My older brother said I'm invincible.

Chapter 153 Motorcade
The sage has been gone for some time now, and Loufan County has finally returned to its original state.

After leaving Loufan, Yang Guang headed towards Mayi. Wherever he went, he spoke of Li Yuan's outstanding governance and how generously he had rewarded the Li family.

The counties along the way were also ravaged. The busy farming season had just ended, and all the places were originally trying to seize the time to prepare for next year's spring planting. However, due to the previous large-scale corvée labor, the entire Hebei and Hedong regions suffered enormous losses.

In Hebei, a million people were conscripted for forced labor in the early spring, when farmland was almost completely rotten.

More than 400,000 laborers were mobilized from Hedong to build the Great Wall and palaces. The population of Hedong was mainly concentrated in the Shangdang and Taiyuan areas, while other places were sparsely populated. 400,000 was not Yang Guang's limit, but it was the limit for Hedong!

Guangshen gave them no time to recover, and once again marched forward in a grand manner. Localities dared not ignore him and urgently mobilized the people to repair roads and welcome the sage, since next year's spring planting was already in trouble.

Guangshen didn't care about these things; he wanted to see the results of his large-scale labor service and whether he could carry out his plan to defeat the distant enemy.

Just as Li Jiancheng had thought, Guangshen wanted to attack Goryeo.

Goryeo was originally called Goguryeo. During the Northern and Southern Dynasties, the Southern Dynasty conferred the title of King of Goryeo and referred to him as Goryeo in official documents. In the following years, he was basically referred to as Goguryeo and Goryeo interchangeably until the reign of Emperor Wen. At that time, the official documents began to uniformly use the name Goryeo, and Goguryeo itself also called itself the King of Goryeo.

Both the common people and the official authorities referred to it as Goryeo.

However, later generations, in order to distinguish between Wang's Goryeo and Go's Goryeo, referred to them as Goguryeo and Goryeo respectively.

Guangshen took a look around and found that his plan was perfect. After dealing with Tuyuhun in the northwest and the small islands in the south, he could then start dealing with Goryeo in the northeast.

While Guang Shen was busy expanding his territory and restoring the entire territory of the mighty Han Dynasty, Li Xuanba was also thinking about how to strengthen his own power.

Outside Dade Farm, many simple dwellings have now appeared.

Many people migrated here. According to the laws of the Sui Dynasty, people could not migrate at will. However, in Loufan, Li Yuan was the ultimate law. These people gathered around Li Xuanba, nominally as tenant farmers, and the officials dared not question them.

The poor village headman outside the city had come once, and he was quite aggrieved, his words full of flattery, hoping that Li Laosan would be lenient and not take in too many people, since Loufan's population was already small enough.
Li Xuanba sat in the 'small courtyard' in the very center of the farm.

Zhang Du and others finally built a small courtyard for him, but it is not yet fully completed and may take some time to complete.

Li Xuanba sized up his trusted confidants sitting beside him.

These were all his fellow disciples, and there was only one outsider, named Tian Chengzhang, who had just come from Guanzhong to join him. His father was Tian Xiangzheng.

Although this young man was new, he integrated into the group very quickly.

When he first arrived, Zhang Du and the others didn't dare to have any in-depth conversations with him. After all, his grandfather was an official and a native of Guanzhong, so they couldn't be sure what he was thinking.

Unexpectedly, before they could even speak, the kid had already started cursing.

The people of Guanzhong didn't fare much better; in fact, they were the main victims. Every time there was a war in the Northwest, the people of Guanzhong had to pay grain and money, and were also responsible for transportation, road clearing, cooking, and so on. When it came to building palaces, locals were given priority! And once they started building, it couldn't stop; one after another, they built several at the same time!

Just as the people of Guanzhong did not treat the people outside the Guanzhong region as human beings, so did Master Guang.

After all, a sage always treats everyone equally, regardless of their background, place of origin, profession, or character; he intends to harm them all.

After Zhang Du and others realized the young man's rebellious tendencies, they quickly accepted him and made him a comrade-in-arms to do great things together.

