Chapter Fifty-two: The Pronged Fortress

  After discussing the matter, Li Qin returned to his room to rest. He lay on the couch, tossing and turning, unable to sleep, thinking about the castle that would soon belong to him.

  Since it is a fortress, it must not be too large. This type of building will be massively constructed in the later Jin Dynasty, with the main function being to station soldiers and strengthen defense forces.

  Li Qin stared at the roof, thinking: "Tang Jie let me build a fort thirty miles away from Fuping. Why is it so far? Ah, I understand. Because I can only choose the north side, he explicitly said it was to prevent the Hu trouble, the Hu people come from the north, this is equivalent to telling me that I can only choose the north side, but the north side is thirty miles away, isn't that a plain?"

  At the thought of this, Li Qin suddenly sat up from his bed, feeling annoyed in his heart. This Tang Jie actually wanted me to go to the plain to build a castle, is he afraid that I won't die quickly enough?

  He slowly lay back on the bed, that's just the way it is, getting angry won't do any good, on someone else's turf, you can only listen to them. But in a plain area, what kind of castle can be built?

  After thinking for a long time, Li QIN suddenly remembered the travel show he watched in his previous life. The tour guide had introduced an ancient castle in Europe, but he couldn't remember which one it was. However, because of its unique style, he remembered it very clearly. The tour guide also commented extensively on the special features of the castle, exaggerating that there had been a war here, and the attacking soldiers were ten times more than the defending soldiers, but after half a year of fighting, they still couldn't take the castle. After the battle was over, when the defending soldiers came out to look, they saw that the entire campsite of the attacking soldiers was filled with graves, and countless attacking soldiers had died!

  Li QIN sat up again, on the couch with his fingers painting a picture, it was a prism-shaped castle, the city wall was full of protruding corners. He painted and suddenly understood that the protruding corners of the city wall were to allow the defenders to attack the attackers from multiple angles, no matter which side of the city wall the attackers attacked from, their backs would be exposed to the guards on the other side of the wall, each side was also within the range of the bow and arrow, in this way the attackers had almost no chance of climbing up the city wall, either being killed by the front guard or shot dead by the rear guard!

  This type of castle is easy to build and expand, as long as you follow the polygonal city wall, continuously repairing walls of the same shape, forming a passageway between the walls, which can be expanded, and the defensive capability will not only not weaken but also strengthen!

  Li QIN finally understood all this and felt relieved in his heart. He lay back on the bed and soon fell asleep.

  The next morning, Li Qin gathered all his men and set off north with Jia Yu to find the place to build the fort. When he explained things, the soldiers were extremely angry - building a fort on the plain would only attract the Huns to attack, it was too dangerous. They were angry but no one had any way out, they couldn't go look for Tang Ji to reason with him.

  They walked north and arrived at the plain area. Jia Xu gazed out at the vast plain, sighed and said: "If we were to cultivate this land, it would be a good place, with endless fertile fields, and over there are two small rivers, which can be called good fields of ten thousand mu. But if we were to build a castle and station troops here, I'm afraid it's not suitable!"

  Li Qiwang gazed out at the vast plain, nodding and saying, "Yes, there's no natural stronghold to rely on, so we'll have to use our own two hands to create one." He urged his horse forward, racing towards the riverbank.

  Arrived at the riverbank, the river water is rapid, and a few dozen miles west is the Yellow River. At this time, the Yellow River has not undergone many major changes in its course, and the section of the river that flows through Fuping also does not have much silt, bringing many benefits, belonging to the Hetao Plain area. The small river in front is called Qing Shui He, a tributary of the Yellow River.

  Li Qin looked at the small river and said, "The water in this river is rapid and can be used to irrigate tens of thousands of acres of land along both banks. There's another one over there, a bit further away."

  Jia Xun followed and asked: "But is it necessary to build a castle by the river?"

  Li Qin turned over and got off his horse, pointing to the surrounding terrain: "There is a bend in the river here. If we build a castle at this location, we only need to build two small beacons between the river and the castle, and we can take care of both directions. We don't have to get close to the river, so we can avoid the enemy digging up the river and flooding the castle. Our current ability is that we can only build an earth castle first, which cannot withstand flooding; while the other two directions only need to build a few more beacons, and we can discover enemy movements in advance and make preparations for battle."

  Jia Xun nodded and said, "It's not hard to discover the enemy's situation, but building a beacon tower here is impossible to defend. When the soldiers see the enemy coming, they can only retreat to the castle. In short, we still have to defend the castle."

  Li Qin squatted down, picked up a stone and drew a pattern on the ground, drawing out the shape of the fort he had thought of. "We just need to build a five-pointed star-shaped castle like this," he said. "The walls don't have to be too high, just about two people's height will do. We'll dig trenches outside the castle, both vertically and horizontally. As long as there aren't more than 2,000 enemy soldiers, our 200 men can defend the castle."

