After the end of Liaodong, the whole world seems to have restored peace.

A month passed in a flash, and soon entered the beginning of autumn.

On the tenth day of July, the streets of Heyang County, Baoding Prefecture, Beizhili suddenly sounded the sound of firecrackers, and the people who loved to watch the excitement immediately came over, and then in the sound of firecrackers, a shop covering a wide area pulled down the red cloth of the signboard.

【Heyang Huang Store】

Seeing these four words, the people around them immediately looked disgusted, and then prepared to leave this place.

But soon, before they could move their steps, they were stopped by the shouting of the men.

"Neighbors, this store is newly opened, today the store has two pounds of honeycomb coal, buy enough 100 pounds to get a pottery stove, and another pound of coarse salt is five pounds!"

"What? Wuwen?! Hearing this, the surrounding people immediately poured into the imperial store.

You must know that although Baoding Mansion is also a northern Zhili, the price of salt is generally six or seven Wen.

Now suddenly there is a big man who only sells five words, and the people around him immediately flock to it, just like the uncle and aunt when the supermarket promotion rush in the later generations.

Such a picture can only be said to be in the same vein.

In a short time, the honeycomb coal, coarse salt, and fine salt in the store were all snapped up.

After the manager and the guy in the store reacted, the manager immediately said to the guy:

"Go to the 100 households in Fusi, Nanzhen, and ask people to send a letter to the Imperial Horse Supervisor, saying that the goods in Heyang Huangdian will double next month!"

"Okay!" Hearing this, the guy happily ran to the Baihu Office, and then the Baihu Office sent a fast horse to send the news to the capital of Shuntian Mansion.

In the capital, the Imperial Horse Prison Yamen is lively today, and almost every quarter of an hour there are fast horses coming, and they leave in a hurry after delivering the letter.

Seeing this, the officials of the Caoyun Yamen, who were located diagonally opposite the Yamen of the Imperial Horse Supervisor, thought that something terrible had happened, but they did not know that this was the imperial store doing business.

"Okay...... Okay......"

In the Yamen of the Imperial Horse Supervisor, Cao Huachun, who was sitting in the main seat of the Yamen, counted the letters with a smile and couldn't close his mouth at all.

Seeing this, a eunuch next to him smiled and said, "Admiral, this salt farm can be said to have revitalized all the imperial shops." ”

"Huh...... It's an exaggeration. Cao Huachun was modest on his lips, but his eyes were smiling, which showed that what the other party said was not wrong.

"Okay, I'll bring these accounts back to the palace and show them to His Highness and Banzai, and I think the two of you will be very happy to come." Cao Huachun said that, and also got up and prepared to go to the palace.

He went out and got into the carriage, and then entered the palace in only two quarters of an hour, and went to the Qianqing Palace.

He didn't go to the Qingong Palace, because he remembered that his Royal Highness had said that he would go to the Yangxin Palace to play chess with the emperor today.

Therefore, he walked to the Qianqing Palace, and then he really saw the eunuch of the Qinqin Palace, and after greeting the other party with a slight bow, he stepped into the Qianqing Palace and saw Wei Zhongxian who was guarding the door of the Yangxin Palace.

After fighting each other with each other, Cao Huachun walked into the Palace of Nourishing Hearts and saw the two brothers Zhu Youxiao who were playing chess.

"Long live, Your Highness, there is news from the imperial shops in the Imperial Horse Prison."

Cao Huachun bowed and reported the reason for his harassment.

Hearing this, Zhu Youxiao was still studying the chess game, but Zhu Youzhen raised his head and said, "Take it." ”

When his voice fell, Cao Huachun took the letters from the imperial stores in various places and handed them to Zhu Youzhen, and then stood quietly aside.

However, Zhu Youzhen played chess while watching the situation of the imperial store, and the two did not delay.

If he looks like this, if he is seen by the ministers, he will inevitably be drenched in cold sweat.

