On the morning of the next day, Li Yuntian, accompanied by Li Ji, Huang Hee, and other senior members of the Korean National Assembly and Government Department, went to the Righteous Forbidden Mansion.

According to Li Ji's account, under the royal order of the king of Joseon, the Yiban Mansion interrogated Hu Cao's officials overnight about the purchase of military rations by the Ming Dynasty, and now it has been ascertained that a group of officials headed by Hu Cao Shen Judge secretly withheld 170,000 taels of money used to buy military rations, and only 100,000 taels of silver were sent down to buy grain.

As for where the remaining 80,000 taels went, according to Hu Cao's judgment, when Chen Ming handed it over to Hu Cao, it was only 270,000 taels of silver, and 80,000 taels were given to Chen Ming as a kickback.

In the distance, Li Yuntian, who was surrounded by everyone, heard a terrible scream coming from the courtyard of the Forbidden Mansion, as if many people were being tortured, and the corners of his mouth showed a subtle smile, obviously the scene of torture inside was for him to see.

The Righteous Forbidden Mansion was an investigative agency of the Joseon Dynasty, combining the functions of courts, prisons and prosecutorial investigations, and the main work of the Righteous Forbidden Mansion was to torture prisoners who wanted to shake the country's foundation, such as treason and usurpation, and was responsible for investigating cases related to the national rebellion.

Although the Righteous Forbidden Mansion was subordinate to the Hyoso, its chief officer, the Righteous Forbidden Mansion from the second grade, was directly appointed by the King of Joseon, so the Righteous Forbidden Mansion was actually the direct administration of the King of Joseon.

When I entered the courtyard gate of the Forbidden Mansion, I saw dozens of officials in white underwear lying on the ground or sitting on chairs bearing the punishment imposed by the soldiers of the Forbidden Mansion, all of them covered in blood, and the screams were quite terrible.

The corners of Li Yuntian's mouth showed a sneer, these officials had obviously confessed their guilt after a torture last night, and the scene at this time was just for themselves, letting themselves know that the king of Joseon attached great importance to this case.

Since the king of Joseon arranged a good show for Li Yuntian, then Li Yuntian naturally has to enjoy it, otherwise wouldn't he live up to the "good intentions" of the king of Joseon?

On a wooden chair in front of the compound of the Righteous Forbidden Mansion sat a middle-aged man with his hands tied behind his back, and the two executed soldiers of the Righteous Forbidden Mansion pinned the middle-aged man's legs with two sticks, causing the middle-aged man to let out a terrible scream and sweat profusely on his forehead.

This kind of punishment may seem like a small punishment, but it is not small, and it is similar to the tiger chair, which is used to torture the prisoner's leg joints, which is a kind of painful torture.

Seeing Li Yuntian and the others coming, the two sergeants who were executed hurriedly bowed down and retreated, which gave the middle-aged man a chance to breathe and gasp for breath.

"Lord Liu, this person is Hu Cao, and he has confessed all the guilt." Li Ji took a confession from a nominal official of the forbidden government and brought it to Li Yuntian, on which was the confession of Hu Cao's judge, and he took all the charges.

Since the Korean language uses Chinese characters, Li Yuntian took the confession and read it, and soon found a problem, and a smile flashed on the corner of his mouth.

"Where did the other 80,000 taels go?" Subsequently, Li Yuntian looked at Li Ji quietly, and the eighty thousand taels in his mouth naturally referred to the eighty thousand taels that Wei Yi and Chen Ming were greedy for.

"Lord Liu, Counselor Cao said that Lord Chen only handed over 270,000 taels of silver to Hu Cao, and the remaining 80,000 taels were with Lord Chen." Li Ji frowned slightly when he heard this, and opened his mouth to explain.

In order to deal with Li Yuntian, under the order of the king of Joseon, the sergeants of the Uiban Mansion had already collected bribes from the homes of those officials involved in the case of embezzlement of ink in the procurement of military rations in Seoul overnight, and the total amount was exactly 170,000 taels of the embezzlement of ink by Hu Cao.

Among those who handed over the bribes, Li Ji was undoubtedly the most depressed and depressed one, and Cui Shikang gave him 30,000 taels of bribes, which was the largest amount of money among all people, and now the silver was returned before it was hot.

Huang Xi secretly gloated, because he and Li Ji belonged to two camps, this benefit naturally did not come to him, so he did not suffer any loss from it.

