The village is calm and cozy, and the sun shines on the newly built wooden houses with wide eaves. There was a "clanging" sound in the air, mixed with shouts and shouts. However, in Mengyang, the weather is unpredictable; On a sunny morning, it can suddenly rain down.

There were no showers today, but there was a rush of horses' hooves.

As soon as he rode on the street, the sergeant on horseback saw Zhao Ping, so he turned over and dismounted and hugged his fists and said: "Zhao Baihu, the scout came to the camp to report, and found that behind the mountain in the mine, many natives were digging in the pit!" ”

Zhao Ping frowned, remembering what the King of Han had told him, and immediately said, "Pass my order and immediately gather the brothers in the camp." ”

"Order!" Sergeant holding his fists.

Zhao Ping turned his head to Diao Ya and said, "Our official documents will be handed over, and then we will do it, and Miss Diao Ya will go to the mountain with me first to take a look." ”

Diao Ya nodded in agreement.

Zhao Ping rushed to the back of the mountain with twenty or thirty people, and saw a large group of natives digging stones at the foot of the mountain. He took a look at the horse and decided that these people had indeed come for the jade mine.

The natives learned the method of the Han craftsmen in the mine, and burned the excavated ore with fire and poured it with water, so that the ore could be cracked and the jade inside. Black smoke and white steam swirled down the mountain, and it was noisy; There were also two elephants, which chirped from time to time.

Many natives noticed that an armored soldier was coming, and they looked up one after another.

Zhao Ping turned over and dismounted, leading the horse down the hill. He turned to Diao Ya and said, "Ask them who is in charge, and come out to answer!" ”

After Diao Ya shouted a few times in the local language, several swarthy men in flowered skirts walked towards this side with knives.

"Array!" There was a shout from the sergeant. More than 20 sergeants lined up in two rows with guns, shields, bows and crossbows, and made a way in the middle of the formation to protect Zhao Ping and Tuguan Xiaoniang and others.

The natives in flowered skirts shouted loudly. Diao Ya said quickly: "What do you want to do? ”

Zhao Ping said: "The Yunnan Dusi and Mengyang Xuanzhi made a covenant with Sixing, and Mengyang's jade mine had to be opened by someone approved by the Dusi. ”

Diao Ya told Zhao Ping's words to the natives of the flower skirt, and the natives shouted again. Diao Ya translated: "This is our place, we dig our own mountain, what does it matter to you?" ”

Zhao Ping and Shopkeeper Xu exchanged looks, and Shopkeeper Xu hugged his fists and said, "I have to take the idea of Zhao Baihu." ”

Zhao Ping said: "Go and block the road!" Tell them to lay down the ore before they can leave the place. ”

The military commander responded and shouted: "Turn left!" Advance! ”

The sergeants lined up and ran towards the main road outside the pit.

The native coolies pushing the wheelbarrow were blocked on the road, and more native people rushed up to push and push the Ming army sergeant. The sergeants were armed with guns and shields, and for a time did not dare to use their hands against the unarmed coolies.

Zhao Ping scolded loudly, and Diao Ya also shouted in the local dialect, but to no avail. After a while, the two elephants rushed towards the road with heavy steps.

If you wait for the elephants to approach, how can the weak defense of the infantry army still be able to stop it? Zhao Ping ordered the arrow to be released, and the string "bang" sounded, and the elephant was injured by the arrow, screaming and running out to the side of the road, and the natives were screaming at the arrow. The scene was chaotic, and the natives in front of the formation were pushed and squeezed onto the big shield, which made the Ming army's formation turbulent. Finally, a sergeant stabbed a native in anger, blood splattered out, and all the soldiers struck one after another, and soon several more native people were stabbed to death.

There was panic and confusion on the road for a while, and soon the natives ran away.

Zhao Ping saw a few natives in flowered skirts leave the pit and hurriedly left from the path. He looked at several corpses lying in pools of blood on the road, and suddenly felt that something was wrong.

There were too few Ming soldiers, and there were no fortifications here, so Zhao Ping decided to go back first.

When the group returned to the barracks, Zhao Ping immediately wrote two letters. One was delivered to the Han Palace, Yunnan, and the other was sent to the nearby Mengyang Propaganda Envoy to negotiate the mining covenant with Sijia. It is all written in Chinese characters, and the father of the Si family was once enshrined in peace and Burma, and there must be people who can understand Chinese characters.

Then Zhao Ping ordered martial law in the Tunjun village.

The barracks are also in the village, near the north gate of the village; There is also an open space outside the north gate that is the school field; The pit is at the foot of the hill to the west of the village. Now the situation is different, the Ming army of 150 people can only barely defend the village, and the mine can not take care of it.

In the afternoon, many natives came to the west gate of Juntun Village, put the dead bodies on wooden shelves, and carried them to the door. At this time, the weather is hot, and it is estimated that it will taste after an afternoon. The natives shouted outside the gate of the village, demanding that the officials and soldiers of the Ming Dynasty compensate for the funeral expenses, eight taels of silver for a corpse, and punish the murderer.

Zhao Ping shouted to Diao Ya that it was illegal for Meng Yangnarians to open mines without permission; It is unreasonable to take the initiative to come and attack the official army formation. Anyway, it can't be discussed.

After arguing for a while, Diao Ya said: "Those people must not be villagers, the villagers must be afraid to see so many armor soldiers, and it is unlikely that they will bargain with the officers and soldiers." ”

"When I saw those flower-skirted natives in the pit behind the mountain, I guessed that they were not ordinary villagers." Zhao Ping nodded.

