Fu Tang

After hearing the news, Ye Luxian was taken aback for a moment, feeling very unbelievable: Is Tang Guo crazy?

Usually in this situation, officials from both sides need to be sent to negotiate, and if the negotiation fails, they will attack each other with heavy fists. What's the matter with Tang Guo's attitude that I'm not going to make it easy, and you don't think about it?

He looked at the officials below with a serious face and asked: "How did you negotiate with Tang Guo at that time, don't hide it, and explain everything!"

Ye Luxian can be sure that when he gave the order, he had already said that his attitude should not be too tough, and he must give Tang Guo room to bargain. It is not that they really don't want to sell wool, but they want to sit on the ground and add some benefits.

But sometimes the meaning of a sentence may change after several people say it, and he is worried that the meaning of the people below has not been conveyed correctly, causing Tang Guo to be angered. If this is the case, killing these people will not relieve the hatred.

The Khitan officials also knew that this matter was very serious now, so they quickly described everything, even including details such as the expressions of the people present.

I have to say that this person is also considered a talent, and he can even remember the tone, expression and even the movements of the officials present. After listening carefully, Ye Luxian felt very unbelievable. The people on his side obviously did not have a strong tone. Was it Tang officials who distorted the facts when conveying the news to their court?

But even so, Tang Guo's counterattack was too powerful. Could it be that they really don't want wool?

Yeluxian dared to do this because he had already investigated in detail that the sales volume of wool products before the Tang Dynasty was very high, and the supply of Khitan's wool was still in short supply, so he made the request. Otherwise, how could he come up with such an idea? ?

The people below looked at Ye Luxian cautiously and asked, "Khan, what should we do?"

Ye Luxian was very irritable: "Ask me what to do? Let me do everything. What do you want to eat?"

All the officials immediately fell silent. Although Yeluxian has been rewarded and punished since he took office, the credit record of Yeluxian's family is not very good.

Ye Luxian looked at this group of people, and thought of the ministers of the Tang Dynasty, he couldn't help feeling depressed for a while. He didn't say how powerful the ministers in the court of the Tang Dynasty were. Even the monk who was appointed as the national teacher is not an ordinary person, and look at the group of wine bags and rice bags under him... Ye Luxian has a headache.

No one dared to speak, and finally Yeluxian said: "Send an envoy to Tang."

None of the officials dared to speak, so King Song Yeluxiu had no choice but to stand up and ask, "Dare to ask the Great Khan, send an envoy...how should I say it?"

The front foot aggressively wanted to stop selling wool, not to mention asking for a price increase, and also raised a lot of conditions. It turned out that the other party did not follow his own routine, directly cut off the trade between the two countries, and then sent envoys over in a hurry. How do you see how you slap your face.

But Brother Yeluxiu didn't dare to speak out what was in his heart. What if Yeluxian became angry and punished him if he did?

Ye Luxian's complexion was serious: "Go and propose marriage."

Everyone: what?

Everyone was puzzled by Ye Luxian's actions, not only Khitan officials, but even Datang officials were very strange. They had already made preparations for Khitan to raise troops to attack Datang in a fit of anger. Even the Privy Council had already stepped up the guard at the border, but Ye Luxian turned around as if nothing had happened, and sent someone to propose marriage?

How did this person's brain circuit grow?The two countries are now engaged in an invisible confrontation.

The cabinet's analysis and analysis failed to come up with a result, which made them very disturbed. They always felt that Ye Luxian must not really want to marry the princess of the Tang Dynasty, not to mention that anyone who is not a fool knows that there is no princess in the Tang Dynasty!

There is even only one prince, that is the current prince, there should have been several eldest princesses, but when Li Jing was fleeing west, his sons and daughters were lost all the way, basically there was nothing left, and the eldest princess was naturally gone.

So... what exactly is Ye Luxian's intention.

Li Congjia looked at the lavishly written credential, and said with a smile, "Don't say that Yeluxian actually has people who are proficient in sinology. It's not easy."

The cabinet ministers collectively stared at Li Congjia: When is it, can your focus be normal?

Li Congjia was a little helpless by everyone's gaze, so he put down his credentials and said, "Why are you so nervous? Ye Luxian is looking for a step down, so don't think too much."

Zhao Pu disagreed: "There are many ways to find people under the steps. Why did he come to propose marriage? The most important thing is that he actually promised that Princess Datang would definitely become the Queen of Khitan. It's the daughter of the Xiao family, there are almost no exceptions in these years, he must have other plans when throwing this bait!"

Li Congjia lazily said: "Of course there is a plan, otherwise he would be reluctant to take the second place, and you still haven't figured it out. Then I will say two people, and you will definitely understand."

