Wu Shigong didn't know that in the capital, the things that surrounded him and beat Yu Zilian were all disturbing. In fact, he had already forgotten about beating Yu Zilian. What he wants to do most now is to give the merchants in the town who don't know each other to see his muscles.

One day, all the merchants in the town received a notice from the Thousand Households: the Thousand Households were going to conduct firearm shooting training. However, since the site of the Sennohe House is relatively small, the Sennohe House will place an empty boat on the river with a target on it for firearm shooting training.

In order to prevent accidental injury, it is hoped that the boats of the merchants will not be close to the shooting training site. Otherwise, you do so at your own risk.

Before waiting for any reaction from these merchants, Wu Shigong arranged a weekly patrol and led those newly recruited soldiers to the river. With the empty ship and the target in place, "Crackling" began to shoot with a firecracker.

The place chosen by Wu Shigong is very mysterious, and it is the only way for boats on the river to get close to the pier. As soon as the soldiers' guns shot like this, the boats on the river could not get close to the pier, and the boats on the pier could not get out. After all, no one dares to give it a try, whether the fire gun will really hit people.

At this moment, these merchants are in a hurry. Now is the peak period before the end of the year, when goods are coming in and out, and after a while, the river will freeze. These merchants gathered on the dock, watching Wu Shigong and his guards fully armed to protect the trained soldiers shooting, and none of them dared to come forward to negotiate.

It wasn't until Yao Yuanwai rushed over after getting the news that he saw this situation and came to Wu Shigong.

Yao Yuanwai trembled his beard and shouted angrily at Wu Shigong: "Wu Qianhu, why do you want to shoot firecrackers on the river? Aren't you afraid that we will accuse you of obstructing the passage of civilian ships? ”

Wu Shigong glanced at Yao Yuanwai and said quietly: "This official is training soldiers on the land of his thousand households, what does it matter to you?" And you want to sue me? Then you go and sue it. It's incomprehensible. ”

Yao Yuanwai was taught back by Wu Shigong's words, and he almost vomited blood when he heard it. However, the question of the ownership of this land is still unclear at this moment.

Yao Yuanwai had no choice but to hold back his breath and asked in a low voice, "Then how long does Wu Qianhu have to train?" ”

"Training until these soldiers have mastered the firing of firearms, of course." Wu Shigong said confidently, "It is estimated that when the training reaches the time when the river freezes, the official estimates that it will be about the same." ”

This is simply too much, this is naked blackmail. Yao Yuanwai didn't want to pay attention to Wu Shigong anymore, he thought about discussing it with those merchants later: it was not necessarily that Wu Shigong was shooting firecrackers on the river day and night. It's a big deal to wait until the evening, light more lanterns, and load and unload the ship's cargo at night.

As if knowing Yao Yuanwai's thoughts, Wu Shigong said leisurely on the side: "From today onwards, until the end of the soldier's training, this section of the river will be set as a military restricted area. If any vessel enters, the vessel will be detained, the cargo will be confiscated, and the personnel will be imprisoned. Folks, if you don't believe in the words of this official, you can give it a try. ”

At this moment, these merchants were in a hurry, and they all surrounded them and pleaded with Wu Shigong one after another. Wu Shigong listened for a while, seemed to be a little moved, sighed and said: "This official is soft-hearted, forget it, let those ships come over later." But there is a dock usage fee, which is five taels of silver for a ship. ”

"Wow-", these merchants were in an uproar. They all thought in their hearts: "This newcomer Wu Qianhu's heart is a little too dark." ”

But people are under the eaves and have to bow their heads. Let's deal with the difficulties in front of us first. Some merchants bargained with Wu Shigong to pay less money.

Wu Shigong became angry all of a sudden, and he shouted angrily: "What do you think of the glorious army of the Ming Dynasty? And bargain with the army? Either pay the silver and dock, or you don't pay the silver and float on the river. The choice is yours. The officer was busy with military affairs and lost his company first. ”

After finishing speaking, Wu Shigong left some guards to maintain order, and after letting Zheng Zhen be responsible for collecting the dock usage fee, he left.

"This Wu Qianhu probably wants to go crazy about money." After Wu Shigong left, Yao Yuanwai said to the merchants around him, "Let's do what he says today." But in the Ming Dynasty, where there is a king's law, the old man immediately went to his parents and asked him to give us a comment on this reason. ”

In the afternoon of the same day, the Qi County Commander of the county sent two officials to Wu Shigong to deliver a letter: Let Wu Qianhu gather at the county government tomorrow morning, and the Qi County Commander will discuss with Wu Qianhu if he has something.

After receiving the letter from Qi County's order, Wu Shigong smiled heartily. He thought to himself, "These merchants are really cheap. It hurt them, and they knew it was time to talk to me. ”

The Qi county order has been in this county for five years, and it will be transferred next year. Qi County Ling estimated that his evaluation in the Ministry of Officials in the past few years was still good, and as long as he was active, he might not be able to be promoted to Zhizhou. Therefore, I don't want to grow branches at this juncture at all.

