Chapter 1 The Change

The changes in Xiling and the intervention of Dongping naturally aroused the vigilance of Chunnan, but the Dongping army was on standby at the border, leaving them no chance to take advantage. Otherwise, Chunnan would have launched an offensive long ago. Now, the Chunnan ruler was in court, constantly discussing with his officials how to deal with the situation appropriately, and what consequences would arise if Chunnan launched an attack first. Chunnan's military strength had also accumulated to a certain extent. If they kept such a large army for a long time, Chunnan would also be dragged down. After all, the current warfare was different from the past. The era of gathering a group of ordinary people, giving them some weapons, and relying on personal guards and a small number of elite troops to play various complex tactics was gone. Highly trained professional soldiers, a close proportion of arms, sophisticated equipment, strong logistical support, various large technical weapons, and even the increasingly indispensable reconnaissance and attack coordination of airships, all made the cost of the same number of troops several times higher than before. Although Chunnan was wealthy and now had a relatively strong and united central government, it could not maintain such a large expenditure for a long time. Moreover, if the army was trained well but not used, morale would continue to decline, which was also a serious problem.

But the development of the situation was completely unexpected. Trade had long ceased completely, and any activity on the border would arouse the vigilance of the other side's border army. In the vicinity of Jinzhou, the monitoring of the forces controlled by the Juxian Wang (Worthy Prince) was even more tense. After all, the armies that were not far apart originally maintained at least superficial harmony and friendship, but suddenly became an existence where friend and foe were difficult to distinguish, and the generals on both sides could not help but be nervous. After several consecutive frictions, the Jinzhou and Chunnan armies fought first, and Dongping immediately entered a state of full combat. Although the deployment of different war zones had not been fully completed, Dongping had been planning for a long time, so it held the advantage. A large number of troops immediately continued to move south from their original positions, and the full-scale war between the two countries broke out inadvertently.

Grand Commandant Ye Tao was still in Xiling, so Tan Xiaopei could only take on the task of controlling the situation himself, assigning the First War Zone to Yu Fuzhong and the Central War Zone to Xue Yuan. However, although Tan Xiaopei said he was in control of the overall situation, he was at a loss when it came to some businesses that Ye Tao was very familiar with, such as coordinating national military production. Although he still had some understanding of the Ye Family Workshop's system, he did not know much about professional knowledge such as production capacity and logistics. After he made several mistakes in this regard, several ministers quietly reminded Zhuo Mang to talk to Tan Xiaopei and appoint more reliable people in this area. Tan Xiaopei always accepted good advice, so he immediately promoted the So Yong and So Zheng brothers into the core staff team in charge of the occupation. So Yong was in charge of production and quality, while So Zheng was in charge of demand research and allocation. There would be no disputes between the two brothers, and So Yong was also Ye Tao's senior brother. Although he had been an assistant minister of the Ministry of Works for several years, he had not abandoned his relationship with the workshop at all. With these two brothers, the problem of material production and distribution could basically be solved.

After the war with Chunnan began, the Central War Zone fought the most fiercely. Although Tan Xiaopei was unable to command in person, young generals such as Chi Yun and Xue Yuan performed extremely well. The Central War Zone had originally gathered a large number of elite troops, which were to be used as the main assault direction. Chi Yun was good at attacking and had a strong overall view, while Xue Yuan was a fierce general in defense. The two took turns to lead, on the one hand, advancing step by step, but at the same time constantly making postures of excessive expansion and insufficient follow-up, attracting enemy forces to gather and attack, and then annihilating the enemy in a strong mobile defense. In less than a month, they had already played two rounds of this trick, and the cooperation between the two became more and more tacit.

