The big man has a living father

Chapter 161 (Big Chapter) Fight against the Huns!
When the first steam locomotive arrived at Tongguan, the miners there were so shocked that their jaws dropped even though they had received advance notice.

Although people in mines farther away did not see the steam locomotive at first, a small platform was built in each of the four large open-pit mines. Soon, steam freight trains became well known to them.

Tongguan Station was built at the headquarters of Tongguan Coal Mine.

Along the way, Liu Che had already figured out how much profit the railway could make and was in a good mood. After getting off the train, he saw that Tongguan was pitch black everywhere, but he felt particularly at home.

The heart of industry is as black as mine.

Many of the ministers were here for the first time and they were also very curious about the place.

Although they had heard about the scale of the coal mine a long time ago, as central officials of the empire, they had no time to visit the mine.

I finally seized the opportunity today.

Almost all the ministers wanted to take a closer look at the various things at the Tongguan Coal Mine Headquarters.

Because currently, the opening of coal mines is in a semi-privatized state, in fact everyone here can open a coal mine.

But if an ordinary person opened it, the heavy taxes and increased revenue ratio would belong to the court and Liu Che.

But many people still have their eyes on coal mines.

After all, they have made a lot of money over the past year as the business has developed.

Due to the increase in business prosperity, their personal wealth has increased almost tenfold in the past year, and the assets in their hands have increased dozens of times due to the increase in house prices.

Because there are too many assets and the times have witnessed a period of rapid development, no matter what business you do, the difference is just a matter of making more or less money, and few people lose money.

And when you have the opportunity to examine the most profitable project in the world, how can you not take a closer look?

Liu Che was also very happy. He hadn't been to the mine for a long time. Next time he came, he would go to his office to meet with the important people in the mine.

Liu Che led the team to the second floor, talking and laughing all the way, and turned back to look at the queen: "Queen, this is my office in the mine."

"You've never seen this kind of building before, have you? I'll have one in my palace in the future..."

Liu Che almost let slip the information about the palace upstream of the Bashui River.

Liu Che could only announce the information of the Ba Shui Palace after the development in the south.

Only after the development of the east side did Liu Che announce the plan for the Lishan Palace.

In the future, the new city road section of Chang'an City will be the densely populated center from the new Wei River to the city, and Mount Li connecting Maoling will form an inverted cross zone with the north-south road.

Among them, Maoling is more than 70 kilometers away from Chang'an, and Chang'an is 40 kilometers away from Mount Li.

It is nine kilometers from the center of Chang'an inner city to the Wei River.

It is called a cross, but it is actually a diamond-shaped area that looks like a compass.

For example, it would be enough to plan this area into the Chang'an of the Han Dynasty, let alone the Chang'an of the next 2300 years.

The palace complex built after Emperor Liu Che was built was built around this area.

As for when to repair it, a group of wealthy court officials decided to repair it after living in their newly bought houses for a while and then buy a new house.

If any minister is not convinced and is prepared to go home every day and run more than ten or even dozens of kilometers to work...it's up to him.

Besides, you work far away, and when others get the first-hand information, you are still on the road. By the time you get the news, the source’s dog at home already knows it.

You still want to make money?
This palace - the building of the wealthy area, and the previous mausoleum - the building of the powerful mausoleum county, have the same function.

The difference is that when Liu Che was alive, he distributed money like crazy, raising wages so that people could enjoy what they deserved.

As for the big trees needed for the palace... I'm sorry, the kings behind us, you may not be able to build a super large solid wood palace in the future.

After Liu Che almost let the cat out of the bag, he turned back and changed the subject: "Prince, are you happy today?"

Liu Ju nodded vigorously: "Yes!!! Father!"

Everyone knows that Liu Ju is a mechanical fanatic, and he particularly likes things that can rotate, like windmills.

No matter how well the windmill and the waterwheel can turn, they are just borrowed from the name of cars. The real car still has to run on the road.

At this time, the train had replaced the windmill and became the white moonlight in Liu Ju's heart.

Liu Ju was thinking: After my father dies, carriage 01 will be mine! Oh, it's so hard to wait!
If Liu Che knew what was going on in his little head, he would probably never be able to wait for it in this lifetime.

As he was speaking, Liu Che led the crowd to the office door.

