Time flies, Zhu Youzhen and the others are hunting in Yanshan, Huanglong is fighting in South Asia, Hong Chengchou is supervising the southwest, Sun Chuanting is reading hard, and it is rare to have leisure......

The big trend has the big trend, and the small trend has the small trend.

For example, the selection of concubines in Beijing, although it is a small trend, but it can't stop for a single step.

A day passed, and with the arrival of the third day of the concubine selection, the Hakka family led people to start a more detailed inspection of the more than 900 show girls who remained.

According to the standard of the third level, they first measured the hands and feet of the show girls with a ruler, and then asked them to walk dozens of steps, eliminating those with slightly shorter wrists, slightly larger toes, or slightly more irritable behavior.

Due to the good quality of this draft, not many people were eliminated in this third level, which made Zhang Yan and Concubine Liu, who were sitting firmly in the middle palace, a little anxious.

The initial test ended at dusk, and the original 1,527 people, after passing the three levels of the initial test, finally left 803 people.

These women who passed the primary election were introduced to the palace by the Hakka clan with the pure army on the fourth day, and they were greeted by a deeper investigation.

When the Donghua Gate of the Imperial Palace was opened, the eight hundred and three show girls were very nervous.

The twenty-seven women standing in the first row were even more so.

Zhou Sujie, Tian Xiuying, Yuan Xifei, Agarwood Jun, Li Shaoxi......

The five women stood in the first row, aged from left to right, from oldest to youngest.

The eldest Zhou Sujie is more than 20 years old and 3 months old, and the youngest is Li Shaoxi from North Korea, 14 years and 5 months old.

Li Shaoxi is different from North Koreans in the traditional sense, she looks very delicate, with big eyes and a high nose bridge, thick eyebrows and a nose, and the whole person looks very heroic.

The reason why she can perfectly avoid the ordinary appearance of Koreans is also because her ancestors are a family that migrated to the Korean Peninsula in the late Tang Dynasty.

Although it is inevitable to combine with the Koreans, since the beginning of the Ming Dynasty, the Li family has often married some families in Shandong, so Li Shaoxi's whole person is slim and slim, and he and Agarwood Jun have grown to the extent of five feet.

According to the situation of a normal woman, perhaps two girls of the same age will grow an inch or two taller.

Compared to them, the other three people who were about five feet and an inch were under pressure.

"Don't look around when you enter the palace, keep the etiquette, and you will be sent directly to Chuxiu Palace later, where someone will wait for you."

The sound of the Hakka broke the silence outside the Donghua Gate, and the show girls were reprimanded by the Hakka group of 100 people in each group.

Finally, when her lecture ended, the show girls were also led into Donghua Gate by the old female officials.

The magnificent Forbidden City is out of reach for most of the show girls, even if some of them will leave tomorrow, but to enter this palace that symbolizes the supremacy of the Ming Dynasty is already a step to the sky for them.

Although some of them will be eliminated, the show girls who can enter the Forbidden City, even if they are eliminated, will be worth a hundred times.

Before some small and medium-sized landlords and gentry backgrounds set foot in the Forbidden City, they were at best worthy of seven or eight petty officials.

But once they stepped into the Forbidden City, when they came out again, the ones who matched them were the children of high-ranking cadres in Huijing......

Thinking of this, many show girls, greeted by the female officials, began to walk into the Forbidden City with red walls and yellow tiles step by step in accordance with the etiquette of the court.

When they entered the city and stepped on the tiles, they felt an unbelievable sense of disbelief in their hearts.

Because they entered from the Donghua Gate, after crossing the long corridor and crossing the Jinshui Bridge, the first thing they saw was the Ciqing Palace, also known as the East Palace, which is located in the southeast of the outer court of the imperial palace.

Next to the entrance of the East Palace, there is the Wenhua Hall where ministers such as the Cabinet, the Six Ministries, and the Six Divisions handle political affairs.

"The largest palace is Ciqing Palace, that is, the East Palace, and His Royal Highness the Crown Prince is still young, so it is not yet inhabited."

"The place next to it is the Wenhua Palace, which is the place where hundreds of officials and important ministers deal with government affairs."

The Ke family took Zhou Sujie and others into the palace, and began to introduce the outer court.

This is a process, normally speaking, women are not allowed in the outer court except for the East Palace.

