Of course, Zhu Youzhen's concern about Yuan Keli can still be understood, after all, the royal family is not a robber, and what he does cannot be too much.

"Yuan Qing, I add you as the left deputy capital of the imperial history, stationed in the Lianghuai Salt Transportation Division to investigate the case, Jinyi Wei will cooperate with you, be sure to find evidence of the corruption and bribery of the Salt Transportation Division, internal and external collusion, and collusion with salt merchants to embezzle state funds. We will order Liu Wenbing to intensify the interrogation to find out the evidence of the smuggling of salt by the salt merchants, and to thoroughly consolidate the charges of the salt merchants and the salt transportation department. Zhu Youzhen commanded.

There is no cat that does not steal, and there is no salt merchant who does not smuggle illegal salt, even if it is a nest merchant with salt qualifications, the salt he sells will carry a lot of illegal salt. As long as the interrogation was strict and torture was severe, it was not difficult to find evidence of his sale of illicit salt.

The Yamen of the Salt Transportation Division is in the prosperous Yangzhou, and its officials rely on Huai Yan to eat one by one, so how can it be possible that there is no corruption and bribery, and there is no collusion with salt merchants? Sent people to the Salt Transportation Division to investigate the case, and under severe torture, one investigation was accurate.

With the evidence of the salt merchants selling illicit salt, and the evidence of corruption of the officials of the Yamen of the Salt Transportation Division, it is enough to explain to the people of the world.

Of course, according to the regular procedure, it is the evidence of the crime that can be found before arresting people and raiding homes, after all, just like Yuan Keli said, the salt industry of the two Huai is very important, and the salt merchants and gentry officials are intertwined and affect the whole body.

However, Zhu Youzhen had to raid his house and arrest people first, and then look for evidence of the crime, only in this way could he play the role of knocking on the mountain and shaking the tiger, deterring the gentry of the world, and forcing those with ill-intentioned intentions to come out and force these people to make trouble!

Yuan Keli was born in two lists of Jinshi and served as a feudal official, so he is naturally a person with a clear mind, and after thinking about it a little, he understood Zhu Youzhen's plan, and his heart settled down slightly.

"The old minister obeys."

As a result, Yuan Keli's current official position has become the secretary of the Ministry of Taxation and the left deputy capital of the Inspectorate. The Ministry of Taxation has not yet been established, this book is just a fictitious, and the left deputy capital Yushi is a real position, but this position is only from Zhu Youzhen's private decree, and has not been confirmed by the imperial court, that is to say, there is no formal process.

Of course, Yuan Keli didn't care about whether there was an official position of the left deputy capital Yushi, and after receiving Zhu Youzhen's appointment, he quickly led people to the Yamen of the Salt Transportation Division to investigate the case. The sooner the evidence is found, the sooner Yangzhou can settle down.

Under the leadership of Yuan Keli, the Jinyi Guards and the Praetorian Guards entered the Yamen of the Salt Transportation Division, detained all the officials in the Yamen, locked them in different rooms, and the Jinyi Guards tortured them and forced them to question their incriminating evidence. Liu Wenbing also sent the arrested salt merchants to the Yamen of the Salt Transportation Division, where they were tortured and interrogated by Jinyiwei, and for a time the entire Yamen became a place for interrogation.

Leather whips, soldering irons, clamping sticks, and all kinds of torture tools were put on the table, and the torture tools in Huai'an Mansion and the Yali of Fukuo County were all moved, but they were still not enough. For a while, the screams came and went, and the howls and begging for mercy resounded in the sky above the yamen, and the entire yamen of the salt transportation division was like a hell.

Yuan Keli sat in the hall with a calm face, ignoring the torture of Jinyiwei to extract a confession, and he didn't care whether he was tortured into a trick. The situation is like this, you must get the evidence of the crime of the salt transportation department and the salt merchants, even if there is no evidence of the crime, you must find the evidence of the crime, otherwise the emperor will order to raid the house and arrest people.

