RPAGF Chapter 7189 People Always Look Forward
Chapter 7189 People Always Look Forward
Chapter 7189 People Always Look Forward
"That's the situation. Stop messing around with this stuff. There are far more people buried in there than you think, and everyone who gets in is a big shot with a name and a name." Chen Xi nudged Wan Zhen and warned him again.
When Chen Xi first learned about the "Bin Shi Xiang Li" (a ritual involving the offering of corpses), he was also interested in it. However, after learning that Sun Wu and Wu Qi were buried inside, Chen Xi lost all interest in studying it. One should know one's own limitations. Killing the remaining demons of the Bin Shi Xiang Li was not too difficult for Chen Xi, but solving this thing was out of the question.
Anyone who is a military strategist, or even just a normal person, should know the caliber of Sun Tzu and Wu Qi. So, it's best to stay away from such dung-like things and not try to do anything like butterfly swimming in a cesspool; only idiots do that.
"No problem. Just knowing that Sun and Wu are buried here, I know this is not something I can handle. I understand the difficulty of a matter the most." Wan Zhen gave a very rational answer. He is also the kind of person who can give up when faced with difficulties. What do you mean by facing difficulties head-on? This is a question of facing difficulties head-on. You don't even know what this is.
"Alright, I'll head out now. You hurry up and finish compiling the data, then you can do whatever you want." Chen Xi and Wan Zhen bumped into each other again, indicating that once Wan Zhen finished his work, he could leave Chang'an and go on his round-the-world trip. As for other things like electric motors, they had already started, and the master craftsmen in Chang'an could handle the rest.
“I’ll take it with me and write it on the way. I don’t really like the atmosphere in Chang’an. It feels like my home.” Wan Zhen said something that a normal person would never understand, but considering Wan Zhen’s experiences over the past few decades, it was honestly quite tragic.
"Alright, just remember to compile and summarize your talent information this year, using scientific thinking to clearly describe it, and submit a report." Chen Xi was eager for Wan Zhen, this guy who was unlikely to do any work and would only cause trouble, to leave Chang'an as soon as possible, so he agreed to the other party's suggestion after only a little thought.
"Alright, after the Grand Assembly is over, I'll hand in my report to the clan elders and then I'll be leaving." Wan Zhen said casually. His great-uncle couldn't come to Chang'an, but he still wanted to see what strange things Chen Xi had come up with in Chang'an. He guessed that Chen Xi was still waiting for Wan Zhen's summary report of the Grand Assembly, so he still had to attend the Grand Assembly.
Chen Xi nodded, picked up his wine cup, and walked towards the group of veterans. At this moment, a group of mid-level officers gathered around Liu Bei. Unlike the big shots who were concerned about status and face, these guys crowded around Liu Bei and surrounded him. It was clear that they were in a very good mood.
Similarly, Liu Bei did not show the same anxiety he had when talking to those "big shots" earlier. When talking to this group of people, Chen Xi could clearly feel Liu Bei's relaxation. Indeed, these people were Liu Bei's foundation and the tentacles through which he truly controlled the world.
"You guys, eat and drink well, don't worry about what those guys are thinking. You can't outsmart them, don't try to outsmart them." When Chen Xi arrived, Liu Bei was giving advice to this group of people. Chen Xi only heard half of it before he knew who Liu Bei was talking about.
"Hey boss, I poached my father-in-law. I'm in Zhongnan now. Will my father-in-law's family hunt me down?" Wang Xi asked with a panicked expression while chugging down his liquor. When he arrived today, he saw the head of the Hu family glaring at him from afar. Had he been discovered?
"Don't be afraid, they can't possibly hunt you down. Although your strength is not as great as those large aristocratic families, as long as you stick together, they can't do anything to you. Moreover, they absolutely cannot cross the entire Han Dynasty to hunt you down. As long as you unite and trust your brothers, not only can they not hunt you down, but you can also hunt them down." Liu Bei was flushed at this moment, clearly a little drunk, and spoke without the slightest hesitation.
"How can we possibly hunt them down from here?" Wang Guiren was dumbfounded.
Wang Gui also participated in the matter on the Ganges. As an elder from the Taishan era, he was among the earliest to participate, but due to injury, he missed out on the early benefits, so his rank is not high now. Therefore, after the Ganges enfeoffment was announced, he did have some negative thoughts.
Later, Wang Gui would often loiter around Chen Xi's house, waiting for Chen Xi to return. She would then tentatively ask Chen Xi for directions. Chen Xi, considering that she did know the other party, pointed her in the right direction. Wang Gui then gave up on the Henghe area. After all, nothing had happened yet, and it was time for her to back down.
Sometimes, it's like that: when you lie down and suddenly feel a sense of vastness and freedom.
After receiving guidance from Chen Xi, Wang Gui realized that if he continued to fight, it wouldn't be good for anyone, so he decided to back down. Since he had already approached Chen Xi, he didn't mind asking him a second time. He directly asked Chen Xi to help settle the merits of the Ganges River and give him a better fiefdom. Then Chen Xi had someone reserve a fiefdom for Wang Gui in the location of Thailand in the Indochina Peninsula, which is now known as Thailand. It had mineral resources, rivers, and plains.
