Rule over Ming Dynasty

Chapter 123 Yangzhou Floating Corpse, Emperor Encounters Difficulties

"Gou Huowang is not in the teahouse!"

"Gou Huowang is not in the restaurant!"

"Gou Huowang is not in the brothel!"

……

After the inn was empty, Li Zhiqing mobilized all the yamen servants in Yangzhou City to search for Gou Huowang in the whole Yangzhou City, but they found nothing after searching for three days.

With their influence in Yangzhou City, it is easy to find a helpless kitchen household, but things have become so weird.

No matter how many people they mobilized to find Gou Huowang, they couldn't find anyone, and Gou Huowang couldn't leave Yangzhou Mansion without a guide. Gou Huowang seemed to have disappeared from the world suddenly.

"Now that I think about it carefully, the matter of Gou Huowang is indeed not simple!" Li Zhiqing had already calmed down slowly, seeming to understand.

Zhang Huangshan, the censor of salt inspection in Lianghuai and Yang Mingyuan, the magistrate of Yangzhou, could no longer avoid suspicion. At this time, they had come to the Yamen of the Transshipment Envoy of Lianghuai Capital together, but their eyes were full of doubts when they heard Li Zhiqing's conclusion.

Although they also felt that it was strange that Gou Huowang could not be found, they were more willing to believe that it was due to the negligence of the staff below.

Li Zhiqing looked at the two pig teammates with bewildered faces, and immediately turned to Zhang Huangshan and asked, "Zhang Yushi, when you interrogated Gou Huowang, did you find anything unusual?"

"I didn't think much about it at the time! It's just that I was reminded by the adults that this Gou Huowang is indeed a little weird. He doesn't look like an ordinary person, nor does he look like a troublemaker!" Zhang Huangshan pondered for a while, and then expressed his opinion. .

Yang Zhifu seemed to be enlightened, and immediately nodded and said: "Zhang Yushi is right, Gou Huowang is indeed not as afraid of officials as ordinary people, but he is not like that kind of daring thug!"

"Actually, that's where the problem lies! Gou Huowang claims to be a stove householder, but he dares to sue the government, and he dares to write a complaint against anyone he catches. Have you ever seen such a common people?" Li Zhiqing nodded lightly. , appearing to be more sure of his own judgment and asked.

Zhang Wei, the censor of Lianghuai patrol salt, and Yang Mingyuan, the magistrate of Yangzhou, looked at Li Zhiqing together, nodded and agreed as if they had realized something: "Gou Huowang really doesn't look like ordinary people, and no ordinary people dare to act like this!"

"The official has sent people to the Taizhou branch to investigate Gou Huowang a few days ago, do you know what the people who came back said?" Li Zhiqing reached out to pick up the tea cup he had just delivered, but said deliberately.

Yang Mingyuan was impatient, so he immediately asked urgently: "Lord Li, don't be fooled, the most urgent thing is to quickly find a way to find out Gou Huowang, who is Gou Huowang from the saltworks, and his parents are still alive?"

"The Taizhou branch checked the personnel files, and found that there is no such person as Gou Huowang!" Li Zhiqing squeezed the tea lid and poured tea, but announced the answer authentically.

what?
Zhang Huangshan, the salt censor of Lianghuai and Yang Mingyuan, the magistrate of Yangzhou, couldn't help staring. They never expected this result. After all, no one would choose to pretend to be a stove household, and Gou Huowang also looked like a stove household.

"If the two of you checked Gou Huowang's identity first, we wouldn't need to be led by him, and we wouldn't have any troubles now!" Li Zhiqing said with a slightly reproachful tone, taking a sip of tea.

A non-existent kitchen household, because it publicly pointed out that the Taizhou branch had a hidden field, made the three of them fly away for a while.

If one of the two of them got to know Gou Huowang a little bit at that time, and found out that Gou Huowang was pretending to be a stove household, then there would be no chaos today.

"Ah? Since Gou Huowang is faked by a trickster, we don't need to pay attention to it at all!" After learning the truth, Yang Zhifu immediately smiled happily.

Holding the teacup, Li Zhiqing glanced at the magistrate Yang and said, "If we find out at the beginning, then we can punish that fake person on the spot, but can we make it clear now?"

"That's right, the Gou Yanwang incident has caused a lot of trouble in the city, and these days we are so aggressive in finding someone, and now everyone is discussing it. Even if we now say that Gou Huowang is fake, the scholars and people in Yangzhou City will not Believe it, or even think that we have expelled Gou Huowang!" Zhang Huangshan said bitterly with a flexible mind.

Yang Zhifu's eyes widened immediately, and he said dumbfoundedly: "That Gou Huowang is obviously a fake, and we can't break it?"