Playing chess with the emperor, and putting on such a dual-purpose appearance, if it were someone else, I am afraid that it would have been dragged down a long time ago.

However, Zhu Youzhen still watched the situation of the imperial store while playing chess.

More than a month has passed since the siege of Shenyang, and not much has happened in this month.

The first is to move the people of Shenyang and the people of the nursing home in Beizhili to Zhenjiang and Daning, and the second is that Qi Yuanbi went south and Qin Liangyu got the will to recruit troops again.

The Liaozhen cavalry of Daning Sanwei withdrew to Guangning, leaving only Man Gui and Yu Linwei outside the pass.

Sun Yingyuan abolished the stone forts in the 600 miles from Zhenjiang to Jinzhou, and successively abolished 26 stone forts, and assisted Qin Bangping in dismantling the guards and soldiers and horses of Jinzhou Wei.

The abolition of the 26 forts of the first guard and three institutes reduced the number of Liao soldiers again, but it did not save too much military salary.

To put it bluntly, the generals of Liaodong have long been transformed into a family system, and the Liaonan guard has been abolished, which has nothing to do with them at all, and the guard post they care about is the area of western Liaoning and Liaoshen.

Perhaps there were too many soldiers and horses in the guest army, and the connection road with Nurhachi was cut off, so there was no chance to raise his own respect, so the Liaodong generals did not speak to Liaonan.

It may be that after Nurhachi was repulsed, they discovered that the strength of the imperial court in Liaodong was far greater than theirs, and this situation became even more unbalanced after Yang Zhaoji and other nearly 30,000 auxiliary troops from the three towns of Shanxi entered Liao.

They kept their mouths shut, and it was even more impossible for the civil officials and nobles in the court to speak, and the civil officials were busy with party disputes, and it was too late for the nobles to hide.

Therefore, as expected by Zhu Youzhen, the Liao generals admitted that the 26 forts of one guard and three institutes were successfully abolished.

Under the inventory of Sun Yingyuan and Qin Minping, there were a total of 365,921 Liao people in Jinzhou, Zhenjiang, Kuandian, Fenghuangcheng and other places, 1,676,400 mu of Juntun land, and 552,000 mu of private land.

This part of the Liao people, plus the 250,000 Liao people who moved one after another, the people in the four places reached nearly 620,000, and after the Juntuntian was abolished, it was distributed to these 620,000 people under the will of Zhu Youxiao.

The lack of land first satisfied the people who did not have land, but even so, the 2,228,400 fields could not feed 620,000 people.

With a yield of less than one stone per mu a year in Liaodong, these fields can at most feed the original local people.

Therefore, after the grain transported from Tianjin by Yumajian and Taicang arrived in Zhenjiang, Sun Yingyuan and the other five people began to reclaim the vast fields.

It's just that, as professional soldiers, it is impossible for the Seventh Guards to participate in the reclamation, and they returned to Beizhili by boat after the end of Fatian, and just arrived in Tianjin yesterday.

They will then go to their original stations and wait for orders from Zhu Youzhen and Zhu Youxiao.

As for the matter in Shanxi, Zhu Youxiao is still thinking about it, and in a month's time, he has not yet decided whether to carry out a comprehensive dismantling of the health centers in one capital and one province.

As for Zhu Youzhen, since the salt works began to operate at the end of June, he has devoted himself to the salt works, and only occasionally pays attention to the recruitment of soldiers and horses from the Yanshan battalion to the Daning Sanwei.

At present, Yu Linwei is still in Daning Sanwei, and after a month of recruitment, Daning Sanwei has temporarily recruited more than 15,000 people.

It is estimated that the number of soldiers and horses of the three guards will be met in mid-July, and then they will be transferred to the three guards of Daning and exchanged for Yulinwei.

Zhu Youzhen has always cared about the extravagant Chongming, but it seems that because of Nurhachi's defeat, he has not moved.

However, he did not stop building the armor, and it seems that he has a new plan.