But he saw a young Yulin guard standing at the door.

After Liu Che got off the car, who dared to walk in front of him? So Liu Che was sure that this soldier had always been here.

When faced with an opportunity to take photos and post them on social media, with all the court officials present and historians accompanying them to capture the news at the scene, how could one not show off?
Liu Che asked kindly: "How long have you been here?"

Soldier: "Your Majesty, ten months."

Liu Che: "Oh? You've been guarding this office all the time? No one's taking your shift?"

Soldier: "No!"

Liu Che: "I have never been here, and you have been guarding here all this time?"

The soldier shouted: "The duty of the Imperial Guards is to protect your Majesty. This is your Majesty's office. Every time your Majesty comes, the Imperial Guards will be responsible for guarding this place and prohibiting any unauthorized persons from entering."

Liu Che: "Oh? Then aren't you bored guarding this place where no one comes for the past ten months?"

Xiaobing: "It's not that no one comes. Every other week, someone comes to clean. I can talk to the cleaner that day and check if he has anything he shouldn't have."

Liu Che nodded: "Not boring?"

The soldier shouted: "Serving Your Majesty is my lifelong pursuit!"

Liu Che: "What's your name?"

Soldier: "Shangguan Jie."

Liu Che nodded and said, "Okay, Shangguan Jie, add Qimen Lang."

Historically, Shangguan Jie first worked as a Qimen Lang, and was then sent to feed horses. He was promoted after performing a political show.

At that time, the horses he raised were in very poor condition. When Emperor Wu asked him about it, he said, "I heard that Your Majesty was ill. I was worried all day and couldn't even take care of my own meals, so how could I take care of the horses?"
Then he rose to prominence.

Liu Che was no fool, of course he knew that he did it on purpose.

However, since some people have used innovative methods to pledge their allegiance, they must be rewarded.

Because Liu Che knew very well that there are many kinds of people.

There may be only one person in a thousand who can match Shangguan Jie's brain waves in this way, but among the 40 million people of the Han Dynasty, that number is 40,000.

How can we not reward it?
Because of this, Shangguan Jie in history seized the opportunity to become a close minister, and then showed his abilities to Emperor Liu Che, and eventually became one of the four great ministers.

But at this time, fate has changed.

He, the Qimenlang, is no longer the Qimenlang in history who relied on his age and seniority to get the title.

After all, the Yulin Guards were all orphans of good family soldiers. Whenever Liu Che couldn't find anyone to promote, he would just promote someone from the Yulin Guards.

It actually takes a long time to get promoted slowly by accumulating experience.

This time, Shangguan Jie, who was only sixteen years old, came to prominence.

Shangguan Jie immediately bowed deeply and said, "Thank you, Your Majesty, for your grace. Long live Your Majesty!"

As soon as Liu Che saw it, he knew that he learned this from Huo Hai.

Because others don’t like to be shouted like that, let alone taught like that.

Behind the crowd, Li Guang whispered, "This child was arranged by Huo Hai to be here."

Li Ling, who was brought to see the world, was puzzled: "Grandpa, how do you see that?"

Li Guang: "Do you know why he had to say "Long live the emperor" when he had so many words to express his gratitude?"

"Because of this sentence, Huo Hai is the only one who often uses it in the court."

"Nowadays, whenever His Majesty mentions this sentence, he will think of Huo Hai."

"Your Majesty, whenever you hear these words, you will think of Huo Hai all day long. May he live forever."

This is the simplest way of returning a favor.

Even though Liu Che could feel that this person was arranged by Huo Hai after hearing it, he would not be disgusted.

The coal mine was originally managed by Huo Hai. Isn't it normal for Huo Hai to arrange people to do security?
Shangguan Jie did not hide anything and directly shouted "Long live the emperor", telling Liu Che that it was Lord Huo who arranged for me to be here.

At the same time, he was reminding Liu Che that Huo Hai remembered His Majesty's kindness.

Three birds with one stone.

Liu Che smiled and said: "The young people of the empire are still very energetic. They are energetic, know the rules, and can endure loneliness. They are talented people who can be cultivated!"

A group of officials echoed.

Zhao Po Nu, who was following behind, said: "Your Majesty, when it comes to the young generation who understand the rules, are energetic, and can endure loneliness, it has to be Huo Guang and Huo Zhonglang. It's not just me who said this, I heard that everyone has a high opinion of Huo Zhonglang."