After Wang Gui went there, she felt that life was just like that, so she directly settled her merits and stopped struggling. She had already gone to Chen Xi to make connections, so why was she still struggling? The big shot was giving her face, and she didn't appreciate it. Instead, she was thinking of causing trouble. Forget it!
So we're not even considering the Ganges anymore. We'll just start building our fiefdom here. A little more or less won't make a difference. And since we've chosen to build our fiefdom, we definitely need our own people. But at this point, wild monsters like Wang Gui don't have any manpower at all.
Basically, just like Wang Xi, he went directly to see if his brother-in-law's house could be dug up.
Then, with one throw, the entire family of the brother-in-law surrendered.
There's no way around it. Family loyalty and fighting for the family are things that only the main family and the direct descendants of the clan consider. Because maintaining these things is equivalent to maintaining the main family and themselves, that's why the direct descendants and the main family fight desperately for each other.
But is it really necessary for you, a mere branch, to risk your life like this?
Of course, there are times when there are benefits. See if you can take them for yourself. If you can get more benefits by following the family, then follow the family. If you can get more benefits by going out on your own, then of course go out on your own. What's the point of talking about loyalty? How much money do you make a month? Why talk about such things?
It is clear that at this stage, with the major families working hard to build their own kingdoms, the benefits that the branches can enjoy are limited. Even if there are future benefits, it is difficult to say how much they will bring. Therefore, it is unlikely that there will be no centrifugal forces.
In fact, this is a test that aristocratic families need to face when establishing a state. The so-called weeding out the dross and retaining the essence is just that, and it is also a test of the management ability of aristocratic families.
A powerful family like the Yang family, capable of supporting the entire clan, would naturally disdain the attempts by Liu Bei's generals and officers to poach them. This is because they are well aware of what they are doing and the future consequences of their actions, thus enabling them to withstand such hardship.
However, most families cannot achieve this level of success, especially second-tier families, those that work for other large families, who often face the challenge of their sons-in-law poaching their employees.
After all, families that work for others are generally aware of their own situation. And since it's just work, it doesn't matter who you work for, so why talk about ideals? You just work for whoever pays the most. Obviously, working for your son-in-law is more promising, right?
After this shift in thinking, quite a few mid-level veterans secretly undermined established families. While it was rare for someone like Wang Xi and his two companions to directly take away a large branch of the Hu family in Anding, it was far more common for them to secretly take away several families.
However, such matters are not easy to discuss openly. Families whose members have been poached inevitably feel ashamed. If the situation is not too serious, the two sides will usually part ways, each going their own way, and there will be no further contact.
However, some families couldn't stand it and directly launched a counterattack.
In this situation, the veterans who do this are mentally prepared before they do it. In addition, the emperor is far away, and most of the noble families that can be poached are not capable of dealing with such tough guys who have earned their titles through battlefield battles and travel thousands of miles to deal with them.
However, the pressure on these veterans still exists even after the other side made its statement.
Therefore, when Liu Bei arrived, some of the older brothers who were under this pressure directly brought this up. After all, there are shrewd people and fools. Didn't the Grand Commandant say that if there are any problems that are difficult to solve, remember to tell him and he will solve them? It seems that it is indeed difficult for me to deal with this kind of pressure from aristocratic families. I should go to the Grand Commandant. The Grand Commandant can definitely solve it.
Then, starting with the first veteran who brought it up, several other veterans naturally chimed in with their own words, and Liu Bei instantly understood the situation these veterans were facing.
"Zichuan, tell them this." Liu Bei patted Chen Xi on the back and said with a smile to the group of mid-level officers in front of him, "You all know this one. This is the chief steward of our Han Dynasty. I've told you before that if you need money, you can tell him."
"Lord Chen." A group of county and prefectural commanders with salaries of two thousand and one thousand shi, as well as mid-level officers from the front lines, all bowed to Chen Xi. They might not have been very familiar with him before, but now they were quite acquainted with him.
Even Chen Xi himself could recognize most of these people. There was no way around it; these people were really useful, and generally speaking, there wouldn't be a situation where you got to know them and then they disappeared after a while. Their survival ability was very reliable.
"Alright, which one was actually being hunted down by the Han family?" Chen Xi asked with a smile.
"The Hu family of Anding has already made their statement, and they've even tightened their control. I doubt my friend can get his father-in-law's family out of here," Wang Xi said helplessly.
Wang Xi's wife is Hu Yan, and his father-in-law is the very distinctive Northwest Hu Laodie, who has more than a dozen sons and grandsons and belongs to a relatively large branch of the Hu family in Anding.
After Hu Yan and her father had a frank discussion, her father summoned his son-in-law and asked him what he was thinking. Wang Xi's answer was that he wanted to reach the 15th rank of nobility, which would likely get him a fiefdom at the level of a county prince.
After listening to this, the father-in-law advised Wang Xi not to rush in, saying it was pointless and that it was better to secure the spoils now. He added that even if they were given fiefdoms at the level of a county prince, they wouldn't be able to control them, so it was better to secure the spoils now.