"Leader of the council, Hu Cao has already issued a voucher for Lord Chen to receive 350,000 taels of silver, is the voucher fake?" Li Yuntian saw that Li Ji denied the eighty thousand taels of silver, so he sneered, and his tone became cold.

After Chen Ming handed over the 270,000 taels of silver to Hu Cao, Hu Cao issued a receipt voucher of 350,000 taels to Chen Ming, and everyone knew about the kickback.

Now, the voucher of 350,000 taels of silver has become the most important evidence that Li Yuntian used to attack the king of Joseon, and it is not so easy for the king of Joseon to do a good job, at least take out 80,000 taels of silver.

"This ......" Li Ji was speechless when he heard this, although he knew that Hu Cao had only received 270,000 taels of silver, but Hu Cao gave Chen Ming a receipt voucher of 300,000 taels of silver to facilitate his return to Beijing to hand over to the household department, and now Li Yuntian grabbed the voucher and did not let him go, he couldn't say it at all.

"350,000 taels of silver is the amount approved by the emperor himself, and now that there are 80,000 taels less, how can you restore your life after letting the envoy go back?" Seeing that Li Ji was speechless, Li Yuntian asked coldly.

"Lord Liu, it must be that he didn't give an honest explanation, I will retry it later, and I will definitely give Lord Liu a satisfactory explanation." Seeing that the atmosphere at the scene became a little tense, Huang Xi hurriedly stepped forward to play a round with a stern expression, and was very happy to see Li Ji eating in front of Li Yuntian.

Although Huang Xi failed to secretly get oil and water from the military rations, Li Yuntian gave him 20,000 taels of silver as a gift two days ago, and now the people of Li Ji's faction are unlucky again, and he can wake up with a smile when he sleeps at night.

In fact, both Li Ji and Huang Xi knew that the 80,000 taels of silver must have been taken away by Chen Ming, Wei Yi and others, but Li Yuntian was now talking about the voucher issued by Hu Cao, and Li Ji, as the leader of the council, had to give Li Yuntian a reasonable explanation.

Now it seems that Li Ji has no way except to compensate Li Yuntian for the 80,000 taels of silver, otherwise any justification will anger Li Yuntian.

"Lord Liu, the lower officials must strictly investigate this matter and find out where the 80,000 taels of silver went." Li Ji's face changed a few times, and then he bowed to Li Yuntian and said in a deep voice, so far he can only eat coptis dumbly and recognize the 80,000 taels of silver.

"I hope that the leader can give this envoy an answer, now that the war situation in Liaodong is in full swing, this envoy will rush to Liaodong soon, and there is not much time to wait." Li Yuntian glanced at Li Ji, coldly left the next sentence and left the Yiqiang Mansion, now that the military situation in Liaodong is urgent, he has no time to spend it in Seoul.

Looking at Li Yuntian's back, Li Ji's face turned blue and white for a while, Li Yuntian made it clear that he wanted to calculate the account of the 80,000 taels of silver on Hu Cao's head, 80,000 taels of silver was not a small amount for the Korean Kingdom, it was worth a quarter of the country's annual taxes.

Gyeongbokgung Palace, Ideological and Political Palace.

"What, he wants to let Hu Cao give out the eighty thousand taels of silver?" Li Tao, the king of Korea, looked at Li Ji standing in front of him in surprise, he didn't believe that Li Yuntian didn't know that the silver was greedy by Chen Ming, Wei Yi and others, and then understood that Li Yuntian was ripping off the bamboo pole, so he smashed his fist on the table, and said angrily, "It's really unreasonable!" ”

"Your Royal Highness, the minister thinks that this person's origin is not simple, so let's be careful to deal with it." Li Ji pondered for a moment and opened his mouth to persuade, "If this matter is to blame, it is to blame the local officials for being too greedy, and even requisitioned grain in the name of raising military rations for the Ming Dynasty, which caused great resentment among the people, and only then did today's incident." ”

"Order Hu Cao to judge the document and take out 80,000 taels of silver from Hu Cao's treasury to serve as military rations." Li Ji couldn't help frowning when he heard this, and after a deep groan, he said to Li Ji, "In addition, in order to make up for the vacancy in the treasury, next year's tax revenue will be increased by one to five!" ”

The Joseon Kingdom was mainly agricultural, and the territory was mountainous and there was not much fertile land, so once the treasury embezzled 80,000 taels of silver, the only way to fill this hole was to add agricultural taxes to the country, which is why the Goryeo Dynasty and the Joseon Dynasty have always coveted Liaodong, which has fertile land, which means grain and grain taxes for countries in a feudal agricultural society, which can be said to be very important.

