Tong Yangjia went out happily, and Cao Fang outside the door came in to report that Chen Zilong was here.

Cao Fang is now the admiral eunuch of Dongchang, so he doesn't have to serve in Zhu Hongsan. But Eunuch Cao knew that all his rights came from the favor of the king, and losing the trust of the king would immediately be a catastrophe. So no matter how busy the work in the East Factory is, Cao Fang has to come to the Chu Wangfu every day to serve for a morning.

"Master, the messenger from Li Zhi, the governor of Nanzhili, is here, and...

"What else?"

"And Qian Qianyi also came along!"

Old man Qian is here? Hearing that his cheap father-in-law also came, Zhu Hongsan was very tricky, and Zhu Hongsan had no good impression of a waste like Old Man Qian. It's really useless to eat anything, except to be a-stirring stick, it's useless.

"Let Chen Zilong come in, Qian Qianyi, you send someone to send him to Guangzhou Qian Mansion first!" A few months ago, Qian Qianyi's eldest wife Chen and her son Qian Sunai had arrived in Dongguan, for the sake of his wife, Zhu Hongsan prepared a big house for them in Guangzhou City, which was a little wish of Qian Yuting.

Hearing Zhu Hongsan say this, Cao Fang went down to make arrangements.

After a while, Chen Zilong came outside the house, and Zhu Hongsan hurriedly went out to greet him.

Coming outside the house, Zhu Hongsan held Chen Zilong's hand and said, "Brother Chen, little brother has finally waited for you!" ”

"Haha, I've been saying goodbye to my brother for many years, but I didn't expect to see you today. Chen Zilong meets His Royal Highness the Prison State! After Chen Zilong finished speaking, he was about to kneel down and salute.

Zhu Hongsan hurriedly helped Chen Zilong up. "Brother Chen doesn't need to be so polite, this king has already issued an order, and in the future, scholars don't have to bow down when they see the Son of Heaven, this king wants to rule the world with scholars!"

Chen Zilong is a real vested interest class, and he is naturally very happy to hear Zhu Hongsan say this.

"King Chu's move is very good!"

Zhu Hongsan smiled and didn't elaborate, but took Chen Zilong's hand and sat down. Zhu Hongsan now has a preliminary plan for the future political situation, that is, to restore the prime minister system of the Tang and Song dynasties. And the prime minister of the Han Dynasty had too much power and was not Zhu Hongsan's first choice. But now it's just an intention, and it can't be said to a low-level official like Chen Zilong.

"Brother among people, what have you been doing in the past few years?"

Chen Zilong sighed, recounted the events after he became a jinshi, and finally said that he would go to Zhoushan Dinghai to serve Li Zhi.

Zhu Hongsan listened in detail, now he is no longer the stunned young man he was ten years ago, as long as he hears the celebrities in history, his face is full of stars. Now that Zhu Hongsan is a king in the practical sense, he has also learned to look at a person with different eyes.

Chen Zilong's evaluation in history is not low, but history is written by posterity, and Chen Zilong's actual talent has not been verified.

Zhu Hongsan lowered his head and thought about Chen Zilong's whereabouts, and said: "Brother among people, don't go to Nanzhili again when you come back this time, there is no expected major war in that place within two years." I just heard you say that you have sorted out Xu Guangqi's "Complete Book of Agricultural Administration", and it happens that the prefect of Zhaoqing is vacant, if the brother in the middle of the people does not dislike it, go to Zhaoqing first! ”

Zhaoqing was the residence of the governor of Guangzhou, second only to Guangzhou and Chaozhou among the provinces of Guangdong, with a population of five or six hundred thousand. In addition, in the past two years, Zhu Hongsan has resettled a large number of displaced people in Zhaoqing to build mulberry fish ponds, and Zhaoqing Mansion has now become the land of fish and rice in Guangdong. One-third of the silk produced in Guangdong comes from Zhaoqing, so the prefect of Zhaoqing is really a fat shortage.

