The bloodstains in front of the heart hall are brighter and denser than the fireworks that ascended to the sky half an hour ago.

The strong smell of blood also firmly covered up the original strong smell of sulfur.

Halfway through the killing, the first of the bandits to throw away their weapons and surrender on their knees.

Zhu Shouhong, the king of Lu, ordered the eunuch to shout loudly: "Those who abandon the sword and return to righteousness will stay and wait for their lives, and their sins will not be as good as their parents and wives."

Calling on the other side to surrender on the spot is by no means just to reduce the difficulty of subduing them, but to keep them alive for interrogation.

Soon, a second and third surrenderers followed.

On the top of the steps, Wu Bangde and a palace guard were being tied up by Zheng Haizhu's scalded hanging eyes.

When Wu Bangde, who was wearing a helmet, got up and looked at both sides, he could no longer see Zheng Haizhu's figure.

A moment ago, he heard with his own ears that Zhu Yipai asked Zheng Haizhu to avoid it.

At present, Zhu Yipai ordered him in a deep voice: "The situation has been decided, go and protect the princess and his wife."

Wu Bangde understands that this is Zhu Yipai's practice of his previous promise.

Yesterday, Zheng Haizhu bluntly proposed that if the troublemaker was really led by the charcoal worker surnamed Zhao, after the pacification, she and Wu Bangde were reluctant to come out and identify them in person.

One is no longer necessary, and the other is afraid of retaliation.

At that time, Zhu Yipai did not think it was resentful, but said that this is common sense, you are people who want to go to Shandong often to do business, if the Xiangjiao knows that you are the accuser, you will seek revenge, you are loyal to my Lu Mansion, and my Lu Mansion must not be unjust to you.

At this time, Wu Bangde soon found Zheng Haizhu, who had joined the Guo family, behind the Cunxin Palace.

After guarding about half a stick of incense, the guards and chamberlains also surrounded Zhu Shouhong and Zhu Yipai.

followed by Zhang Yaofang, although the hairstyle was a little messy, but his face was full of triumph.

Zhu Yipai explained the reason: "It doesn't matter if the leader of the charcoal household is stubborn and doesn't move. Several servants were interrogated separately, and the confessions were correct, and they all said that one of the leaders of the Wenxiang Sect, Hu Congkui, was arrested by the Dengzhou prefect, and they wanted to kidnap His Royal Highness King Lu and coerce the court to release him. This time, the lanterns were invited from Weifang, and the dancers were also believers. Tanhu's uncle was found tied up in the charcoal courtyard, and he was really unaware, but he was only negligent in checking the charcoal bag. The two young students of the Chai Tan Yuan are their accomplices."

Zhang Yaofang immediately picked up Zhu Yipai's words and said to Zhu Shouhong, the king of Lu: "Your Highness, this Hu Congkui, the lower official has seen it in the palace newspaper before, saying that he was originally a fellow villager of Xu Hongru, and in recent years, he has traveled from northern Lu to the Denglai area, bewitching the people, gathering in the mountains and forests, and in the summer and autumn, he was pacified by the Dengzhou prefect because of the torture and killing of a prefect under the rule of Dengzhou."

Zhu Shouhong asked, "What is the origin of the current prefect of Dengzhou?"

Between the fiefdom of Yanzhou of the Lu Domain, and Dengzhou, which faces the Yellow Sea, separated from Qingzhou and Laizhou, Zhu Shouhong is hindered by the body of the vassal king, except for the governor of Shandong and the prefect of Yanzhou, it is more taboo to make friends with other local officials in Ludi, so it is not surprising that this free and virtuous king does not know what the current Dengzhou prefect is.

Zhang Yaofang, as a civil official in the system, is the same as many department-level cadres in later generations, and is most concerned about various personnel information from the central to the local.

After he saw Zhu Shouhong asking, Zhu Yipai also showed a look of confusion, and hurriedly said: "If you go back to Your Highness, the current prefect of Dengzhou is surnamed Tao, and his name is Langxian, and like Xiaguan, he is also from Zhejiang. He should have been a Jinshi ten years ago, who had served in both the Ministry of Industry and the Ministry of Household in Nanjing, and four years ago he arrived in Dengzhou, and he was a good hand at water control, tuntian, and disaster relief.