"Of course we can expose it, but we need to find out the real master first, otherwise the problem will not be resolved satisfactorily, and the imperial envoy will probably pursue this matter! In addition, we have to investigate the real intention of that person pretending to be Gou Huowang!" Li Zhiqing squeezed The teacup splashed the tea lightly, appearing full of wisdom and authenticity.

Yang Zhifu found that things had become more complicated, so he couldn't help but frowned and said, "Master Li, since Gou Huowang was faked by someone else, he must have been hidden by someone behind the scenes, and he is unlikely to show up again in the near future. The matter of Shengyin Field, the prosperity of the world is for profit, and the chaos of the world is for profit, I think the people behind this matter are the group of salt merchants in Shanxi!"

"It's reasonable! As far as I know, many salt merchants in Shanxi can't get the salt for the salt. Even if they mention the salt, it costs a lot. I'm afraid I've already felt resentful, so I thought about shrinking the rope. The matter of Yintian is brought out so that we can confuse ourselves!" Zhang Huangshan immediately agreed with Yang Zhifu's analysis.

Yang Zhifu was more confident in his own judgment, so he said with certainty: "That's exactly the case, that's why the government thinks that the merchants in Shanxi did it! Although some big salt merchants in Shanxi have a good relationship with us, many Shanxi salt merchants The merchants can’t raise salt, so they want to report the Taizhou branch to force us to restore the previous salt production, so that they can smoothly raise the salt!”

The salt cake is really too big. Although they can get benefits from the salt merchants through the method of card salt, the officials of each salt field also want to get a share.

Officials in the officialdom naturally dare not come to compete with them for food, but they can use their power to squeeze the bottom kitchen households, not only occupying more salt fields, but also forcing the kitchen households to shoulder more production tasks.

Faced with the declining salt production year by year, the officials in the officialdom shifted the responsibility to the kitchen households who were forced to leave their hometowns. However, these things could be hidden from the court, but they could not escape the eyes of the Shanxi salt merchants.

If the matter is exposed, once the imperial court clears up the problem of shrinking the salt fields and hiding the fields, then the Shanxi salt merchants who hold a large amount of salt will undoubtedly be the beneficiaries.

"According to your analysis, this matter really seems to be done by a Shanxi businessman!" Li Zhiqing found that he seemed to be thinking about the matter in a complicated way, so he nodded slightly.

A light flashed in Yang Zhifu's mind, and he imitated Li Zhiqing and said: "I'm afraid this matter has something to do with those two people!"

"Who?" Li Zhiqing found that Yang Zhifu seemed to have suddenly become smarter, so he immediately asked.

Although Zhang Huangshan didn't say anything, he looked at Zhifu Yang curiously.

The magistrate Yang got the attention of the two, and he couldn't help but secretly said proudly: "Wang Chunlai, the Tongzhi of the transshipment envoy of the two Huaihe Rivers, and Wailang Guandong, a member of the Nanjing Household Department of Yangzhou Chaoguan, are both officials from Shanxi!"

In the transshipment envoy of the Huaihe River and Huaihe River, in addition to Li Zhiqing, the transshipment envoy, there are also positions such as Tong Zhi, deputy transshipment envoy, and judge.Since Yangzhou is an important transportation hub of the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal, Yangzhou Chaoguan is located here.

"Prefect Yang, do you mean that Wang Chunlai wants to seek the position of the transshipment envoy of the Huaihe River Capital?" Zhang Huangshan heard the implication of Yang Zhifu's words, looking thoughtful and authentic.

Yang Zhifu turned his head to look at Li Zhiqing, seeming to be full of wisdom and said: "In my opinion, Shanxi businessmen want to solve the problem of difficulty in extracting salt by breaking the Taizhou Branch Shusheng Yintian. Make it a position! There are more and more Jinshi from Shanxi, and the Shanxi Township Party should not be underestimated!"

"Don't say anything about this matter, I will handle it properly!" Li Zhiqing realized that the problem was most likely caused by his deputy, so he immediately took care of it.

In the early morning of the next day, two bodies were found in the Xiaoqinhuai River. According to the investigation, they were Wang Chunlai, Tong Zhi of the transshipment envoy of the two Huaihe Rivers, and Wailang Guandong, a member of the Nanjing Household Department of Yangzhou Chaoguan, who died of drunkenness and drowned.

Even in a peaceful and prosperous age, there are inevitably all kinds of dark sides.

Beijing City, Qianqing Palace.

Since the last time a solar eclipse was used to carry out a massacre, no matter whether it was inside or outside the palace, everyone suddenly became much calmer.

The civil and military officials re-examined him as the emperor, and the eunuchs and maids in the palace also re-appreciated their master, and they have all settled their positions so far.

Even Niu Mengmeng, the most "favored" court lady, became cautious when speaking, and Fan Jinling didn't dare to shake the bell to untie the button, but her eyes clearly said that she wanted Zhu Youtang to be domineering for a while.

