At the same time.

After receiving the news, Qiu Pei, the commander of the Tongzhou Guard, Fang Sheng and others, also hurriedly took their own guards and hurriedly ran into Tongzhou City from outside the city.

"The last general, Qiu Pei, see His Highness!"

"Get up."

Zhu Di was quite impressed by the generals of Tongzhou Wei, waved his hand casually, and asked a little tiredly: "I don't know what Commander Qiu is here?" ”

Qiu Pei was speechless, you rushed into Tongzhou City with a thousand soldiers with full armor early in the morning, what else do you ask?

"The last general heard that His Royal Highness came to Tongzhou with troops, and he came to pay a visit."

"This king just came to catch a few thieves and gentry who used the name of this king to exploit and harm the people, so there is no need to make such a fuss."

At this time, Zhu Di also realized something, and explained casually.

Qiu Pei's expression was slightly relaxed.

At this time, I also noticed that under the public court, a group of Tongzhou magistrates and several famous gentry in Tongzhou who were paralyzed all over their bodies flashed with surprise in their eyes.

However, I didn't pay much attention to it.

Even, there is some schadenfreude in my heart.

These civil gentry looked down on him, and he was naturally happy to see these civil gentry unlucky.

Zhu Di was tired all night, and he didn't pay much attention to Qiu Pei, and gave an order to the officials in the court, and went directly to rest.

At this time, he took pity on Guo An and the officials of Shi Si, the governor of Yanwang's Mansion, as well as Yu Rentian, the prefect of Beiping, the officials of the Ministry of Inspection, and the officials of the Political Envoy.

Zhu Di can rest, but they can't, and they have to continue the interrogation.

The officials in Tongzhou were almost wiped out, regardless of whether they took the initiative to make mistakes or not, but from the officials to the officials, they all more or less shared some money.

Under the interrogation of the officials of the Jinyi Guard and the Prosecutor's Department, they basically confessed happily.

In fact, these officials were not much at fault, and the most heinous ones had been killed almost a year ago.

The most troublesome thing is He Ji and the other four gentry, these gentry have all read, and their hearts are darker and more treacherous, even if they are re-interrogated, they will still cry out one after another.

However, the name of Jinyiwei is not for nothing.

Let King Yan be so disgusted, every Jinyi guard did not have any softness and scruples when interrogating these gentry.

So, basically in the afternoon, these people all confessed.

Meantime.

Zhu Di also walked out of the backyard in good spirits.

Seeing this, Guo An, Pu Sanji and others, holding a pile of money and grain books in their hands, hurriedly stepped forward to report.

"Your Royal Highness, the lower officials have tried some field thieves and taken a few gentry."

"How many acres are they hiding?"

Zhu Di said with some expectation.

Pu Sanji said: "At present, it has been determined that there are fifteen field thieves who hide acres, and the number of hidden acres is 46,000 acres. ”

As soon as these words came out, Zhu Di was directly shocked.

You must know that the number of acres of land registered in Tongzhou's yellow book is only more than 105,000 acres.

After only one day of investigation, half of the hidden acres were found.

Zhu Di took the book and looked at it, all of them were gentry and sages who had hidden more than 2,000 acres of land.

There was murder in his eyes, "I have copied all these field thieves who deceive the king, and if you can hide so many acres of land, you must be a field thief who exploits and oppresses the people like He Ji."

As for the thieves who hide under a hundred acres, register them one by one, and let them make up for the taxes they have owed for so many years.

If someone doesn't want to pay, they take their farmland. ”

"Yes, Your Highness!"

Pu Sanji answered, and walked down murderously.

At this time, half of the Jinyi Guards in the entire Beiping Mansion have come to Tongzhou.

As for the Beiping Prefecture Ya, the Political Envoy Division, and the Inspectorate Department also received the news, and they all rushed to Tongzhou one by one.

At the same time, there were also five hundred households in Yanshanwei.

The entire Beiping Mansion began to shake.

Especially under the rule of Beiping Prefecture, there are many governors and counties, as well as those gentry and sages.

Hiding acres of land is already their instinct engraved in their bones.

Originally, all this was from top to bottom, and all the officials and gentry and sages of the Ming Dynasty tacitly understood common sense.

However, who would have thought that a few gentry and sages in Tongzhou would dare to hit King Yan with their ideas because of only 500 acres of land.

Moreover, it also directly lifted the lid on the hidden fields.

If this matter is spread to Yingtian and let the emperor who was born as a cowherd know about it, wouldn't it be a big deal?

At the same time, many gentry and village sages, and even officials, wrote letters one after another with anxious faces, and then hurriedly sent them out.

It's just that before them, there were already two letters, which were sent to Yingtian City in the name of the Jinyi Guard of Beiping Mansion and the Yanwang Mansion respectively.

Two days later.

Lao Zhu, who was far away in Yingtian City, received a note from Jinyiwei and Yanwangfu at the same time.

"How dare these field thieves hide so many acres of land, and they still exploit and oppress the people like this? Is it really a knife to deceive us? ”

Your Royal Highness, the crown prince Zhu Biao also finished reading the two notes, and his face was full of anger.

"These gentry and sages in Tongzhou dare to do this, don't they know that this is bullying the king?"

Lao Zhu snorted coldly: "We never believe that these village sages and gentry will be good, they used to be full of benevolence, righteousness and morality, but they are like a few crows chirping, spitting feces and croaking non-stop......"