Liu Che: "Speaking of Zimeng, I remember that he has been with me for a year. I will make him a Cao official and a Shizhong to give him some training."

Shizhong was an additional official title that could be obtained by anyone from Zhonglang to princes.

Whoever gets it is one level higher than others at the same level.

Their privileges were to bring the toilet to the emperor before he went to the toilet, to bring the plates to the emperor before he ate, and to bring the bow to the emperor before he went archery.

Of course, these jobs were done by different ministers.

Huo Guang had always been with Liu Che, but he was mainly taken care of, and now he was given a higher position.

The Shizhong was equivalent to an official close minister of Emperor Liu Che.

And Caoguan means subordinate official.

What this means is that Huo Guang went from being a candidate for recruitment to a professional official, and became a favored close minister.

This is a political signal.

The people present were not stupid and they realized it immediately, which made the emperor very happy.

After thinking about it, Liu Che promoted four Yulin guards from the mine, promoted them to lieutenant officers, and sent them back to the Jianzhang Palace and the Weiyang Palace to serve.

The Yulin Guard is currently in a state of insufficient senior officials all year round, and most people do nothing but patrol and play every day.

When they were sent to guard the Tongguan Coal Mine, there was basically only one Yulin Guard to watch over a small mining area. So after a year of training, those who achieved results here almost all had the experience and personnel skills to stand on their own.

As for the skills and knowledge to be able to stand on one's own, they can be taught and should of course be promoted.

The ministers behind him immediately realized that what came out of the Tongguan Coal Mine was not charcoal, but black gold!

From any angle, this has become a very important place in the empire.

In the future, these Yulin Guards will be transformed into high-ranking officials of the empire, or in other words, they will be the reserve force for the title of nobility.

But unfortunately, only the orphans of martyrs can serve as Yulin Guards.

Next, Liu Che summoned Mehefu again.

Mehef now not only controls the money like he did last year, but also has great power.

In the new year, in addition to the coal mines that Liu Che opened in other places, many people applied to him to establish private coal mines.

Moreover, in the new year, the output of Tongguan Coal Mine has been increasing compared with last year.

In fact, the miners at Tongguan Coal Mine are far from reaching the workload limit. The problem is that it is difficult to transport the coal.

After small rail cars were installed in various small mining areas in the first half of the year, the transportation volume increased significantly. In addition, after the road to Chang'an was opened to traffic, the transportation volume increased again, so the output of Tongguan Coal Mine also increased.

In the past ten months, shipments have reached nearly 14 billion!

Last year, the calculation was 900 million per month, 10.8 billion per year, and this year it is even higher.

The estimated dividends for these ten months are 4.6 billion yuan.

If this happened last year, it would have scared everyone present to death!
However, after experiencing the increase in housing prices in the second half of the year, many people are not so sensitive to this number.

Only Liu Che was calculating.

Coal output is equal to the overall industrial output value.

At present, the only large-scale coal mine is Tongguan Coal Mine, which accounts for almost 90% of the country's coal mines.

That is to say, the actual industrial level of the Han Dynasty has increased by about 10% compared with last year.

That's not high.

But with the invention of the train, this amount was bound to skyrocket.

With the steam engine, industries that require energy, such as the textile industry, will gradually move from ideas to real industrial progress next year.

Then, the demand for coal will increase.

Continue to expand mining at Tongguan Coal Mine?
That means that the surface open-pit coal mines will soon be exhausted, which will require a lot of money to be invested in technology.

Or, look for other open-pit coal mines nearby and transfer the miners there.

If there is, there is. Shenmu also has an open-pit coal mine, but with such a large output and so many workers flocking there, it will be mined out in a few years at most.

Therefore, Tongguan Coal Mine is about to enter the underground excavation stage, which requires technological advancement.

At the same time, it is time for Tongguan Coal Mine to allocate part of its profits to open new mining areas.

Because profits decreased after underground mining began, it was necessary to open more large-scale coal mines in other parts of the country and start increasing profits from these new open-pit coal mines.

At the beginning, Liu Che wanted to gradually reduce the proportion of Tongguan Coal Mine in the output value of national coal mines.