Well? Playing the sea ban?

When Zheng Haizhu heard this last sentence, she was interested.

Zhu Yipai was obviously just as curious.

It must be known that since the founding of the Ming Dynasty, the earliest Japanese true Japanese people often invaded the location, in addition to Lushun in Liaodong, is Dengzhou in Shandong.

The eighteen guards in Shandong, there were eleven who were subordinate to the command of the Shandong Beiwei capital in those years, and although the total strength was about 10,000, they were all elite soldiers, among which the Dengzhou battalion had the largest number of people and horses.

Although there have been great changes in the Japanese situation and the initial period of the dynasty, the court invited the Wenchen who opened the sea, mentioned Guangzhou, Fuzhou, and Tining

Bo, mention Taicang, no one has mentioned Dengzhou's opening of the sea ban yet.

"This Tao Governor's Mansion, why did you ask for the Kaideng Prefecture Sea Ban?" Zhu Yipai asked.

Zhang Yaofang recalled for a moment and said cautiously: "Xiaguan remembers that it seems that not long after he arrived in office, he came to Qingzhou to cause a locust plague, and he wanted to transport rice from Liaodong to save the victims of Dengzhou."

Zhu Yipai became more and more surprised, this time, he looked at Zheng Haizhu and said, "Miss Zheng, didn't you say that you also have business dealings with relatives over there in Liaodong, is Liaodong also rich in grain, and can in turn help my Shandong Island?"

Zheng Haizhu wished that the big and small princes in front of him would give him a chance to preach.

She then said respectfully: "Most of the northern part of Liaoning is Huze mountains and forests, and the Jurchen *** and Yupi*** (referring to the Hezhe people) live on fishing and hunting, but in Jinzhouwei and Fuzhou Wei in southern Liaoning, the climate is more suitable than that in Shenyang and Liaoyang. Our Ming Dynasty's military camps and households are also very diligent, and the harvest may not be inferior to that in the Gyeonggi area. However, this situation did only exist three or four years ago. In the past two years, Jiannu rebelled, plundered my Liao people, and stepped on my fields.

Sure enough, after listening to this, Zhu Yipai frowned and said: "The trouble of Jiannu is far worse than that of the rabble of the Wenxiang Sect, thinking that Liaodong is originally under the jurisdiction of my Shandong, if it is occupied by Jiannu, it is like there are tigers and wolves on the side of the couch."

Zheng Haizhu nodded: "The chief of Jianzhou, Nurhachi, established himself as a khan last year, and he always wants to expand his generals, but the white mountains and black waters are bitter and cold and poor, and they can't feed so many Dingkou just by hunting and fishing, and they will definitely step up their invasion of the relatively rich western and southern Liaoning. The grass people speculated in vain, and the Tao prefect asked to open the sea, whether there was also the idea of strengthening the defense of southern Liaoning. After all, between the islands of southern Liaoning and the port of Dengzhou, sailboats can reach it in three days downwind, and it is feasible to transport grain, and it is even more problematic to transport other goods, and ginseng and mink skins can be sold to Shandong, and Shandong's specialties can also be sold to Liaodong and even North Korea."

When she talks eloquently, she tries to keep her tone as calm as possible, not exaggerated, but also not pretending to be afraid.

Zheng Haizhu believes that thanks to these noisy incense-smelling disciples, he has made the first contribution in protecting the safety of King Lu, which is beyond doubt.

Such an opportunity should be actively seized.

The two men of the Zhu family in front of him, one has power and the other has the ability.

She, a grass farmer, should take advantage of the fact that they are more grateful to themselves, boldly state their knowledge, express their opinions, and let them add appreciation and trust in addition to gratitude, so that they can turn back to business cooperation matters.

Looking at the Zhu Yipai, when listening to the lecture, there was no absent-minded or impatient expression at all, so it was explained to some extent that there was a play.

