"General, have more than 30 million people really died in the past twenty years?"

In the military camp, Li Dayan asked.

"Of course it is true. It is precisely because there are so many dead that every time we fight, I will capture more prisoners, kill less people, and leave some blood for us Han people."

Cao Xin said it seriously.

"General Gaoyi, when we captured prisoners in exchange for money, I thought the general was greedy for money. I didn't expect the general to think this way. I admire you very much!"

Li Dayan bowed his hands and bowed.

"The general is so righteous, and I deeply admire him!"

Yu Du raised his hands and praised.

Cao Xin nodded and was about to say something modest when he heard someone say,

"No! No!"

Two scribes walked over from the side, and Zhong Yao, who had three long beards, smiled at him.

"As the generals of the imperial court, the Six Generals should charge forward to eliminate the rebels. How can we tolerate and support traitors? The kindness of the Six Generals is the benevolence of women. It is not advisable to steal it from others."

Cao Xin smiled softly, clasped his fists at the two of them, and called Zhong Yao 'Zhong Shangshu' and Xun You 'Brother Gongda'.

"Zhong Shangshu is right."

"Uh~"

Zhong Yao was stunned for a moment. What kind of words were these? Xun You burst into laughter.

"General Sixth, do you agree with what I said? Do you also think you are not suitable for leading troops in war? Are you not a qualified general?"

Zhong Yao asked with a stern face.

Cao Xin shook his head slightly, "Zhong Shangshu's opinion is very reasonable, but what I said is also correct. The world is huge, and there are countless generals. Some are violent and easy to kill, while others are kind to women, but as long as they can protect the country and the people, and be loyal to their duties

, they are all considered qualified generals, and there is no distinction between superior and inferior generals."

"Ziyu is right."

Xun You nodded slightly, blinked at Zhong Yao, and quickly refuted him, refuted him fiercely.

Zhong Yao frowned, stroking his three long beards,

"It is rumored that on the battlefield of Xinye, the Six Generals captured Jingzhou's general Deng Xian and more than 2,000 Jingzhou soldiers, and then sold them to Jingzhou for a price of 120,000 guan.

What the general is doing is tantamount to letting the tiger return to the mountain, and it is also a waste of the lives of the soldiers. Yao disagrees."

"Zhong Shangshu is wrong. Shangshu has read a lot, so he should know the principle of eating an enemy's one bell and treating me as twenty bells.

I exchanged Jingzhou soldiers for Jingzhou's goods and grain, which strategically greatly weakened the enemy's logistical supplies and strengthened our army's logistical supplies.

In addition, the Jingzhou soldiers knew that they would not kill prisoners. If they met me on the battlefield in the future, as long as the battle went badly, they would surrender voluntarily and habitually.

As for the partial general Deng Xian mentioned by the Minister, since I can capture him once, I can capture him twice. If I kill him and Jingzhou sends a more powerful general, wouldn’t I be very troubled?"

Cao Xin spread his hands.

"Send a more powerful one...Pfft~"

Xun You supported his waist and laughed.

Zhong Yao pulled a long face and glared at Xun You. This man was not forgiving at all, and he said he didn't like empty talk?

"General Six, how could you..."

"Zhong Shangshu!"

Seeing that Zhong Yao wanted to refute, Cao Xingong raised his hand and said,

"Zhong Shangshu's words are not unreasonable. As the old saying goes, kindness cannot lead an army, righteousness cannot support wealth, emotion cannot establish affairs, and kindness cannot serve as an official.

At first glance, Zhong Shangshu seems to be a kind man, but he is not suitable to be an official, just like I am too kind and not suitable to be a general.

But these are troubled times, and heaven will entrust us with great responsibilities. Sometimes even if we don’t want to do it, we still have to stand up and do what we can, even if we don’t want to do it.

Cao Xinchong cupped his hands at the two people who were in a daze, and quickly left with Li Dayan and Yu Du.

After a long time, Zhong Yao gradually came back to his senses.

"Compassion does not control soldiers, justice does not support wealth, emotion does not establish affairs, and kindness does not serve as an official. These four sentences do not make sense at first, but if you look carefully, they make sense and point directly to human nature. But this is an old saying

?Why haven’t I heard of it, Gongda, have you heard of it, Gongda? What are you doing?”

Zhong Yao frowned and looked at his friend, and saw Xun You and Xun Gongda took out a writing brush, dipped it on the tip of his tongue, and wrote eight words on the inside of his robe, "People cannot help themselves in the world of rivers and lakes."

"This sentence is very suitable for me. I used to just want to go to Shu to live in seclusion and not care about worldly affairs, but my fourth uncle insists that I become an official and do something I don't like. Alas! Waiting for the next party, I will stand in the misty rain

Upstairs, looking out the window at the deep night, I sighed softly, "You can't help yourself when you are in the rivers and lakes. This sentence will definitely shock everyone."

Xun You praised.

Zhong Yao's chin trembled, he looked up at the sky and let out a long sigh.