This will dilute the proportion of other shareholders in the total national wealth.

But now, the Tianzhu Company, the Xiongnu Company and the Western Regions Company are booming, and with the advent of railways, the proportion of coal mines in the national economy is declining rapidly.

The total wealth of the shareholders has already plummeted as a proportion of the national total. If this continues, they will lose their position as the top wealthiest group in the country.

Therefore, Liu Che was already planning to open branches of Tongguan Coal Mine in other places.

As for the previous year, the huge amount of money that Tongguan Coal Mine invested in researching technology and the results of the research did not belong to Tongguan Coal Mine, but were taken away by the research institute.

The locomotive chassis on today's steam locomotives, including various technologies for the rails, are the results.

Now they are all taken away for free.

It now seems that, starting from the new year, the funds of Tongguan Coal Mine will be returned to the research of coal mining technologies, and these technologies must be used for a fee.

The era of super profits at Tongguan Coal Mine is over.

Of course, this is only relative.

Compared with traditional industries, this is still super profitable.

Not only the Tongguan Coal Mine, but also the Anshen Railway will be completed and the steel mills will have to make profits.

Because up to now, the cheap mines have been almost used up, and it is impossible for the steel mills to continue to provide power for railway construction without making any profit in the future. In that case, wouldn't Huo Hai be running the company without making any profit and also draining his own funds?
Liu Che did not mention this matter in front of his ministers.

Instead, he planned to discuss it with Sang Hongyang.

When Liu Che was returning, more people from Chang'an who heard the news came to the sides of the railway to watch!

The poor Yulin Guards had to change horses at three stables along the way, which exhausted the horses. They just ran to Tongguan with their buttocks swollen from the ride, and then the great emperor returned on the steel behemoth!
They could only start running back again.

Fortunately, the railway was opened to traffic and coal was transported by train immediately, otherwise the managers of several horse farms would be cursing!
This guy, even the fast-running horses were pulled to pieces, how can horses be used in coal mines?

Fortunately, there was a train. But then again, if it weren't for the train, the Imperial Guards wouldn't have broken so many horses.

The people of Chang'an City witnessed with their own eyes an absurdly long train approaching from a distance.

Then I realized that the train was not only ridiculously long, but also ridiculously big and ridiculously fast!

The word "train" is quite famous!

After returning, Liu Che got off the train at the train station. He was so happy that he directly appointed the train driver Du as the commander of the Fengche.

Of course, Su Wu's brother was still the Commandant of Fengche, but this Commandant of Fengche was in charge of the train and was a full-time official.

In other words, if Liu Che wanted to use a train in the future, Du would have to drive it himself.

In fact, Liu Che did not just give Du an official title.

Give Du back his surname!
Du had no surname. In other words, he was neither a descendant of the common nobles in the Yellow Emperor era nor a descendant of the old nobles of the Six Kingdoms, but a descendant of the Jiuli.

Liu Che gave him the surname Li.

Le Duc.

As the saying goes, a horse that moves slowly is called "tu." "Tu" originally means heavy and slow. Now a man named "tu" has become the first driver of the fastest means of transportation, the train.

This event is still very memorable.

Sima Qian even wrote a special chapter on this after he returned, saying that the era that belonged exclusively to the nobility was over, and that ordinary people should also throw off the heavy shackles on their bodies, speed up, and keep up with the development of this era.

From now on, ordinary people will no longer be referred to as "common people", but should be referred to as "common people". The large number of ordinary people without surnames are an important part of the empire and should make great contributions to the economic development of the empire.

It was even suggested that if they had great achievements, granting them surnames should become a normal practice and a kind of honor in the new business era.

This proposal also made Sima Qian stand out and be recognized by many people.

Sima Qian even wrote a short fu "Fu on the People" for this purpose, whose level can be said to be close to that of Jia Yi, and he was only inferior to Huo Hai and Sima Xiangru in this dynasty.

When Liu Che was naming Du, he thought that by giving Du the surname Li, there would definitely be smart people who would understand and increase publicity.

As long as the article is published, the political meaning will be different.

But unexpectedly, this smart man was right beside him. He was a historian, the son of Sima Tan, and the son-in-law of Li Guang's grandson...

Up to now, Liu Che had actually wanted to turn against Li Guang for a long time, the only reason he didn't do so this year was because Huo Hai mediated between them.

