai Ni to fight and compete with each other in the Central Plains. Instead, they continued to kill the forces of the southern imperial court. How could this happen? We can't make them extremely worried. The same cannot be said for the south of the Yangtze River. The essence of the southeast's wealth centers, including Jiangdong, Jiangxi, and Liangzhe, have mostly become paradises for big cloud thieves and all kinds of chaotic people. Except for a few prefectural cities headed by Jiangning Prefecture and important cities. Outside, as far as the eye can see, there is no peaceful place to stand. And just to maintain the situation and basic roads within the ridge, the country had to spend tens of millions of dollars on military food and salary every month, and astronomical amounts of goods were filled into this bottomless pit every day. Once the protection of Shuzhong and Jinghu in the upper reaches is lost, the traditional Southern Dynasty structure that continues to occupy Lingnei may not be able to maintain and return to the dangerous situation at the founding of the country. However, for another conservative force that has re-emerged in the court, these seemingly unfavorable changes are relatively good news; because it also means that the court may give up and it is unrealistic in the ridge. The persistence and the so-called false reputation of the results of the Northern Expedition have re-directed the focus and attention to the management and stabilization of the basic market outside the mountains; and even the possibility of changing the general policy, and investing all kinds of resources and personnel for war preparations into more Familiarity and convenience for overseas colonization. At least, they relied on military pressure on the Western Kaido vassals to complete the latest round of negotiation and victory. While continuing to retain some of their authority and status and no longer pursue or implicate them, they forced them to cede territory, pay compensation, and Only by taking hostages and pleading guilty, reducing titles, abdicating, and even disbanding and handing over a certain scale of private armed forces, and handing over a sufficient number of ships and the remnants of the rebel navy hidden on the islands, was the court's latest investment The cost of organizing and training each army. However, the generals and officers who were lost during the two Northern Expeditions are not so easy to train and replenish. Therefore, there is an urgent need for a group of new generals brought back by the only remaining Northern Commander-in-Chief, Wang Duanchen. , it is possible to re-form basic combat capabilities in a relatively short period of time. And in Beizhou, Hebei Province, Cui Boqi, who had become a wanted bandit leader with a fifty-minute bounty on his head, also tried his best to gallop across the wilderness on the run. It had only been such a winter, and when he came out of the mountains where Mao Dong was hiding, he found that the world he was familiar with seemed to have been completely changed, and he was almost unrecognizable. There are villagers carrying weapons parading on the road everywhere, and there are many road junctions and mountain passes everywhere.Various defensive settlements, inns and outposts were built in Jinjin and the market. Once they made the slightest movement, they suffered heavy losses from various pursuits and interceptions. And once upon a time, these despicable people, who in the past had no choice but to humiliate themselves even though they had no choice but to tolerate it with a smile, actually dared to resist their request for cooperation while they lurked down to rest, asking for little bits and taking away the young and strong; Cui Boqi A bloodstain on his brow and most of the story trapped in his hometown village were the heavy price he paid for his momentary neglect. You must know that most of the land in the dozen or so villages around here belongs to the Cui clan. The tenants and slaves who farm and work for the Cui clan alone account for more than 80% of the residents of these villages. . However, in front of the swords and guns they brought out to show off their power, the former tenants and villagers almost gathered together, resisted by closing the doors and blocking the windows, and at the same time set off fireworks on the roof to report the news; if he hadn't gotten out in time when he saw the opportunity. If so, I'm afraid he would be trapped in the village that was once so familiar to him. And all these are the huge changes brought about by those Huai Ni. You must know that his ancestor was also a member of the Cui family of Qinghe, one of the seven major clans in Shandong. During the nearly thousand years from the Han Dynasty and the Three Kingdoms to the Sui and Tang Dynasties, during the period when the five surnames and Qiwang were at their peak, , they even have a more prestigious and prominent reputation and power than the Emperor's family, and they basically only intermarry within small circles within each other's clan to ensure the nobility and purity of their bloodline. And those kings who were born in a rough way or who had the blood of the Hu people all tried their best to marry the daughter of a certain family of the five surnames and the seven most popular ones, in order to gain some recognition and recognition in the blood, and then use this to get from the five surnames. The surnamed Qi Wangzhong recruits corresponding learned scholars or outstanding children to enrich his court and local officials to strengthen and stabilize his rule. The aristocratic families also obtained more privileges and benefits from the court, and through various annexations of land and hiding in exile, more people and acres of land were brought under their direct or indirect control, even within the limited government. In addition to the ruling order, in the name of following ethics and rural conventions and folk customs, they created a set of exclusive social ethics and moral systems from the state and county down to carry out disguised implicit ideological rule and public opinion guidance. And any dissident and opposing voices that arose during this period either surrendered and begged for mercy before the power and forces rooted in the government system, or disappeared completely due to various accidents and banditry. Even the Li and Tang dynasties, which claimed to be the most prosperous in imperial power and national power, claimed to open the door to poor families through the imperial examination and tried their best to suppress land annexation. By the Kaiyuan period, the imperial court was filled with the royal family of prime ministers and relatives. The lineage of concubines is still Cui Wei Pei Lu, who are inextricably linked to the five surnames and Qi Wang, or simply are prominent families of branch clansmen. This relationship of struggle and confrontation, as well as compromise and dependence, lasted until the outbreak of the Anshi Rebellion. It