Tensho 17th year, June 25th.

Cloudy, partly cloudy with no rain.

On this day, it is the day of the market in the west market of Wannian County, early in the morning, the villagers from all over the country appeared in the market, many of them set off at 12 o'clock in the middle of the night, to the market, not to mention those women and children, even the young and middle-aged people who go into the city from time to time, they also keep looking around, and the tiredness on their faces can not hide the excitement and excitement in their eyes.

The West Market is different from the East Market.

The east city of Wannian County is located next to Weishui, on one side is the water wharf, every day, there are many cargo ships against the water, bringing goods from the south, part of them enter the moat along the Weishui, and then, along the artificial canal through the water gate into Chang'an City, most of them are unloaded at the wharf of Wannian County and moved into the warehouse of the riverside wharf.

The reason why this is the case, the artificial canal is relatively narrow, due to the reason of protection, the water gate is not spacious, can only accommodate some smaller canopy boats, therefore, there is a limit on the number of ships entering the city every day, only those ships with special traffic flags for the imperial city or Daming Palace can enter Chang'an, without that flag, they can only unload at the wharf of Wannian County.

After the goods are unloaded, some goods will be transferred by horse-drawn carriage into Chang'an, or into the shops in the East and West Markets, or into the courtyard of the deep house; The rest of the goods were also distributed in the East Market of Wannian County.

The shops in the East Market are basically owned by large merchants, and those large merchants are all covered by the power of the gate valve, otherwise, they can't be opened at all, and here is basically a distribution center for bulk goods.

Nishishi, on the other hand, has many shops.

However, most of these shops are mainly retail, and the customers are the villagers who come from all over the world to catch the market, and the villagers sell the produce of their land or the game they have hunted to the market, give it to the vendors, and then buy some necessities from the store, such as salt, ironware, and other things that cannot be self-sufficient, and the prices here are much cheaper than buying them in the township markets or the hands of the merchants who go to the countryside.

The west city of Wannian County is to catch the market every five days every month, once every ten days.

Of course, it does not mean that the market is closed except for this day, at that time, there are still many people who come to visit the market, such as the citizens of Wannian County, and some villagers from nearby villages, but at that time, it was far from being as lively as the market.

At three o'clock, the entire bazaar was crowded.

Sweating into rain is not an exaggeration, in some areas, it is indeed crowded with people, people next to people, at this time, often the voices of people are boiling, the voice of calling friends is endless, children's whispers, crying, fighting, adult reprimands, complaining one after another......

Of course, this is not the case in all areas, only in the narrow paths.

Wannian County is located in the Guanzhong Plain, the terrain is flat, the place is big enough, although there are many people in the market, after all, it still can't catch up with Du Rui's previous life, and now, the population of the entire Tang Empire, excluding those hidden households, is less than 100 million people.

So, once you get to a more spacious place, it's much better.

Du Rui was also shopping around the West Market, Mo Chou followed behind him, however, it was not three feet away, but only one foot away, this foot distance was convenient for her to draw her sword, there were too many people here, she did not allow the slightest mistake, so her hand was always on the hilt of the sword, her eyes did not leave Du Rui's surroundings, and anyone who approached would observe very vigilantly.

Wei Yue walked in front of Du Rui's left side, with a bitter face, he was originally a crying face, because he couldn't resist Du Rui, he had to come to this crowded market with him, so he was unhappy.

This is Du Rui's first time at the market.

The reason why he must come here is to see the real situation in the market, and in the future, he will go to the countryside for a walk, and even, if necessary, he will leave the Guanzhong Plain, go to the northern Shaanxi Plateau, and go to the Qinling Mountains.

In a previous life, there was a saying that was very popular in officialdom that without investigation there was no right to speak.

In later generations, this sentence has become a sentence of officialdom, everyone is saying it, but few people really do it, he is different, when he was in office, he would do a lot of research.

It's not the kind of person who reads the report, or goes down with a lot of people to inspect it, just look at it, get into the car, leave a cloud of black smoke and disappear away. He is really disguised, he goes to contact those ordinary workers or peasants, he will know exactly the advantages and disadvantages of those places, what the personnel are like there, and then, according to local conditions, make plans to do something.

So, he is an alternative in officialdom.

Of course, he was doing these things quietly, and even the confidant secretary and the driver didn't know about it, and he couldn't let this kind of thing spread, if it spread, he would be isolated by everyone.

Because, he is not their kind.

Coming into this world, this phrase is still important.

Therefore, he ignored Wei Yue's dissuasion and insisted on coming to Xishi.

Prices, the flow of people, the shops, the places where the goods come from in the north and the south, and the scoundrels in the market, and the officials on duty...... He observed all this and understood the people's livelihood only in such a bazaar, not to mention, there were people at the bottom of the empire, peasants.

In all dynasties, the peasants were at the bottom of the pyramid.

In the past twenty or thirty years, the world has been in turmoil.