For him, Zhu Youzhen is not worried.

Hong Chengchou, Yang Wenyue, Wu Aheng, Sun Chuanting, Qin Liangyu......

The combination of these five people determines that even if he makes trouble, he will not make too much trouble like history.

At present, what Zhu Youzhen has to do is to prepare for the dismissal of the three towns in Shanxi and Shuntianfu.

Therefore, while reading the recitals of the imperial stores in various places, he said to the good imperial brother:

"Brother, there is still a month and a half before the autumn harvest, and the Imperial Horse Supervisor needs to prepare for the affairs of the three towns of Shanxi and Shuntianfu."

"This time I am going to recruit sixteen battalions, will my brother allow it?"

"Can I stop you?" Zhu Youxiao glanced at his younger brother, and at this moment he was still racking his brains thinking about how to win the game of chess in front of him.

Seeing his younger brother's leisurely dual-mindedness, he was angry, but soon devoted himself to the chess game again.

As for the conversation between the two, it made Wei Zhongxian and Cao Huachun inside and outside the Heart Cultivation Hall speechless.

Sixteen battalions, that's more than 48,000 soldiers and horses......

If the 16th battalion is successfully recruited and trained, then the soldiers and horses under the command of the Imperial Horse Supervisor will reach more than 153,000.

Coupled with the Daning Sanwei full of Gui outside the Saiwai, that is nearly 170,000 soldiers and horses.

Such a number of soldiers and horses, placed on an eleven-year-old prince, I am afraid that other emperors will not be able to sleep.

However, looking at the frank posture of the two brothers, it is estimated that the king of Qi controls the world's soldiers and horses, and the emperor will not worry.

However, when it came to soldiers and horses, Zhu Youxiao, who had fallen into the country, thought of something in the southwest, so he said:

"My brother said before that if Liao affairs are weak, maybe the southwest Tusi will rebel, but now that Liao affairs are very good, why don't you transfer those soldiers and horses in the southwest to Liaodong?"

Zhu Youxiao still couldn't swallow the breath of feeding more than two million taels of silver to those Liaodong military gates who were eating empty salaries every year, but Zhu Youzhen said:

"These soldiers and horses are very useful in the southwest, if the change encounters danger, others dare not guarantee it, but Sun Chuanting and Qin Liangyu will already defend the land for the Ming Dynasty in the southwest."

Zhu Youzhen's words made Zhu Youxiao's brows tighten.

He understood that his younger brother's words meant that if one day the ministers, nobles, and border troops were dissatisfied with the imperial court's abolition of guards and the collection of commercial taxes and miscellaneous items, and raised troops to rebel, then Sichuan could still become a horn of the Ming Dynasty.

As long as Qin Liangyu and Sun Chuanting swept Sichuan, they would be able to invade Jiangnan and force Wenchen to submit when they went down the river.

However, he also noticed that his younger brother did not mention Hong Chengchou, Yang Wenyue, Wu Aheng and other three.

This shows that these three people actually have too much contact with civil officials in the hearts of their younger brothers, and if the court and the local government are in a dilemma, then it is difficult to guarantee the position of these people.

Ranwen

From this point of view, his younger brother has long thought about how to calm the world if the world is against it.

Thinking of this, Zhu Youxiao suddenly said:

"The matter of Shanxi and North Zhili, just listen to my brother......"

"Huh?" Hearing this, Zhu Youzhen looked up at his imperial brother, and didn't understand why the other party suddenly set the tone when he thought about something that he hadn't decided for a month.

His appearance made Zhu Youxiao see it, and he just shook his head with a smile and said:

"In terms of side affairs, I am indeed inferior to my younger brother, so since my younger brother thinks about the southwest so thoroughly, Shanxi and North Zhili are probably even more comprehensive."

"It's just that I want to ask my younger brother, after Shanxi and Beizhili are recovered, is my younger brother going to attack Liaodong?"

