To achieve immortality, I cultivate using Qi Luck

Chapter 922: Chapter 387: Establishing a City to Resist Liang, Swallowing Tibet and Abandoning the District – Part 2 Chapter 922: Chapter 387: Establishing a City to Resist Liang, Swallowing Tibet and Abandoning the District – Part 2 Maintaining the current situation, having expended the nation’s full effort, with men at war and women transporting grain, is already an achievement.

Yet, such circumstances are inevitably unsustainable in the long term, even lasting for just three to five months would be challenging.

Therefore, for the opponent, they are undoubtedly eager for battle, seeking combat right now.

But for Chu State, the primary goal of deploying troops is simply to preserve the Barbarians as a group.

To let them settle in the northwest of Chu and serve as a barrier to obstruct Western Liang.

The true core goal is still to weaken Western Liang.

Hence, going to battle with Western Liang, shattering their army, and annihilating their state is not necessary for Huang Xin.

It would be good if it could be done naturally.

But to seal Western Liang off in Hexi, preventing their eastward advance, would also fulfill the purpose.

At this moment, Western Liang seems troublesome to provoke, for if we were to fight, we’d likely lose.

Though Chu now has a million in population and its troops flaunt their might in Jiangnan,

If we were to lose a hundred thousand troops in the northwest, defeated by a marginal state like Western Liang, that would be a painful loss, and akin to squandering our strength.

Therefore, upon realizing this risk, Huang Xin naturally adopted the prudence of his original self, and began to choose a cautious approach as a matter of course.

Western Liang is but a small country, with limited population and land, unable to sustain too many troops or prolonged large-scale conflicts.

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But Chu is a great nation, a dominion over a region, with tens of millions of citizens.

For Chu, to maintain half a million troops at the northwest front, although extremely costly in terms of money and grain, is not beyond reach.

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After capturing the regions of Lingnan and Jiangdong, not only has Chu’s territory and population grown significantly, but also its grain-producing areas have increased by three.

As of now, Chu has the Xichuan Plain, Jianghan Plain, Dongting Plain, Pengli Plain, the small Southsea Plain, the small Jiuzhen Plain, and so forth—six grain-producing regions in total.

Let’s not mention the two small plains of Lingnan for now, as the grain they produce barely suffices to feed the regions of Lingnan and the Southwest, with no surplus for export.

But the plains of Xichuan, Jianghan, Dongting, and Pengli, those are genuine granaries.

A fully developed plain can yield enough grain in a year to feed more than ten million people.

And Chu’s current total population, according to the latest data from within the country, is about thirty million.

The four grain-producing plains alone can feed forty million people; adding the other two small plains and the assorted lands within Chu’s borders, the nation produces enough grain to feed sixty to seventy million people annually.

This means that, after a period of recuperation, Chu can produce enough food surplus for thirty to forty million people every year.

This grain, if left for Chu’s people alone, would be far too much, only to be collected and left to mold in the warehouses.

Rather than benefiting the warehouse rats, it’s better to take out the grain and deliver it to the northwest to exhaust Western Liang.

After all, Xichuan and Xiangyang Prefecture are not far from Hanzhong Prefecture.

In particular, the Jianghan Plain where Hanzhong Prefecture is located – grain produced there can easily be shipped to Hanzhong using the Han River, then transported from Hanzhong to Longxi.

The pressure of transporting grain is minimal.

And from Longxi, bringing it to the TaoShui front line here isn’t troublesome at all.

In Longxi alone, there are four to five million Barbarians.

These starved and shivering Barbarians are all desperately in need; Chu could easily conscript or hire them with the grueling task of transporting military food.

Providing food for carrying the grain, a labor force of a million could be gathered in no time.

Furthermore, since Chu is waging war on behalf of their people and the grain they transport is also for their consumption, there’s no worry they wouldn’t be cooperative.

The only cost for Chu would be extra grain they can’t consume themselves.

On the other hand, for Huang Xin, he can use this grain, along with the major project of constructing fortresses along the Southern TaoShui line, to infiltrate the Barbarians and gradually achieve control over this ethnic group.

‘Also, perhaps by seizing the opportunity to station troops in the fortresses, and under the pretext that the nomadic Barbarians are non-combatants, I could propose that Chu’s army help train their elite soldiers, thereby gaining control over the Barbarians’ military power.

With the threat of Western Liang and the deterrent of my hundred thousand strong army, as well as the lure of Great Chu’s grain, even if those tribal leaders are reluctant, they wouldn’t dare to refuse.

In this way, controlling through food on one hand, and seizing military power on the other, these four to five million Barbarians left in Longxi wouldn’t be able to escape the palm of Great Chu…’

As Huang Xin calculated in his mind, a plan to annex and control the Barbarians gradually took shape.

Having thought it out, he acted.

Looking at the generals, he immediately said, “Summon someone to invite the chieftains of the Barbarian tribes to come.

I, as the commander, wish to discuss with them the construction of towns and fortresses along the Southern TaoShui Line and the support of the Barbarians with grain from the nation.”

Upon hearing this, a member of the Personal Guard immediately turned and left to summon the representatives of the Barbarians.

…

While Huang Xin was busy containing Western Liang to the northwest and plotting to swallow the entire Barbarian populace,

Far away, across ten thousand li in the south of the Great River, Lu Yuan gazed at this year’s latest household registration statistics from various prefectures and fell into contemplation.

As early as the second half of last year, Lu Yuan ordered local prefectures to start tallying their populations to check against Chu’s household registration.

Now, in the early second half of the second year, over a year had passed, and as the population tallies from various prefectures were reported, they were compiled into the hands of the King of Chu.