Diao Ya asked, "Who does General Zhao think they should be?" ”

"Homesick people." Zhao Ping frowned.

Diao Ya opened her mouth in surprise and looked at Zhao Ping speechless.

Zhao Ping glanced at the contemplative Xu Caiqi and said, "I heard that not long ago, two pieces of beautiful jade in Kunming City called 'Heavenly Match' were sold for a high price of 30,000 guan and 50,000 guan successively. When Sijia heard the news, they must have been dissatisfied with the original 8,000 per year, and they wanted more benefits. ”

Xu Caiqi opened his mouth at this time: "General Zhao is worthy of being a scholar, and he is a genius!" ”

Mengyang's Propaganda and Consolation Embassy is only more than ten miles away from the mine. Early the next morning, Sijia sent someone over.

Sure enough, as Zhao Ping expected, the Si envoy was very happy, and when they met, they "readily" asked to increase the profit of Meng Yang's Xuanfu envoy by twenty times, to 160,000 pieces of silver!

160,000?! Zhao Ping suspected that he had misheard, but the homesick envoy could speak Chinese, and he said it again......

The emperor of the Ming Dynasty, the son of the Han Dynasty, guarded the army with as many as 20,000 people. Half of the 20,000 people are in Tuntian, and the other half are on duty. In fact, the annual military salary expenditure of the Han Wangfu is about 10,000 yuan, and the guards of the Han Wangfu are well-equipped, strong and strong, and the military salary is not low. 160,000 pieces of silver, enough for the sixteen years of military salary expenses of the three guards of the Han Palace!

Zhao Ping immediately rejected the envoy's proposal, "This will be the military general of the Han Palace's guard for the hundred households, and he will be ordered to control the affairs of the Mengyang mine. Such a major event should have been played first by the Han Wangfu and the Yunnan Dusi. But Meng Yang's consolation envoy proposed a number of 160,000 yuan, and it was impossible not to report it! ”

The messenger said: "I heard that a pair of jadeite was sold for 50,000 guan, and now the jade mined in the land of Mengyang is not counted, 160,000 guan is not much?" ”

Xu Caiqi hugged his fists and bowed to Zhao Ping, and when he saw Zhao Ping nodding, Xu Caiqi said: "You don't know." The rumored jadeite is called 'a match made in heaven', and this kind of jade is a rare thing in the world, and it is not possible to find it every year. What's more, even if it is a 'match made in heaven', it can't be exchanged for 50,000 pieces of silver. The people who bought this jade were King Ning and King Han...... The Mengyang Mine was protected by the Han Wangfu, so that Jun thought that the Han King would really spend so many silver taels to buy this jade from the Shen family? ”

"What do you mean?" The messenger asked.

Xu Caiqi said: "The implication is that you may have miscalculated the windfall profits of jadeite; The rumors are not credible, but the merchants are trying to promote the fame of jadeite. In fact, the profits we have in hand are far from so much, and we can't share the huge amount of 160,000 silver taels. ”

The envoy said: "Our king has been deceived by the Han people, and eight thousand pieces of silver are simply not worth mentioning!" ”

Zhao Ping said: "This matter is very important, and we must first show the Yunnan government before we can reply to Meng Yang's consolation envoy." Ben will ask Sijia to evacuate the people on the pit first, and the people who made trouble outside Juntun Village will also be evacuated, and wait for the Kunming City Government Office to re-dispatch envoys to Mengyang to comfort the envoys and discuss again. ”

At this moment, Xu Caiqi approached Zhao Ping and whispered a few words. Zhao Ping nodded after hearing this, and then hugged his fist at the envoy and said: "The King of Han once proposed another method with the mine owner Shen family, in addition to distributing profits, the Si family can also open a mine, but it can only be sold to the Shen family. At that time, the head of the Shen family thought that Tusi could not afford to open a mining pit, so he decided to divide only profits. ”

The envoy thought for a moment and said, "Then I will go back and report your words to the king (Meng Yangxuan's consolation envoy)." There were people outside, and the dead were all villagers, and the general did not pay for the funeral expenses, so I am afraid it would be difficult to convince the public. ”

Zhao Ping immediately replied: "We don't want such a thing to happen, but the fault of this matter is not in the official army." If you lose money this time, the next time the villagers here don't follow the rules, won't it increase the number of casualties? ”

The messenger said coldly: "Listen to the respect! ”

The two sides talked for a long time and broke up unhappily. Zhao Ping still personally sent the messenger out of the walled gate.

Yesterday night, the corpse outside the gate of the village stinks. The generals and shopkeepers were afraid of the plague, so they first fired firecrackers on the wall to frighten the natives. Then he dispatched troops to rush out of the west gate, forcibly poured tung oil and firewood, and burned the corpse.

On the fire where tung oil firewood was burning, black smoke billowed out. Zhao Ping stood behind the earthen wall, looking out, looking at each other with the natives through the black smoke. The natives did not come up to put out the fire, but they did not disperse either.

After nearly three months of uneventful mining, the peace may have been short-lived. The mutually beneficial buying and selling between the local villagers and the Han merchants and the common people may be gone forever. The affairs of this world are not up to the will of the good people.

Zhao Pingliang was silent for a long time, standing between the flames and smoke, thinking about what had happened in the past two days. He was a little worried that he hadn't done a good thing, but thinking about it, everything was according to the rules and reason, and if Toast was going to make trouble, what could he do?

At this moment, Xu Caiqi also walked onto the earthen wall. Zhao Ping said: "Even if we give in first, Toast may have to gain an inch!" ”