Chapter 777: Sangui, Go to Remedial Class

Xi'an Prefecture, the headquarters of the Pingxi Army Military Governor's office.

Wu Sangui, who had just finished the New Year celebrations, was in the rear residence of the Military Governor's office doing his accounts, and he was worried — his Military Governorship had run at a loss again!

And this feudatory domain couldn't be abolished.

And these accounts — no matter how he worked them, they wouldn't balance.

Last year Wu Sangui had taken the lead in enforcing strict economy, squeezing the Military Governor's office expenditures again and again, and had also worked hard to develop industry and commerce, even selling more than two thousand fine Hequ horses to Huguang — yet in the end it was still a loss!

There was no help for it: no matter how hard Wu Sangui tried, he couldn't withstand the three hundred and thirty "little bottomless pits" beneath him!

The Chiliarch system Wu Sangui had implemented in the Pingxi domain had consolidated his power, but financially it was an absolute black hole. Beneath the 330 Chiliarchs there were at least 330,000 households and more than two million people, with actual per-capita arable land holdings of between eight and ten mu — which meant nearly 2,000 mu had gone to these 330 Chiliarchs. What land and households remained for Wu Sangui, the Military Governor, was next to nothing.

And after seizing so much land and population, not one of these 330 Chiliarchs had reported a profit last year — all of them were running at a loss, and all of them came to Wu Sangui with their hands out for subsidies!

What was even more infuriating was that these 330 Chiliarchs were constantly clashing with one another all year round!

These Chiliarchs had now split into two factions — one the Ganshan faction, the other the Guanning faction — endlessly fighting openly and covertly over land, over population, over trade routes, fighting without end. And Wu Sangui dared not provoke the numerous and powerful Ganshan faction, nor could he shortchange his own Guanning faction, so he had become a rat trapped in a bellows, with no choice but to spend money to ward off disaster.

But how much money did he actually have in his pockets? How could it possibly be enough? The money raised last time by issuing domain bonds had been used by him to cover daily expenses and pay interest, and now more than half of it was already spent — while the abolition of the domain remained nowhere in sight.

What depressed him most was that Zhu Cilang still wanted the Pingxi domain to send troops to attack the Yarkent Khanate — to bring the land of Anxi, which had belonged to China since ancient times, back under the indirect jurisdiction of the central court.

Although the Dzungar tribe would coordinate with the Pingxi domain's operations and might even bear the main burden of sending troops, Wu Sangui still could not show weakness in front of Batur Khong Tayiji — he absolutely had to fully display the Pingxi domain's strength, and that meant an enormous expenditure.

And the Yarkent Khanate had little to plunder anyway, because this khanate had a rather speechless tradition — it liked to sack its own cities!

Although the Yarkent Khanate had adopted the religion of Arabia as its state religion, its core was still Mongol in character. Its methods of rule were extremely crude, and the institutions it practiced were not much different from those of Genghis Khan's era. The khanate's backbone was still Mongol-style nomadic tribes, and it did not rule cities directly, instead handing them over to subjugated local nobles to manage, while the khanate simply collected money. If the money collected was insufficient to pay for the khanate's civil wars, then they resorted to plunder — plundering their own cities, and plundering other people's too!

Moreover, the khanate's ruling clique had not established centralized power internally, but continued to use the Mongol-style kurultai assembly — and they didn't even hold proper elections, often ending up fighting midway through the selection process.

War naturally costs money, and the Mongol tribes had no money, so they went plundering.

Besides the internal strife among the Mongol tribes, there later appeared the sectarian struggle between the White Mountain and Black Mountain factions, which also became entangled with the Mongol infighting.

And a weak state had powerful neighbors — the Dzungars to the north, the Khoshuts to the south, the Kazakhs to the west — none of them easy to deal with, and all of them stronger than the Yarkent Khanate! So they invaded at every opportunity, and always in the steppe manner — burning, killing, and plundering the moment they entered!

So the common people of the Yarkent state truly had nothing left to say — the Mongol lords above wanted to plunder and kill, and the Mongol and Kazakh neighbors next door also wanted to plunder and kill!

With all this plundering and killing back and forth, of course wealth was exhausted and the people impoverished, and the population was extremely sparse — a proper weak state through and through.

If Wu Sangui's Pingxi Army were to enter, the middle and lower ranks of the Yarkent Khanate would surely welcome them with songs and dances!

But what about Wu Sangui's own finances? Zhu Cilang also wanted to use Anxi to swap for Xi'an — and that was another money-losing deal!