Fan Zhi immediately asked, "Who?"

"Princess Wencheng and Princess Jincheng." Li Congjia played with the fingers in his hand and continued, "These two princesses brought something to Tubo back then, and now what Yeluxian wants."

The ministers of the cabinet suddenly realized it. I have to say that perhaps the emperor's brain circuit is connected. Ye Luxian's brain is so big, only Li Congjia thought of this in an instant, and Fan Zhi and others are still thinking about it from other levels. Looking for it!

Of course, that also has something to do with the fact that there is no habit of marrying princesses in this dynasty, they didn't think about it at all!

Since Ye Luxian thinks this way, everyone is relatively calm, Wang Pu asked: "Then... Your Majesty means..."

There is nothing wrong with marrying a princess, if it is not possible, just find a daughter from the clan, after all, the position of Empress Khitan is still a bit tempting.

Li Congjia snorted coldly and said: "The Tang Dynasty married Tubo, and then raised a serious problem. I finally weakened Khitan to the current level. Do you think I will agree?"

Everyone looked at each other, although they felt a little regretful, but thinking about it, if the other party really wanted all kinds of advanced technologies, the position of queen would be useless. Anyway, even if Princess Datang becomes queen, the final throne may not necessarily be a princess As for the son, the Khitan people don't have any saying that the eldest son inherits.

The Khitan envoys were not so high-spirited this time, they thought they could threaten Datang, so they put on a high stance, but now they find that Datang does not accept this, and now they are on other people's territory, they still come to propose marriage , so be very polite.

In the end, what they never expected was that they were kicked out after living in the post house for only two days, and they were told that Datang was very dissatisfied with Khitan's previous actions, so they did not intend to marry, nor did they intend to withdraw the previous agreement. Decide!

The envoy was completely dumbfounded. Before he came, he had the cheek to discuss with his boss many ways to deal with it. For example, how would he raise the conditions when Datang agreed to the marriage, and how would he persuade him if Datang did not agree to the marriage? If the marriage was really not possible , then try to get Datang to revoke the previous ban.

But no one thought that Datang's reply would be so tough and slap in the face. At this time, the Khitan envoy couldn't bear it no matter how good-tempered he was, he took people away from Datang directly, and claimed that he would never be threatened by Datang .

When Ye Luxian got the news, there was only one thought in his mind: Is Li Yu crazy?

In his opinion, Li Yu's previous move did seem tough, but it was more like a response to Khitan not selling wool.

This kind of correspondence seems to be straightforward, but it actually affects too many businessmen. If there are too many people complaining, even Li Congjia may not be able to bear it.

Ye Luxian thought very well, thinking that Datang should agree to the marriage. After all, the stalemate between the two sides is not good for anyone. For Datang, the tax will be reduced suddenly, and many businessmen will go bankrupt because of this ban.

But for the Khitan, the impact is even greater. Datang directly pinched the Khitan's weakness, the food is better, they have barley, cattle and sheep, not to mention that the Khitan's land is not completely unable to grow rice and wheat, cloth does not matter , anyway, they have sheepskin and cowhide, although it is not as gorgeous as silk, but that is not a necessity.

But salt is more deadly. There are no particularly large salt fields in Khitan, and a lot of salt is sold to them by relying on Datang.

In the dynasties before the Tang Dynasty, that is, the former Tang Dynasty and the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms period, the Central Plains had very strict monitoring of salt, resulting in high domestic salt prices in Khitan. After Li Congjia came to power, the supervision of salt was not so strict, or for export. The supervision is not so strict, and the price of Khitan's salt will come down when the quantity is large.

But now Datang has cut off the Khitan's salt channel again, and now the price of Khitan's salt has risen in an all-round way, if it continues, the common people may not be able to afford it!

Even Ye Luxian couldn't help but feel a little overwhelmed at this moment. The ban on the sale of wool was negotiated between Ye Luxian and the leaders of the various tribes. It was half of threats and half of lures.

Everyone hoped that they could master the high technology of Datang, and hoped that the wool could be sold at a higher price, so they agreed to Ye Luxian's proposal. After all, Ye Luxian's analysis was very reasonable.

In the end, I didn't expect Li Congjia to be so snarky and angry like a child, and he wanted to boycott it to the end!

Yeluxian closed his eyes and thought about it for a long time, and finally called Yeluxiu brother and asked, "Do we still have manpower in the Tang Kingdom?"

Just like Li Congjia arranged nails all over the world in other countries, Ye Luxian also sent people to lurk in Datang, but Datang was very strict about this point. If he wanted to be an official in Datang, he wanted to check the eight generations of his ancestors.

