When Li Mu was fighting in Kuaiji County, Jiangnan, Zhao Kuo was also conquering Jiujiang County.

The origin of Jiujiang County is because nine rivers gather into the Yangtze River waterway in this county, thus gaining their name.

Due to the age, Poyang Lake in later generations did not appear at this time. There is a big lake further north of Poyang Lake, whose name is Penglize.

The area of ​​Penglize is larger than that of Poyang Lake, but even on the larger lake, when hundreds of warships of all sizes arrive, it still gives people a very strong sense of oppression.

Zhao Kuo stood on the largest warship. The name of this warship is Yu Huang. Legend has it that it was built by the order of King Goujian of Yue back then, and it is also the flagship of the current Navy of the Han Kingdom.

Xiang Yan stood in front of Zhao Kuo and introduced excitedly: "King, this is the most powerful warship in the world, and it is definitely an invincible existence in the world!"

Zhao Kuo smiled and said nothing.

Emperor Yu is indeed quite big, but for Zhao Kuo, he was also a person who visited the aircraft carrier museum back then, and of course he knew what a real marine overlord-class ship should look like.

The Yuhuang warship may be able to help the Han Kingdom conquer all the rivers, but if it is really taken to the sea, it can only fight in the near-shore, and the ocean-going capabilities are still very lacking.

This is also because people in this era are basically active in the near-shore environment, and basically no one is bored to sail in the deep sea. Isn’t it good to live?

Zhao Kuo suddenly spoke: "I heard that the shipbuilding technology in Wuxian is not bad?"

Xiang Yan was stunned for a moment and hurriedly said, "That's true.

In the past, the best craftsmen in Yue were in Langya and Wuxian. Later, our Chu State destroyed Yue State, and Langya became the front line of confrontation with Qi State, so most of the shipbuilders were moved to Wuxian."

Zhao Kuo nodded slightly when he heard this and said, "In this way, the future Marine Fleet base can be placed in Wuxian."

In Zhao Kuo's plan, the Han Dynasty will have two fleet bases in the future, one is in Jiaodong, Qi, and the other is in Wu County, Chu.

Both of these places are very developed places in later generations, especially Jiangnan, where Wu County is located, which became one of the richest sea transport areas in the world during the Song Dynasty. The eight-character idiom "There is heaven above and Suzhou and Hangzhou below" was famous all over the world at that time.

Of course, in fact, in terms of great navigation, there is another better port, that is Lingnan.

However, it obviously takes a lot of time to conquer and develop Lingnan, so Zhao Kuo can't count on that for the time being.

At this moment, a shout of killing suddenly came, attracting Zhao Kuo's attention.

Zhao Kuo looked around and saw a group of people in strange costumes rushing out of the forest by the lake, standing on the shore of the lake, swaying at the Han army's fleet, and howling in a roar.

Zhao Kuo looked at it for a while and was sure that the guys in front of him should be Yue people.

Although the Chu State established three counties, Kuaiji, Changsha and Jiujiang south of the Yangtze River, in fact, only Kuaiji County was basically the core area of ​​Wu and Yue countries back then, so it basically achieved Huaxia. The two counties of Changsha and Jiujiang are still in the north, and the places slightly southward are basically gathering places for these Yue people.

What do Yue people look like?

Simply put, it is a "broken hair tattoo". Because the Yue people lived in the hot Jiangnan and Lingnan areas at that time, their hair was not like the Chinese, both men and women, and they were combed into a bun. Instead, they were cut into various short hairs and applied various tattoos on their bodies.

Even in later generations, some ethnic minorities in the south still retain such customs among the older generations, because they are descendants of the Yue people.

Not only that, the jewelry on Yue people is also very distinctive. They like to string shells, beads and other things together to wear, such as wrists, necks, ankles, etc., which can be worn.

Another point is that many Yue people also like to barefoot because they live in the mountains and forests.

But it is worth mentioning that Yue people are also a race that has learned to grow rice very early.

Zhao Kuo thought for a while and said, "Xiang Yan, can you communicate with them?"

Xiang Yan shrugged her shoulders and said helplessly: "To be honest, our Xiang family's fiefs are all north of the Huai River, and there is basically no communication with these Yue people south of the Yangtze River.

