Previously, Wei Gao and Gao Yue attacked the southwest, first consolidated Qionglai Pass, and then attacked Lizhou, which was adjacent to Zhuzhou. The three Dongman tribes here, namely Wu Deng, Lianglin and Fengpi, all of their respective great ghost lords surrendered to the Tang army. Later, the Tang Dynasty conferred Wu Deng Da Ghost Lord Zhu Song as the Duke of Changchuan County, and Lianglin Da Ghost Lord Zhu was the King of Shunzheng County at that time, and appointed Fengpa's great ghost lords as the King of Heyi County. The three of them came to the capital Chang'an to attend the banquet of the Emperor Yulinde Hall.

But shortly after returning to the country, Wu Deng's ghost lord Zhu Song died of illness. His son Zhu Piaoli was still young, so the Eastern Barbarian tribe sent envoys to Wei Gao to request that Zhu Song's younger brother Zhu Mengchong be regent - Wei Gao also agreed, and then asked the court to enthrone Zhu Mengchong as the prince of Huaihua County, and also serve as the envoy of the Qiong tribe, to rule over the strongest Wu Deng tribe among the three tribes.

But who would have thought that the "Yunling Grand Theory" of Xifan stationed in Zhuzhou was Shang Jiezan's eldest son Qizang, but he took the initiative to attack and secretly instigated Zhu Mengchong!

It turned out that Zhu Mengchong had great ambitions. Not only did he want to control the Wu Deng tribe, but he also wanted to use the help of the Xifan to annex the two forests and Fengpa, so as to "unify the Eastern Barbarian tribes, separate Lizhou, and become the fourth leader after the Tang, Xifan and Yunnan."

The military officers placed in Lizhou and Yazhou quickly reported Zhu Mengchong's movements to the Jiedushi. Wei Gao was angry and shocked. He understood that whether it was the Eastern Man or the eight small Qiang countries on the west mountain of Shu Capital, they actually followed the Tang Dynasty and maintained a close relationship with the Western Man. Wei Gao had previously called the Eight Kingdoms of the Western Mountains "two-sided Qiang", but now he called Zhu Mengchong the "Erth-headed Man" and cursed him, but Wei Gao was calm outside, mastered the army and closely monitored the movements of the various divisions of the Eastern Man.

Sure enough, at the beginning of this spring, when the Tang army was working hard to Pingqiang in Yuzhou, Xiazhou, and the main forces such as the East and North Roads began to siege and eliminate the Tang army's last stronghold in Hexi, Shazhou (Dunhuang), the warlike and martial Qizang could not help but use Ma Dingde, a cage official who was familiar with geography, and used Weizhou Taideng City as the center of the stronghold, frequently crossed the mountain roads around Qingxi Pass, colluded with Zhu Mengchong, who was still loyal to the Tang Dynasty, attacked and robbed Lianglin and Fengpa, who were still loyal to the Tang Dynasty, and restrained the Great

The first to be hit in the other battlefields of Fan was the great ghost lord of Fengpa. This lord was very young and full of energy. He led his tribe members to resolutely fight against the Western Ban soldiers, but he could not defeat the beggar and cover them. The crops in Kaitun were trampled by the Western Ban cavalry. Then, the Xifan soldiers guarded their own city and continued to resist. Under the leadership of Ma Dingde, the Western Ban soldiers took a small road to capture Fengpa Guan City, burning down the living rooms and halls of the Fengpa barbarians - Feiping fled, and the seal given to him by the Tang Dynasty was also thrown away.

Without the seal, Piao Ping cried and ran to Qionglai Pass barefoot, told Tang Jiashou that he had committed a death sentence and actually lost the seal given by the emperor and Wei Gong.

Soon Wei Gao from Shu Capital engraved a new seal for the Piaoping, and also gave the Fengpa tribe many weapons, silk and food, promising: "Don't cry, I will not only give you a new seal, but also send troops to avenge you soon! Before that, you led the tribe and the two barbarians to defend the Zhu Castle of Lizhou, waiting for my order."

At this time, the war between Xifan and Tang was on the verge of being surrounded by Lizhou.