What?unknown origins?I'm sorry, but at most I'm just a petty official.

As for relying on a big family, it is even more impossible. These days, no matter what kind of family, bloodlines are valued, and those wealthy businessmen who don't value... unless their children are outstanding enough to win the first place in Chunwei, otherwise it will be a big deal to become an official.

Therefore, it was very hard work for Khitan to deploy manpower to Datang, but it was not of much use.

Brother Yeluxiu is in charge of this matter, he said in a low voice: "There are, but they can't take on important responsibilities. What does Da Khan want to do?"

Ye Luxian said: "They don't need to take on any important responsibilities, you find a way to arouse those businessmen and let them put pressure on the Tang court."

Ye Luxian didn't believe that Li Congjia could be so stubborn!

Brother Yeluxiu was a little hesitant: "Businessman? The status of Tang country businessmen is very low in this country. Even if they put pressure on the Tang country court, it may not be of any use."

Ye Luxian smiled slightly: "How could it be useless? Didn't you find out? Now the tax revenue of the Tang Dynasty has been gradually transferred from the ordinary peasants to the merchants. In the past, farmers accounted for the majority of taxes, but now merchants pay more than farmers. You said that if they join forces, the Tang court will not be afraid?"

Brother Yeluxiu is mature and prudent after all, he didn't act rashly after hearing this, but said: "Khan wait a moment, I only love money. We don't know much about the merchants in the Tang Dynasty. I'll ask someone to check the situation of the merchants in the Tang Dynasty. Then discuss a countermeasure."

Although Brother Yeluxiu didn't agree immediately, Yeluxian was very satisfied with his actions, nodded and said: "Go ahead, if you find out, you don't need to report it, just do it, I want to see how long Tang Guo can last."

Brother Yeluxiu turned around and left after taking the order, while still shaking his head in his heart, he now felt that their sweat was about to be driven mad by the Tang emperor, and the two countries resisted each other. In fact, strictly speaking, there was no winner, but Khitan clearly lost Be more ruthless. In this case, you should bow your head temporarily and wait until the Khitan becomes stronger before competing with Tang.

But Yeluxian refused to admit his mistakes, and wanted to make the people of Tang fight against each other. Brother Yeluxiu had been to Tang Dynasty, and to be honest, he was not very optimistic about Yeluxian's idea.

Sure enough, after Yeluxiu checked the Datang merchants, he turned around and went to Yeluxian—although Yeluxian said before that he didn't need to report to him again, it probably wouldn't be possible not to report this time.

No one thought that Datang's business was actually under the control of the imperial court. It might be wrong to say that, but it should be said that almost all powerful businessmen in Datang were under the control of Li Congjia!

After Ye Luxian heard that someone under Li Congjia had directly set up a firm to control those merchants, he couldn't help being a little surprised: "He is really tight-knit, even these merchants must be firmly in his hands!"

If Li Congjia knew Ye Luxian's thoughts, he would definitely complain. At the beginning, he just wanted to let his subordinates do business to get some pocket money, so as to avoid the embarrassing image of being an emperor who is rich all over the world, but who spends money and is constrained by courtiers. Who knew Shi Xue The family is so capable, he is capable of doing his apprentices even more capable, and abruptly developed the firm into a chamber of commerce!

Brother Yeluxiu sent someone to investigate the affairs of the chamber of commerce. Li Congjia received the news very early on. After he knew it, he immediately understood Yeluxian's thoughts, and couldn't help but shook his head and said, "This Yeluxian, can that bit of cleverness be used for business?" superior?"

Shi Xueting on the side was very speechless, didn't you force Ye Luxian to do this?

Li Congjia asked, "How about the chamber of commerce?"

Shi Xueting explained: "The mood is still very stable now, Arong has already started to organize a caravan to sell in Tubo."

Li Congjia smiled slightly: "This is just an opportunity, otherwise I will send my own people to Tibet in a while, and now I just have a ready-made excuse, not bad."

As soon as Shi Xueting heard what Li Congjia said, he knew that Tubo would suffer. However, all the countries that Li Congjia sent caravans to, in the end, there was only one result. They surrendered and became part of the territory of the Tang Dynasty, or they were slaughtered and became part of the territory of the Tang Dynasty. one.

After all, Li Congjia's favorite method is not to send troops to attack directly at the beginning, but to control the economy first. If he can control it, he can take it down when the time is right. If he can't control it, he can use force.

Tibet is now in such a situation.

Shi Xueting didn't think too much about Tubo, but reminded: "Ye Luxian is still determined, it seems that he sent someone to Yanyun Sixteen Prefectures, this time we really have to guard against it."