"My lord!"

Zhang Du spoke first, "I discussed this matter with everyone, and we all think that we can set up inns in the cities along the route and station personnel there. If we can open up such a route, we can transmit orders and exchange intelligence at any time. At the same time, we can also promptly detect situations along the route and protect the convoy in the future."

Zhang Du wasn't just making things up; he sent people to investigate quite a bit.

"Even for the imperial court, sending a message from Luoyang to Loufan requires more than ten post stations. One person cannot make the round trip quickly. It would be much better if there were people to meet them along the way. However, it is still not as fast as the post stations. Even when changing people or horses, one must be extra careful, especially with the horses at the checkpoints along the way."

Many things seem easy in theory, but are actually very difficult to do.

Only then did Li Xuanba take out those maps and distribute them to everyone to look at.

Zhang Du and the others were filled with astonishment after reading it. "What happened to you, Lord Jun?"

"I asked someone for it."

"Won't this map make things much more convenient?"

With the map now, everyone can formulate a more detailed plan. If each of the eight counties along the way has a restaurant, that would be eight stores, requiring at least twenty people, and they would need to be clever and resourceful.

The most important thing in passing a message is to avoid being discovered. If you just send some random people, the message might end up reaching the authorities.

They also need horses.

Zhang Du and the others began to discuss it one by one.

At least for now, Li Xuanba doesn't lack people around him. He brought quite a few people from Xingyang, and it's fortunate that he brought so many people, otherwise he would really be in trouble now.

These people are all useful in their own way. For example, the three mines require a lot of people to work there.

They discussed this for a long time before Zhang Du finally spoke.

"My lord, we cannot simply sit here and discuss these matters."

“When we raided these three mines earlier, there were still many ore reserves that we hadn’t had time to move. Now that the manpower at each mine has been arranged, I think it would be better to have Qu Qiusheng lead the team, while I lead the brothers disguised as grooms and guards, to travel along this route and check on the road conditions, as well as the situation in the counties. After we return, we will make detailed arrangements.”

The mine has just resumed operation and is not yet in production. However, many of the products produced previously, which were not moved in time, have become Li Xuanba's property. Although it is not a large amount, it is still a good first attempt. Even if something goes wrong, he will not feel bad.

Li Xuanba thought it was possible to do that.

The crowd cheered, and many wanted to join in, but Zhang Du knew that not everyone could leave, and Lou Fan needed to leave enough manpower behind.

Just then, someone asked, "Is this Qu Qiusheng trustworthy?"

"He is very attentive to everyone and even tried to bribe the brothers to win them over. He comes from a merchant family. If he finds out about our important plans, wouldn't it be very dangerous?"

Zhang Du did not answer; he looked at Li Xuanba.

Li Xuanba shook his head slightly. "Merchants are not all bad people. I think this person is not a bad person. Although there were warriors supervising the mines he set up, the laborers he used were all quite good-looking, unlike the people in other mines."

"That's because he's not a big merchant; he has neither money nor power. You shouldn't trust him too easily, my lord!"

Li Xuanba pondered for a moment, "What we are about to do is something big. To achieve something big, it can't be done by just the few of us. We need more people to help us. It will be very difficult to achieve something big by relying solely on the few of us."

Li Xuanba glanced at Tian Chengzhang in the crowd, and everyone seemed to be deep in thought.

Zhang Du pursed his lips. "Does Your Excellency mean that you want us to accept more people?"

Someone asked, "But wouldn't it be too dangerous to do that?"

"The Lord said that when our strength is not yet sufficient, we should not rush to show our claws; we must be patient and wait until the time is ripe before we make our move."

Everyone had their own ideas, and Li Xuanba fell into deep thought.

On the one hand, he wanted to expand his power as soon as possible and have more people to help him, but on the other hand, doing so was indeed too dangerous.

This matter involves the lives of many people.

"Let's ask the teacher about this first, and take care of other things first."

"I'll figure out a way to handle the craftsmen's affairs."

(End of this chapter)