What is most important to a ruling group?

Li Xiao's answer is money!

Money is so important, it costs money to raise troops and prepare for war, it costs money to rest and people's livelihood, everything is fucking money.

If the state is a huge machine, money is the driving force and lubricant of this machine. The first collapse of an empire starts with money. Before that, Li Xiao had never really understood the importance of money to an empire.

Fortunately, there is a guy named Ai Husheng next to Li Xiao, and he took a big advantage by bringing this guy back from North Korea. All kinds of factories let him run well, and this product actually found someone to drum up the vermicelli.

Whenever he saw a truckload of vermicelli driving into the dock, Li Xiao smiled. This thing is really a treasure trove of export earnings! Last year, there was a bumper potato harvest in some parts of Liaodong and Shandong, which directly caused a huge amount of potatoes to pile up. If you can turn potatoes into shelf-stable vermicelli in such a short period of time, and you can never turn them back into grain, this idea can be regarded as the ultimate use.

The Wa Kingdom and North Korea originally had an inexplicable sense of worship for the Ming Dynasty, and the things that have been passed down from China from ancient times to the present represent advanced and civilizational. Ai Husheng said that he found a cook to make vermicelli for Tokugawa Ieyasu and Mori Terumoto to eat. Tokugawa Ieyasu and Mori Terumoto were very happy to sign a contract with Ai Husheng, and the noodle shops in the Japanese country sprang up like mushrooms after the rain.

If you want to talk about the lack of food, in fact, the Wa State is even more short of food than the Ming Dynasty. In fact, the place lacked nothing but volcanoes and earthquakes. Most Japanese people eat wild vegetable dumplings at some point in the year. The lack of food has led to the short stature of the average citizen. There are only special supplies of samurai, and the body will be stronger.

However, the volcanic earthquake also brought some benefits, that is, the Wa country had a large number of gold and silver mines. When Ai Husheng first told Li Xiao, Li Xiao didn't even believe it. But after asking Sun Chengzong, I found out that since the Tang Dynasty. In fact, the Wa Kingdom is one of the main producing areas of gold and silver in East Asia, and its status has not changed for hundreds of years, which shows the richness of the gold and silver reserves of the Wa Kingdom.

Unlike the Wa Kingdom, Korea also produced gold and silver, but its output was far less than that of the Wa Kingdom. However, North Korea is very rich in mineral reserves, especially the pyrite and iron ore copper ore that Li Xiao often uses, and there are amazingly rich deposits in North Korea.

Both of these countries have become dumping grounds for Li Xiao's various industrial products. Every day, a large number of ships left the ports of Liaodong, Shandong, and Hebei to sail to the Japanese and Koreans, in exchange for all kinds of ores and gold and silver that Li Xiao needed. Without the support of these things, Li Xiao would not even be able to pay his military salary.

However, trade was no longer enough to feed the growing armies, plus the expenses of the local governments. Li Xiao found himself about to fall into a situation where he couldn't make ends meet, and everything else was easy to say. The army is especially difficult to control, with guns in hand and no money in pockets. God knows what these guys who have been trained in violence all day can do to come out!

After discussion with Sun Chengzong, Zhang Huangyan and others. The Longwu Imperial Court officially announced that Liaodong, Shandong, Hebei, and from now on, the officials and gentry will be integrated to pay grain and be on an errand.

In other words, the preferential treatment of scholars since the time of Zhu Yuanzhang ended in these three places.

As soon as the holy decree was issued, the whole country was in an uproar, and the scholars did not pay for food and were not poor, which was a precedent for more than 200 years. The Longwu Imperial Court actually dared to collect money from scholars, and it was immediately received by a thousand ...... Wanfu refers to.

The adults of the Jiangnan Foundation are even more red-eyed. When Wei Zhongxian was killed, it was because this guy was brewing an errand for the officials and gentry. Now although Wei Zhongxian has been broken into thousands of pieces, there is another Li Xiao.

This guy is not Wei Zhongxian, he can kill him if he says he can kill him.

Although he couldn't beat Li Xiao, the Donglin Party was a literati. What literati are best at is scolding, and they are also scolding. A sprinkling essay is written, with allusions set on allusions, foreshadowing after foreshadowing. The one with a little ink on his stomach can understand that he is scolding, and he thinks that he is writing a letter of praise without any culture.

For a time, the Jiangnan Donglin Party criticized the Longwu Imperial Court. Even the qualification of Emperor Zhu Yihai of Longwu was also brought up to talk about the matter, and 100,000 people marched on the streets in Jinling City, demanding that the imperial court send troops to the Northern Expedition. deposed Emperor Longwu Zhu Yihai, and the slogan was shouted loudly, and Zhu Yujian in the palace was enthusiastic.

The emperor's line is all self-employed, and now Zhu Yihai is actually engaged in industry competition. Zhu Yujian was very angry and convened several imperial meetings, asking Shi Kefa, the secretary of the Ministry of War, to send troops to the Northern Expedition and pacify the subordinates.

Zhu Yujian was angry, and the consequences were not serious.

Because whether it is Zhou Yanru, Wen Tiren, Ma Shiying, and Shi Kefa, they all know it in their hearts. The Northern Expedition will not succeed, and nothing will be gained except to provoke Li Xiao and throw down mountains of corpses. The Jiangnan Forbidden Army, which is easy to drum up, can be regarded as having some family background. A lot of ammunition has to be supplied by the Liao army, and talking about the Northern Expedition at this time is simply a brain flood.

All kinds of sports are in full swing, but they can't help Li Xiao. In July, when the weather was so hot that it was like a fire, the officials and gentry paid grain and worked as an errand officially, which was officially implemented in Shandong, Liaodong, and Hebei.

No matter how big the gentry is in your family, as long as your family has land, you have to pay taxes according to the land. The poll tax, which had been in place for more than 200 years, was completely thrown into the garbage. It was the gathering of wheat that had just been harvested, some crying, some selling miserably, and some threatening the whole family to hang. Some of them were more aggressive, and they even beat the local officials who went to the countryside to collect grain.

Liaodong is very calm, because when Li Xiao gathered the displaced people and reclaimed the land. What is implemented is the policy of the gentry paying grain as one and paying the same errand, and apportioning the land to the mu. The Liaodong people, who were the first to become wealthy in the war, were accustomed to this system.

Every time the grain harvest season comes, the villagers will pay the public grain according to their own land. Every family is very conscious, no household pays less, and of course no fool will pay more taxes. The reason is very simple, as long as you find that your family pays the wrong amount of food. Then you will be kicked out of the village immediately, and your family's property will be redistributed to other villagers. Even if you save a lot of money, you will become poor in an instant.

Strict dogmatism, each with a starting card with an enacted decree. No one intercedes, and no one dares to intercede. After Li Xiao's instructions, Liaodong implemented a strict punishment law. The set of human society is not easy to do here! Now in Liaodong, there are only clear rules. As long as you follow the rules, you will become a cheerful free man.

After paying taxes and servitude each year, the peasants had a lot of time. You can drink and gamble for money, or the east family can go to the west house. Except for killing people and setting fires, you can do whatever you want.