Le'an Commandery of Lingzhou bordered North Sea Commandery. It stretched seven hundred and twenty thousand li from east to west and roughly 1.3 million li from north to south. On the map, North Sea Commandery was fairly square, shaped like the character for field.
Le'an Commandery, meanwhile, was like a large half-enclosure laid over North Sea Commandery's field shape. Together, the two commanderies vaguely resembled the character for cultivated land.
In terms of area, Le'an Commandery was nearly one-third larger than North Sea Commandery. But in terms of population, present-day Le'an Commandery did not even have half of North Sea Commandery's population.
North Sea Commandery currently had more than four million registered households and nearly twenty million people, the result of years of vigorous bandit suppression and taking in displaced refugees.
Le'an Commandery, on the other hand, currently had just over 1.32 million registered households and more than seven million people—only one-third of North Sea Commandery's population.
As for annual tax revenue, it was not even one-tenth of North Sea Commandery's current revenue.
Even the yearly expenses for stationed troops and officials' salaries had to rely on allocations from the imperial court.
It was worse off than North Sea Commandery had been in those days.
Still, that was perfectly normal.
Like North Sea Commandery, Le'an Commandery bordered the North Sea on one side and lay hard against Changling Commandery on the other.
Changling Commandery was already a border commandery of Great Zhou.
To the east of Changling Commandery stood Great Zhou's famed Changlin Fortress beyond the Human-Demon Battlefield. The Changlin Army, one of Great Zhou's central Imperial Guards, had been stationed there year-round.
However, though the Changlin Army was stationed there, scattered Devil Race members had caused havoc over countless years, while North Sea Water Demons had also stirred up