In the south of Chunnan, the Yazhou fleet was active on the coast of Chunnan all day long, making Chunnan very annoyed. They wanted to ignore it, but they were afraid of harassment from Yazhou. The fleet, led by Tianwen-class ships, had caused huge losses to several Chunnan ports with its powerful artillery. Chunnan's fleet now had only the Huyaclass ships, which were built by Chunnan itself with technology imported from Dongping, and the improved version of the Huyu-class. The Huyu-class ship, which used ballistae and Shenbi crossbows as its main weapons, was not at all a match for the Tianwen-class ships. It could not even enter the range of the ballistae on the Huyu-class ships and was always sunk at a considerable distance. Yazhou began to come up with new ideas after occupying this advantage. Should they advance the landing operation and then transport all the artillery to the land to use? Anyway, Chunnan had completely lost sea control, and the sea was at Dongping's mercy. It was enough to maintain a fast fleet of a certain size, and other combat power could be completely transferred to the ground. Artillery could play a very obvious role in positional warfare and siege warfare. Although the consumption of gunpowder and ammunition would be terrible, its effect was much greater than using fire oil bombs and stone bullets. Fire oil bombs had power but no kinetic energy, and stone bullets had decent kinetic energy, but almost no power. However, artillery shooting combined both, and the shooting itself was very powerful, which could cause great psychological pressure on the attacked party. Although Tan Xiaopei had not yet decided whether to approve this combat plan, Yazhou had already begun to prepare gunpowder and shells, and a fast fleet was also established as soon as possible, constantly patrolling the coast of Chunnan, destroying all enemy targets that might cause damage to the fleet. Chunnan did not rely on foreign trade to obtain its own strategic resources, so the actual loss caused by this coastal harassment was not very large, but it was really embarrassing. Just thirty years ago, Chunnan could exchange Cangshui-class and Lianshui-class ship technology with Dongping. They had a huge advantage in navigation, but now, times had changed. Chunnan had to ask the Dongping fleet if it was allowed to have a ship with a slightly larger tonnage sailing in the sea. Those spirited captains of thirty years ago were now all important figures in the Chunnan navy, and the personal experience of the change from prosperity to demise made them even more unbearable. Although Chunnan did not place the importance of the navy very high, it was second only to the army on the ground. What methods to take on the coast to prevent Dongping's ubiquitous attacks was also a quarrel among the generals. Chunnan's coastline was too long, so long that even if they all knew that Dongping's Yazhou troops would eventually have to land, they still could not imagine where to wait for this landing to effectively prevent Dongping's invasion.

However, Chunnan was not completely at a disadvantage. In the Grand Canal War Zone, several old Chunnan generals joined forces and fought steadily, making Tan Weiming suffer unspeakably. The troops assigned to the Grand Canal War Zone were not very strong. Their main task was to coordinate the supply of the entire army. However, before the local administration could be stabilized, it was difficult to have a perfect solution if the enemy's harassment and destruction took advantage of the situation. Chunnan, led by 57-year-old Chen Jingkang, with 35,000 cavalry as the backbone, constantly launched attacks at night. Every time Chen Jingkang launched an attack, 62-year-old Pang Yao, 54-year-old Ding Han, and 51-year-old Chen Cheng each led their own troops to launch considerable harassments at different times and places. Even if Tan Weiming knew that the most critical blow from the opponent still came from Chen Jingkang, he could not help but divide his troops to rescue them all the way. Although they were old generals, the battlefield wisdom and creativity they showed far surpassed other Chunnan generals and were not at all outdated. After Chen Jingkang captured a mooring yard, although the Dongping side set fire to and destroyed the airships that could not take off, Chen Jingkang still seized two complete sets of lanterns. They immediately imitated a series of various lanterns and began to guide the airships to carry out night attacks. At night, air supremacy was completely unreliable, and no one could carry out air combat. Tan Weiming did not have any omissions in his command and handling. It could even be said that the commanding ability he showed was quite strong. While organizing a large number of material transportation and facility construction, he also had to constantly deal with the enemy's harassment operations, minimizing the loss of materials and personnel as much as possible. He also organized an endless stream of ambushes and counterattacks of different sizes, and the Chunnan army that was wiped out before and after was indeed not a small number. However, the Grand Canal War Zone fell into such a stalemate, which began to gradually affect the progress of the Central War Zone.

However, no one had anything to complain about. The most tense situation was not in the Grand Canal War Zone or the Central War Zone, but in Xiling. Ye Tao and Dai Yun had only a little over 10,000 direct military forces at most. Together with the Lei Yin Mo Zong (Thunder Sound Demon Sect) troops, it was also extremely limited. After the Lei Yin Mo Zong (Thunder Sound Demon Sect) joined forces with the Zhenzhou army, they were intertwined with the Dao Ming Zong (Way of Light Sect), with mutual attacks and defenses. Although they contained hundreds of thousands of Dao Ming Zong (Way of Light Sect) troops, it was impossible for them to quickly break through the area controlled by the Dao Ming Zong (Way of Light Sect) to give Ye Tao direct support. Although Dai Yun led his troops to open up a passage, contact various aristocratic families, and gather military strength, the final outcome was really hard to say. Ye Tao, Tan Weixin, and Dai Yun, with just over 10,000 troops, coordinated over 100,000 Xiling Imperial Guards and direct troops loyal to the royal family, but what they had to face was the aristocratic family army and the Dao Ming Zong (Way of Light Sect) coalition forces, which probably numbered more than 800,000, who were hostile to the Yin family. Everyone had to give full play to their strength, and every army and every battle could not be wasted... This was the true picture of the situation that Ye Tao and others needed to face.

