Chongzhen has never been very kind to this cheap old man in his heart.

In real history, Guozhang Zhou Kui was a greedy and brazen person.

In the last years of Chongzhen, he once mobilized his imperial relatives and civil and military officials around him to donate money, and the first thing he found was naturally the closest father-in-law.

It is said that over the years, Chongzhen has rewarded the Zhou family again and again, not to mention hundreds of thousands of taels, not to mention that after Zhou Kui was named Jiadingbo, he relied on the prestige of the emperor's relatives to collect wealth everywhere, and the name of the rich is known all over the world.

As a result, this guy only took out five thousand taels for the first time. Empress Zhou was afraid that Chongzhen would be unhappy, so she specially sent some of her savings from the palace to make up tens of thousands of taels.

Unexpectedly, this week, Kui even had to eat kickbacks for his daughter, and in the end it was only a few thousand taels handed over to Chongzhen, and he cried and sold miserably.

Chongzhen naturally couldn't do anything with him, and even took other relatives and officials to do the same, and in the end, this subsidy was gone.

Chongzhen, who has experienced many simulations, also hates Zhou Kui's bad qualities.

As long as he finds some way to grow his industry and rejuvenate the country's finances, Kui came over to mix it up this week, and almost messed up Chongzhen's new policy a few times.

When he enjoyed the benefits, he was there, and when Chongzhen was temporarily short of money, he asked him to turn around, and this person was also said to be sick and couldn't pull out a dime. It can be said that he has never been able to contribute to the effort.

After going back and forth, Chongzhen completely understood what this cheap old man was.

However, this time the rectification of the salt policy and the use of Jiading Bo Zhoukui are also a key part of the plan.

Therefore, Chongzhen still pinched his nose and went to this Zhou ceremony.

The royal family grabbed Zhou, and naturally did not put ordinary people with any abacus, swords and other daily things for a living.

After the week, the five princes were laid on the ground with books such as the subset of scriptures and histories.

The little prince touched the ground east and west, and finally hugged a copy of "Historical Records".

Chongzhen bowed his head and said, "When he opens the Mengmeng, I will order a master for him from among the Hanlin Cichen, and teach him the "Historical Records" first. ”

After the week, she was naturally grateful, and hugged the little prince to practice thanksgiving.

Zhou Kui, the old man on the side, said with a shy face, "Your Majesty, I have also specially asked skilled craftsmen to prepare a batch of objects here, why don't you let the little prince catch them?" ”

Chongzhen also wanted to see what kind of medicine this guy was selling in his stomach, so he nodded and agreed.

Zhou Kuiru got the treasure, took out a pile of sonorous jasper pendants from the silk sac next to him, and placed them on the mat that grabbed Zhou.

Chongzhen took a closer look, and it turned out that this jasper pendant was actually divided into the shape of the rich provinces in the two capitals and thirteen provinces by the craftsman.

Good guy, Chongzhen's face changed, where could he not know that this was Zhou Kui's pretense of arresting Zhou, hoping to set a fief for these five princes to go out in the future.

However, at this time, the little guy was already lying on the ground, comparing and playing with each other. Chongzhen was inconvenient to stop immediately.

After all, according to the practice of the royal family, if it is not the prince, he must go out of Beijing to become a vassal, if he has a move, maybe someone with a heart will misinterpret it as he is dissatisfied with the prince, and keep the fifth child to take the heir with him.

The little prince pouted his buttocks, chose between east and west, and finally chose a jade pendant, babbling excitedly.

However, Chongzhen and Zhou Hou were not as excited as him, because he chose Zhejiang Province, which was rich in wealth.

The vassal kings of the Ming Dynasty, even if they were favored, no one was sealed in Nanzhili and Zhejiang. Because this is the economic lifeline of the Ming Dynasty, Nanzhi even has a complete set of court teams, and if a vassal king rebels, it will inevitably cause a catastrophe.

Even if the vassal kings themselves were to keep to themselves, the proliferation of the clan over time would cause serious erosion of the tax base.

