In 1645, the world was in turmoil, and the Dashun regime in the north, because Li Zicheng was defeated in Beijing, the Shun army retreated in Guanzhong, which caused the collapse of Dashun's rule in the north, and the power of the Qing court began to expand unprecedentedly.

This year, Li Zicheng's life in the north was not easy, and the energy of the Qing army was also restrained by the breaking army, and he was busy cleaning up the occupied territory and was pinned down in the north.

This year can be said to be an extremely easy year for the Ming Dynasty in the south.

Nanjing got rid of the burden of the north, not to mention, it was once the two strong enemies of thieves and the fierce people, and the situation of taking turns to blow the hammer no longer exists, and instead the two strong enemies pinched each other in the north, and the Nanjing court withdrew and was able to calmly watch the tiger fight from the mountain.

At this time, there was no pressure from the outside in the Nanjing Imperial Court, and life could be said to be quite easy.

Although Ma Ruan and the Donglin Party were busy fighting for power and profit in the Nanjing court, there were still many people with lofty ideals in the government and the opposition, and they proposed to take advantage of the opportunity of the Kou Yu to compete for the front and have no time to look south, and quickly consolidate the Huaisi and Huguang defense lines, so as to cope with the changes of the times.

Although the princes of Nanjing have no enterprising spirit, they still need to be defended in order to favor the left side of the river, Lianghuai and Huguang.

The gentry in the southeast can abandon the north, but they can't ignore the safety of the south of the Yangtze River.

To a certain extent, all they wanted was to control the imperial court themselves in order to safeguard their interests, but they never thought about capsizing the ship Nanjing.

At this time, Nanjing was set up in Jiangbei, Huang Degong, Gao Jie, Liu Zeqing, Xu Dingguo four town soldiers, by the university scholar Gao Mingheng sat in Xuzhou to supervise the division, and the Ming army even entered Shandong to deploy defenses.

Compared with history, the Jiangbei defense presided over by Gao Mingheng undoubtedly put on a positive and enterprising posture.

This can be seen from the fact that he set up the university scholars in Xuzhou, rather than Yangzhou, which is close to the river.

Gao Mingheng, who is known for his good guards, presided over the defense of the two Huai, and the gentry in the southeast were very confident in the defense of Jiangbei.

There is no problem in Jiangbei, so the direction that the Nanjing court is worried about will be Huguang.

As early as last year, the Nanjing imperial court had already paid attention to Huguang, and allocated a lot of money and grain to Huguang, and Huguang's Ming army also took advantage of Zhang Xianzhong's entry into Sichuan and successfully captured Wuchang.

Wuchang is a place, the southeast survives, and it dies.

After the Nanjing court took Wuchang, the western defense also had a layer of guarantee, plus Gao Yihuan begged for appeasement, Wuchang had no threat from the north for the time being, Zhang Xianzhong went west to Sichuan, and Nanjing was not so concerned about the war in Huguang.

After all, the war will have to be taxed, and the tax will damage the interests of the southeastern gentry, and the Donglin Party is pressuring the new tax law to not be passed, and if a large-scale war breaks out at this time, the new tax law will not be suppressed.

Therefore, after the Ming army took Wuchang and the western defense was guaranteed to a certain extent, the Nanjing court gradually reduced the money and grain to Huguang.

Emperor Jianzhang of Nanjing, in fact, still wanted to do something, but the southeastern gentry colluded, the emperor came from the north, and he did not have his own team, plus he was young, so he was completely incapable of controlling the court situation.

After all, this country is still the country of the Zhu family, the minister is not in a hurry, the little emperor is in a hurry, but it is useless for him to be anxious, he needs silver to fight, and if the new tax law is not passed, the court will have no money, and the army will naturally lie still.

In the late Chongzhen Dynasty, the officials and soldiers of the towns of the Ming Dynasty have been warlordized, and now Beijing has fallen, and the authority of the Ming court has been further weakened.

Seeing that the tax law could not be passed, the imperial court did not have much grain to allocate to Huguang, so he could only use his title and cabinet to tempt Huguang officials, so that they could raise their own money and grain, hoping that they could recover Jingzhou and Xiangyang.

He Tengjiao is very concerned about the title and entering the cabinet, but it is not an easy thing to raise money and food by himself.

As the governor of a province, although the official position is large, it is not as convenient as Gao Yihuan in terms of physique, and he is not bound by rules. There are various rules and constraints in the physique, and there are special imperial histories to find fault with you.

In the old empire of more than 200 years, the relationship between the local squires, the powerful and the local officials, and the officials of the DPRK and China has been intertwined.

In this social network, even the governor is difficult to move the interests of the squire and Haoqiang, so he can only loot from Kuhaha, but if Kuhaha can live, he has already done his best, and how much money can he scavenge?

Nanjing did not allocate money and grain, and the Ming army, which was the strongest in Huguang, did not move, so that in the Huguang area, Gao Yihuan still maintained the situation that Gao Yihuan occupied Xiangyang, the Western Army occupied Jingzhou, and the Ming army occupied Wuchang, Yuezhou, Changsha and other large areas, and maintained it for nearly a year.

Originally, this situation would continue to be maintained, but in April, the situation in Huguang suddenly changed.

The Huguang official mansion, which could not make ends meet, suddenly had money and food.

This matter has to be thanked to Gao Yihuan for letting Ma Hongshan come to Huguang to speculate on grain, after Ma Hongshan and others cashed out the grain, they immediately ran to Changde to avoid the limelight for the time being, but some small grain merchants who were coerced into this speculation, or small businesses whose relationship was not strong enough, did not receive the news that the government was going to do it.

At this time, the Ming court still had a certain degree of majesty, especially for civil officials, which still had a relatively strong binding force.

Therefore, even if He Tengjiao is the governor, he can't mess around, and he can't just steal his family to collect money, but this grain speculation turmoil gave He Tengjiao a very good excuse.

Originally, in Huguang, it was difficult for the squires and Haoqiang to collect money, and the taxes paid by the poor people were limited, which made He Tengjiao at a loss. Now the merchant fried grain, it is equivalent to sending it to the door himself.

These merchants who participated in the grain speculation, before the silver in their hands was hot, they were ordered by He Tengjiao to lock all of them and take them to prison, and all the shops were raided.

The government is cracking down on hoarding, and the imperial history has nothing to say, and the merchants who have been raided can also spend some money to dredge up the relationship, break the wealth and avoid disasters, and be released, and if it doesn't matter, the family will be ruined immediately.

At the end of April, He Tengjiao copied more than 700,000 taels of silver and 200,000 stones of grain, and the Huguang Mansion treasury was instantly sufficient.

After having money and food, He Tengjiao was full of ambitions, requisitioned soldiers and horses from nine towns in Hunan, gathered an army of 100,000 people, and commanded Jingzhou, preparing to recapture the core of Huguang.

Outside Yuezhou City, in a restaurant near the river, Gao Yicheng stood by the window on the second floor with his hands in his hands, looking at the river view outside.

At this time, a man hurriedly walked into the room, reflexively closed the door of the house, walked behind Gao Yicheng, and saluted: "Commander, the investigation is clear, the Ming army is indeed going to fight Jingzhou!" ”

(End of chapter)