If the people who were worried about Ye Tao knew how relaxed Ye Tao, Tan Weixin, and Dai Yun were facing such a situation, they would probably find it a little unbelievable. Ye Tao never had the habit of complaining about the world. Facing such pressure, he did not rush back and forth in the command post. Every morning, he would participate in the Xiling court meeting with Tan Weixin to discuss the current war situation. Most of the rest of the time, he stayed in a luxurious garden only one street away from the Xiling Royal Palace. This was also where Ye Tao's command post was located. He believed that Dai Yun would definitely be able to open up the situation with limited troops, and he also believed that according to the previous deployment, the troops that were dispersed to perform different tasks would also complete their tasks excellently. Small victories would finally accumulate into a grand enough victory to completely defeat the enemy. Every day, in addition to constantly reviewing the telegrams from all sides, understanding the progress of all parties, and occasionally making some instructions, he spent most of his time chatting and playing chess with Tan Weixin. Those anxious civil and military officials in Xiling were often calmed down by seeing the leisurely posture of Ye Tao and Tan Weixin.

"Xin'er, the children are having a lot of fun in Yunzhou." A long telegram was sent, and it took from morning to noon for the telegram to be fully sent. This telegram was completely in plain text. The content inside did not need to be kept secret. It mainly described what the children had done in Yunzhou. It was written with great interest and made people feel fun to watch.

"What's wrong again?" Tan Weixin chuckled. Now her body was countless times better than when she first met Ye Tao. Although she was still prone to fatigue, and naturally could not compare with Dai Yun or her sister Tan Weishi in terms of physical fitness, she could not tell that she was a patient in her daily life. Her mood naturally improved with her body.

"The second child has loosened his attitude towards the Huang family's little girl. The little princess of Xiling may become our daughter-in-law." Ye Tao picked up the gossip and said it first. They never interfered in the communication between the children, but tried to create conditions for them and guide them to become better and better people.

The Huang family's little girl always reminded people of Dai Qiuyan back then. It seemed that from the first time she saw Ye Wenji, she had fallen in love with this brother who always had bits and pieces of interesting little things on him. At that time, in order to prevent this little girl from crying, Ye Wenji gave the Huang family's little girl a small porcelain cat that he had just made. The little girl often ran to find Ye Wenji. Ye Wenji could not do anything when he was in Yunzhou, but once he arrived in Danyang, she came almost every day. Ye Wenji was not so idle. He spent a lot of time in the studio, doing experiments, making interesting little things, and constantly honing his skills. The little girl's patience was surprisingly good. She always stayed quietly on the side, watching the masses of clay and pieces of wood and stone gradually changing their appearance and becoming all kinds of interesting little things. The little girl could even restrain her curiosity and never disturb Ye Wenji's work. Even if she had any questions, she would wait until Ye Wenji was free to ask. At first, Ye Wenji also found it quite annoying, but after all, the little girl was not noisy at all. When he was waiting for the results from the small kiln in the studio, waiting for the hot metal to cool down, and waiting for the moist materials to dry slowly, it was not bad to have a cute little girl to talk to. This time, when the Huang family's little girl continued to watch Ye Wenji work in Ye Family Fort, Ye Wenji asked the little girl to help him take a tool for the first time... Then, he began to teach the little girl pottery. It is said that at that time, in the studio, when Ye Wenji gently said to the little girl, "Help me get the number four wrench," the little girl was stunned for a full half a minute before going with joy. This little girl with an extremely quiet personality could not help but ask this and that when learning pottery. According to the attendants who were present at the time, Ye Wenji was still very fond of the little girl. Ye Wenji and Ye Wenxuan brothers were both like this. They would not neglect anyone, but it was not so easy for them to really treat people as friends or relatives.

What attracted Ye Wenji was the Huang family's little girl's patience and calmness. What attracted Ye Wenxuan was Yin Ying's sincerity, generosity, and eagerness to learn. Yin Ying had received the Yin family's education since she was a child. Although she was only so young, she already had good handwriting and was good at painting. After she arrived in Yunzhou, she was overwhelmed with things, but she carefully recorded various things and recorded what she had asked from various people around her. Then, if she did not understand anything, she would ask again and again. The female officials who followed her reminded her several times that it was useless to understand these things. But Yin Ying said that she was really happy to understand these things, and it had nothing to do with whether it was useful or not. This made Ye Wenxuan feel very good. That was what Ye Tao told them, people always have to do something that is not so useful. Imbuing such education from an early age also made the children living in Ye Family Fort different from the children in other places.

"It's still early... how old is she?" Tan Weixin took the telegram, a thick stack, and slowly read it. But she was obviously somewhat disapproving of Ye Tao's earlier judgment.

"According to... the rules here, they get engaged and married at the age of 12 or 13, right? Or at least both families know it in their hearts." Ye Tao said with a smile: "The Huang family's little girl is fine. If Yin Ying really wants to come to our house... we don't care, but to the outside world, just preparing the betrothal gifts will take several years. It's very troublesome."