A few years ago, he was in Chang'an, serving the emperor Liu Xie, and dealing with brutal bandits such as Li Jue, Guo Si, and Zhang Ji all day long. During that time, he was often frightened and wanted to escape Chang'an and go to a kinder place.

Last year, he finally escaped from Chang'an and came to Xudu, Yingchuan. He met Xun You, Xun Yu, Guo Jia and other outstanding people, the proud sons of heaven. He was so happy that he thought he had found an organization.

But within a year, he discovered that he was wrong, very wrong. Under Prime Minister Cao, there was no good person, no matter the counselor or the general.

Xun Yu was stubborn and conservative; Cheng Yu was cruel and arrogant; Guo Jiazhai was lazy and greedy; Cao Hongfei was domineering; Xiahou Yuan was a white general; Xiahou Dun was violent and reckless.

There is also the old and crooked Xun Gongda, the arrogant and lewd Cao Ziyu, and the lustful Cao Mengde who likes to massacre cities, dig graves, and kill friends.

This group of people had problems from top to bottom, and yet he had to hang out with these people.

Sometimes when I think about it, Zhong Yao really feels that his future is bleak.

"Yuan Chang, let's go and have some wine. Fortunately, there is a new singer arriving in Qiu Pavilion."

Xun You put away his brush and said.

"I won't go, I won't go, don't pull me away!"

Zhong Yao reluctantly followed and left the training ground.

——

"General, you are so powerful. Even an eloquent person like Zhong Shangshu was rendered speechless by you."

At the equestrian training ground, Li Dayan exclaimed.

Cao Xin shook his head and was not happy, "We are warriors. It doesn't matter if we are good at talking. We are really good when we treat the enemy well. How many people can Langya Cavalry recruit?"

"There are only 82 people. At first, Prime Minister Cao said that we could choose people at will from the army, but when we went to choose people, Cao Hong and Xia Hou Yu banned several generals and refused to let them go. He said that the Prime Minister was also planning to form a team of armored cavalry. The people in the military camp

The men must be retained to form a new cavalry battalion and cannot be given to us.

We selected 82 qualified candidates for the Grange Guard, and together with the original veteran cavalry, we barely managed to make up 200 people."

Li Dayan shrugged and said.

Cao Xin frowned slightly. After seeing the bravery of Langya Cavalry, Cao Cao and the generals hoped to train some armored cavalry.

They all think that Cao Ziyu, with his 100 cavalry, can defeat Zhang Xiu's 5,000 Xiliang elites. Why can't they? As long as they have armored cavalry, they can defeat 100 against 5,000, or even tens of thousands.

Cao Xin was noncommittal to people who had such thoughts.

If you want to build an armored cavalry, you must first have money, hundreds of iron smelting, and northern war horses.

The most important of the three is the Hundred Smelting Iron, which cannot be bought with money.

At the end of the Han Dynasty, a saddle was already available as an accessory for war horses. Cao Cao's guards often held up the saddle to block his arrows. There were also stirrups, which were mostly made of leather ropes, wood, and bones. They were not very strong and would break when stepped on a few times.

It's not too strenuous on the battlefield.

The iron stirrups used by Langya Cavalry are refined iron made from blast furnaces and coal, which are stronger and more durable than the iron materials commonly used at this stage.

The same goes for the horseshoes on the soles of war horses. Some people once thought of using wrought copper to shoe the horseshoes to slow down the wear and tear of the horseshoes. However, the copper horseshoes were too thick and heavy, and too thin to be strong. After running for dozens of miles, they turned into slag.

And the cost is more expensive than a horse.

It is best to make it from 100-forged iron.

However, forging a piece of refined iron requires too much material and the price is relatively high.

Only high-ranking generals are qualified to use hundreds of refined iron to make weapons, such as his big iron spear, Guan Yu's Yanyue Sword, Sun Jian's ancient ingot sword, etc. It is not cost-effective to use fine iron on stirrups and saddles.

Cao Xin has made calculations. The price of a high-quality northern war horse for Langya is about 100 guan. The price of a pair of armor is about 500 guan. The saddle, stirrups, horseshoes and other accessories cost about 500 guan. A well-trained cavalryman costs about 500 guan.

It costs about 500 strings, and the armor and weapons on the cavalry cost about 1,000 strings.

Each Langya Cavalry is worth about 2,500 guan, and 100 Langya Knights is 250,000 guan.

This is the price after improving the process and saving costs. If others want to build cavalry equipment, the cost will be higher.

If Prime Minister Cao and Cao Hong want to build armored cavalry, they will definitely find that the quality of the pig iron is not good enough in the future. At that time, they can take the opportunity to sell some refined iron and make a lot of money.

"Big Eyes, the training of new recruits needs to be stepped up so that they can adapt to war horses and armor as early as possible. The same goes for Lao Yu's infantry. We will have a tough battle to fight in a while."

"General, who to fight?"

Li Dayan and Yu Du asked excitedly.
To be continued...