"Biao'er, this time we want to kill people, you are not allowed to stop us. If we don't kill chickens and monkeys, if this goes on for a long time, these village sages and gentry will once again turn our Ming Dynasty into a miserable scene like the end of the Yuan Dynasty.

All the land was occupied by these gentry and sages, but they did not pay a single acre of land, and all the taxes were pressed on those people, and the people could not live......"

Zhu Biao's expression changed, and he hurriedly said: "My father wants to kill those gentry and sages who have done a lot of evil, and his sons and ministers dare not stop them.

However, I have thousands of gentry and sages, and if I kill them together, something big will happen.

Moreover, if I want to educate the township, I have to rely on these village sages and gentry.

Therefore, the sons asked their fathers to leave some of the gentry and countrymen who did not oppress and exploit the people. ”

Lao Zhu grinned, "Don't worry, Biao'er, some of the village sages and gentry who are still good, we won't kill him."

Tens of thousands of officials in our Ming Dynasty are all gentry, if we kill them all, who will govern the Ming Dynasty for us.

However, they have to spit out for us honestly as much as they swallow us, otherwise, don't blame our steel knife on their necks......"

"Father is wise."

In Zhu Biao's eyes, there was still some worry.

Although he is kind-hearted, he also knows that those gentry and sages will never hand over the hidden fields so easily.

On the throne, Lao Zhu grinned, his mouth full of yellow teeth, like a bloody mouth, "This time, let's take Beiping Mansion as an example, let's take a look, how many acres of land is hidden in just one Beiping Mansion?" ”

……

Half a month later.

The concealment of acres of fields in the seven counties and four prefectures of Beiping Prefecture has also been investigated.

In one Beiping Mansion, there are 350,000 acres of hidden fields, nearly half of the land registered in the Yellow Book of the entire Beiping Mansion.

What made Guo An a little unbelievable was that Wanping County also found out more than 10,000 acres, of which there were two gentry hiding more than 1,000 acres, and these two gentry also did a lot of evil, and they actually exploited and oppressed the people.

And these, no matter how he went down to the townships when he was the magistrate of Wanping County in the past, he didn't even notice a trace.

Naturally, both gentry were also raided.

And in the past half a month, he can be regarded as truly understanding the true meaning of family in the ancient countryside.

The interests of the family are the highest criterion in the hearts of the people in the countryside.

And how well a person behaves in the countryside depends on how much benefit he can bring to the family.

He has always pinned on the morality of the previous life as his concept of doing things in this era, but he is blind.

Here, people exist in families, as long as they are relatives who are close to each other, they are the closest family members and allies when facing outsiders.

In this era, everything can involve your family, as long as you do something wrong, or you are weak, how many people can be killed, even your family!

As the hidden acres of the Beiping Mansion reported to Yingtian City, Lao Zhu stood directly in the Fengtian Palace, and scolded the courtiers all morning with anger on his face.

In the afternoon of the same day, the holy decrees of the imperial court spread throughout all provinces, prefectures and counties in the world.

Jin Yiwei investigated the hidden fields in various provinces, states and counties.

The prefects and counties of various prefectures and counties, as well as a group of gentry, are all mourning.

Although they have their own ways to deal with the Jinyi guards who are being checked, with the support of the number of hidden acres in Beiping Mansion, the number of acres they hide will definitely not be hidden.

Moreover, if they dared to continue to hide it, those brocade guards could keep an eye on them until the day they were exposed.

As a result, in just half a month, the entire Ming Dynasty had more than 3.8 million acres of hidden fields.

Lao Zhu and the household department looked at the amount of grain and money collected in various places, and smiled with cold eyes for five days.

……

Yan Wang's Mansion, in the heart of the palace.

Zhu Di's face was full of joy.

"Guo Qing, our Yan Wangfu directly has an extra 250,000 mu of fields, do you think these fields should be dealt with?"

According to the law of the Ming Dynasty, all confiscated fields were confiscated and turned into official fields, or directly became imperial villages.

It was found that 100,000 mu of the 350,000 mu of hidden fields were some gentry and village sages with good character, and they did not raid their homes, but only made them make up the field taxes for these years.

As for the remaining 250,000 mu, it was directly confiscated.

And under the happiness of Lao Zhu, he directly gave the 250,000 mu of land confiscated by the entire Beiping Mansion to Yanwang Mansion.

As a result, the officials of the entire Beiping Mansion went up and down, and they worked hard for half a month, but in the end they didn't get anything, but they cheapened Zhu Di, the king of Yan.

However, there was such a big mess in Beiping Mansion, Lao Zhu didn't settle accounts with them, and these officials were already burning incense.

Therefore, I have no face, let alone the courage to come out and argue about this matter.

Zhu Di has been very happy in the past two days.

I bought a 500-acre piece of land near the Zhangjiawan Wharf at a low price, and even sent an additional 250,000 fields.

"Your Highness, Weichen thinks it's better to give it to the original farmers to cultivate!"

Guo An thought for a moment, then said, "As for the grain tax, the government will collect as much as the grain tax. ”

Zhu Di asked again: "What does Zhu Qing think?" ”

Zhu Fu said: "Weichen also thinks it's the best. ”

Zhu Di nodded slightly, "This matter will be handled by Zhu Qing." ”

"Wechen obeys."

Zhu replied.

……

(End of chapter)