After Li Congjia heard this, he frowned slightly. The sixteen prefectures of Yanyun could be regarded as a historical issue, or it should not be called sixteen prefectures, but the six prefectures of Yanyun. When the six prefectures of Yanyun were returned to Datang, there Li Congjia was very annoyed by the lack of understanding of current affairs. The taxes for these years were all in accordance with Khitan's regulations.

Therefore, the people there have to pay a lot more taxes than other places, which makes the people in that place feel very uncomfortable, but they dare not protest, for fear of offending the emperor and increasing their taxes, they will really be unable to live. .

Now that Yeluxian sent people over there, if he did some private activities and promised to reduce the tax revenue, the people in these six states might really be tempted.

But this time Li Congjia didn't bother to get angry with them, he just said: "In that case, let's take advantage of this Christmas and let the taxation of those six states be the same as other places, it's an amnesty."

Anyway, it has been sorted out for so many years, the thorns are basically removed, and the governors sent over are all skilled, and the governance is well-organized. The governors of the six states have long written to demand that they be treated equally, but before Li Congjia I haven't passed my temper yet, so I didn't agree.

Now is not the time to be angry, he doesn't want to see any more rebellion.

The news was sent out in a timely manner, and the people sent by Yeluxian did not cause any trouble, and nothing was achieved in the end.

For this reason, Yeluxian directly overturned the imperial case. As a result, after he overturned the imperial case, the Kara Khanate sent envoys.

Yeluxian was a little surprised. Khitan and the Kara Khanate were still separated by the Tang Dynasty, so there were not many contacts, or they had never sent envoys to each other. But Yeluxian also knew about the Kara Khanate, and he knew about this country in his heart. Also a little vigilant.

Now that the other party took the initiative to send someone over, he decided to ask his subordinates to test it out before deciding whether to see him or not.

As a result, he was very surprised by the feedback from his subordinates: Kara Khanate actually came to discuss business with them!

And these businesses happen to be the supplies that the Khitan is very short of now, but are gradually decreasing due to their hostility with the Tang Dynasty!

Yeluxian didn't believe that the Kara Khanate was so kind, but they really lacked it now, so after thinking about it, they decided to meet the Kara Khanate's envoy.

I have to say that the envoys of the Kara Khanate were very sincere. The price they gave Yeluxian was almost the same as the price sold by Datang, but everyone knew that if the caravan of the Kara Khanate wanted to go to Khitan, there would be a After passing through the checkpoints of Datang, you must pay Datang tariffs, which will increase the cost a lot, and make almost no money!

On the third day after he met with the envoy of the Kara Khanate, Li Congjia got the news.

"The Kara Khanate wants to trade with Khitan?" Li Congjia didn't seem particularly surprised.

Shi Xueting said: "At present, it seems to be yes, but there is no news about the specific negotiation situation."

After all, no matter how powerful his subordinates are, they will never be so quick to inquire about such confidential matters.

Li Congjia said directly: "It's hard to guess, it's nothing more than that the Kara Khanate is going to sell what they need to the Khitan, but the Kara Khanate seems to have forgotten that they are not an agricultural country, what the Khitan needs , they still have to buy it from Datang.”

Shi Xueting asked with a smile: "Are you going to ban the sale of all items to the Kara Khanate this time, including but not limited to salt?"

Li Congjia raised his eyebrows and looked at him: "You are a fast learner, and you have learned to infer other things from one example."

Shi Xueting pinched his face before saying: "But this time not only the Ministry of Household Affairs, but even the cabinet may not agree."

Datang’s commerce is now considered developed. Of course, compared with other countries, the export items are very rich and the volume is also very large. The largest customers are the Kara Khanate and Khitan, and the rest are other countries on the Silk Road.

Now that they have cut off trade with Khitan, and if they cut off trade with the Kara Khanate, the tax revenue will be reduced by not one or two points, and the Ministry of Household Affairs will definitely make trouble.

Li Congjia didn't answer but said, "Keep an eye on Khitan to see when they will sign the document."

Shi Xueting didn't know what his plan was, but he didn't ask too much, and turned his head to let people continue to stare.

After half a month of continuous negotiations, the Kara Khanate and Khitan finally signed various documents and confirmed the details of the trade, but they kept this detail secret, and Shi Xueting's people would not get specific information for a while.

Li Congjia waved his hand and said, "It doesn't matter, it's the same if I don't know, I've been waiting for this day for a long time."

As a result, the envoy of the Kara Khanate had just returned to the country to report the results, when he heard a piece of news: The Tang State began to increase tariffs in an all-round way, at least [-]%!