Chengdu.

Liu Wei also led his troops to surround the Shu Wangfu here at the beginning of the lunar month.

Zhu Xuanqi, the king of Shu, also learned from Liu Huangshang, the long history, that Liu Wei was ordered to copy the palace and take him to the southern capital to face the saint, and also knew that the emperor wanted Liu Wei to copy the salt.

"It should be because the salt merchant in Yangzhou made him lose face, so he had to deal with the salt merchant, so he wanted to raid our home, and he also made it clear that he would not stop until he copied the salt, in order to lower the price of salt and clean up the salt merchant."

Zhu Xuanqi also muttered to himself because of this.

Boom!

Immediately, Zhu Xuanqi also slammed his fist on the table: "It's just that it's the salt merchant who offended him, what does it have to do with Lone." ”

"Your Highness is wrong in what he said."

"His Royal Highness is involved in the smuggling of well salt, and he is already a salt merchant himself, and he should be regarded as one of the largest salt merchants in the country."

Changshi Liu Huangshang replied with a smile at this time.

"You!"

"Which side the hell are you from?"

Zhu Xuanqi got up at this time and looked at Liu Huangsheng, pointed at Liu Huangsheng and said a few words, and then asked: "So, the smuggling of Sichuan salt in the palace is a secret from you, a despicable and shameless person, to the imperial court?" ”

"It's not bad for you to be alone!"

"Your Highness is wrong in what you said, the minister was appointed by the imperial court, and his duty is to watch His Royal Highness for the imperial court, so it is the minister's duty to report the truth to the imperial court."

"His Royal Highness treats his ministers well, but precisely because His Highness treats his ministers well, the ministers can't sit back and watch His Highness go astray."

Liu Huangshang continued to reply at this time.

Zhu Xuanqi gritted his teeth after hearing this.

After a while, he sneered: "Since you know about my smuggling and selling salt, you should know that I have entrusted you to sell all the salt to Yangzhou salt merchants, where is there still salt!" ”

"Why should Your Highness lie?"

"Although the minister is not responsible for the smuggling and selling of salt by His Highness, he also knows that His Highness has just brought tens of thousands of new salt to the mansion recently, and it has not been sent out for sale yet."

"And!"

"Your Highness should understand that Your Majesty's purpose in raiding the palace this time is to get enough salt, the more you can say, the better, you don't let Your Majesty get salt, and you get enough salt, what do you make Your Majesty think, do you think that your own family members are not cooperating with your own family?"

"Your Highness should also know that the vassal king who was copied this time is not only His Highness who smuggled official salt, so if His Highness gives the most salt, I am afraid that the punishment will be the lightest."

Liu Huangshang said with a smile at this time.

Zhu Xuanqi, who even had the monthly money of the little maid in the house, could drag it out as much as he could, and now when he heard Liu Huangsheng's words, his forehead couldn't help but be bruised, and he said after a while:

"Good! I bothered Changshi to go out and inform Liu Hou and let him bring the troops in, and Gu personally took him to steal salt. ”

"Your Highness is indeed a person who understands righteousness."

Liu Huangshang bowed to Zhu Xuanqi, and then left the Shu Palace.

Zhu Fengquan, the son of the King of Shu, walked up to Zhu Xuanqi after Liu Huangshang left, and asked, "Father, you said, is it our Zhu family today?" ”

Zhu Xuanqi, who had always kept his face calm, raised his head sharply and looked at Zhu Fengquan: "Why do you ask that?" ”

"If so, how can anyone be so ruthless to their own family!"

"What's wrong with us reselling some official salt?"

"We just want to make more money, it's not rebellion, it's not murder, he doesn't even want to do this, it's not human, it's mean!"

Zhu Fengquan said.

"You're not mean?"

"I said, all the salt for our palace will be given enough silver, have you given enough?"

Zhu Xuanqi asked Zhu Fengquan at this time.

Zhu Fengquan lowered his head: "No! ”

"You bastard!"

"I said, the people in the house, it's nothing to deduct some, but the people in the salt field can't deduct, can't deduct, you dare to deduct! Didn't you give Liu Huangshang a chance to buy people's hearts with silver dollars, and then let the court know our details? ”

Zhu Xuanqi pointed at Zhu Fengquan and scolded, and reprimanded.

After the reprimand, Zhu Xuanqi complained with his hands on his hips:

"However, you are not wrong, this Son of Heaven is indeed mean and cruel to his own family, and he dares to kill if he dares to manage it!"

"Since Taizu, there has never been such a mean as him, he obviously only wants to be comfortable, and he is not willing to eat at all, we have united with the gentry and magnates to smuggle official salt, and obtained huge profits, in order to prevent him from seeing our wealth and raise the intention of rectifying the salt government, and let him suffer a little grievance, he will kill his relatives in righteousness!"

"It's just a little grievance!"

Zhu Xuanqi stretched out his hand and put his five fingers together as he spoke, said a word accusatoryly, and then said:

"Moreover, the Yangzhou salt merchant also made up eight million taels of silver dollars to let him copy and confiscate into the official, which can be regarded as giving him enough face, which is much more than the face given to the temple back then!"

"But he's still not happy, he still refuses to let go of this matter, he still doesn't talk about some human feelings, he is really hard-hearted!"

"However, this is all the sin created by Zhang Taiyue, he taught this son of heaven to respect the new rites, no longer implement the old rites, and no longer rely on the benefits of his own people to raise the army and strengthen the country, as a result, salt profits are not important to this son of heaven at all!"

"And it is precisely because the Son of Heaven no longer relies on salt to raise the army, so he is in a hurry, he can do without salt tax, and then let everyone not want to make a fortune by selling salt!"

"It's really money that the Son of Heaven doesn't want to make, and others don't want to make it, this world is really his."