was seriously broken and divided because of the different positions and tendencies of the five surnames and seven families. Heavy losses were suffered in the continuous war that swept most of the world. Finally, the chaos in the world was finally settled. Emperor Qianyuan, who then brought order to the chaos, and Emperor Taixing, who later started to revive with the help of Liang Gong, began to take advantage of the situation to further suppress and weaken the power of these noble families, and once again served as successors. It is one of the national policies that the country has always adhered to. In the hands of the successive emperors and descendants of the ruling Liang Gong, the Tang Dynasty gradually recovered its vitality and commanded all directions. There were continuous conquests and expansion of territory at home and abroad, and generations of princes divided the country and divided the country. , also began to be born in any land where the soldiers and business travelers of the Tang Dynasty set foot. But for the aristocratic families who were suppressed by the powerful imperial power and could not breathe, it was a dark time that they could not bear to look back on. The treasures and vast amounts of physical resources transported back from overseas greatly strengthened the power and power of the imperial court's centralized power, and also armed and maintained large-scale military forces at home and abroad. And these are not Leos that any one or a group of aristocratic families can easily resist and violate; not to mention, under the guidance of the government, a large number of bankrupt farmers and fleeing tenants have also become the followers of these aristocratic families. The personal control and social influence of the place are the inducements and triggers of further weakness and decline. They even have to lower their status little by little and use the hometown party sentiment that is difficult to leave their hometown and the continuous improvement of tenant treatment to try to restore and curb the continuous loss of these hidden dominant populations. It was also an era when officials from poor families and common people were becoming popular all over the world. Every famous family had to show their noble heads and bodies, and desperately restrained their own children and relatives to avoid being betrayed by these people who were eager to make achievements but had no foundation.The ruthless officials in this country gave him the excuse and opportunity to find Daxing prison and criminal prosecution. So when the DPRK in the Yiwei period began to show various countercurrents and undercurrents against the ruling Liang family and his party members, these wealthy and powerful families, county officials, and nobles who had been suffering for a long time almost immediately hit it off and started to push forward with all their strength. Therefore, in the Yiwei Rebellion that broke out later, in a sense, they both succeeded and failed; although they were able to overturn the turbid current and counter-current that they had suppressed above their heads, and made them The Longwu Clan and its members who controlled the government in the era when people could hardly breathe; but it also ushered in a long and endless chaos, and the endless suffering and blood and tears that followed; instead of returning to the past as they wished. It is an ideal era in which aristocratic families and the emperor competed with each other, compromised and depended on each other within the limited framework of high-end political struggles. When the Mad Emperor clan, the main culprits of the troubled times, were completely purged and massacred by the Dragon Martial Arts branches who took turns retaliating from all over the world, these aristocratic families who had been the driving forces and supporters behind the scenes also ushered in a new round. The wave of liquidation and revenge, and the irresistible overthrow and demise in the rolling trend of the times. It can be said that his family is one of the few remnants that managed to escape the destruction of the family because of its too remote distant relatives. Despite this, according to the strong status that his family has established in the local area and the thousands of clan members. The large surnames formed by the people are still ups and downs in this troubled times, continuing to control the voice and social resources of the local villages; and even rely on the Uburgs and walled cities built for generations to easily gather a large amount of food and asylum-seeking people , with the rash heroes who are swirling and dying one after another, or with the officials of the vassal town one after another, the long-term dealings and games continue; even if the tenants and people working around them died in the hunger, cold, soldiers, fires and famines Generation after generation has passed, but Cui's status as a prominent figure and the head of the village has remained intact. However, the arrival of Huai Zhen completely broke everything they were familiar with, and forced them to embark on a decisive path of struggle. Until now, many people, including him, still do not understand or understand why the Huai army cannot properly appease and rely on the local wealthy families and prominent figures to continue to maintain this good situation of order and respect. Go down; Why should they, good families, prestigious clans, and rural gentry who have maintained local peace and stability for generations, be driven to a dead end without any compromise, without even a little room for accommodation and tolerance? Therefore, they could only direct their anger and resentment to everything related to Huai Town; they attacked and killed officials who left the city or went to the countryside, burned and plundered the settlements of new immigrants, and robbed the teams transporting supplies. Then, relying on the familiarity of the place and the tips from people everywhere, and even the convenient location for hiding and shelter, they dealt with the garrison soldiers who came to attack, causing them to rush into the air again and again or return without success. However, after just one winter, everything changed. No one informed them anymore, most of the familiar faces and supporters disappeared, and the hiding places and places where supplies were obtained were completely changed. . Therefore, as activities became more and more difficult, they had to take the initiative to find some familiar villages. Suddenly, his horse's hooves softened and he fell heavily forward and rolled to the ground. He was so shaken that he struggled to get up. Then, he couldn't help but trembled and knelt down on the ground in despair, because, just in front of his path, rows of lead-gray horizontal arrays and forests of metal reflections vaguely appeared. Then came the forest-like flags held up all over the mountains and plains by the cavalry, as if they were endless and heading towards his direction.