Many female officials led the team to explain, but the Hakka family was obviously not so patient, but after the introduction, they took the show girls to the Zuoshun Gate, crossed the Inner Wulong Bridge, the Huangji Gate, and came to the Huangji Palace Square.

Due to the sufficient collection of wood, the Huangji Hall that Zhu Youxiao personally started to build was one-third larger and one-third higher than the Taihe Hall in later generations.

The show girls stood in the square, and when they looked up, they saw a splendid palace towering in front of them.

The yellow glazed tiles were shining, and the majestic Danbi stone on the white marble steps made people can't help but take a breath of cool air.

"This is the Imperial Palace, the first of the three halls that were built by Banzai."

The Ke family gave a simple explanation, and then without waiting for Zhou Sujie and the other show girls to come to their senses, he took them to the Qianqing Palace.

During this period, they saw the Zhonghe Hall and the Baohe Palace, and the exclamation words in their hearts poured out endlessly, if it weren't for the fear of annoying the Hakka clan, they all wanted to stop and take a good look at these three halls.

Just before they could walk out of their sighs, the Hakka family took them to the gate of the Qianqing Palace, which was guarded by the Jing Army.

Compared with the three major halls, the Qianqing Palace seems to be "ordinary", although the show girls are still sighing, but it is not as good as the first time they saw the Emperor's Palace.

Since the principle of the Hakka family is to look at the flowers and see them roughly, she quickly took the show girls out of the Qianqing Palace.

They bypassed the Jiaotai Hall and the Kunning Palace, and then came to the Imperial Garden.

Entering the imperial garden, the first thing Zhou Sujie and the others saw was a pavilion.

The lush trees of the Imperial Garden reflect the red walls and glazed tiles of the pavilion, which is next to a rockery made of stone.

Even if it's just a glance, it's beautiful.

It's a pity that beauty is always short-lived, and before they could take a good look, the Hakka family took them out of the imperial garden and took a detour to Chuxiu Palace.

"Okay, the old body will send you to wait here, and then they will be in charge of waiting."

Walking to the gate of Chuxiu Palace, the Ke family turned around and spoke to the group of show girls he was carrying, and after Zhou Sujie and the others looked up, they saw two female officials in their thirties who could vaguely see that they were very beautiful when they were young.

"Let's go inside."

Ke Shi indifferently explained the last sentence to the show girls, and then turned around and left with the two female officials beside him.

As for the show girls, they were brought into the Chuxiu Palace shortly after she left, and after entering the Chuxiu Palace, the two female officials lectured them:

"Today's business is complicated, so let you wait for a day to relax."

"Tomorrow, you need to take a bath and change your clothes, and be inspected for entering the palace."

"The people who check and clear the customs stay for a month and learn etiquette in the palace, and then someone will select thirty people who are "beautiful and intelligent and overwhelming" as maids, and five people are concubines. ”

After the two finished speaking, the palace maids of Chuxiu Palace gave wooden cards to the show girls.

They were assigned by the female officials according to five people in a room, and after getting the sign, they were taken away by the palace maids.

This scene was clearly seen by Zhang Yan and Concubine Liu, who were far away in an attic, with clairvoyance, and they did not interfere, but left separately after watching all the show girls enter the Chuxiu Palace.

For them, this is just a pastime in the boring inner court, and for the people of the world, although they know that King Qi chooses a concubine, but after the heat of the draft in each province has passed, many people have forgotten it.

The people are more concerned about the small things in the fields, the market, the neighborhood, and the streets and alleys.

Of course, there is an additional thing in this little thing, and that is family affairs.

"Drive!"

"Li Dingguo, you kid ride slowly, if you fall, we will be scolded by His Royal Highness, you see that we will not let you ride a horse next time!"

On the fourth day of the seventh month, with the shouting and scolding of the Tiance guards, Li Dingguo, who rode out of the market town outside the northern city of Beijing, turned around and grinned: "Your Highness will not scold!" ”

Twelve Tiance guards came on horseback, protected Li Dingguo in the circle, and the chief flag officer headed by him laughed and scolded:

"If Your Highness knows that you are riding so fast, you can see if Your Highness scolds you."

"Hehe...... Li Dingguo smiled and didn't reply.

Today is the 10th day of the official school holiday, and because the holiday homework of the official school is stipulated by Zhu Youzhen in one book per lesson, one book cannot exceed 20 pages.

Therefore, Li Dingguo spent half a month to complete the homework of the five subjects, and then completed all the homework, and he is now preparing to go to Yanshan County in Duoyan Mansion.

