Chapter 48: Reorganizing and Expanding the Army

  Now that the county magistrate is dead, who can lead them to resist the bandits? So these people are preparing to ask Li Chong for help. At worst, they also want to let Li Chong leave one army to assist in defending the city.

  Especially the gentry of Shenchi, they don't care who is the county magistrate, what they care about is that their property is not looted by bandits. As for the taxes in Shenchi, it's the country's, even if Li Chong takes them to train soldiers, it doesn't matter.

  Most importantly, who knows if these bandits will kill for fun after breaching the city. These officials and gentry are indeed greedy, but one's life is more important. Please help me out, Li Zhong, it's like spending money to hire a thug.

  Yunxian County Magistrate Gong asked: "I don't know if Lord Li can leave behind a troop to help us resist the bandits?"

  "This... won't do, now that bandits are rampant, our Guangwu County has too few soldiers, I'm afraid... I'm afraid..." Li Zhong shook his head in a pretentious manner.

  Yunxian Cheng hastily said: "If that's not possible, it would be better for the general to stay behind and assist in the battle. The grain stores at Shenchi are abundant, so you can recruit and train soldiers on your own."

  "This plan is feasible, so let Guan Hai stay and assist. I will assign 100 cavalrymen to Guan Hai, which should be enough." Li nodded and introduced Guan Hai to everyone.

  The officials and gentry of Shenchi were overjoyed, and the one who performed most bravely last night was Guan Hai. Recently, Guan Hai had been overshadowed by Taishi Ci's brilliance, and he had long been holding back a fire in his heart. He took advantage of Wang Dang's army to vent his anger. Last night, Guan Hai charged forward like a madman, wielding a large blade, and slaughtered the enemy troops like a tiger entering a flock of sheep. At least dozens of enemy soldiers were killed, and the people on the city wall could see it all clearly.

  Tai Shi Zi was much more low-key, he didn't dare to show off, after all, he had personally shot and killed Yan Xian Ling, always feeling like someone was secretly watching him, this is what they call a guilty conscience.

  So these people have always thought that Guan Yu's martial arts are superior to Taishi Ci, and seeing Li Chong leave such a fierce general behind, they naturally rejoiced, shouting: "Lord Li is righteous!"

  As for whether these people are scolding Li as stupid in their hearts, that is unknown.

  Before leaving, Li Chong summoned Guan Hai and told him to be careful with these local officials, hurry up to recruit soldiers, then took the captives away from Shenchi and returned to Guangwu.

  As for how to deal with the affairs of Shenchi County, Li Chong couldn't help much. However, Li Chong did make those officials sweat a bit. Guan Hai, this old roughneck, relied on killing people to manage the mountain stronghold. Alas... it's unknown whether his management level has improved now.

  Returning to Guangwu, Li Zhongxian ordered Taishi Ci to go ahead and pursue Wang Dan, while he himself summoned Zhang Cai to discuss the matter of capturing him.

  Zhang Cai stepped into the house with a beaming smile and congratulated Li Chong: "Congratulations, sir, on your victory..."

  Li Chong smiled and nodded, waiting for Zhang Cai to finish speaking before saying: "This official wants to discuss with Mr. Zhang the matter of buying a servant."

  Zhang Cai bowed and asked: "I don't know how many slaves the master plans to take out?"

  Li stretched out his hand to signal Zhang Cai to sit down (kneel), and only then said: "This time, the official has captured a total of 600 prisoners. At least half will be kept as soldiers. As for the rest, you name a price, and let the official consider it."

  Zhang Cai said with a smile: "Each servant is worth ten thousand pieces of money, what does your excellency think?"

  "Ten thousand coins!" Li Chong shook his head. The price of a Han Dynasty servant was generally around 20,000 to 30,000 coins, but with the frequent wars, prices had dropped quickly. So Zhang Cai's quoted price wasn't unreasonable, but Li Chong didn't want to exchange it for money. What he needed were grains, weapons, horses and so on.

  Li Zhong slowly said: "Three hundred servants, exchanged for one hundred steel knives, fifty war horses, how is that?"