However, Zhu Yipai quickly restrained the conversation and returned to the theme of tonight.

He said to King Lu and the princess: "The evil plan of the bandit sect has been broken, the arrogance has been extinguished, although everything is under the control of the two highnesses tonight, but after all, there are also some twists and turns, the two highnesses will go back to the palace to rest first." My nephew and Zhang Changshi will go to deal with the affairs in front of the palace, send the remnants of the bandits to the Yanzhou Mansion for detention, appease the clansmen, and report to the two highnesses tomorrow."

After this catastrophe, King Lu became more and more satisfied with this loyal and wise nephew, and nodded happily.

did not forget to reward Zheng Haizhu and Wu Bangde, and while praising Zhang Yaofang for being good at making good friends, he personally inspected the palm burns of the only civilian official who participated in the on-site battle, and told the eunuch to hurry up and send the doctor on duty to apply the medicine.

The next day, the palace attendant sent a reward of one hundred taels of gold to the official post, and the invitation from the Zhenguo General's Mansion came.

At the family banquet in the mansion set up by Zhu Yipai and Guo's, Zheng Haizhu and Pan told two things.

The first case is to disclose the origin of Wu Bangde, which is indeed not the shopkeeper hired by himself, but the righteous son of Qi Jin, the chief soldier of Zhenjiang in Nanzhili, who partnered with him to buy and sell, mainly to maintain the cost of Qi Jin's family.

The second is to show his intention to cooperate with Lu Fan to dig coal. What he can contribute to this side is to recruit a large number of miners from Liaodong through Mao Wenlong, and second, to sell a part of the coal and transport it to the firearms workshop in Jiangnan through the canal for his own use, and at the same time rely on the Haoming Trading Company to help sell the remaining coal. Of course, the Homei Trading Company also

It can help market Lu Fan's other products, such as deer antler velvet and cotton in the fiefdom, Lu Fan can completely parachute into his own account office and come to Haoming Trading Company to keep an eye on the money in and out.

Zhu Yipai is still smart and ambitious, after all, he is only the son of a county king in his early twenties, and he has never left Ludi since he was born until he was a teenager. Four or five years ago, in the name of congratulating Emperor Wanli on his birthday, he followed his uncle to Beijing.

That time, he saw in the capital that millions of people were burning something completely different from charcoal and firewood.

This time, from Zheng Haizhu's mouth, he learned that under his own charcoal mountain, there was this kind of fuel that the nobles might not look down on, but had unlimited business opportunities in the daily use of civilians and military smelting, and naturally he was surprised to happy.

"Miss Zheng, you said that Liaodong is also the same as Jingshi Xishan, there are already coal mines?"

"Yes, Your Royal Highness," Zheng Haizhu replied with certainty, "My Uncle Mao said that to the east of Liaoyang, where he was guarding, there were small coal kilns around a place called Dongningwei. There is a long frost year, and the yield per acre of land is only 12/12 of that of southern Liaoning, and the locals can only get grain by digging and transporting coal."

The Dongningwei that Zheng Haizhu said is the Benxi of Liaoning in later generations. At the end of the Ming Dynasty, although agriculture in eastern Liaodong could not keep up, the coal in Benxi and the iron in Tieling had begun to be excavated in an orderly manner. Geng Zhongming, Mao Wenlong's subordinate general at the time of the Apocalypse and forced to surrender after Mao Wenlong was killed, was born as a miner.

Zhu Yipai was extremely active, and he also understood that if he really opened a large area of coal mining in Lu Domain, local farmers and transit refugees could not be turned into miners.

It is indeed the safest to ship miners from Liaodong.

Zheng Haizhu continued to add firewood to the fire in Zhu Yipai's heart: "Your Royal Highness, many of those Liao people are no longer military households, and as the number of people grows, in that territory, they will either starve to death or be taken captive by the Jiannu in the east to be slaves. Come to Shandong to work as miners to earn money, they will definitely be willing. Although they are foreigners, if they reach a certain number, they will eat the meals rewarded by His Royal Highness and His Royal Highness, and be loyal to the Lu Mansion, they can also serve as a deterrent to the Wenxiang Sect, and together with the defenders of the Lu Domain, they will protect the safety of Yanzhou."