"What are you going to prepare?" Tan Weixin's tone was hard to say whether it was vigilance or playfulness, or perhaps both.

"Nothing, you see, after finishing Xiling and Chunnan, I should be able to rest no matter what. I should be able to rest for a long time. I'll have a chance to build a few more gardens, which will be just right for my sons and daughters to use as dowry and betrothal gifts. Gardens are still very fun. Also, since we are now the richest people in the world, we have so much money that we don't know where to use it, so we have to use it. Otherwise, we'll get a lot of criticism. We really have to plan this carefully." Ye Tao said extremely easily.

Ye Tao and Tan Weixin had long been deeply integrated into this era. They could not say whether they were adapted or not to the various things of this era, but they just felt that this was the way it was anyway, and there was always a reason. On the children's affairs, Ye Tao did not mean to confront the times. Especially, it seemed that there was no need to confront anything in the current situation. The children and their friends got along very well, which made Ye Tao, Tan Weixin, Tan Weishi, and Dai Yun somewhat happy to see it happen. Why did Tan Xiaopei not directly agree to the marriage proposal in Xiling and let his grandson and Yin Ying get engaged just like that? Instead, he let the children cultivate their feelings themselves. Part of the reason was probably because Tan Xiaopei could never become a cold-hearted politician no matter what. If Yin Ying married into the Tan family, it would certainly allow both the Yin family and the Tan family to feel at ease and not worry about any future problems. But it was unknown what would happen to Yin Ying. The wives of Tan Weiming and Tan Weiran and their families all had very deep roots and very strict rules. Tan Weiming was already a serious and upright person. Tan Weiran's status and the fact that he had been leading troops outside allowed him to completely ignore the faces of the elders in his wife's family. But if Yin Ying entered any of these families in the future, it would not be easy to be a daughter-in-law. Now that Yin Ying and Ye Wenxuan's feelings were gradually merging, it was not a situation that everyone could accept. With the Ye family's status and relationship with the Tan family, if Yin Ying married Ye Wenxuan in a few years, it would not be much different from marrying into the Tan family. The atmosphere in the Ye family was very relaxed and life was superior. As long as the Yin family was not really out of their minds, they would always hope that Yin Ying could achieve her goals and have a comfortable life. Ye Wenxuan was first-class in terms of appearance, character, and talent.

"Let's talk about this later. I haven't seen that little girl Yin Ying a few times. She looks very good in the documents. After all, she has the education of the Xiling royal family, so she can't be too bad. The Yin family... and the Chang family are different." Tan Weixin said with a chuckle. The last sentence was purely a joke. The Chang family of Chunnan sending Chang Ling was arguably the biggest failure in many years. Without Chang Ling, the two countries would purely calculate based on interests, and perhaps the alliance could last longer, and there would be no hostility or ill will. Even if Dongping was to attack Chunnan, Dongping might make more complete preparations and perhaps give Chunnan several more years. However, Chang Ling had offended almost the entire high level of Dongping. In the Dongping court, even those who supported Chang Ling when someone proposed the plan to merge the two countries and let Tan Weizai succeed to the throne could not say they had any good feelings for this person. Presumably, not many people in Chunnan liked Chang Ling either. The difference between a successful marriage and a failed marriage was really great.

"Lord Commissioner, Your Highness the Princess, new military intelligence." Feng Zi hurriedly arrived at the palace where Ye Tao and Tan Weixin were playing chess with a telegram in his hand, looking like something terrible had happened.

Ye Tao took the telegram and glanced at it, then nodded. "Let's go, call everyone to a meeting."

"What happened?"

"The fighting in Taizhou is fierce, and it looks like they won't be able to help us in a short time. But Dai Yun has good news." Ye Tao handed the telegram to Tan Weixin.

"Okay, it's just now that this can be considered good news." Tan Weixin felt a little headache.

The joint army of Dai Yun and Fu Sinian had now gathered about 70,000 troops that could carry out mobile warfare. Those aristocratic families had also left considerable troops to defend. Dai Yun had now taken control of almost half of the state's territory. When they urgently rescued the Xiong family's old nest located in the valley, which was being besieged, they discovered that the Xiong family had gathered nearly 50,000 troops and were preparing to counterattack. With Dai Yun and Fu Sinian adding to the trouble, the Xiong family's siege was naturally lifted. The Xiong family, which had always been loyal to the Yin family, handed over all of its troops to Dai Yun's command, except for 15,000 people who were left to protect the old nest. The number of troops in Dai Yun's hands immediately exceeded 100,000. However, how many aristocratic families had hidden such a hand? Being able to support so many clan soldiers was definitely a problem... However, now did not seem to be the time to investigate.