However, several local Chu monarchs may have a way to communicate with these Yue people."

In order to facilitate the control of these local Yue people, the Chu State took a completely different approach here from the Central Plains.

In the Central Plains, although some of the land would be occupied by the nobles of Chu State, most of the land was still controlled by the royal family. However, in places like Jiujiang County, Chu State directly set up several vassals to let these vassals control the tribes of Yue under its command. The central government of Chu State did not directly govern this place.

After listening to it, Zhao Kuo also felt a little regretful: "Then there is nothing we can do."

At this moment, for some reason, the Yue people actually took out their bows and arrows and shot at the Yuhuang warship where Zhao Kuo was located.

However, these Yue people's bows and arrows looked very simple, and they could not touch the Yuhuang warships and fell into the water one after another.

Zhao Kuo was so happy when he saw it: "Good guy, I don't go to find them, but they came to him on their own initiative?

Where are the crossbowmen? Give them a lesson!"

With Zhao Kuo's order, hundreds of Chi Youjun immediately took out the powerful crossbow behind him.

"Swoosh swish swish!"

After a dense sound of fierce crossbows breaking through the air, people were shot down a large area, and wailing sounds came one after another.

Zhao Kuo snorted and said slowly: "Go, catch a few prisoners, and find the surrendered Chu people to see who knows how to communicate with these Yue people. Can you ask for some confession?"

This is the benefit of Zhao Kuo after he became the king. If you want to do anything, just let the people below find a way.

Soon, a Han army ship docked and brought the Yue people who were rolling and screaming on the ground to the ship.

After another half a day, a freshly baked confession was delivered to Zhao Kuo.

It turned out that these Yue people were ordered by Yu Ganjun of Chu and wanted to harass the Han army halfway.

Yu Ganjun is one of the several vassals set up by the Chu State in Jiujiang County.

When Zhao Kuo heard this, he was also amused: "Is there only a few hundred people under Yu Ganjun's command?"

The surrendered minister of Chu State who was in charge of the questioning hurriedly said, "Your Majesty, these Yue people have said that Yu Ganjun has actually issued this order to all Yue tribes in the entire Jiujiang County, but I don't know why only they appeared here."

When Zhao Kuo heard this, he couldn't help but spread his hands: "I understand, we are meeting an honest tribe."

Other tribes were watching and knew that the Han army that destroyed Chu must be very powerful. Only this tribe silly came up after obedience to the order. What is this not an honest person?

This small episode did not have much impact. Zhao Kuo continued to lead the troops south, and one day later, leading the army to land on the southern bank of Penglize, and continued to march towards Yugancheng, the southernmost stronghold in Chu.

Along the way, the army led by Zhao Kuo was also harassed by many other Yue tribes, but these Yue tribes miscalculated in this matter.

The Yue tribes thought that the harassment of the Han army in the mountains and ridges could definitely be done without realizing it, and the Han army had no temper at all, but they never expected that Zhao Kuo had already trained an all-round elite army that could ride horses and shoot arrows, and whistle the mountains and forests - the Chiyou Army.

There is a saying that goes, don’t challenge my career with your interests and hobbies.

When these Yue people met the Chiyou army, their methods seemed so clumsy and ridiculous to the Chiyou army.

The Chiyou army captured a large number of Yue people and, with the help of the local surrendered officials of Chu who were familiar with Yue people's language, used persuasion to surrender and torture many means to draw out the address of many Yue people's tribes, and then carried out a merciless sweep of these places.

After each sweep, there will be hundreds to thousands of additional Yue prisoners in Zhao Kuo's army, and these prisoners will be given as spoils to the soldiers who have made contributions.

After this several times, all the Yue tribes wherever the Han army went were fleeing, let alone harassing, they didn't even dare to show off in front of the Han army.

Seven days later, the army finally arrived in Yugan City.

What surprised Zhao Kuo was that he originally thought he would encounter strong resistance here, but he found a small city with a large city, as well as a group of Chu officials and generals who were kneeling on the ground and respectfully.

Zhao Kuo looked at a young Chu nobleman kneeling in front of him with some surprise and said, "Where is Yu Ganjun?"

The man hurriedly took out a head from the box beside him and said to Zhao Kuo: "Your Majesty, Yu Ganjun Xiong Xian's head is here."