He went to Yanshan County not only to find Zhu Youzhen, but also to meet his parents, whom he hadn't seen for half a year.

"If we ride like this, how many days will we be able to reach Yanshan?"

Li Dingguo asked the chief flag officer, and the chief flag officer did not think twice:

"From the capital to Yanshan County three hundred and eighty miles, if you run a hundred miles a day, you can reach it in about four days."

"Four more days?" Li Dingguo frowned, and then couldn't help complaining:

"If it weren't for the prince's entanglement and delaying me for a few days, I'm afraid I would have eaten at home by now."

"Hahahaha-"

As soon as he said this, the Tiance Guards next to him burst into laughter.

Li Dingguo's words are not bad, compared to his preference to finish his homework and then go home to play, Zhu Ciran is not so particular.

Although he also does the homework of the official school, this guy belongs to the kind of person who works hard to write until the last few days.

Due to the matter of choosing a concubine, Zhang Yan could not supervise Zhu Ciran to do his homework, so Zhu Ciran always left the palace and came to annoy Li Dingguo every day, resulting in the homework that should have been completed in five days was dragged out for fifteen days.

"I can't say more, I have to hurry back...... Drive! ”

Li Dingguo saw that he was being laughed at, so he could only shake the reins of his horse and quickly rode his horse north.

When they went out of the capital for thirty miles, they clearly felt the scene of "sparsely populated".

Although there are rice fields on both sides of the road, there are very few busy people, and it is often two or three men who run more than ten or twenty acres of rice fields.

"This road is suitable for horses and horses, but not for cavalry."

"Indeed, the cavalry still has to take the road."

The chief flag officer on horseback ridiculed them on the "horse road" next to the government road, and this horse road was no more than two zhang wide, it was a simple dirt road, attached to the left and right of the government road.

For war horses, if they just walk slowly or quickly, it is not harmful to walk on a cement road without water and ice.

The horse-drawn carriage is not fast, so it can walk quickly on the government road, but for the cavalry's war horses, due to the many times of trotting and running, the horseshoe is very slippery after contact with the hard ground.

And walking on the cement road for a long time, not only the horse will feel uncomfortable, but also the harm of damaging the joints in the long run, and the faster you run, the more serious the injury will be.

Therefore, when the government road was laid, in order to take care of the horses, Zhu Youzhen began to design the "horse road".

For the cavalry, the horse road is the road suitable for their rapid attack, and for the infantry, the road is very suitable for their way of traveling no more than 80 miles a day.

"Pulling a horse with a fully loaded carriage on this road, it can run to twelve or thirteen miles in an hour, and this road is actually quite good, suitable for the army to hurry."

Li Dingguo interjected while galloping on his horse.

"You're right." The Tiance Guards next to him heard this, and also smiled and approved of him.

"It's supposed to be a railroad site over there, right?" Li Dingguo looked at a construction site that was laying railroad tracks in the distance, and asked curiously, and the chief flag officer of Tiance Wei also said:

"It is a railway construction site, which began to be laid yesterday, and it is said that the roadbed has been repaired to Duoyan, and the follow-up will pass through the Liaohe River, Liaozhong, Daning, and finally arrive in Shenyang."

"This railway should be prepared for horse-drawn carriages, and it is estimated that the carriages will be able to run 30 miles in an hour when they are fully loaded, and it is estimated that they can run 40 miles in an hour when they are fully loaded."

"If you can run to forty miles, then it is convenient to go to Liaodong, counting the rest time, six days is enough to get to Shenyang."

"Yes, if there was such a thing in the battle of recovering Liao, the hundreds of thousands of people who would not have been needed to transport grain and grass in the early stage."

"Alas......"

The soldiers of the Tiance Guards began to sigh, and Li Dingguo rarely did not interject during this period.

For the soldiers of Tiancewei, although they have seen the railroad tracks, they have basically seen them in the mines in Fangshan and other places, and what they have seen are also railroad carriages.

As for the steam engine, although the third version has long been used in the mine, its horsepower is actually not enough to pull more than a dozen ore weighing tens of thousands of catties, so its role is mostly used to pump water.

】

In addition to the people in the military control areas such as the Armaments Institute, the Mint, and the Steam Engine Factory, who knew that the fourth version of the steam engine was about to enter service, there were only less than 20 people in the whole world, including Zhu Youzhen and Zhu Youxiao, who knew about the fourth version of the steam engine.