Chen Zilong came back this time to ask for the war from Kainan Zhili, and when he heard that he was asked to go to Zhaoqing to be a magistrate, he was anxious, and hurriedly said: "Your Highness the Prison State, Zilong has no opinion on where to go." But there is something that your subordinates want to ask the prison country, the war is going well on Nanzhili's side, why should you stop? ”

Hearing Chen Zilong ask this, Zhu Hongsan was very unhappy in his heart, that order was issued in the form of a military order, if Li Zhi was not stupid, he would not have disobeyed the military order, but Chen Zilong asked this question today, could it be that Li Zhi expressed his dissatisfaction with himself through Chen Zilong's mouth?

Using the Manchu Qing Dynasty to eliminate the Lu Wang regime in Zhejiang and the Tang Wang regime in Fujian was the top priority of Zhu Hongsan's clique, and if Li Zhi still had sympathy for Lu and Tang at this juncture, it would be a big deal.

Zhu Hongsan looked at Chen Zilong, smiled and said, "Brother among people, did Li Zhi ask you about this matter?" ”

"This is not what the governor meant, the lower officials saw that the people of Zhejiang were poisoned by the Manchu Qing Dynasty, and our tens of thousands of troops sat quietly in Dinghai and did not help them, and the subordinates were really ashamed!"

It turned out that it was not Li Zhi's meaning, but Chen Zilong's Madonna complex.

Zhu Hongsan believes in Chen Zilong's character very much, so he also believes what Chen Zilong said. But explanation cannot be explained, and this matter can only be realized by himself.

"Brother among people, there is really no way. The dispatch of troops by Nanzhili is costing day by day, and the Guangdong side is really unable to make ends meet, so I have already issued an order for Li Zhi and them to withdraw 5,000 troops. Don't worry about military affairs, your task now is to go to Zhaoqing, and Tuntian is our top priority now! ”

After Zhu Hongsan finished speaking, he didn't give Chen Zilong a chance to speak, and said to Cao Fang: "Cao Fang, you lead Lord Chen to the cabinet to report to Ma Mingyuan." ”

"Yes, Your Highness! Lord Chen, please go this way! ”

Seeing Zhu Hongsan chasing away guests, Chen Zilong had no choice but to stand up and follow Cao Fang out.

The houses of the Chu Wangfu in Dongguan are tight, and the new Chu Wangfu in Guangzhou will take another year to be built. So now all the offices are crowded into the small mansion of the Chu Palace. Zhu Hongsan's wife and children couldn't all move to live in Guangzhou, and the three of them took turns to come to Dongguan every month to serve Zhu Hongsan.

The cabinet now has three courtyards in the palace of the king of Chu, which is already good, and each of the six departments only enters the courtyard. Cao Fang led Chen Zilong to the door of the cabinet, handed it over to the waiter guarding the door, and went back.

When the servant heard that this was an order from the King of Chu to come to Ma Ge Lao to report, he didn't dare to delay, so he hurriedly brought Chen Zilong to see Ma Mingyuan.

It is now the end of the year, and the New Year will be more than half a month away, and after the fifteenth day of next year, I will have to hand over the beginning of this year and the budget for next year when I go to work, and Ma Mingyuan is in charge of the household department, and he is now busy with the back of his head. Hearing that Chen Zilong came to ask to see him, Ma Mingyuan was so busy that he poured out his efforts to meet him.

Chen Zilong entered Ma Mingyuan's hut and saw that this hut of less than ten square meters was full of documents and papers, but there were two Taishi chairs in one corner of the room, but there were also files on it.

Seeing Chen Zilong enter the door, Ma Mingyuan laughed: "Brother among people, I finally looked forward to you, brother among people has had a good life in the past few years!" After speaking, he sent the waiter out to pour tea, and Ma Mingyuan personally cleaned up the chair and let Chen Zilong sit down.