Now I don’t need to explain it. It seems that Yu Ganjun doesn’t want to surrender, so these people who want to surrender killed Yu Ganjun.

Zhao Kuo thought about it and asked again: "What is your relationship with Yu Ganjun?"

The man hesitated for a moment and said, "To be honest, this Yu Ganjun...is actually his father."

The atmosphere suddenly solidified.

Zhao Kuo was also speechless, good guy, are you still a peaceful person who killed his father and surrendered?

But after thinking about it, Zhao Kuo didn't say anything, but directly agreed to Yu Gancheng's surrender, and also granted Xiong Hou, who killed his father, a false position as the guard of the Han King, and asked him to follow Zhao Kuo to return to the imperial capital in the future.

After all, Yu Ganjun has been operating here for decades. If Xiong Hou is killed at once, then the Yue tribes that Yu Ganjun could have controlled would become independent again, which is also a problem for the Han country that wants to control here.

After conquering Yugan City, the conquest of Jiujiang County ended here.

In fact, from the perspective of geographical conditions, Yugancheng is only located in the northern part of Jiangxi in later generations, and is still a long way from the central and southern parts.

The reason why we did not continue to march was mainly because Yugan City was the dividing line between the plains and hills, and we would enter the long hills further south.

There were Yue people tribes driven to the south by the Chinese princes, namely Minyue, Yang Yue, Fang Lin, Cangwu, etc. Most of these tribes were full of hostility towards the Chinese, and the hilly terrain was full of miasma, so it was not suitable for the army to move south until they were prepared enough.

Yu Gan was also one of the southernmost cities controlled by the Chinese princes in the Warring States Period.

The goal of this war is mainly to destroy the State of Chu, so Zhao Kuo's military operations ended until the final city of the State of Chu.

After making preparations in the future, the army continued to move south and pacify Baiyue! After three days of stationing, Zhao Kuo left three thousand troops to Yugancheng to garrison here, and then he returned north with his army and countless prisoners.

Half a month later, when Zhao Kuo once again stepped onto the north bank of the Yangtze River, good news from Changsha County and Kuaiji County had been waiting here for a long time.

The two counties in Changsha and Kuaiji have also completed all conquests and have applied to return to the court.

Zhao Kuo thought about it and wrote to Li Mu himself. Sima Shang replied to order that Li Mu and Sima Shang leave some elite troops to guard the country, and that other main forces could return to the court! At this point, the State of Chu was completely destroyed.

As the third longest founding of the Seven Heroes of the Warring States Period (Qi and Yan ranked first), it also has the longest strongest (from the Spring and Autumn Period to the Warring States Period for hundreds of years), and it is also the last country among the Seven Heroes of the Warring States Period to be destroyed by Zhao.

From then on, all the vassal states in China were under the rule of the Han state, and the newly born Han state became a giant dynasty with a territory of 6 million square kilometers.

What is the concept of six million square kilometers?

The Roman Empire, the "spiritual leader" of the Western world, had a territory of 5.9 million square kilometers at its peak, which was not as good as the current Han Kingdom.

The other Frank kingdoms, the Holy Roman Empire, and even the first, second, and third empires in France, are even more incomparable to the Han Kingdom.

During the heyday of the Western Han Dynasty, the territory was 6 million square kilometers, which was exactly the same as Zhao Kuo's Han flag.

The territory of the Tang Dynasty at its peak was 15.67 million square kilometers, but this was just a flash in the pan. The actual controlled area was actually 6 million square kilometers in the old Han Dynasty.

The territory of the Northern Song Dynasty was 2.8 million square kilometers, less than half of that of Zhao Kuo.

During the heyday of the Ming Dynasty, the territory area was above 10 million square kilometers, but Uszang and the Northeast were only nominally controlled. In fact, the territory that the Ming Dynasty was truly controlled by the central government was about 4 million to 5 million square kilometers, which was still inferior to the Han Dynasty.

In other words, if we look at the actual controlled territory area, Zhao Kuo's Han Kingdom is now comparable to the most powerful Chinese dynasties in history.

At this point, the seven heroes of the Warring States Period returned to the Han Dynasty, and they were the destiny of heaven, and belonged to China! Zhao Kuo, gloriously!
Chapter completed!