Therefore, the soldiers of Tiancewei did not know that this so-called railway was built for trains.

"After the train is repaired, it should be able to reach Shenyang ...... in two days"

Li Dingguo was precocious as a young man, and only slightly calculated the speed of the train when it was fully loaded and the distance from the border to Shenyang, and then calculated how much time it would take to go from the capital to Shenyang.

When the soldiers of Tiancewei were still thinking that the six-day period was already very fast, Li Dingguo had already begun to sigh at the power of the "Armaments Institute".

"How many people did this railway use?"

Li Dingguo asked curiously, and the chief flag officer responded without thinking:

"It is rumored that there are 300,000 people, and the people of Shuncheon and Duoyan Mansion have participated, and the daily salary is fifteen wen, which is not much, but it is not much, but it is not much."

"The wages in Shanxi and Shaanxi are ten wen, and the basic ones in other places are about ten to fifteen wen, and if you are full of farming, you can have three or four taels of silver a year."

"Although it can't compare to us, it's not bad if you count the family's farm property."

"I don't know how many acres of land have been divided among the people who remain in Changping and Miyun now."

The chief flag officer was thinking, and Li Dingguo didn't know what happened ten years ago, so he was curious: "Is there a difference between land division?" ”

"Absolutely!" The chief flag officer subconsciously responded loudly:

"Ten years ago, when I was a recruit, Changping and Miyun shared more than 3 million acres of land equally among more than one million people."

"Two years ago, I heard from officials of the Ministry of Household Affairs that there are less than 600,000 people in Changping and Miyun, but more than 4 million mu of cultivated land has been left, which is enough for one person and eight mu."

"I'm afraid that if we move again, it is not impossible for one person to have ten acres and one household to have fifty or sixty acres."

"You seem to be your hometown Yan'an Mansion, I heard that there are less than 100,000 people in Yan'an Mansion at the moment, and each person has more than 20 acres of land at this time."

"That is, there is a great drought, otherwise the 100,000 people left behind may not even be able to plant land."

Li Dingguo heard about his hometown from the mouth of the chief flag officer, but he didn't expect that the fields in Yan'an Mansion were abundant to such an extent.

He still remembers that when he was young, a family with three acres of land was already considered a "big family".

For example, his family, a family of three has only two acres of land, and every year it depends on his father to find some errands at the city gate, so that the whole family can survive.

It wasn't that he didn't have older brothers and younger brothers, but most of them starved to death or died of illness.

"Although this relocation is good, it is always a bit unkind......"

"Ahem! Okay, stop talking about it, and keep going. ”

While Li Dingguo was pondering the horse, one of the cavalrymen couldn't help but speak, but was quickly muffled by the coughing voice of the chief flag officer.

Li Dingguo didn't know why, but everyone kept silent.

Obviously, the matter of forced relocation is actually not something that cannot be inquired about in a place that is too safe and stable, but everyone knows about it.

Many Yanshan officials and people from the Terracotta Division have done the black gloves of Zhu Youzhen's "immigration to the real border" policy, and millions of people have been forced to tear down their houses and move north with food stamps, even if they are unwilling.

In front of the power machine of the imperial court, the power of the individual seems insignificant.

Li Dingguo didn't know about these things, because he rarely went out of the house alone to observe the people, but he still sniffed out the cats from everyone's conversations.

"I heard from some students in the official school that they will go to Duoyan Mansion for classes next semester, and they don't want to, is it ...... the government?"

Li Dingguo is cheating people, in fact, the students who are with his classmates are all selected, and most of them are the children of small people living in the capital.

Migration is a migration to the countryside, and there are no rural classmates around him, or the official schools in the capital, and there are basically no rural children to study, because the rural children are concentrated in the official schools in the townships.

"Alas......"

When the chief flag officer heard Li Dingguo's words, he thought that he also knew, so he couldn't help but sigh:

"The officials of Beizhili and various provinces are driving people away in order to complete the things arranged by the imperial court, and they were reluctant to drive people away because of bad rules."

"The more people there are, the more bad rules there are, and the more money they covet."

"Now that the bad rules have been lifted, most of the officials are holding anti-New Year's salaries, so they would rather be more idle."

"If you want to be idle, there are few people in Nafu County, so you can be idle, so you can emigrate."

"On the Hubu side, the prefecture and county with the largest number of immigrants are said to give an extra reward, which is quite a lot, and the officials, officials, and soldiers and horses of a county can get three or four taels of silver each."