There was a foreign invasion in the Western Regions, occupying the Hexi Corridor and cutting off the Silk Road; To the east, the towns of Yan and Zhao attacked each other, and from time to time they would cross the Yellow River south and invade the Central Plains; The prairie outside the Great Wall, a group of Hu together, there are jackal clans occupy a large grassland under the Yin Mountain, eyeing the Central Plains, last time, Du Rui also heard some information from Yingzong, invaded the pass, and it was the jackal clan who invaded the state.

However, the Guanzhong Plain has been peaceful.

Over the years, there have been no major floods, droughts and locust plagues, it can be said that the wind and rain are smooth, so the income of the farmers can also maintain food and clothing, basically, Du Rui did not see those displaced people.

There are naturally beggars and other things, but there are many reasons for becoming a beggar.

Du Rui listened carefully to those villagers, among these villagers, there are not many yeoman farmers, there are few small landlords, most of them are tenant farmers, to be precise, they are all villagers, from a certain large village, those land, all owned by the owner, they only need to pay the land tax to the owner, as for the tax of the court, the owner of the village to pay.

Of course, they could not avoid forced labor.

They are more afraid of forced labor than they are of taxes.

Du Rui knew that most of the granges in Guanzhong were actually concentrated in the hands of a small number of people, basically, they were all owned by the gate valve family, like the entire Lantian County, and all the fields were owned by the Lu family.

In Wannian County, the Gu family has to occupy at least half of the land, and even the Du family's Huangzhuang does not occupy as much land as the Gu family.

Not only Wannian County, in Wugong, Zhouzhi, Meixian and other places, the Gu family has a large number of granges, in the entire Guanzhong Plain, the Gu family is actually the oldest inheritance, about two thousand years, there have been several great masters, and now, the great master who lives in seclusion at the top of Huashan is surnamed Gu. Of course, the background of this great grandmaster is a little embarrassing, he is an illegitimate child, his father is the third room of the Gu family, that is, a concubine in the room where Gu Qingye is, and his mother's identity is even more humble, she is a courtesan in the Qinglou.

If it weren't for the fact that the Gu family didn't talk well to that great grandmaster when they were young, the great grandmaster's achievements didn't all depend on the Gu family's martial arts secrets, and the Gu family's power would be far stronger than now.

After all, that great grandmaster had said to all the masters, including the Du clan, that the Gu family was not allowed to use his name.

He openly claimed that he was not a member of the Gu family.

Of course, he didn't enter the ancestral hall of the Gu family in the first place, but after he achieved congenitalism, the Gu family hurriedly recorded his name on the genealogy, and at that time, he didn't care about this anymore.

The topic is far away, in short, after some observation, Du Rui's face is not good-looking.

There are no yeoman farmers, no small landlords, most of them are bankers, even if those granges do not evade taxes and evade taxes, and all the fields are handed over to the imperial court, of course, this is basically impossible, the urine nature of those gate valve families, Du Rui knows very well, this is the same as the capital interest groups in the previous life, there is no difference at all, if you don't have a strong political power, it is difficult to make those capitalists pay taxes according to the law.

Now, as if those gate valves are very patriotic, they have all paid the field endowment.

This is still a very big problem.

Everything these bankers are given by the master, they can only be grateful to the master, and they can only work hard for the master, and the court is just a symbol for them.

This is far more terrible than the imperial power in the Ming and Qing dynasties in the previous life.

These human resources are in the hands of the Maison, who owns land, shops, mines, blacksmiths, silver horns...... In fact, it is a small world that can be self-sufficient, and in this small world, the head of the family is like the emperor. They control all the means of production, and in order to consolidate their rule, they choose the most conservative management, and even if the productive forces are developed, they will cherish themselves and will not let outsiders know.

In this way, the solidification of this social class has become extremely terrifying.

The most important thing is that there are martial arts in this world, and the first-class and super-first-class martial arts cheats are in the hands of these families, and they have strong force, so it is just a fantasy to rely on the power of the low-level peasants to overthrow them.

It's been a hard road!

A wry smile appeared on the corner of Du Rui's mouth.

"Shaojun, it's past noon, should we find a place to rest...... What to eat by the way? ”

Wei Yue said cautiously on the side.

Now, they stand on the right side of the street, where there are many teahouses and restaurants, and on this street there are far fewer pedestrians, and the villagers who drag their children and daughters do not come here to eat, they usually bring dry food, at most to borrow tea from acquaintances in the surrounding shops. Of course, there are also some Zhuang customers who are ruthless and bring the Hun family and their children to the restaurant for a meal.

Most of them are citizens of Wannian County, and there are also stewards of the grange, etc., and their clothes are very different.

"Help! Grab people! ”

Above the street, there was a sudden terrible scream.

"Get out of the way, the four seas help errands, all of them get out of the way for me......"

Someone roared.

The crowd surged like a tide and dispersed in all directions.