It's just that Zhu Youtang's life is still the same, and he continues to work hard to be a good emperor who is truly diligent in governing and caring for the people.

The sandalwood smoke from Dongnuan Pavilion curled up, and the faint sandalwood filled every corner of the room.

Liu Jin led two young eunuchs in from the outside, holding a memorial in his hand and respectfully sent it to the imperial court.

Now he is no longer the little eunuch who poured the chamber pot, but now he has become the leading eunuch of the Qianqing Palace, resolutely becoming a celebrity around the emperor.

After Guo Yong's instruction, he also strengthened his own learning.Although it is impossible to study in the inner school every day, once I have time, I will read some books on arithmetic.

The memorials of the two capitals and the thirteen provinces were sent to the study room through the Sizheng Secretary, and some not particularly important memorials were sent to the cabinet for drafting, and then sent to the Qianqing Palace.

It's just that the memorials handed over by Wang Yue will not be sent to the cabinet for drafting, but will be sent directly to the imperial court for the emperor to review as soon as possible.

Shrinking the rope and hiding the field?

Zhu Youtang opened the memorial that Wang Yue had sent up through Nanjing's garrison eunuch Wang Zhi, and while learning about the latest situation in Yangzhou, he muttered to himself in surprise.

Since I was a lover of Internet literature in my previous life, I have already learned about Internet governance. Qingzhang Tianmu seems to be a good way to save the country.

Zhu Youtang naturally knew that Qingzhang Tianmu could increase the tax revenue of Ming Dynasty, but after all, it involved the measurement of more than 100 counties. This kind of matter cannot be solved by sitting in the Forbidden City and issuing orders, and it also needs an opportunity to do this matter. .

Due to his habitual thinking, he has always felt that the disadvantage of shrinking ropes and hiding the fields can only be found in the fields, but he completely ignores that the same problem may exist in Yantian.

Just thinking about it carefully, it shouldn't be surprising that the salt government has this problem.

After all, kitchen households are also in the bottom group, and the output value of salt fields is many times higher than that of rice fields, so how can these officials not squeeze them?
What's more, the large-scale private farm salt that Wang Yue spent a long time looking for earlier does not exist at all. These hidden fields controlled by officials are the largest supply end of "private farm" private salt.

Now it seems that there are indeed many problems in the salt administration of Ming Dynasty, and there are also big problems in the production side, at least not at the same level as the salt production of the later dynasty.

Zhu Youtang realized that "shrinking the rope and hiding the salt fields" was an important opportunity, and immediately replied: "The matter of hiding the fields is related to the people's livelihood of the country and the people in the world! This matter must be checked clearly, and Luo will use evidence to tell the world before it can be done. Let the people have a meter, and the officials dare not bully the people!"

The biggest crux of Shusheng Yintian is that the officials master the meter, not to mention that the common people don't understand the meter at all, even if they know it, they can only obediently ask the government for food.

Now if we want to truly solve the persistent illness of Shuosheng Yintian, we need to make the Taizhou branch a landmark event, so that it can become an important opportunity to clear up the Tianmu in the world.

Of course, whether this thing can be done depends on the beheading of the king. I hope he can cut a piece of sky in Yangzhou and make Huaxia revitalized.

Even the high-ranking emperor is also unsatisfactory.

"Your Majesty, the [-]th Battalion is very resentful about the issue of military pay. I am afraid to give an explanation!" Qian Yi, the admiral and eunuch of the [-]th Battalion, reported military affairs almost every two or three days, and he reported bitterly today.

The Aegis Battalion that Zhu Youtang wanted to build encountered a problem again. The problem was not with the Aegis Battalion, but the voice of raising the salary of soldiers appeared in the [-]th Battalion.

It has always been a matter of not worrying about numbers but unevenness. The soldiers' pay of the Aegis Battalion had already made ordinary soldiers jealous, but with the instigation of the remaining forces of the Civil Service Group and the Wu Xun Group, the [-]th Battalion has already had a relatively strong voice to increase the soldiers' pay.

With the current problem in front of him, Zhu Youtang wanted to quickly quell these voices, either by raising the salary of the [-]th Battalion, or by adjusting the salary of the Aegis Battalion back to the level of the officers and soldiers of the [-]th Battalion.

Zhu Youtang found that if it was really cured, many problems would not exist, or they were well hidden, just like the shrinking rope of the Taizhou branch.

It’s just that if you really want to do it or uncover it, then it’s like Schrödinger’s cat, no one knows what will happen when you open the box.

Zhu Youtang may have been spoiled by the Civil Service Group or the Wu Xun Group to ruin his plan to strengthen the army, so he immediately made a decision and said: "You can make arrangements, and tomorrow I will visit the Aegis Camp!"

(End of this chapter)