Gao Yue entrusted Li Xian to send Wei Gao the plan: "Qian Rong (also known as Xifan) betrayed his faith, Shang Qixin'er, Ma Chongying attacked our Hexi Shazhou, and begged to hide and jump the beams in Jiannan Lizhou. If you want to rest assured, you must cut off the Qiang Rong's arm... After the money and food are available, I will work with Chengwu, joining Dongchuan Du Huangshang, gathering the elite troops of the Three Sichuans, attacking the Qiang and hide and climbing the city on the Taichung of the Weizhou, and beheading his head to shock the Qiang Rong, so that he could not be happy in the Western Regions."

Wei Gao, who received Gao Yue's signal, was overjoyed and secretly dispatched troops to Yazhou to prepare for the battle.

On the other hand, in the Zichen Hall of Daming Palace in Chang'an City, the emperor specially called out the four ruling ranks of Dou Shen, Ban Hong, Dong Jin and Jia Dan.

Military struggles will inevitably be accompanied by political frictions.

The issue at that time was that after Dou Shen implemented the law, he asked the emperor to reduce the "main fee for all soldiers and grain money."

It turns out that since the emperor moved to Fengtian, all the towns of the county have raised troops to serve the king, and then the governors have also taken this opportunity to do two things:

First, take the opportunity to expand the number of troops and ask the imperial branch office for more money and grain quotas to raise soldiers. However, in fact, if you report to expand 10,000 troops, there may not be any expansion of 5,000. The additional 5,000 places were all eaten by the Jiedushi;

2. In the name of supplying the army, miscellaneous taxes such as "major army food and materials" and "rewards and sets of money" are imposed within their respective jurisdictions, which will increase the burden on the people.

In fact, Gao Yue also did these two things in Xingyuan and Fengxiang, but his expansion was solid, and his "filling the registration" was always strictly controlled at one-tenth of the proportion. In addition, he did not impose miscellaneous taxes. He needed to revitalize the various agricultural, industrial and commercial industries of Xingyuan Fengxiang and rectify taxes through the law of the boundary, without adding additional burden to the people.

But Dou Shen used this to say to the emperor: "Now that the national crisis has been pacified, most of the soldiers recruited by various departments have been ordered to be disbanded and returned to the agriculture industry by the Jiedushi. For example, Han Huan, who was the governor of Xuanrun Town, once served as the governor of the Navy, not only expanded the fangs and Caishi and other towns to 30,000, but also ordered the states to recruit more land units, including 800 small states and 1,000 large states, which are all supported by regular taxes. Now the Zhenhai Army has cut troops, less than three-fifths of the original, but the amount of self-imposed taxes is cut from the regular taxes every year, and the amount of the miscellaneous taxes has not decreased. The troops are gone, but the taxes are still there. The root cause of the insufficient taxes in the court is this."

Then Dou Shen reiterated the old story, and said that the Fang Towns of Gao Yue's Xingyuan, Fengxiang, Wei Gao's Xichuan and other Fang Towns had abolished the unity of the prefectures and counties. Three-fifths of the reformed army were Shooting soldiers, and the camps and fields were self-sufficient; only two-fifths were generals and soldiers, so the "recruitment" and "liuzhou" part of Fang Town's official tax was supported. However, the "tax sharing quota" signed between these Fang Towns and the court remained unchanged. The money given to the Duzhi Department every year was still enough, and all the saved ones were entered into Dingwu and Yining,

In the private treasury of Fengyi and other troops, Gao Yue and Wei Gao used this money to weave, brew wine, grow cotton, etc., and the money was getting more and more, but half a penny was not included in the treasury! Dou Shen strongly suggested that Gao Yue must copy the anvil base book after the law of the scriptures to the Ministry of Revenue. In addition, Gao Yue must cooperate with the court to readjust the proportion of the two taxes "three ranks" (offering, re-entry and liuzhou) in Xingyuan and Fengxiang, and strive to give most of the extra money to the capital instead of leaving it for personal use by himself.

The emperor was very hesitant and told Dou Shen that Gao Yue's income was mostly tax-trading income, and it was difficult for the court to ask for it.

After all, in this era, the court's tax collection benchmark was mainly limited to land and population, and at most it was added indirect consumption tax such as salt, wine, and tea, which lacked the ability to tax positively on commercial activities.

Dou Shen said that Gao Yue also had a detailed statistics on the "population and assets" of various households in the merchants and Kufang. As long as the Ministry of Revenue obtained his Jinji, everything would be fine.

"What you say is very good, but..." After a long time, the emperor spoke.
Chapter completed!