Seeing this, Ma Cheng couldn't control his anger anymore, he was still guarding a fart city without food!

Ma Cheng stepped forward and shot Wanquan five or six mouths with a bow left and right, and then scolded: "Say, where did all the grain go!" ”

At this time, Wanquan knew that he was dead, and in order to ensure that his family did not die, he had to tell the secrets and inventory of the household granary.

The Ming Dynasty from the founding of Zhu Yuanzhang in Nanjing, vigorously stockpiled grain, probably because Zhu was hungry when he was a child, so it was stipulated that all provinces in the south should pay grain to Nanjing, and Nanjing's various granaries stored grain in about 5 million stone all year round.

At the beginning of the Ming Dynasty, the population of Nanjing was about more than 300,000, plus the 400,000 guards stationed here, 5 million stone grain was enough for these people to eat. However, with the change of Zhu Di's martyrdom, Zhu Di moved the capital to Beijing, and Nanjing gradually lost its role as the capital.

Because of the relocation of the capital, most of the 400,000 guards outside Nanjing moved to Beijing to garrison, and Nanjing did not need so many troops here, so the grain storage in the granary in the city began to slowly decrease.

At the same time, because there is another side effect of moving the capital, that is, Beijing's population has increased greatly, and in order to ensure the normal supply of Beijing, it is necessary to increase the transportation of water. However, the main body of Cao Yun is Nanzhili, which supplies Nanjing, which has a population of nearly one million, and this time it also supplies Beijing, which has a population of one million.

In the Chenghua years, the imperial court has found this situation, but there is no way, in order to ensure the supply of the Beijing division can only be wronged Nanjing, at the same time, the south has been living for a long time, or the main grain production area, lack of a little is not a big deal. In this way, with the acquiescence of the above, the magistrates of the various prefectures of Nanzhili put the transportation of grain in the first place, and then the grain transported to Nanjing.

In this way, Nanjing's grain stocks decreased year by year, and by the 28th year of Jiajing, the grain stocks in the warehouses in Nanjing were only 2 million stones, and in some years it was even reduced to 1.3 million stones. You must know that Nanjing has a complete set of civil affairs teams, as well as more than 200,000 guards and soldiers, these people need Nanjing granaries to open salaries, and they need 1.07 million stone of grain every year, so in the middle of Jiajing, the granaries in Nanjing can only try to maintain a balance of payments, and there is no excess grain to store.

However, fortunately, Nanjing is surrounded by grain-producing areas, and if grain is needed, it is urgently dispatched from various provinces and provinces, so there are no major problems in the last years of Wanli.

However, this situation was not possible in the year of the Apocalypse, and the northern provinces were in turmoil, and in order to quell the rebellion and deal with the Houjin rising in Liaodong, the imperial court began to attack the two million stone grain in Nanjing. In the seventh year of the Apocalypse, according to the report of Wanshihe, the head of the household department in Nanjing, there were 500,000 stone left in Nanjing's grain stockpile, which had reached the red warning line.

In the twelfth year of Chongzhen, Zhu Youzhen had done everything he could to ensure Beijing's food supply, and sent Zhu Guobi, a big corrupt official, to serve as the governor of Caoyun. Zhu Guobi arrived and faithfully carried out Zhu Youzhen's order, and scraped all the provinces of Nanzhili, and his title was also promoted from the Marquis of Funing to the Duke of Baoguo.

After these several scrapes, the four major warehouses in Nanjing, which are now in the hands of Ma Cheng, only have less than 200,000 stone of grain, and the Dong'an warehouse in front of him only has 26,000 stone of grain, and most of them are old grain of more than three years.

Ma Cheng really wanted to cry without tears after hearing Wanquan,

This is no longer the problem of a single corrupt official, but a problem of the whole country. The chaos in the north needs to transfer grain, and at the same time, these corrupt officials and corrupt officials in the household department of Nanjing also have to embezzle, so it is not bad to have 200,000 stone left.

Thinking of this, Ma Cheng is not prepared to be unprepared, what can he do as a Jiupin granary ambassador, even if he kills his whole family, it will not solve the problem. Ma Cheng waved his hand to get Wanquan up, and then asked, "You still have 26,000 stones left here, and now hand them all over to Wang Xian, and he will be responsible for transporting the grain away!" ”

Wan Quan, who survived the dead, hurriedly promised again and again that he would definitely not delay the important affairs of the town guard.

Ma Cheng is not interested in going to those warehouses after leaving Dong'ancang, and it is estimated that other warehouses are not good here. However, Wang Xian was not prepared to spare Wanquan, and after leaving, he encouraged Ma Cheng to severely punish the corrupt officials.

Ma Cheng shook his head and said, "Now that defending the city is important, don't kill your own people anymore!" Wang Xian, you go to a few other warehouses and tell them that the governor only needs the real number, and as for their rotten things, Lao Tzu doesn't want to care! ”

Hearing Ma Cheng say this, Wang Xian hurriedly promised that the food problem would be dealt with, Ma Cheng nodded and let Wang Xian leave.

After Wang Xian left, Ma Cheng rode on the horse to ponder the matter of defending the city, he used to think that there was enough food in the city, as long as he relied on the city wall to consume the Manchu Qing Dynasty. But now it is different, there are only 200,000 stone of grain left in the city, plus the scraped from various merchants and grain stores, it is probably only about 500,000 stone.

If calculated according to the consumption of one pound of grain per person per day, one million people in Nanjing need 10,000 stone of grain a day, and 500,000 stone of grain is enough to consume for two months. This is not counting those new army officers and soldiers, as well as those noble civil officials, who absolutely cannot lower their living standards.

