Chapter 1 People Watching the Wedding

Those paying attention to this wedding weren’t just Sun Xiaofan. And there were more than just a couple of groups wanting to take action. However, none of these people knew that in reality, neither Ye Tao, Dai Yun, nor Tan Weixin were in Ningyuan City at this moment. Too many guests and attendants from various parties, all sorts of merchants and travelers who happened to be there, people from all over the country made this small city of Ningyuan too complicated and unpredictable. Maintaining the highest level of vigilance for a short time during the wedding ceremony was one thing, but maintaining this state at all times was something else entirely. Therefore, under the joint suggestion of Ye Tao's chief guard Guan Huan, Tan Weixin's chief guard Liu Yong, Dai Yun's head butler Dai Shizong, and the slightly insignificant Tan Weishi's chief guard Jin Ze, the most important people were now in a manor less than half an hour away from Ningyuan. Outside the manor, a battalion of the Frost Wolf Army, which had just completed its re-equipment, was stationed. Together with the guards of several people, there was a total of nearly 5,000 guards. The search circle opened by the Frost Wolf battalion ensured that it was almost impossible for irrelevant people to approach the manor, which could be said to be very safe. Not to mention those assassins who wanted to speculate, even if they encountered a large army attack, these 5,000 well-equipped and well-trained people could probably hold out until reinforcements arrived.

In fact, those who stayed in Ningyuan City to prepare for the wedding were all elders. The highest in status were Chi Xianping, Dai Shikui, and Ye Laogeng. However, Chi Lei was inexplicably involved in an assassination during a dinner that day. The assassin was a guard from a grassland tribe who had been running to the northern tribes as a merchant. Because the scene was relatively chaotic at the time, there was no accurate judgment on whether the target was Chi Xianping, Chi Lei, or Ge Lan. Chi Xianping was a big figure in the Dongping military, Chi Lei made great contributions when the Dongping military launched a strangulation campaign against the northern tribes, and Ge Lan was the chief of the grassland tribe and now completely leaned towards Yunzhou and Dongping. No matter how you look at it, these three people had enough reason to be hated to the point of taking extreme actions. But after the assassination occurred, the search could only be regarded as a habitual reaction. These people really didn't take this very unprofessional assassination seriously.

The maintenance of law and order in Ningyuan City was entirely entrusted to Dai Shiheng, the original commander of the Dai family's army, to take on a minor role. In the countless preparations for this wedding, this was actually the most precedented and easiest item.

Compared to the maintenance of law and order in Ningyuan, the preparation of the entire wedding was a brain-racking task for everyone. From the original status, Dai Yun's identity may be slightly inferior to Tan Weixin's, but it was not far off. In the territory of Yunzhou, Dai Yun's appeal was quite amazing. It was no exaggeration to say that Dai Yun was a princess. However, the wedding procedure could not be handled according to the level of a princess, or even according to the procedure of a wealthy family marrying off their daughter. Because although Dai Yun had a lofty status and great influence, and no matter what kind of organizational form this strange family would have in the future, Dai Yun was marrying Ye Tao as a status between wife and concubine at this moment. This ambiguity of identity was already deliberate. Naturally, this unprecedented wedding would also carry out this ambiguity of identity to the end. Because there was no precedent to follow, everyone had to boldly use their imagination. The final procedure combined the rituals of a tribal daughter's marriage with the form of a traditional wedding, carrying out the principle of muddling through to the end. In the entire ceremony, there were no words to describe whether Dai Yun's identity was a wife or a concubine. All the words that the master of ceremonies needed to say in the entire ceremony were decided after repeated discussions by everyone. In the preparation of this wedding, Ye Tao and Dai Yun, the two parties involved, had been deprived of the power to speak, and were treated as puppets that everyone could manipulate. Ye Tao naturally saved trouble. Anyway, the final result was to bring a very distinctive beauty into the house. As for anything that happened in the middle, it didn't seem to be a very important link. And since Dai Yun figured out the various things about marrying Ye Tao, she had never worried about the ceremony and other issues. After seeing the grasslands and snowfields, the battlefield of war, and the floating ice of Beiming that many people could only sketch in their imagination, she had enough open-mindedness about many things.

Hiding in the manor became an excellent opportunity for communication for Ye Tao and Dai Yun, the two people who didn't seem to care much about avoiding each other before the wedding. Perhaps both of them were a little clumsy, or perhaps their biggest intersection was in the military field. The topics of discussion could always slide to Yunzhou's military affairs and the further rectification of Yunzhou's defense, no matter where they started. Because of a series of actions against Xiling, the safety of the western side of Yunzhou had been guaranteed. Now what Dai Yun was most dissatisfied with was the extremely weak defense on the eastern side of Yunzhou facing Beiliao, even after all the troops in Yunzhou had been trained.