After Sima Qian came to prominence, Emperor Liu Che also issued orders to Li Guang.

Li Guang was ordered to collect food and fodder and store them in the newly built warehouse in Tongguan in preparation for the war next year.

At the same time, Li Guang was ordered to keep the grain price in Chang'an from fluctuating too much, otherwise he would be beheaded.

In fact, Liu Che was just unhappy with Li Guang and wanted to take revenge on him.

Since the beginning of industrialization, Li Guang's ambition has actually been dashed. The reason why Liu Che is punishing him now is because he was disobedient before, not because he was worried that the Li family would benefit from Longxi's geographical location during the development of the Western Regions.

Let Li Guang lose some money and take revenge.

What could Li Guang do? He bought a large amount of grain from Longxi and transported it to Chang'an by water.

This is actually a sure kill.

Because if Liu Che wanted to kill Li Guang, he could have ordered Li Guang to prepare another batch of food and station it in Longxi, ready to attack the Huns from the Western Regions next year.

It also requires that food prices not be allowed to soar.

Li Guang has already brought the surplus food from Longxi to Chang'an in preparation for use in the war. Longxi now has only enough food for itself, and the excess can only barely support an army of 50,000.

If Liu Che went too far, Li Guang would have no choice but to give himself up for dead.

This was actually Liu Che venting his dissatisfaction with Li Guang and letting Li Guang know that if there was any mistake again this time, he would surely die!
Of course, it is not certain to die.

If Liu Che really gave such an order, Li Guang could choose to rebel!
But now the army is preparing to fight the Huns, and Guanzhong is full of troops. The probability of a successful rebellion is less than one in a hundred thousand.

Then Li Guang has one last choice.

Find someone who can take over and take over all his land.

Then he took the money to buy a batch of grain in Shu, and transported it to Longxi via the Tianshui line, sparing no expense in transporting the grain.

This can barely solve the problem.

In other words, if Liu Che did not let go, Li Guang would either die or escape with all his property.

This is really overbearing.

But...what's wrong with Liu Che's Yulin Guards having muskets and being more domineering than before?
Li Guang has clearly felt that his status has declined significantly.

But Li Guang did not do anything to make Liu Che continue to be unhappy, but waited for Liu Che to cut his flesh.

In other words, Li Guang acted like a person who could be bullied. The subtext was: If the king wants his subjects to die, then they have to die. If Your Majesty cannot get rid of this anger, then I will die.

This attitude made Liu Che very satisfied.

After entering winter, people's happiness index is much higher than in previous years.

The houses in the new city have central heating, and even now at home, you only need to wear light clothes.

A large number of houses in the old city have also been renovated, and at least they have kangs and stoves.

Since the railway was opened, all the rickshaw drivers on the Chang'an to Tongguan road have changed their jobs.

They were able to endure hardship and being away from their families, so they went further north to participate in the installation of railway tracks from Shenmu to Tongguan.

This is a very complicated and physically demanding job, and it is difficult to repair just a few dozen meters every day.

However, as more people came together, the engineering method of laying rails in sections was adopted, and progress began to increase rapidly.

Although this resulted in inaccurate docking in many places, which required rework.

But rework is usually expensive in terms of labor and time.

There is no shortage of manpower on the railway now.

In order to avoid massive casualties and leaving this road littered with bones, Huo Hai even ordered the construction site to work in two shifts so that the same group of people would not be required to bear too much physical labor.

There must also be sufficient supply of meat and vegetables on the construction site.

Because the overall grain production in the north has skyrocketed, smart farmers have spontaneously increased the output of agricultural and sideline products.

The breeding capacity of pigs, dogs, chickens and ducks has increased a lot, so there is no shortage of food on the construction site.

Roads are also being built from Shenmu to Yunzhong and other counties.

The original design of the highway was to be eight meters wide, but currently a three-meter-wide section has been built in the middle first, and the remaining five meters on the sides will be built later.

This job is coordinated by Bu Shi.

Bu Shi, the Commandant of the Imperial Chariot, did a very good job as Emperor Liu Che's right-hand man in various projects last year.

This year, when choosing the general manager of the Xiongnu Company, Liu Che had three choices. The first was Bu Shi, the second was Sang Hongyang, and the third was a relative from the nobles.