Seeing that Ma Mingyuan was busy, Chen Zilong said with a smile: "Brother Zhong Mingxian, as the second assistant of the cabinet, is still working in such a small room?" ”

"Hey, the housing here in Dongguan is tight, don't say I'm here, even the first assistant Chen Zizhuang Chen has only one single room, except for a few of us, the six Shangshu have to work together with their subordinates, which is not bad!"

"Oh? I didn't expect the King of Chu to be thrifty! ”

"There, our King of Chu is very powerful, and the surrounding land has been sold by him, so the Chu Wangfu has not been expanded in the past three years. There is no way for several princesses to live in the city of Guangzhou. But next year will be fine, the king of Chu has already ordered a new palace of the king of Chu in the city of Guangzhou, and the office conditions will be improved by then! ”

At this time, the waiter outside the door served tea, and the two sat down on the Taishi chair, Ma Mingyuan asked: "Brother Zhongren, the official document sent by Li Zhi two months ago also said that you were a senator with him, why did you go back to Dongguan?" ”

Chen Zilong sighed, and put aside what he had just said to Zhu Hongsan, "Brother Zhongmingxian, the King of Chu didn't give me a chance to speak at all, and sent me to you before I could speak again." ”

Ma Mingyuan immediately knew what Zhu Hongsan meant when he heard Chen Zilong say this, this was to let Ma Mingyuan wake up Chen Zilong.

Ma Mingyuan stood up and picked up a piece of music on the bookcase, handed it to Chen Zilong, and said, "Look at the people, at this time, our household department has just made this year's income and expenditure!" The new unit of measurement used on this is 200 stone per ton. ”

Chen Zilong opened it and watched it in detail, the first tax is Guangzhou Mansion, with 8.7 million taels of silver this year, and the second is Zhaoqing Mansion, with 270,000 tons of rice and 120,000 quintals of silk. The third is the Leizhou Mansion, and the income from sugar and salt is 3.4 million taels of silver. Next is Qiongzhou Mansion, which transports 50,000 tons of raw iron and 10,000 tons of stainless steel throughout the year.

After reading it, Chen Zilong was dumbfounded, he didn't expect Guangdong to be so rich, only Guangzhou and Leizhou had an income of tens of millions of taels, and the Zhaoqing Mansion he was going to also had an income of several million taels, but why did the King of Chu have to say that there was no money?

Ma Jiyuan said on the side: "Among the people, this is only the four prefectures of Guangdong, as well as the Lianzhou Mansion and the Nanyang Governor's District. Zhaoqing, where you are going, looks at a lot of rice production, but compared with Nanyang, it is less than 30% of them, and now 50% of the rice in Guangdong is transported from Nanyang, and it is equivalent to 7 yuan of silver and 1 stone when it is transported to Dongguan, and the cost of Zhaoqing rice is 1 or 2 silver and 1 stone, so most of the rice produced in Zhaoqing has to be eaten by the displaced people in the south, and the silk of Zhaoqing is the bulk of exports. Now you know that the king of Chu said to you that he has no money is just a pretext. ”

"Is that really the reason why the king of Chu ordered to stop the military activities of Nanzhili? Borrowing a knife to kill? ”

"Shhh Just know what to expect! ”

Chen Zilong couldn't believe it at all, Li Zhi had already told him when he was in Zhoushan, but at that time, Chen Zilong still had a trace of illusion about Zhu Hongsan, thinking that it was just a bad idea from a certain minister. After Ma Mingyuan heard with his own ears that this was Zhu Hongsan's meaning, Chen Zilong felt that his worldview had completely collapsed. Could it be that in order to compete for power and profit, can we ignore Nanzhili and tens of millions of people in Zhejiang?

Looking at Chen Zilong, who was pale, Ma Mingyuan felt that it was necessary for him to help the same year, after all, Chen Zilong could become his help in the future.