Zhou Hou naturally understood this truth, squatted down, and wanted to take back this jade pendant from Lao Wu's hand.

However, children don't understand so much, they just think that adults want to snatch their favorite things, hold on tightly and don't let go, and start rolling all over the ground.

Guozhang Zhou Kui said to Chongzhen on the side, "Your Majesty, the prince is talented and intelligent, and he seems to have a relationship with Zhejiang. In addition, the land of Huguang and the Central Plains, which had been in the domain before, were already full of feudal kings, and they were very crowded. Why don't you choose a fief for him from this Zhejiang Province? ”

Chongzhen chuckled in his heart. Good guy, this is a son-in-law who eats his grandson.

Zhou Kui's fiefdom of Jiading was originally in Zhejiang, and if there was another grandson of his own who was crowned king here, then even if Chongzhen and the future emperor were not there, they could still rely on their relationship with this vassal king to collect money everywhere and be lawless.

did not answer, but Ling left and right took a cup of sweet cheese and went to exchange it with the little prince.

Sure enough, there was something delicious as bait, and the little prince was no longer obsessed with the "toy" in his hand, and obediently put down the jade pendant, and ate the sweet food.

After eliminating the turmoil in front of him, Chongzhen said to Zhou Kui with a smile, "The national lord is here, it's not all for the fifth child to catch Zhou, right?" If there is anything, let's sit down and talk about it. ”

Although Zhou Kui's plan to crown his grandson as the king failed, he was a little stupid. But when he heard Chongzhen take the initiative to mention his needs, he hurriedly followed to the banquet.

During the banquet, without saying a few words, Zhou Kui began to cry poorly, saying that Zhou Hou's younger brother was about to get married, and he couldn't handle it shabbyly, and he lost the emperor's face.

However, the Qincha sent by the emperor to patrol the salt was a lawless villain, and he actually replaced all the salt of the Zhou family with the Laizhou salt field.

Although Laizhou also produces salt, the quality is not as good as Huai salt, not to mention that it does not have the advantage of the confluence of the canal, Huai River and Yellow River of the two Huai rivers, which is high cost and low profit.

In this way, the emperor previously rewarded 200,000 taels worth of salt, but now it is only worth less than 50,000 taels, how can this handle the marriage? can only ask the emperor to make the decision for his brother-in-law.

Chongzhen also laughed after hearing this, and when he saw Zhou Hou on the side, he was obviously embarrassed by his father's insatiable greed, and couldn't help but complain secretly.

Could it be that this is the Daming Brother Demon?

However, Chongzhen had already prepared for this.

Pretending to sigh and said, "I don't know, in recent days, many people have talked about this in my ear. ”

Zhou Kui was overjoyed when he heard this, "Your Majesty, it seems that this Liu Zongzhou is really stubborn and self-serving, and he has committed public anger, and I hope that Your Majesty will transfer him back to investigate thoroughly and take back his fate!" ”

Chongzhen sneered in his heart, he gave up halfway, was mean and unkind, wouldn't he really become Chongzhen.

"Jiading Bo, Liu Zong's Zhou patrol salt is from my handwriting. Now, although there is a slight obstacle, how can you give up eating because of choking? ”

When Zhou Kui heard this distant salutation, he knew that Chongzhen was a little angry, and restrained himself slightly.

Chongzhen said again, "You don't know that over the years, due to the siltation of salt, not only has the salt tax revenue of the imperial court decreased sharply, but also the private salt has also flooded because of the high price of official salt, which has also damaged the value of your salt introduction." ”

Zhou Kui argued, "Your Majesty, although there is something wrong with the salt administration, the salt in our hands can at least be worth at least seventy or eighty percent of the price. But as soon as Liu Zongzhou stirs up like this, we will only have two or three percent of the benefits. ”

Chongzhen smiled slightly, "In this case, I have a compromise method, and I am about to ask Jiading Bo and Counselor I to do one or two." ”