In the end, Liu Che chose Bu Shi.

Option three would definitely be better if development stabilizes in the future, but it’s not the case now.

However, Sang Hongyang was still young, so it would be better for Bu Shi to take on this important task.

When Bu Shi arrived in Yunzhong, he crossed the Yellow River without saying a word and began posting notices in the densely populated area of ​​Jin State.

In the past, people in Yunzhong would go there and post notices, asking the people there to come and perform labor service.

The answer I got was: "Sir, you are kidding me. This is a big river crossing. It is normal for us to spend two days crossing it. We only do three days of corvée labor a year. Two days are spent crossing the river? Don't forget that it will take us a day to walk to the river. By the time we cross the river, we won't even reach the construction site and we should go home."

This time, the notice said [Monthly salary: 2,200 yuan, food and accommodation included].

Before nightfall on the day the notice was posted, more than 6,000 people from the State of Jin appeared on the banks of the Yellow River.

The next afternoon, Bu Shi had to send someone to the river to pick up the notice and post a new notice [The first round of recruitment has been completed. Those who want to work, please wait for notification!]

With so many people building a road, and only building it three meters wide, can it be slow?

Many officials in the court knew that His Majesty was determined to deal a ruthless blow to the Huns next year.

The Xiongnu Company and the Western Region Company have currently raised tens of billions of dollars in total. This time, they have invested tens of billions of dollars just in road construction regardless of the cost!
This was the tax revenue of the entire Han Dynasty in one year two years ago, including the total amount of salt and iron special taxes, grain and head tax!
It's like paving a road with money.

Just looking at the construction cost, it is a bit outrageous. Although the highway in the five counties of Yunzhong is several times longer than the Anshen Railway, the investment is no less than that of the railway.

At the end of the year, Huo Hai turned 19.

Huo Hai had already reached adulthood, so he didn’t hold a big celebration for his 19th birthday. He just invited people he was familiar with to dinner.

But on this day, Huo Qubing was out on business.

The reason is that the railway to Shenmu is about to open to traffic.

Huo Qubing wanted to check the four borders of Shenmu to avoid any bad guys.

Because this time, just like the last time the Anshen Railway Andong section was opened to traffic, Liu Che would personally take a car to inspect it.

But further north of Shenmu is the former territory of the Huns, which only fell into the hands of the Han Dynasty in the last ten years.

There are even ordinary Huns living in the mountains and hills on the border.

Although they also escaped secretly and would no longer work for the Xiongnu Chanyu, who knows if there are any hidden spies among them?
Therefore, Huo Qubing had to clear the entire sacred tree in advance.

The court officials could only sigh that Huo Qubing had missed both Huo Hai's birthday and the New Year, no wonder he was so favored.

After all, if we stay two more days, we can celebrate both Huo Hai’s birthday and the New Year.

I have to leave two days in advance.

The news spread so quickly that all the people in Chang'an knew that the General of Cavalry had gone to inspect the new railway.

In the past two months, there has been a train service between Chang'an and Tongguan every day! From the beginning, the number of passenger trains has gradually increased to three!

Each freight train makes four round trips during the day.

In fact, it is equivalent to twelve buses.

And one class can transport 400 people.

In one day, 4,800 people were transported from Tongguan to Chang'an, and another 4,800 people were transported from Chang'an to Tongguan.

That’s it, it’s full attendance!

Tickets are hard to get!
There are even scalpers already appearing!

There is no other reason. There are 8,000 people working on shift leave at Tongguan Coal Mine every day.

The train can only carry 4,800 people to Chang'an, but this capacity is not enough, resulting in a large number of people having to return to Chang'an by road.

To solve this problem, we need to increase the transport volume.

One suggestion is to design a special bus for miners, removing useless things such as seats and designing it so that tickets require standing room only.

In this way, while all the miners can go south, there will still be a few trains left for businessmen.

Because there were so many miners in the mine, many of them started to do traveling business, specifically bringing things from Chang'an to Tongguan for sale.

This is of course a good thing.

However, the institute is trying to find other ways to increase the capacity for human transportation.

For example, increasing the number of locomotives, or finding ways to design carriages lighter to increase transportation capacity.

But in the dead of winter, convertibles are definitely not possible, so we can only make improvements slowly.