Ma Cheng snapped his fingers and calculated that at most he would hold on until the end of the year, and then the whole city would run out of food, but the Manchu siege outside the city showed no sign of lifting, so what should I do next? Thinking of this Ma Cheng is very troublesome.

Just when Ma Cheng was calculating the grain in his hand, a group of people in Nanjing City were also calculating Ma Cheng. In the Baoguo Mansion in Beicheng, Zhu Guobi, the Duke of Baoguo, who was idle at home, was meeting guests, and he was also greeted by the big man in Nanjing, Xu Wenjue, the Duke of Wei.

Xu Wenjue is just twenty years old this year, although he is not very old, but because he took over as a first-class duke, his status is still above Zhu Guobi.

After the two of them drank for thirty years, Zhu Guobi asked: "The virtuous nephew took over as the Duke of Wei this time, and the uncle didn't go to congratulate him, don't be provocative!" ”

Xu Wenjue laughed and said: "What my uncle said, now that the country is in danger, everything is simple, so my nephew didn't hold any banquets!" ”

"Virtuous nephew, I don't know what happened to my uncle this time?" Bao Guogong was born in Beijing, and he had never had much contact with Wei Guogong in Nanjing, but Zhu Guobi was sent to Huai'an as the governor of Caoyun, so he moved his family to Nanjing. Wei Guogong, who didn't have much to do with him now, took the initiative to come to the door, and Zhu Guobi was very curious about what made this young man come.

Hearing Zhu Guobi say this, Xu Wenjue sighed and put down his wine glass: "Hey, now that the north is besieging the city, there is not enough food in the city, a few days ago, the sage issued a holy decree to let the whole city donate food, I don't know if my uncle's family can donate?" ”

As soon as Zhu Guobi heard this, he immediately called out to the poor:

"Hey, virtuous nephew, you know that your uncle's family is from the Northern Capital, and most of the industry is also in the Northern Capital, and now there is really no food in your hands! But after all, I, Zhu Guobi, am the duke of the country, and I am deeply favored by the country for hundreds of years, and Zhu Guobi will definitely destroy his family in this time of crisis! ”

Zhu Guobi said it well, but Xu Wenjue knew what virtues the old guy in front of him had. A few years ago, when he was in charge of Cao Yun, he resold most of the Cao grain and made a lot of silver, otherwise how could Zhu Guobi spend 20,000 taels of silver when he married Kou Baimen.

"The little nephew also knows the ambition of the uncle, this is also the ambition of our Wei State Mansion, the ancestor followed Emperor Taizu Gao to raise troops back then, and the country was supported by the dynasty for more than 270 years, how could he drop the chain at this time?"

Xu Wenjue took a sip of wine after speaking, and then continued: "But my Wei Mansion has been scattered for more than 200 years, and the population in my family is too much, and I can't get so much food out for a while!" ”

Zhu Guobi didn't know what Xu Wenjue meant at this time, and thought that this guy came to him to intercede with Ma Shiying and take less food. So after listening to Xu Wenjue, Zhu Guobi patted his chest and said: "This matter is simple, wrap it up on your uncle!" The relationship between the uncle and the motosuke is not bad, and you can make peace for the virtuous nephew! ”

Xu Wenjue scolded in his heart when he heard Zhu Guobi say this, this old guy is really old and confused, and he means this there.

"Uncle, the little nephew didn't come to you today for that little food! Just a few days ago, Ma Cheng, a bastard, led someone to seal my family's property, if it wasn't for the little nephew who went to the palace to ask for the holy decree first, it is estimated that the family would have been copied by Ma Cheng, the bastard! Now that the Ma family and his son are so domineering, coupled with the large army of northern captives outside the city, I am afraid that this southern capital will not be able to hold on! ”

Zhu Guobi was taken aback when he heard Xu Wenjue say this, he stood up and scolded: "Xu Wenjue, are you crazy?" If these words get out, do you still want to live? ”

Zhu Guobi scolded Xu Wenjue like this, in fact, he was not optimistic about Emperor Shaowu in the city, the reason is very simple, the strength of the two sides is too different.

There were more than 400,000 Qing troops outside the city, and with the continuous reinforcements from the north, Nanjing could not hold on at all. If the prefectures and counties around Nanjing were in the hands of the Ming Dynasty, it would be fine, but according to Zhu Guobi's news, Nanjing has now become an isolated city, and the entire Nanzhili has fallen into the hands of the Manchu Qing Dynasty, and in Zhu Guobi's eyes, it is only a matter of time before this Nanjing city falls.

But Zhu Guobi didn't dare to say this when he thought about it like this, the bloody coup d'état in Wuyingdian a few months ago made Zhu Guobi see how bloody Ma Cheng's methods were, this guy will not compromise his means for the sake of the end, even his own pro-Laozi can be arrested as soon as he says, so Zhu Guobi really doesn't want to offend Ma Cheng.

But the situation in the city of Nanjing is getting worse and worse, the Qing army has stopped attacking the city, and now it has changed to a siege, according to Zhu Guobi's estimate, in a few months, the city of Nanjing will be cannibalistic, when the time comes, what can he do with Zhu Guobi's Wanguan family wealth?

In the past few days, Zhu Guobi has also thought about surrendering the Qing army outside the city, but Zhu Guobi has no official position now, so he has an empty duke, and the errand of the original Nanjing town guard was also taken over by Ma Cheng, so Zhu Guobi couldn't find a way to surrender even if he wanted to. In addition, Zhu Guobi does not have many people in his hands, and Ma Cheng has heavy troops in his hands, even if Zhu Guobi wants to do something in the city, he can't do it to deal with the Qing army.