  The soldiers next to him didn't react much to what he said earlier, but when they heard the last sentence, they immediately gathered around, looking at the pentagonal fort map in surprise. Everyone was shocked - with such a low wall and only 200 people, could it really withstand ten times as many enemies? It seemed a bit exaggerated!

  Jia Xun was also slightly surprised, he squatted down, carefully looked at the diagram, and after a while, said: "This is very similar to what's described in Mozi about the horse-faced city. The defensive positions are not just the gates, but the entire fort wall can be defended everywhere."

  Li Qindao said, "Exactly, that's what I meant. It was something I thought of last night." He stood up and pointed upstream at the Qing Shui River, saying, "There are forests over there. We can cut down big trees, make them into rafts, float them downstream, and then pull them out to repair the city walls. Using tree trunks as bones and the dirt from digging moats as flesh, we can quickly build up the castle."

  Feng Cheng, a soldier, would build houses. He usually did some important work on the top beam. Being a soldier was just a sideline for him. He said, "General Hou, if the wall is about one mile long, two hundred people can finish it in a month. Of course, the wall can't be too high, only as high as two men are okay. If it's higher, it needs to be thicker, and it will take longer."

  Jia Xun stood up and said, "If we decide to repair it here, we must start immediately. The river water is thawing, and the spring plowing season has arrived in Fuping. It's hard to recruit laborers now. Hmm, spring plowing also means spring famine. As long as we can offer food, we will definitely be able to recruit people, at least the Qiang and Di tribes."

  Li Qindao said: "First build a basic one, stand firm on our feet, and when we have more people in the future, it's not too late to expand!"

  Gazing out at the river, Li Qin suddenly felt an overwhelming surge of passion. He exclaimed loudly: "Brothers, let's join forces and use our own hands to create a territory that truly belongs to us!" As he spoke, he raised his right hand high in the air.

  Everyone was excited, thinking of their own territory, everyone was happy, they all raised their right hands and patted each other, cheering loudly. Jia Yu also imitated the gesture, and slapped palms with Li Qin. Suddenly, he felt that he had a goal in the future, and also had a collective to rely on, he found his organization!

  As soon as the matter was decided, actions became targeted and speeded up naturally. Everyone went their separate ways, Jia Yu was in charge of various data and personnel scheduling, while Feng Cheng and the soldiers went to the countryside to recruit people, Li Qin went to find Liu Sheng to borrow grain from him, of course, he couldn't borrow it for free, so he pawned that oversized broken horse knife to Liu Sheng, saying that when they had grain in the future, they would redeem it.

  Liu Sheng's wound had not healed yet, and he was still recuperating in the manor. When he saw Li Qin bring a large broadsword, he was naturally shocked. Sitting on the couch, Liu Sheng looked at the big knife lying horizontally on the ground and said: "Brother, did you seize this sword from bandits? I'm afraid you've gotten into trouble. As far as I know, only the Bao Department can forge such a large sword, which is the strong department of the Di people. They must have obtained it by plundering the raw iron from the Sha Luo tribe!"

  Li Qian furrowed his brow and said, "The people of the Bao Department are skilled at forging weapons. If there's an opportunity, it would be best to establish a good connection with them!"

  He had an idea in his mind, if he had the chance in the future, he would definitely take over this tribe and have them forge weapons for him, but this idea could only be thought about for now, as he didn't have the power to put it into action.

  Li Qin told the story of obtaining the treasure from Shiluo, and this kind of thing didn't need to be hidden from Liu Sheng. Looking at his appearance, he was a good hand at selling stolen goods, and could help himself get rid of this batch of treasures.

  Liu Sheng was overjoyed and said, "You've obtained wealth? This is a case of 'black eating black', you must get rid of it quickly to avoid trouble. If someone's mouth isn't tight, they'll bring disaster upon you. You can go to Long County to sell it, I have acquaintances there who can help you, I'll send a trusted person to guide you and save you a lot of trouble."

  Li Qindao thanked him and then bid farewell, planning to set off tomorrow. He arranged for Liu Sheng's confidant to go to Fu Jiaocun to find himself. As for the grain, Liu Sheng readily agreed to lend it to Li Qindao.

  After Li Qian left, Liu Sheng looked at the big knife and thought: "I really didn't expect that in such a short period of time, this Li brother would build his own castle. In the future, he will definitely become a big figure in the local area. I should fully support him, so that in the future, I can also bask in his glory. It's not worth worrying about some food, and it's not good to be stingy with Li brother."

  Back in the village, Li QIN told his parents about what had happened. Li Tian and He Shi were worried when they heard that their son was going to travel far away, but seeing that their son had made great progress and was even planning to build a castle on his own, the Li family's fortunes seemed to be recovering, so they couldn't stop him from going. They repeatedly reminded him to be careful in all things, and Li QIN naturally agreed to each of their reminders.

  The next morning, Liu Sheng's trusted aide arrived. He was a Qiang man in his 40s, very shrewd and capable, named Liu Zhongyan. The name suited him well; people doing business called him Zhongyan, and just hearing the name could put customers at ease.

  ——

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