The more Zhu Yipai listened, the better he felt.

As for the migration of Liao people to Yanzhou to dig coal, he estimated that there was little resistance in the court.

Zheng Haizhu's analysis of the current situation, especially his concern that the Liaodong Zhuangding was captured by the freshly baked Jurchen rebels, inspired him.

Zhu Yipai even thought of the wording when he played.

To make it clear to the imperial court, what he wanted to get from Liaodong to the Lu clan were households that had no land to grow and could not safely mine, so that they could release labor in Yanzhou, and then exchange the coal under Yanzhou for silver, and donate a part of it to pay the imperial court for military salaries, mobilize and move soldiers from all over the town, and deal with the military action of Jiannu.

Zheng Haizhu listened to his line of thought and reminded bluntly: "His Royal Highness's words are like a direct promise to the imperial court that he is willing to pay the bamboo and wood tax. Each vassal country has its own property, and when they see Lu Fan's move, will they attack it en masse?"

Zhu Yipai understood what Zheng Haizhu meant, he looked sideways at his wife Guo, pursed his lips, and said to Zheng Haizhu: "Miss Zheng, my wife and I both think that you are a good businessman, let me ask, when you do business in the future, will you lose your conscience because you are afraid that the female businessmen will attack her?"

When Zheng Haizhu heard this, he praised "good" in his heart, and said firmly: "Yes, if you are in the same dust with the female businessman because of cowardice, when the sky falls, everyone will be crushed together and really crushed into dust. In the chaos of Liaodong, Shandong will suffer, and Lu Fan can come forward so early and pay taxes for the imperial court, which is not only righteous, but also wise."

Zhu Yipai nodded and continued to talk about the details at the practical level: "According to what Miss Zheng said, the suitable miner Dingkou is east of Liaoyang, not north of Lushunkou, and our Yanzhou Mansion is still thousands of miles away from Dengzhou, why should those miners come in from Dengzhou instead of the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal by land?"

After Zheng Haizhu touched the situation of Lu Fan in the past few days, he had decided to set up the future Liaohai Situation Intelligence Station in Yanzhou, so he naturally wanted to focus on recommending Wu Bangde.

She then said, "Wu Gongzi has a lesson from thistle Liao's wandering."

Wu Bangde understood, and said in a cautious tone: "If you go back to Your Royal Highness, if you go by land, not to mention the cumbersome customs clearance procedures at Shanhaiguan, just say that after entering the customs, you will be in Shuntianfu

Boarding the canal boat will also have a lot of twists and turns along the way, so wouldn't it be better to be under the rule of Shandong all the way?"

The implication is very simple, don't go through other people's land to transport people and do things, and try to operate in a closed-loop in Shandong's own territory.

Zheng Haizhu took the opportunity to add a more direct sentence: "In the future, if the cotton cloth of the Lu Fan is transported to Liaodong and North Korea for sale, and the ginseng and mink skins from there are sent to Yanzhou, it will be more convenient to take the Liaohai Road."

Zhu Yipai smiled, looked at his wife Guo Shi and said, "Miss Zheng is really inseparable from the word silver in three sentences, which is quite similar to you and me."

Guo Shi did not smile: "Miss Zheng needs silver more than us, she wants to buy our coal and make her firearms, no, to make firearms for the imperial court."

Zhu Yipai was stunned for a moment, and then waved his hand: "I went to the king of Lu, and we dug up some coal in Yanzhou, and gave some to Miss Zheng."

Zheng Haizhu said: "That's not necessary, Songjiang Firearms Workshop, in the future, may be able to ask for money from the imperial court, now I say that I donated funds to try to build, and it is a great fortune for the imperial court to be allowed to build." Your Highness and Madame, if you think I am worthy, it is better to enlighten King Lu and share some shares of our Haoming Trading Company from the coal mine."