Wang Xi didn't understand at the time, but Old Man Hu was a ruthless man who had truly experienced the chaos of war and had raised his family of more than ten people steadily through all sorts of trickery, deception, and theft, and even made them grow stronger day by day. So Wang Xi couldn't help but admire his life experience.
In addition, Wang Xi was not the kind of guy with great ambitions. He was quite satisfied with his current situation. Although a fiefdom at the level of a county prince was very nice, he felt that having a good fiefdom was fine even without one. Anyway, his current situation was already very good.
So, with his father-in-law presenting a bunch of facts, Wang Xi decided to let it go and went back to Liu Bei to sign off on the fiefdom in the Central and Southern regions. Because the Central and Southern Peninsula was so vast at the moment, and very few veterans were being granted fiefdoms, people like Wang Xi could basically choose for themselves, so the places he received were all very good.
Therefore, after the selection was completed, they took the entire Hu family away. By the time the Hu family of Anding realized that something was wrong, Hu had already entered the Central Plains and was probably already in his fiefdom.
Upon learning of this, the Hu family of Anding issued a kill order to Wang Xi. Of course, it was only verbal, and they did not actually carry out the attack. However, they were extremely angry with Old Man Hu's family. They had raised the whole family for decades, but they ran away as soon as they left, even taking several of their elite young men with them!
"Verbal pursuit? Or what?" Chen Xi said with a smile. Just as he had thought, some veterans were undecided about whether to be confined to the Ganges or the peninsula. After visiting their fathers-in-law and gaining some life experience from them, some veterans naturally chose the peninsula, thus resolving part of the problem.
“Just talk about it. Nothing serious has happened yet, but we’ll have to face it sooner or later.” Wang Xi wasn’t stupid. The Hu family of Anding didn’t have time to deal with these things right now. The relocation of Old Man Hu’s lineage was actually a shock to some branches with their own ideas. Any branch that was dissatisfied with its current situation would definitely have other ideas. In this situation, it was better to strike at Wang Xi than to suppress the ideas of its own branches.
As long as Old Man Hu's lineage is not doing well and Wang Xi suffers a heavy blow, other branches will have to think twice about whether it's worthwhile to carry out their plans.
After all, the reason for leaving the family was to live a better life. But if you find that you are not living as well as you are now after running away, then why run away? Working for the main family is not bad, right?
"Don't worry, they can only verbally pursue us, they won't actually do it," Chen Xi said with a smile. "If I don't allow it, you can go about your business without worry."
Chen Xi's clear answer reassured Wang Xi considerably.
"The first wave ran away quickly, but my father-in-law hasn't run away yet," Bai Hao said helplessly. "What should we do?"
"This depends on whether your father-in-law wants to work with you or not," Chen Xi said seriously. "If he wants to work with you, as long as he clearly expresses his willingness to participate, I can issue you a formal document and file it for record."
Liu Bei looked at Chen Xi with a look of utter disbelief. What kind of crazy move was this? Was this a family division?
Although in the era of patriarchal clan system, such matters, which are so-called internal family conflicts, are generally not managed by the state, if the state recognizes a branch of a family, it is indeed possible to register it. At least this is reasonable. Once it is included in the management, it is no longer a family, so if others want to run away, you really can't control them. They can even take their own family ancestral tablets with them.
This was a serious problem. Liu Bei had considered other solutions, but he never expected Chen Xi to solve it in this way.
"Is this really okay?" Sun Er looked at Chen Xi with some curiosity. Because of his wife, he had come into contact with some situations of large families, and he was indeed a little shocked by the way Chen Xi proposed to divide the family.
"There is no problem with this approach," Chen Xi said with a smile. "Isn't it normal for families to separate so that each member pursues their own ideals? The main family manages all internal affairs, but they can't restrict other branches and prevent them from pursuing a better life. It's not like the main family can live a life of luxury while the branches starve."
Chen Xi had thought of this a long time ago. Of course, this tactic was meaningless to those truly top-tier large families. Those families had been around for too long and knew when to fight amongst themselves and when to unite, so this method was of little use.
However, considering that the Cui surname can be divided into the Boling Cui clan and the Qinghe Cui clan, it is clear that it is impossible to avoid internal strife. So, given a chance, they will split up on their own.
Moreover, there are such huge interests outside now, and Central Asia is a place that is only suitable for large families to develop. Small and medium-sized families are just partners, and they are workers brought out by the large families. Although it is more promising than in China, the greatest benefits have already been taken by the large families. Under such circumstances, with new directions and possibilities, how could small and medium-sized families not have ideas?
Of course, there were such cases, but back then, small and medium-sized aristocratic families were arrogant and proud, and they all married off illegitimate daughters, with some families having several. So what will happen today, facing a more realistic situation?
Of course, it's the large branches that can provide illegitimate daughters. After careful consideration, they will rely on their respective sons-in-law. Even if they are not very clear-headed now, they will realize this clearly as time goes by. In Central Asia, the upper limit for small and medium-sized families is there, and the upper limit for their branches is naturally even lower!
The author seems to be truly finished; there's no hope left.
(End of this chapter)