"For the sake of this silver, officials are in a hurry to drive people out, and it is rumored that the population of Beizhili this year may not even be 7 million."

"You must know that six years ago, the people in the household department said that there were at least eight million people in Beizhili, and it was only a few years......

The chief flag officer was a little embarrassed, but he reacted immediately and said cautiously to Li Dingguo:

"Just listen to these words, if you kid dares to say it to His Highness, I will have to kick you twice."

"You're not afraid that you won't even have a chance to kick me?" Li Dingguo was a little stunned, but the chief flag officer glanced at him contemptuously and said:

"What do you think Your Highness will do to me, let me tell you, Your Highness doesn't say anything else, but it's good for us big soldiers."

"Even if I say these words to you by the Jinyi Guard, it is estimated that His Royal Highness will at most send me to the Gongwei camp of the governor's mansion in various places to be a garrison."

"Be a guard?!" Li Dingguo was surprised: "Didn't the garrison of the Gongwei battalion lead more than 500 soldiers? You have only led more than 50 troops, and you can also be a garrison? ”

"Phew!" The chief flag officer spat out a mouthful of saliva and shouted: "What kind of soldier do you think is the upright soldier?" ”

He straightened his chest and said proudly:

"We are all ten-year veterans and veterans, and if any one of us is delegated, we can all be promoted to the next level, not to mention that we are still the people of the Four Cavalry Guards."

"Although the military system of the Shangzhiwei and Gongwei battalions is different, even if I am transferred to be the general flag, I can lead 90 people, and if I am promoted to a higher level as a garrison, it will be more than 500 people."

"What about two levels?" Li Dingguo was very curious, but at this time, the chief flag officer looked embarrassed:

"If I am promoted to two levels, then I will not be able to do it, and I will be a general if I am promoted to two levels, if I have that ability, I will already be an official of hundreds of households."

The embarrassment of the chief flag officer was seen by Li Dingguo, and he smiled and said:

"I'm curious, why doesn't His Highness directly unify the military system?"

"It was premature." When the chief flag officer heard Li Dingguo's inquiry, he explained to him:

"At that time, the battalion was not a good reputation, and His Highness started with Teng Xiang Siwei, and the officials in the temple were powerful, and His Highness did not have the power to change the military system."

"Later, the temple was weak, but at that time, Shangzhi was used to going out of the fortress with heavy troops, and then split it into the Gongwei battalion, and the commanders were a little embarrassed."

"In addition, there are many soldiers and horses in the upper guard, also because we have experienced a lot of wars, originally we are a field army, and the Gongwei battalion is a land defense army."

"Later, the imperial court fought in all directions, and the strength of Shangzhi was not enough to conquer the south and the north, so the twelve guards of the navy were split and the three guards of Daning were absorbed."

"In other words, the Twelve Guards of the Navy are the sons of our Sixteenth Guards."

"Do you think that Shangzhi doesn't send troops to fight much, but the navy has been fighting outside, you have seen the "General Map of Daming Kunyu" in the Carrier Palace, two-thirds of my Daming's current territory is down by the navy."

"The land laid by the navy is actually the land that I have laid down."

The chief flag officer was proud, but Li Dingguo was silent:

"...... so"

"Shangzhi has a very close relationship with the navy?"

"Of course!" The chief flag officer said with a smile: "The Governor of Huang Du also went out of Shangzhi, and when the navy sent back overseas gold and silver, he would let people leave a small part of one-third of the intercepted and send it to the Shangzhi Governor's Mansion." ”

"Although we say that the salary of the other Gongwei battalions is fifteen taels, but this small part is divided, and each person also has three or four taels of silver, and when there are many times, they can have five taels."

"Actually, our military salary is about twenty taels, otherwise why do you think it is so difficult to get in?"

"......" Li Dingguo really didn't know about this, so he was curious: "Your Highness doesn't know?" ”

"Your Highness naturally knows that the silver is still distributed by Your Highness." The chief flag officer said, and Li Dingguo nodded as if he didn't understand.

"In short, whether it is combat power or experience, Shangzhi surpasses the soldiers and horses of the other five governors, if you kid can mix with Shangzhi and become a general in the future, then don't forget my old Zhang Tou's care for you."

The chief flag officer made a joke, and Li Dingguo also smiled and nodded in response.

Before they knew it, the group had run for more than 50 miles......