Besides, in this county, the land dispute between the Qianhu Office and the local government is a long-standing and difficult problem left over from history. Originally, because the source of this problem was long, and the military households were in a weak position in the environment of the entire Ming Dynasty. So, this problem is not too prominent.

However, after Qianhu was forced to commit suicide by Li Bingbeidao, the entire Henan officialdom knew about this problem. And Qi County Ling thought that his wife would finish his term of office peacefully and let his successor solve this problem.

In addition, Wu Shigong, a thousand-household office, although it is in this county. However, the Qi County Order could not manage any affairs of the Thousand Households at all. At most, in wartime, orders can be given to the thousand households of the Thousand Households. Therefore, Qi County Ling didn't want to accept this hot potato at all.

However, Yao Yuanwai is the leading figure in the county, and many government affairs of the Qi County Order need to be completed by the gentry of the county outside Yao Yuanwai. And that Yao Yuan's filial piety to the county order is sufficient in ordinary days. Therefore, when Yao Yuanwai begged for Qi County's order, Qi County's order was embarrassed to refuse.

Therefore, when the Qi County Commander summoned Wu Shigong to the meeting, he mainly wanted to be a Chinese person, and it was best for Wu Shigong and Yao Yuanwai to negotiate a satisfactory solution by themselves.

However, the talks between Wu Shigong and Yao Yuanwai and several of their merchants almost collapsed at the beginning.

That Yao Yuanwai did not agree with Wu Shigong to charge any fees at all. In fact, among the seventy or eighty merchants in the town, the twenty or so merchants who were engaged in shipping trade outside Yao Yuanwai did not pay attention to the annual cost of fifteen taels of silver at all.

But Yao Yuanwai didn't think about this problem. He was worried: If Wu Shigong was paid this time, the land lease fee for the town would be paid. On the one hand, it proves that the land of the town is owned by thousands of households; On the other hand, the gentry also owned a thousand households of farmland. Will you have to pay the rent to the thousand households in the future? Therefore, Yao Yuanwai's attitude is not to give an inch.

Seeing that Yao Yuanwai's attitude was so resolute, Wu Shigong completely pretended to be crazy. He shouted at the county office: "You have forced a thousand families to death." Do you want to force the second one to death? Anyway, I'm going to die, and the official will die with you. ”

Wu Shigong's words blew up Qi County's scalp. Qi County's order is indeed not accurate, whether Wu Shigong, a 25,000 household, will really take risks. Therefore, Qi County Ling hurriedly persuaded on the side, and carried out arduous mediation work.

In Zuihou, Wu Shigong and Yao Yuanwai finally reached an agreement. The content of the agreement is: Wu Shigong will not mention this fee or that fee here. And Yao Yuanwai will be responsible for integrating all the merchants and paying Wu Shigong 750 taels of silver every year for labor and military expenses. Wu Shigong will also not charge any additional fees to these merchants.

Wu Shigong is still very satisfied with this agreement. In fact, Wu Shigong didn't care about the name of the fee at all, his main purpose was to receive the silver.

Although the cost of these seven hundred and fifty taels of silver was not much, Wu Shigong did not want to fish all the merchants in these small towns.

If you do use violence, you may be charged more money. However, the business environment of the town will also be disrupted. This is actually not good for Wu Shigong.

Moreover, these gentry outside Yao Yuanwai are all local leaders, and Wu Shigong, as an outsider, is not good at forcing these locals to be anxious. After all, Wu Shigong wanted to use this place as his base.

However, Wu Shigong is satisfied, then Yao Yuanwai is not satisfied. When he left the county office, Yao Yuanwai complained to the county order: "It's difficult to do business in the town." The county has to collect money from the stalls again, and now it has to pay labor and military fees, and even those green-skinned scoundrels have to extort some of them. ”

Hearing this question, the Qi County Order was an expression that more things were better than one less thing, but Wu Shigong was concerned.

After returning to the town, Wu Shigong brought that Yao Yuanwai and asked him to tell him about the situation of the green-skinned scoundrels in the town.

It turned out that with the prosperity of this town, there were more green-skinned scoundrels who were abducted and deceived in the town. Some also form groups and collect protection fees from those merchants. If any merchant doesn't pay, they're going to trick or trick. In order to avoid trouble, all the merchants have also paid protection fees to calm the situation.

Wu Shigong didn't say much, and asked Yao Yuanwai to report the list of these green-skinned scoundrels, and asked Yao Yuanwai to arrange a few people who were familiar with the situation in the town to lead the way, dispatch soldiers, and arrest these green-skinned scoundrels.

After arresting these people, Wu Shigong escorted them to the town to parade and made them express their remorse in front of everyone. There was a green-skinned mouth that refused to speak. Wu Shigong had him killed on the spot. The other green-skinned scoundrels immediately obeyed.

After these green-skinned scoundrels repented, Wu Shigong escorted them all to the fortress of Qianhusuo to do hard labor. Wu Shigong is also short of manpower here.

Wu Shigong's behavior frightened these merchants and made them look at Wu Shigong a little impressed. They all thought: Although this Wu Qianhu is a little ruthless in asking for money, he is not a person who does not do things.