  "Good!" Zhang Cai immediately agreed, Li Chong's price was very reasonable, it was fifty war horses that were priceless, but this was not a problem for Zhang Cai.

  "But can't you, sir, sell a bit more to us common folk..." Zhang Cai said in a low voice.

  "Haha......" Li Zhong chuckled and stared at Zhang Cai's eyes for a while before slowly saying, "No... way."

  Zhang Cai lowered her head, took a deep breath, and thought to herself: This young man is extremely cautious in his actions, I'd better be careful myself, absolutely cannot provoke him.

  Actually, Li Zhong was overthinking things. Zhang Cai's intention to buy 500 servants wasn't anything out of the ordinary. Although 500 servants seemed like a lot, when distributed among the various families of the gentry and aristocracy in Guangwu County, each family would only get a few dozen people at most. Li Zhong was being overly cautious, but given his weak foundation, he couldn't afford not to be careful.

  By dusk, Taishi Ci led two hundred elite cavalry back to Guangwu.

  Li Zhong hastily inquired about the situation, and as soon as Tai Shi Ci returned to Guangwu, he led his troops to pursue Wang Duang. However, after chasing for dozens of miles, Tai Shi Ci did not see any trace of Wang Duang, and fearing that Wang Duang might still be lurking nearby, planning a surprise attack on Guangwu, he could only return without success.

  Since no one could be found, Li Chong shifted his attention to expanding the army. In the following days, Li Chong and Zhang Cai handed over the captives and began to absorb the captured prisoners.

  More than ten days later, Li Chong finally completed the reorganization of his troops. Now, under Li Chong's command, there are a total of 1,500 soldiers in the two counties, including 300 cavalrymen, led by Taishi Ci and Guan Hai respectively. Among them, 1,000 infantrymen and 200 cavalrymen were stationed in Guangwu County, while 500 infantrymen and 100 cavalrymen were stationed in Shenchi County.

  Just then, Liao Hua, who had been sent by Li Chong to Jiangnan, rushed back to Guangwu with a young man by his side.

  Li Chong was overjoyed when he learned the news, and immediately went out of the county government office to welcome them. He had sent Liao Hua to recruit Gan Ning, so it was likely that Liao and his companion were Gan Ning and Gan Xingba, a general who was not inferior to Taishi Ci.

  But when they arrived at the main hall, after some small talk, Li Zhong felt slightly disappointed. The person who came with Liao Hua was not Gan Ning, but rather Jiang Qin and Jiang Gongyi.

  But Jiang Qin is also good, at least he is a general of the same level as Guan Yu, and Jiang Qin has a good hand in internal affairs, at least much stronger than Guan Yu, holding one city is no problem.

  Liao Hua bowed and said, "My lord, this is Jiang Qin, a man from Jiujiang named Jiang Gongyi. He is skilled in archery and horsemanship, with exceptional martial arts skills. I met him on the road and we got along quite well, so I brought him to meet you."

  Li Zhongda smiled and said: "So it seems that Gong Yi has come to join forces with Li Mou to achieve great things."

  Jiang Qin retorted: "Doesn't your lordship despise Jiang for being a thief?"

  "Hahaha......" Li Chong laughed loudly, looking up at the sky: "What about thieves? Those who steal a hook will be executed, those who steal a country will become princes. Let's see what kind of ambition you, Jiang Gongyi, have."

  Jiang Qin stood up, knelt on one knee and solemnly said: "Since the master does not despise Jiang Qin, then Jiang Qin will certainly rush into boiling water and walk through fire to help the master achieve great things."

  Li Chong hastily stepped forward, grasped Jiang Qin's hands and laughed loudly: "To be able to get your help, is truly Li's good fortune."

  Let Jiang Qin return to his seat, Li Chong smiled and said: "When Taishi Ci comes back, I will host a dinner for the two of you."

  Liao Hua heard that Li Chong did not mention Guan Yu's name and asked: "Why didn't you see Bo Wen?"

  Li Chong told the story of Wang Da's surprise attack, and Liao Hua listened with wide eyes, slapping his thigh in anger, clearly regretful for missing this battle.

  Even Jiang Qin listened with shining eyes and couldn't help but say that these bandits were born to be interested in fighting and killing.