The establishment of fifty battalions in Yunzhou was indeed a very wise and effective means, and it was also something Yunzhou could afford. Fifty battalions with a total of no more than 150,000 troops seemed difficult to guarantee the stability of the entire Yunzhou, even if all fifty battalions were well-equipped and well-trained troops, all professional soldiers. If a war really broke out, there would still need to be enough auxiliary troops to fill the battlefield space, to delay the enemy's progress, or even just to serve as a number to confuse the enemy... Finally, under Dai Yun's direct statement, Ye Tao pulled in Tan Weixin and jointly discussed a plan based on Yunzhou's economic strength to carry out supplementary training and equipment replacement for retired soldiers and Rongjun farm and ranch personnel in stages and batches after the establishment of the fifty battalions. This would ensure that when needed, Yunzhou could quickly expand its military strength through an emergency conscription system, and also ensure that at least the soldiers conscripted at the third and second levels had considerable combat effectiveness, at least not falling too far behind the garrison battalion-level troops.

Perhaps this topic was really not suitable for the current atmosphere, Ye Tao frowned and hoped that the situation could change. And the situation really changed. The change in the situation came from the return of Ye Tao's eldest brother Guan Haishan from Dubai. According to him, the lighthouse that the Samir family wanted to build was already structurally capped, leaving only the decorative engineering that was not difficult. After the end of this large project that was already familiar to Guan Haishan, he even helped the Samir family build a set of harbor defense architecture in Dubai Port. The Samir family's grand determination to dump a large amount of soil and stone outside the original port area to directly build a long dike with both defense and wave-breaking functions moved him, but other than giving some engineering advice, he didn't really want to get involved in this project. In his opinion, this project was largely unrelated to architecture and engineering, but rather depended on how determined the Samir family was and whether they had enough money to burn. It was more of an engineering management problem than engineering technology. In this case, Guan Haishan simply took a merchant ship back to Dongping.

After staying in Yicheng for a few days, Guan Haishan rushed to Yunzhou with his wife and children in order to be able to make it to Ye Tao's wedding. For some reason, he couldn't show his face, so Guan Haishan hid in the manor.

"You guys are doing great, Master and you guys have taken all the front numbers of the technician certificates... Would it be so troublesome to be accommodating and leave me a good number?" Facing Ye Tao, Guan Haishan sighed repeatedly and said with a lot of resentment.

Ye Tao was amused and laughed: "Eldest brother, aren't you the kind of person who cares about these things? Why bother? Besides, the technician certificate may be a guarantee of a monthly salary for many people, and even more a proof for those sent by other families for training to hand over to their employers, but is it useful to us brothers? Who dares to say that we are not qualified?... Moreover, eldest brother, the only number you missed was the carpentry certificate. How many years have you not touched those jobs? It would be embarrassing to leave a number for you and then fail, wouldn't it?"

Ye Tao's teasing made Guan Haishan extremely dissatisfied. He snorted heavily and said, "Nonsense. Maybe I can't compare to Dazhu, but I was already a master before you were born. This skill is not bragging. When I was in Danyang, rushing for the exam at Lao Er's place, I passed the technician, it's just that number... I really can't help but complain."

Ye Tao asked with interest: "What's the number?"

"Two hundred and fifty..." Guan Haishan sighed: "It's really a very foolish number."

"Hahahaha..." Ye Tao laughed loudly: "It's nothing. I didn't realize that you had this kind of taboo before."

"Isn't it still because I've been working with those Hu people for so long?" Guan Haishan shook his head and said, "Those people have so many taboos, they don't work properly on the construction site. On the construction site in Dubai, they have to worship the gods three times a day, morning, noon, and night. It's so annoying. If there weren't so many stonemasons and sculptors there, and those people really worked hard, the Samir family wanted to rush the construction period and didn't care much about human lives, they might not have been able to finish it so quickly."

Ye Tao sighed: "You should know that the Samir family is preparing to establish a country, right?"

Guan Haishan nodded and said, "That's natural. Alas, let's not mention them... By the way, when my ship stopped in Yu Hang for two days on the way back, I met some very interesting people there. It seems that Chunnan is preparing to build a set of bell tower buildings by themselves, and they are not prepared to let us extort them. Although the people I met didn't know much, it was enough to scare me. I don't know if the Chunnan people are crazy or fools, their bell tower plan. I estimated the budget, if what those two friends said is true, I am afraid that the cost of the bell tower in Yu Hang will be more than twice that of the Seven Seas Pagoda."

"Oh?" Ye Tao's eyes flashed with a gleam, showing a strong interest.