How could Anxi compare with Xi'an? Although the territory was vast, transportation was inconvenient, the land was barren, and the cost of development and military colonization was extremely high. So attacking the Yarkent Khanate would cost money, and after conquering it, establishing military colonies and construction in Anxi would cost money too!

And the rate of return on all these investments was very low!

A dead loss!

Just as Wu Sangui was worrying, the voices of Wu Sanfeng and Liu Sheng came from outside the door.

"Is Changbo in?"

"Commander, an imperial edict has arrived."

An imperial edict?

Wu Sangui thought to himself: Is the domain being abolished? Or are subsidies being issued?

Before the New Year, he had submitted a memorial requesting either the abolition of the domain or the issuance of subsidies.

Wu Sangui called out, "Come in, quickly!"

This imperial edict had not been delivered by anyone from the Office of Transmission, nor had a eunuch come to proclaim it — it had been delivered by someone from the Pingxi Army's Capital Liaison Office, so Wu Sangui did not need to go out to receive the edict.

Hearing the summons, Wu Sanfeng and Liu Sheng entered the room together.

"What is it?" Wu Sangui asked.

It was Liu Sheng who answered: "Commander, His Majesty summons you to Nanjing. You'll be gone for a while — at least three months in Nanjing."

"Three months?" Wu Sangui was startled. "What for?"

"To take remedial classes!"

"What are remedial classes?" Wu Sangui was baffled.

He had never taken remedial classes in his entire life!

Wu Sanfeng was holding a letter from Wu Xiang — the letter had also been delivered by the Pingxi Capital Liaison Office and had arrived together with the imperial edict. Having already read his father's letter, Wu Sanfeng did know what remedial classes were.

"Changbo," Wu Sanfeng said, "Father's letter says His Majesty has invited a Western military expert surnamed Kong from the Western country of France to teach you how to fight wars!"

"Huh?" Wu Sangui was utterly stunned. He was a veteran of countless battles — how could he possibly need remedial classes in warfare?

Wu Sanfeng wore a half-smile. "Father also said that once you've taken Teacher Kong's classes, your skill in warfare will improve — perhaps you'll even be able to defeat Ajige and Dodo afterward. So you absolutely must go. Not only do you have to take these classes, Father and Third Brother have to take them too."

Well then — father and two sons, all going to remedial classes together!

And who knew how the remedial class fees would be calculated? Was there any discount?

"Summon the envoy of the Kingdom of France, Louis de Bourbon, Prince of Condé, to appear before the throne!"

As the guards' announcement rang out, the special envoy of the Kingdom of France, Prince of Condé Louis II de Bourbon, guided by Luo Dagong and Li Shaoyou, entered the Hall of Heavenly Mandate in the Forbidden City of Nanjing.

The Great Ming court had only returned to Nanjing the day before yesterday, then taken a day off, and this morning Emperor Zhu was receiving the Kingdom of France's special envoy Prince of Condé and the Ottoman Empire's special envoy Semiz in the Hall of Heavenly Mandate.

The first to enter the hall was Prince of Condé — he was a prince, of relatively high status, and naturally should be placed ahead of the Ottoman Empire's special envoy.

Today was the second day of the third month of the fifth year of Hongxing. Prince of Condé had already been in Nanjing for more than twenty days, during which time, accompanied by Shi Ruien, he had visited the Military Academy and the Xiaoling Guard barracks, and had also listened to several foreign instructors at the Military Academy explain the situation on China's battlefields and the circumstances of several important campaigns.

He now had a very thorough understanding of the Great Ming Empire's new army — it was an army with extremely formidable strength on paper! Almost as powerful as the Ottoman Empire's army!

But there were several obvious weaknesses limiting its performance; if those could be overcome, defeating the northern barbarians would be no problem.

Prince of Condé, who was just then planning to make a name for himself in the East, strode into the great hall with his head high and chest out — and then he immediately felt a wave of intense hostility!

It was a rather spacious hall, somewhat dimly lit, filled with big-bearded men wearing crimson silk robes, every one of them looking angry, staring at Prince of Condé with icy gazes.

The Prince was instantly bewildered. What was going on? Why did these people all have such expressions? I haven't offended them, have I? Could it be that when China holds state council meetings, the ministers all look like this?

Teacher Kong — Prince of Condé — did not yet know at that moment that these big-bearded Chinese men were all his future students, all due to attend his military remedial class and listen to him explain battle examples from the Thirty Years' War.

But right now everyone was very disappointed — the legendary French master of warfare turned out to be a shifty-eyed, short-statured "little foreign devil" who didn't look at all like a famous general.

(End of Chapter)