As for the idea of ​​standing tickets, if it cannot be resolved in a short time, it will not be too late to open it later.

After all, there is no rush to increase the transport capacity at once.

On the one hand, the design of the steam locomotive locomotive has reached the sixteenth version. If we still manufacture the tenth version of the locomotive now, it would be a loss.

A locomotive could have been used for thirty years, but after a few years all the technology became outdated and needed to be replaced, which would be an additional investment.

Also, the highway is still usable and has even been made into cement, making it much smoother than before. If the train capacity is fully utilized, wouldn't the highway have been built in vain?
When both highway and train capacity reach their peak again, it will not be too late to invest in increasing train capacity.

And the people of Chang'an finally welcomed the opening of the east-west intercity railway in December.

After all, passenger transport is auxiliary, while military and freight transport are the key.

After several months, a forward dock was built in the lower reaches of the Wei River and the railway became functional.

Therefore, the east-west intercity railway was also opened.

The intercity railway is different from the north-south Anshen Railway.

The journey to Anshen Railway takes at least one hour.

The horizontal railway in the city stops at all stations along the way, which only takes half an hour in total, so you can really use the standing room ticket carriage.

There were so many new and interesting things in Chang'an that some incomprehensible things flowed to the north without attracting anyone's attention.

The news came back in the second week after the Chinese New Year.

The entire Anshen Railway is open to traffic.

Currently it stops at Tongguan, from Chang'an to Shenmu, 450 kilometers!

Twenty billion dollars was invested in the second half of the railway track!

If we calculate purchasing power using commodity prices, it cost almost fifteen times more per kilometer to build it than in the previous life!
This astonishing investment quickly became a must-talk topic among the people of Chang'an.

After all, this is 20 billion yuan! You know, 20% of the shares of Xiongnu Company are only 20 billion!

This time, His Majesty the Great Emperor will go to Shenmu to inspect in person, which means that the empire's business will develop crazily towards Shenmu.

You know, two months later, a city with three streets horizontally and vertically was formed near Tongguan Railway Station!
There was no hair there two months ago!

The people of Chang'an were all thinking about how they could make a fortune from the opening of the railway.

Li Du, the commander of the imperial carriage, was driving the car. This time, Liu Che did not bring all the civil and military officials with him, but only those officials who were qualified to attend the medium-level court meetings.

This group of people had taken a train before, and they had also taken the train privately, so they were all familiar with trains.

As soon as I got on the bus, I began to enjoy the scenery and see the sacred trees that I had never visited before.

As a result, after getting on the train, I saw huge maps hanging in each carriage, as well as mountains of information.

The Imperial Guards announced in each carriage: "Everyone, His Majesty has ordered that all government offices begin to make detailed plans for attacking the Xiongnu. The preliminary plan has been placed here."

The Yulin Guard pointed at the map and said, "At present, the rear general Cao Xiang is stationed here, General Li Guang is here, General Gongsun He is here, General Wei Qing is stationed in Shenmu, and the general of the cavalry has arrived in Youbeiping and joined the governor of Youbeiping, Lu Bode."

Everyone knew that the deployment of Huo Qubing and Wei Qing was a sign that the empire was about to mobilize its troops.

This time, Wei Qing and Liu Che personally went to the front line under the pretext of inspecting the Anshen Railway.

Huo Qubing had already left more than ten days in advance on the pretext of inspection, and now he was rushing all the way to Youzhou!
It’s freezing cold this time, and the spring offensive started a month and a half earlier than the usual!
Even if I start making plans now, and all government offices start cooperating and various orders are issued, it will only take another three weeks at most, which means we will be able to mobilize troops 20 days earlier than expected! ? !
Moreover, it seems that there have been rumors for a long time that this time the army will be a backup, and the first to go out will be the musketeers.

Doesn't it mean...

Huo Haike was also in the first car accompanying His Majesty.

In other words, once the train reaches Shenmu within two days, Huo Hai will most likely start heading north with the Yulin Guards accompanying him.

The entire five counties of Yunzhong invested tens of billions to build roads, and it would take no more than three to five days to drive there.

Add it up... in a week, the army will cross the frozen river and attack the Huns?

Are you serious? !!! What if I freeze to death? !!!
(End of this chapter)