I want to be emperor

Chapter 279 Song Qijing Becomes an Official

Song Hongbao was deeply saddened by the untimely death of Song Qijing's father.

It wasn't just that the white-haired man gave black hair, but also because these two sons were the ones he had placed high hopes on, hoped to pass the Jinshi exam, earn a Jinshi archway for their Song family, and lead the Song family to a truly wealthy family.

Their Song family has never been a Jinshi.

It's a pity that the father of Song Qijing, who was expected to become a Jinshi, died of illness.

Later, Song Hongbao could only pin his hopes on other people, but it was a pity that one of them was more like an idiot than another, and he couldn't even pass the exam for a scholar.

In the end, it still depends on Song Qijing, the only son of the second son who died of illness!

As Song Qijing grew up, he barely inherited his father's talent for reading.

Although he failed the provincial examination for the first time in the middle school entrance examination, with his basic skills, there is still hope for him to accumulate a few more years in the future and finally pass the entrance examination.

As for Jinshi, don't count on it, it's not that level.

But when Song Qijing was preparing to take part in the second rural examination, the Chu army had already captured Hanyang City, and recruited famous scholars and officials on a large scale to become officials.

The young Song Qijing was fooled by his friends, and went directly to sign up to be an officer in the Township Protection Army. At that time, Luo Zhixue hadn't even proclaimed himself emperor yet.

He was awarded the seventh rank for the first time, and because he defected early, he was promoted very quickly in the first few months.

Now in late February of the second year of Chengshun, Song Qijing has already served as a deputy director of the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry, starting from Sipin.

Otherwise, why do you think the Song family approached the officials of the Great Chu Empire in the first place, and even spent real money to buy the Lin family weaving factory.

In addition to their Song family originally wanting to enter the textile industry, there is also Song Qijing's relationship.

All the direct descendants of the Song family have turned themselves into thieves... Oh, no, they have become Conglong, and they have been promoted and divided into pieces. They have all become middle-level and high-level officials.

Could their Song family stay out of it?

impossible!

If the Great Chu Empire was finished that day and the Ming army came back, the first choice to deal with them would be those gentry clans who had defected to the bandit protection army.

Because they are traitors!
And traitors are worse than enemies!
So Song Hongbao secretly sent the five sons and his family to Jiangnan, leaving a backup bloodline for the Song family, and brought the rest of the Song family to lean on the officials of the Great Chu Empire wholeheartedly.

If it wasn't because Song Hongbao was too old to do anything, he would have thought of becoming an official in the Great Chu Empire.

At any rate, he was a juren, so he was definitely not bad to vote for an official position, and he would be able to help his grandson Song Qijing to some extent.

But he was too old and in poor health, so he couldn't do it.

Since there is no way to give this grandson much help in his career, then he has to help this promising grandson clear other obstacles.

At least, don't let this grandson ruin his future because of his possessions.

Try to find a high-ranking official for their old Song family.

As for the others, Song Qijing could only rely on his own efforts.

----

In Wuchang City, Song Qijing from the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry was unaware of his grandfather's arrangements for him. Now he has dark circles hanging on his face, and he looks extremely haggard.

Looking at the thick pile of documents still on the desktop, Song Qijing put down the pen in his hand, sighed and leaned back on the chair.

too tired!
Before becoming an official, he never thought that being an official would be so tiring.

And before he became an official in the Great Chu Empire, he had never heard that his teachers and friends around him would be so busy after they became officials in the Ming Dynasty.

In his earlier cognition, being an official determines the general direction. He needs to stand at a higher height than ordinary people, look at the court and the world, and then make a choice that is beneficial to the people's livelihood and the court.

As for how to implement the matter after making a choice, there are naturally many subordinates, especially the officials, to deal with it.

Don't you see, many people are sent out to be county magistrates after passing the Jinshi examination, and they all travel around the mountains and rivers, taking beauty with them, getting promoted from time to time, and taking a gavel tree, causing panic.

In his opinion, life should be like this when he became an official in the Great Chu Empire.

But he didn't expect that after entering the court and becoming an official, life would be completely different from what he expected.

He was assigned to work in the Department of Agriculture of the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry from the very beginning, and the Department of Agriculture was regarded as the head of the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry, and even in the administrative system of the entire Great Chu Empire.

Because the department is responsible for agricultural production affairs, that is, encouraging farming in the traditional sense.

Specifically, they need to be responsible for organizing reclamation and land reclamation, and guiding farmers to resume farming and production to increase food production.

This kind of affairs is a heavyweight matter for any country that is dominated by agriculture. After all, people depend on food.

This food is not enough, it will starve to death.

Because of the heavy tasks, this department also has a lot of things to do, and the most important task at present is to guide the restoration of agricultural production in various places.

In the past few years, due to natural disasters and man-made disasters, a large amount of land in Chubei and Nanyang Prefecture in Henan has been abandoned, and the grain production has decreased again and again.

After the Great Chu Empire took control of these places, the first thing was to collect taxes, and the second thing was to organize the local people to resume farming.