Zhu Youxiao was determined to clean up the military gate in Liaodong, but Zhu Youzhen frowned and picked up the chess pieces, and said:

"Shanxi's affairs are not only a matter of Weisuo, but also involve the three towns of Ningxia, Guyuan, and Yulin."

"Taking the three towns of Shanxi is the first step, and the second step is to lay down the Hetao and let Tumut completely surrender to my Daming!"

Speaking of this department, many people will be very unfamiliar, but if you talk about its other name, many people will be very familiar.

King of the Ming Dynasty and the King of Shunyi......

Since the establishment of the Ming Jin State by the Da Da Khan and the recognition of the Shunyi King of the Ming Dynasty, the Tumut Department has been crowning the western part of the southern part of the Yu Mo and is known as the right wing of the Mongols.

At present, the Tumut Department is quite deferential to the Ming Dynasty, and they are stationed in Fengzhoutan and Houtao, that is, the area from Bayan Erzhuo to Hohhot in the later generations.

The place where they lived clashed with the place that Zhu Youzhen wanted to conquer, but Zhu Youzhen did not expect to blindly conquer the other party by force.

The current leader of Tumut, King Shunyi of the Ming Dynasty, is the fifth-generation grandson of Alda Khan, Bu Lost Rabbit.

Under the neutralization of the three ladies, Bu Lost Rabbit was recognized by the Ming Dynasty before the death of the third lady, but because Su Nang Taiji in the Tumut Department did not obey him and fought against him for a long time, Bu Lost Rabbit declined, and many of his subordinates did not obey orders.

As the king of Shunyi recognized by the Ming Dynasty, among the 350,000 Tumut tribes, there are less than 30,000 Bu Lost Rabbits, and only 10,000 men, and the place where the nomads are stationed is 700 miles northwest of Shanxi Biaoguan, which is very far away from the Ming Dynasty.

Compared with him, Sunang Taiji, who excluded him, was recognized by the seventy lords of the Tumut tribe, and had more than 60,000 troops under his command, and Taiji, who supported him, lived in the area of Fengzhou Beach and Houtao.

In this way, the situation is very delicate.

Zhu Youzhen could have directly sent troops to defeat Su Nang and more than 70 lords under his command in the name of helping King Shunyi inherit the throne and nomadic land, and occupy Fengzhou Beach and Houtao.

As for whether Bu Lost Rabbit will ask Zhu You for review after the occupation, Zhu Youzhen is not worried at all, unless Bu Lost Rabbit is a fool.

At the moment, the only problem with this plan is the problem of the four horsemen, or the problem of the horses.

Thinking of this, Zhu Youzhen said to the imperial brother:

"In order to make Tumut submit, it is necessary to first exterminate the northern captives entrenched in the Hetao, and to penetrate deep into the Hetao, it will take many war horses."

"At that time, the courtiers may use the four cavalry guards, and the four cavalry guards will require 90,000 military horses, and going deep into the Hetao will require a lot of baggage and supplies, and a large number of people will be required to transport them."

"Therefore, after the subordinate brother calculated and dismissed the soldiers and horses of the three towns of Shanxi, he would organize the division of the fields to the military households, and after the autumn harvest of the fields, the imperial horse supervisors in Shanxi would have enough food to support the army to go out of the fortress."

"At that time, the ministers will unite the three towns of Ningxia, Guyuan, and Yulin to search for the set, and the people after the autumn harvest have no work, so they can conquer the Beiyu of the Hetao and the Subao of Fengzhoutan without delaying the agricultural time."

In Zhu Youzhen's words, he said that he would be the commander-in-chief, and he even formulated the idea of sending troops after the autumn harvest.

Of course, this autumn harvest will not be this year, it should be tomorrow or the year after.

If you want to start with the three towns of Shanxi and Beizhili, and then divide the fields, this time span is very large.

Zhu Youxiao knew that this was his younger brother informing him of the news in advance.