Of course, it is impossible for officials not to be corrupt, let alone a fat and oily yamen like the Lianghuai Salt Transportation Division. And Jin Yiwei's torture methods were not enough for these officials of the Salt Transportation Department to survive, and it didn't take long for some people to confess one after another, revealing the fact that they accepted bribes and embezzlements from salt merchants. And the performance of Hu Million, Lin Wanpeng, Zhou Fengchun and other salt merchants was not much better, and under severe torture, the smuggling of salt was revealed.

At the same time, the clerks of the Huai'an Taxation Division and the Huai'an Branch of the Daming Royal Bank were also stationed in the Salt Transportation Division and began to inspect the past accounts.

As a result, the accounts are in disarray and corruption is appalling.

A small scribe of the Salt Transport Division, relying on his position, can receive thousands of taels of filial piety from salt merchants every year, and Cai Anfu, the two Huai Salt Transporters, has been a salt transport envoy for less than a year, and the embezzled silver has reached 500,000 taels. The entire Yamen of the Salt Transportation Division, only forty or fifty officials, excluding the salt farms and inspection offices of the branch divisions dispatched abroad, has tortured and interrogated the amount of embezzlement has reached more than three million taels, and this must be only a part, and there must be people who have not honestly explained.

You must know that the annual salt tax of the imperial court is less than two million taels of silver, and this salt tax is the six transfer of salt transportation divisions, including the two Huai Du Salt Transportation Divisions, and also includes the tax silver paid by the four salt divisions!

According to the salt merchants, although they were officials and businessmen who issued salt licenses by the imperial court, more than half of the salt sold was private salt, because private salt did not need to pay taxes to the imperial court, and only needed to bribe the officials of the salt transportation department, so that they could be mixed in the official salt.

According to the data obtained from the confessions of the arrested salt merchants, coupled with the large number of illegal salt dealers who could not be caught at all, it is roughly estimated that the salt tax lost by the imperial court is at least two million taels of silver just for the illegal salt that goes out of the two Huai every year, and if you count the other salt transportation divisions and lifting divisions, the annual salt tax loss will exceed four million taels!

Of course, the salt merchants did not only rely on tax evasion to make money, they used other means to bully the stove households, desperately lower the price of salt, so that the stove cooks hard to cook salt all year round, and the income after paying the salt tax could not even support their families.

The price of salt is extremely low, and the salt trafficked and sold to the people is in the name of official salt, but the price is extremely high, so that many people can't afford to eat salt at all. The money spent by the people to buy salt accounted for half of the price of the food they ate, which was ridiculously expensive! And the salt merchants collected salt from the stove households, and three coins of silver could buy as much as one hundred and fifty catties! One in and one out, the profit is close to twenty times!

"The black-hearted salt merchants deserve to be killed!" Looking at the interrogation records and the shocking data, Yuan Keli's chest rose and fell with anger.

The salt profit is so great, it is simply beyond his imagination. Twenty times the profits, no wonder these salt merchants are all rich!

Anger is followed by deep chagrin. If the Ming salt government is corrupted like this, the real reason is still in the imperial court!

The imperial court was incompetent and incapable of managing the salt administration well, so much so that it even adopted the most stupid method of subcontracting, subcontracting the qualifications for salt production to a number of merchants, in an attempt to do nothing. As a result, the price of salt increased year by year, the people could not afford to eat salt, the stove households were extorted and oppressed by the rich stoves and salt merchants, many stoves were unwilling to boil the sea to make salt, and fled the salt area, and the salt tax of the imperial court was reduced year by year.

Maybe Your Majesty is right, to these salt merchants, to the salt transportation officials, should be thundered, should arrest people, should raid homes, should be killed. Salt merchants and officials of the salt transportation department, there is no good thing!

ps: Thank you for your concern, my father's condition has improved, and he is still in the hospital. The book can't be interrupted all the time, otherwise it won't be popular. The author will take the time to code the word and strive to ensure the normal update. Thank you again.