"Your Royal Highness, the minister is the leader of the council should be responsible for this matter, please ask His Royal Highness the lord to remove the minister from the post of leader of the council, and hand it over to Lord Liu." Li Ji nodded first when he heard this, and then knelt on the ground and said with his head touching the ground.

The matter of military rations is so big that a small household Cao Senju can shoulder the responsibility, so in order to prevent Li Yuntian from taking the opportunity to implicate more officials, Li Ji, who is the leader of the council department, can only bear this black pot.

"You are the left hand and right arm of the lonely, how can you leave the lonely, and let others eat and drink?" Li Ji knew Li Ji's mind and wanted to use his own safety to resolve this dilemma, but Li Ji's assistance was indispensable by his side, so he frowned and muttered for a while and said, "You and the Nanyuan Mansion Jun will change their positions, and the Nanyuan Mansion will serve as the leader of the council, and you will serve as the left councilor, and in addition, revoke the name of the Qingchuan Mansion Monarch An Xiao, and strictly investigate the responsibility of the Qingchuan Mansion Monarch in the military rations case." ”

Nanyuan Mansion Jun refers to Huang Xi, and Li Ji is Xingshan Mansion Jun, as for Qingchuan Mansion Jun, he is Shen Wen, the former leader of the council who died of illness not long ago.

After Shen Wen's death, he was given the nickname "An Xiao" by Li Qi, Li Qi made it clear that he wanted Shen Wen to carry the black pot of the military rations case, after all, the case happened during Shen Wen's tenure as the leader of the government, and he had sufficient reasons to hold Shen Wen responsible.

"Your Royal Highness, how can you explain to the princess in this way." Li Ji was taken aback when he heard this, and hurriedly raised his head and asked, Shen Wen is the father of the Korean princess, and the Korean princess is like the queen of the Ming Dynasty.

"The nave understands Lonely's suffering." Li Yan replied expressionlessly, the nave refers to the princess, and he is called the main hall, and these two titles are related to the dormitory where they live.

Although Li Qi and Li Ji were worried about the military rations, Huang Xi seemed relaxed and comfortable, and invited Li Yuntian to a banquet in the Hancheng Teaching Workshop in the evening, accompanied by several powerful people from Huang Xi's family.

The smiling Li Yuntian was flattered by Huang Xi and others like a moon, everyone was staggered, talking and laughing, and the atmosphere was very lively.

Li Yuntian came to the appointment this time, naturally to tell the two classes of nobles in Seoul that he stood on Huang Xi's side, and Da Ming was Huang Xi's backing, so that those two classes of nobles knew who was worthy of refuge between Li Ji and Huang Xi.

Liu Zhen sat next to Li Yuntian and poured him wine after dancing two dances, she had already heard about the Hucao officials being arrested by the Yi Ban Mansion, so she was quite curious about Li Yuntian in her heart, and she didn't know what the reason for him was doing this, was it really for the reputation of Emperor Xuande or did he want to make a fortune from it?

"Your Excellency, Lord Zuo, the lower official just got the news from the Chengzheng Yuan, His Royal Highness has removed the Xingshan Mansion from the post of prime minister, appointed the left minister as the new leader, and the Xingshan Mansion has been demoted to the left council."

When Li Yuntian was enthusiastically inviting Huang Xi and the others to come to his house for official business in the Ming Dynasty, a middle-aged man wearing a Korean scholar costume walked over quickly, bowed down to Li Yuntian and Huang Xi with a smile and said, "In addition, His Royal Highness has ordered the Righteous Forbidden Mansion to strictly investigate the culpability of the Qingshan Mansion in the military rations case. ”

As soon as these words came out, the two classes of magnates at the scene immediately cheered, which meant that Huang Xi would become the top magnate above 10,000 people under one person in the Korean state.

"The king of Joseon acted vigorously and resolutely, handled the case impartially, and the envoy was quite admirable."

Hearing that the king of Joseon removed Li Ji and helped Huang Xi to the throne of leading the government, and also brought the dead Shen Wen to back the military ration case, which made Li Yuntian laugh, it seems that the king of Joseon is not a person to deal with, and then smiled and said to Huang Xi, "Nanyuan Mansion Jun, congratulations on taking charge of the council hall." ”

"I trust the blessing of the envoys." Huang Xi arched his hand to Li Yuntian and smiled happily, although he had expected that Li Ji would step down, but he never expected that the king of Joseon would be able to remove Li Ji from his position as the leader of the government so quickly, making him become the leader of the Korean state.