Looking at Zhu Youzhen in front of him, he said helplessly: "How about letting other generals lead the troops deeply?" My brother is still too young. ”

"I think back then, Emperor Xuanzong Zhang was only twelve years old when he and Emperor Wen conquered Mongolia, and at the age of fifteen, he personally led the troops to pursue the northern captives, Emperor Zhang can do it, why can't I?" Zhu Youzhen moved out of his ancestor again.

It's still the same sentence, don't blame me for being excessive, it's just that my ancestors did too many excessive things, and it seems that I didn't do too much.

Regarding his younger brother's move out of his ancestor's practice, Zhu Youxiao was speechless, but he quickly coughed:

"Emperor Zhang also followed Emperor Wen for several years, and then led his troops to chase the enemy, and ......"

Zhu Youxiao was embarrassed to say the latter words, because Zhu Zhanji was surrounded by the Wara cavalry for the first time when he was fifteen years old.

"Did Emperor Zhang formulate a strategy to advance in four directions at the age of eleven and force the Jianyu to retreat? Or will Emperor Zhang's command sweep away a tribe? ”

When it comes to military exploits, Zhu Youzhen's military exploits are too great.

It can be said that as far as the current Ming Dynasty is concerned, there is no new generation of generals whose military merits surpass him for the time being.

is the general of the older generation, and there are few people who can take the credit for exterminating a department.

At this moment, Zhu Youxiao was angry at his indulgence of this younger brother, but he didn't expect to give this kid the right to help, and this kid established meritorious deeds, but in turn he debated with himself.

"No matter what my brother says, my brother is still too young." Zhu Youxiao simply pretended to be an ostrich, and turned a deaf ear to Zhu Youzhen's words of quoting scriptures, just about catching him not being old enough.

Seeing this situation, Zhu Youzhen was speechless, he simply didn't leave his hand, fell wildly, and then on the chessboard, he killed the emperor's brother and threw his armor off.

"Brother, is this taking revenge on me?" Zhu Youxiao looked resentful, but Zhu Youzhen lowered his head and said:

"I only cared about the income and expenditure of the imperial store, and I didn't pay attention to ......"

At this moment, Zhu Youxiao wanted to scold, but Zhu Youzhen pretended to be an ostrich.

"You ......"

"Hurray, Her Royal Highness the Queen has come to say hello."

Just when Zhu Youxiao wanted to start comparing with his younger brother, Wei Zhongxian at the door sang a salute.

Zhu Youxiao squatted down, and hurriedly turned his head and said, "Xuan!" ”

"Yes......" Hearing this, Wei Zhongxian walked to the gate of the Qianqing Palace, looking at the pretty beauty in front of him, even if he was no longer a man, he still wanted to look at it twice.

He passed the queen into the palace, and at this time, a girl wearing a dragon and phoenix bead crown, wearing a red large-sleeved shirt, a red silk veil on the clothes, a red Luo long skirt, a red gown, and a dragon and phoenix ornament on the first dress, embroidered with a golden dragon and phoenix pattern, and a girl with embroidered ornaments walked in.

"Long Live the Holy Bow ......"

"Well, is there anything wrong with you?"

When Zhu Youxiao saw the other party, he just bowed slightly, and then asked if there was anything wrong, and Zhu Youzhen glanced at his sister-in-law and had to praise it in his heart.

Sure enough, as Zhu Youzhen expected, the most brilliant person in the back court that day was his original sister-in-law Zhang Yan.

In history, Zhang Yan "has a beautiful and plump appearance, a face like Guanyin, eyes like autumn waves, a mouth like a cherry blossom, a nose like a hanging gall, and a fine tooth", which is one of the five great queens in ancient times.

In this way, it is hard to imagine what kind of appearance will be born in a few years at the age of sixteen.

But......

Thinking about it, Zhu Youzhen glanced at Zhu Youxiao, and muttered in his heart: "Such a good-looking daughter-in-law, why did she only have a big nephew with her......"