Zhu Xuanqi continued to speak, and sighed as he spoke:

"It's better to be an emperor!"

Zhu Fengquan nodded and said, "The child is just distressed now, and the salt of the palace must be handed over." ”

"Who let the family hold a knife in their hand?"

"You remember, no matter how much you hate in your heart, you have to be polite and respectful after seeing him and his people, don't say anything mean and unkind, if you want to say that the emperor's grace is vast, and he has the same hatred as His Majesty, and he can't kill the salt merchant with a thousand knives."

Zhu Xuanqi also instructed Zhu Fengquan to come.

Zhu Fengquan nodded yes.

Not long after, Liu Wei walked in, and after seeing Zhu Xuanqi, he announced his decree, and then saluted Zhu Xuanqi: "Your Highness! ”

Zhu Xuanqi hurriedly supported Liu Wei and said with a smile: "Liu Hou doesn't have to be like this, he is a criminal minister, how dare he accept the courtesy." ”

Then, Zhu Xuanqi sobbed, squeezed out a few tears and said: "I'm sorry for Your Majesty, I'm sorry for the imperial court, I did buy a large amount of Sichuan salt from the stove households privately, as Liu Changshi said, if you say who is the largest salt merchant in the southwest, it is naturally Lone!" Although Gu had to do this for the expenses of the house, but it did violate the king's law, fortunately, His Majesty governed well and did not rely on salt to raise the army, otherwise if it caused a shortage of wages on the nine sides, Lone's sin would be even greater. ”

"Your Highness is good if you know!"

"Before Your Majesty ascended the throne, the Southwest Tusi did not take the officials and troops seriously, because the officers and soldiers were short of paid soldiers and were unwilling to fight, presumably because His Highness swallowed too much salt."

Liu Wei responded to Zhu Xuanqi's words bluntly.

Zhu Fengquan therefore glanced at Liu Wei viciously on the spot.

Zhu Xuanqi was also dumbfounded, and then sneered: "What Liu Hou said is true." ”

"Your Royal Highness, hurry up and lead the way, before leaving, Your Majesty has already instructed Ben Hou that if the Shu Wangfu can't take out more than 200,000 salt leads, His Royal Highness's head will enter Beijing."

Liu Wei replied at this time.

Zhu Xuanqi breathed a sigh of relief: "Lonely, take Liu Hou to copy salt." ”

Half an hour later, Liu Wei saw a large number of salt warehouses in the endless storage area in Chengdu, and couldn't help but ask dumbfoundedly: "How many?" ”

"Not much, more than 520,000 citations."

After Zhu Xuanqi returned, he gave the account book to Liu Wei.

Liu Wei suddenly grabbed Zhu Xuanqi's shirt, stared at him and asked, "Why did you steal so much salt?" ”

"Do you know that if this salt had already arrived in the hands of the imperial court, my father would not have knelt down to the soldiers because of lack of salary!"

Liu Wei suddenly asked with blood-red eyes.

Zhu Xuanqi was so frightened that his face turned pale for a while: "Liu Hou is angry." ”

Liu Wei came back to his senses after a while, then put down Zhu Xuanqi, and then arched his hand: "Your Highness, forgive me, the minister was rude just now." ”

"No problem!"

"No problem!"

Zhu Xuanqi smiled.

Liu Wei was indeed excited to see so much salt, so that although he let Zhu Xuanqi go because of his identity, his chest still rose and fell violently at this time.

After all, he really experienced the days of being difficult because of lack of pay.

And next.

Li Rusong and Liu Wei led the official army, escorted the kings of Jin and Shu and other clansmen and a large amount of salt, and came to the southern capital.

Meanwhile.

The vassal kings of other places were also ordered to come to the southern capital one after another.

Because Zhu Yijun's intention announced to the outside world was to summon all the vassal domains into Beijing to discuss the reform of the clan system.

Therefore, all the clans and vassals who are outside have to come to the southern capital to face the saints.

It's just that the King of Jin and the King of Shu are special, because they sell illicit salt, and they have to be escorted into Beijing.

Just after the Chinese New Year's Eve of the twenty-third year of Wanli, when the snow had not melted, Zhu Yijun learned about the salt situation of the Jin King's Mansion and the Shu King's Mansion in the southern capital.

"More than 700,000 citations."

"I copied so much salt!"

"Dare to be affectionate, the real big salt merchant is really my own family!"

Zhu Yijun also said this to the ministers after knowing the situation of salt copying.

Pan Jitao replied at this time: "It is indeed amazing, this is already equivalent to the output of Fujian salt for three years, but there is so much salt, in the future, even if the Yangzhou salt merchants do not sell any Huai salt, they are not afraid that the military and civilian people in the Huai salt area will have no salt to eat." ”

After hearing this, Zhu Yijun threw a piece of Zhu Ben, the former Wang Xijue, the current general of the Chinese army, and Zhang Qigong, the current general of the Tiger Benwei in his hand, about the confiscation of the family property of the three salt merchants in Yangzhou, and threw it on the case:

"Since this is the case, then at the same time as reforming the suzerain-domain system, we will officially rectify the salt administration, and we will do it at the same time!"

After speaking, Zhu Yijun instructed: "The privy envoy Governor Li Chengliang is here, the secretary of the ministry Wang Xun, the secretary of the household department Pan Jixun, the secretary of the Ministry of Rites Shen Yiyi, and the governor of Caoyun Song Yingchang to assist in this matter!" ”

"In addition, with the millions of silver paid by the salt merchants to the imperial court as the second assistant to Wang Qing's family, and the Daming Bank as the silver money issued to the small people for special small loans, all of which are interest-free, I don't believe that there are no ordinary people who are unwilling to borrow money to open small shops and sell salt to make small profits!"

"Yes!" (End of chapter)