Among them, Nanyang Mansion, Xiangyang Mansion, Yunyang Mansion, and Junzhou have the most arduous tasks.

Because these four places have been persecuted by thieves and officers and soldiers in the past few years, a large number of people died or fled, and a large amount of land was abandoned.

At the same time, Nanyang Prefecture and Xiangyang Prefecture have suffered severe drought in recent years.

It's serious, but in fact it's just like that in the modern society of later generations... If it's exhausted, there will be a few more news reports that the water level of rivers and lakes has dropped...

However, in the era of the late Ming Dynasty, when technical capabilities and production capacity were seriously backward, and water conservancy facilities were almost zero, this level of drought had already seriously affected the local people's livelihood.

Ever since the Great Chu Empire went south to control Nanyang Prefecture and Xiangyang Prefecture, it has almost been trying to restore local agricultural production.

First, the banditry was eliminated, so that the local people were not threatened by bandits or officers and soldiers.

Then it adopted the method of work-for-relief, allocating a large amount of money and food to recruit local refugees who could not survive, and the poor children used it to build various water conservancy facilities.

At the same time, it also called on the local gentry and ordinary people to contribute money and strength to build various water conservancy facilities for their hometown.

At the same time, in parallel with free distribution and interest-free loans, local people are provided with grain seeds and farm tools so that farmers can resume production.

These policies are of course good news for local farmers, especially those tenants with very weak ability to resist risks.

But the implementation of the policy also needs people to do it. After spending such a large amount of money and food, the superiors, especially the emperor Luo Zhixue, must see the effect.

If the money is spent and no effect is seen, let alone His Majesty will have opinions, even other departments will have opinions.

Why are other departments dissatisfied?
Because when the discussion last year finally decided to give money and food to several northern prefectures for disaster relief, the money was there, but the money was squeezed out of the limited funds.

Although the financial revenue of the Great Chu Empire was very high last year, the military expenditure was also large, and most of the financial revenue was eventually turned into military expenditure for war.

There are not many funds left for administrative agencies, and a considerable part of these administrative funds is occupied by the Ministry of Taxation and the Ministry of Industry, and even less is left for other departments.

In the case of limited funds, the various departments competed fiercely for funds.

At that time, the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry took away a large amount of funds from other agencies in order to restore agricultural production in several northern provinces and provide relief to local victims.

Relief and restoration of people's livelihood, other people have no opinion and dare not have any opinion.

But if your Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry takes the money and doesn’t do things, or spends all the money for fun and can’t get things done, then don’t blame the bosses of several other institutions for overturning old accounts.

For this reason, the people in the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry are also under a lot of pressure, and the Department of Agriculture, which is in charge of this time, is even more under pressure.

As a member of the Department of Agriculture, Song Qijing started his career as an official without touching the ground after joining the big family of the Great Chu Empire.

I go out early and return late every day, dealing with various documents that seem to never be finished.

Unknowingly, Song Qijing, who was so busy and dizzy, was promoted one level from time to time, and sometimes jumped two levels.

In January of this year, he, who was then the head of a section of the Land Reclamation Department of the Agriculture Department, followed the then head of the Agriculture Department to Xiangyang Prefecture to inspect the local re-cultivation situation and the construction of water conservancy facilities.

It’s been a month since I came back from the inspection. After I came back, because of my diligence and the lack of manpower in the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry, I was quickly promoted to the deputy director of the Land Reclamation Division of the Agriculture Department, and my grade was also promoted to the fourth rank.

When he was Conglong in July, he was just an ordinary staff member of the seventh rank. By February this year, he had become the deputy director of the fourth rank, and it only took half a year in the middle.

This kind of promotion speed, if placed on the side of the Ming Dynasty, would be like riding a rocket.

But it was normal in the Great Chu Empire.

The Great Chu Empire was only entrenched in the area of ​​Funiu Mountain last spring, and it only started to expand abroad in March, and it only entered Nanyang Mansion in April.

Strictly speaking, it took only one year for the Great Chu Empire to emerge from the Funiu Mountain area.

During this year, the Great Chu Empire directly expanded from a few thousand people at the beginning to nearly 20 troops, and the territory it occupied expanded from a small remote mountainous area to the entire northern Chu area, plus Nanyang Prefecture in Henan Province and Chu State. Wuchang Mansion in the south.

In order to control such a huge place, the administrative officials of the Great Chu Empire also rapidly increased from more than a hundred in the early days to tens of thousands.

In this kind of rapid expansion, if you defected a few months earlier, as long as you don't make any mistakes in principle, you can be promoted continuously...

Especially the dozens of people who defected here during the Funiu Mountain period, there are quite a few ministers and ministers, and there are even a bunch of chief ministers and prefects.

But those like Song Qijing who came here after July are still not bad, promotion is as easy as drinking water.

The friend Chen Haoren who defected here with Song Qijing at the beginning is now the deputy director of the taxation department.

That is the position of Cong Sanpin, or a position with real power.

Compared with someone like Chen Haoren, Song Qijing's is not very impressive from the fourth rank.

(End of this chapter)