"The concubine heard that Banzai was playing chess with Brother Qi Wang, and seeing that today was the beginning of autumn, she brought watermelons." Zhang Yan saluted slowly and behaved decently.

"Well, put down the watermelon, and I'll go to Kunning Palace to accompany you later." Maybe the time of urgency has passed, but Zhu Youxiao didn't keep the other party.

Seeing this, Zhang Yan didn't say anything, saluted Zhu Youxiao and Zhu Youzhen, and then withdrew from the Heart Cultivation Palace.

However, after he withdrew, Zhu Youxiao glanced at Zhu Youzhen, who continued to read the imperial store's book, and said, "Does my brother understand?" ”

"I've seen it almost...... Zhu Youzhen pushed the handwritten letter from the imperial store over, and said:

"In the past month, 727 imperial stores have been opened, and all counties and towns have one imperial store, covering the entire territory of Beizhili and Shanxi."

"Today and yesterday alone, a total of more than 726,000 catties of coarse salt, more than 14,000 catties of fine salt, more than 885,600 catties of honeycomb coal, and 5,736,25 cents of silver were sold."

"If it goes on like this, only Beizhili and Shanxi will be able to get about one million taels of silver per year."

"After the cost, the profit is about 820,000 taels, but it is ......"

Speaking of this, Zhu Youzhen looked up at his imperial brother and said:

"With the scale of Yongping Salt Farm, the annual salt output is more than 90 million catties, which is enough for the people of Shanxi and North Zhili to eat cheap coarse salt."

"This year, because of the late drying of salt, plus the beginning of autumn, there are still more than 20 days of salt drying time, which can dry nearly six million catties of coarse salt."

"With the salt of the first ten days, there should be nearly 10 million catties, and it can be sold for 50,000 taels of silver."

"Judging from the current situation, it is not a problem to sell this salt, and even the salt farm can be expanded to 200 or even 300 li."

"But the problem is that the imperial store sells such cheap coarse salt, which must be noticed by the imperial history from all over the world, so I need my brother's help to solve the siege."

Selling smuggled salt is very simple for Zhu Youzhen, because the imperial horse supervisor has soldiers, imperial shops, and fields.

But in the same way, in the late Ming Dynasty, when the nobles, civil ministers, and officers of the guard all shielded the smugglers selling salt, only Zhu Youzhen dared to openly make dozens of miles of salt flats.

In addition, Zhu Youzhen can also make a larger salt flat and produce more coarse salt, and this practice is undoubtedly to annex the private salt market on the market.

It's like now, others sell six or seven texts, and he sells five texts.

He is not only encroaching on the market, but also making the market less profitable.

Perhaps in the eyes of others, doing so is to kill oneself and kill the official salt and private salt of the Ming Dynasty.

But only Zhu Youzhen knows that cheapness is the biggest monopoly.

Once the monopoly is formed, whether a pound of salt is ten or twenty will be decided by Zhu Youzhen.

The various classes don't know, they only know that Zhu Youzhen's mixing will make them earn a lot less money!

As a result, it is foreseeable that in the next few days, Zhu Youzhen will be impeached by countless lawyers.

At this time, it is necessary to see whether Zhu Youxiao's resistance ability is great.

To resist this wave, the Huangdian sells illegal salt, and the Yongping salt farm can also be expanded, developing to the extent that the annual output is hundreds of millions, or even hundreds of millions of catties.

At that time, the income from private salt may be about the same as the annual income of the salt department of the imperial court at the beginning, which is more than two million taels.

But once a monopoly is formed, every penny that rises at that time will be a tax of hundreds of thousands of taels.

After his younger brother's explanation, Zhu Youxiao had already understood that this was the best opportunity to run the salt state, so he gritted his teeth and said:

"If the news in the court is sparse, it won't disturb my younger brother, my younger brother only needs to continue to recruit troops, expand the salt farm, and prepare to dismantle the Shanxi and Beizhili guards!"