The ten-month defense war in Nanjing ended. Although Nanjing avoided the massacre of the city like Yangzhou, Nanjing also paid the price of more than 100,000 casualties in this defense war. In addition to the soldiers who died on the battlefield, a large number of civilians died on the battlefield. Ordinary residents in the city also starved to death by Ma Cheng's surplus grain collection system.

Although people died, life still had to continue. After Nanjing rescued the siege, merchants who were trafficking in grain from various prefectures and counties around entered Nanjing again. The big grain merchants in the city were basically cleaned up by Ma Cheng, and such a large blank market was extremely tempting. So in less than a month, the grain market in Nanjing was divided up again, and Nanjing City also started its usual singing and dancing to peace again.

Nanjing slowly got on track, but Ma Cheng was idle. Ma Cheng had already estimated that he had made such a great contribution and would be jealous of others, and the emperor would be wary of him. However, what Ma Cheng did not expect was that the Lin Party of the Middle East of the North was so shameless. Under the leadership of Qian Qianyi, he criticized him for his own faults. He ignored the huge gap in strength with the Qing Dynasty and went out to fight in the city. Fortunately, God blessed the victory of this battle, and no matter where the emperor was safe?

Emperor Zhu Lunkui also stood on the side of the Donglin Party, and the final result of the court meeting actually directly removed Ma Cheng's military power.

Of course, Ma Cheng's contribution was placed there, and the emperor would not directly issue an order to let him go home. Instead, it was tactful to say that in order to defend Nandu for the past year, Ma Cheng gave Ma Cheng two months off to let him rest at home. At the same time, he handed over the most critical position of the Admiral of Nandu to Lu Siye, and also handed over the position of the Military and Ma Si in the city to Mei Chun, the commander of Xiaolingwei who made great contributions.

Although Ma Cheng still holds the position of Nandu, his subordinates' rights were basically undermined by Lu Siye and Mei Chun. So Ma Cheng was very depressed this month. Today, taking advantage of the good weather, he took his wife and children to the other courtyard on the shore of Xuanwu Lake to relax.

Although the weather was still a little cold in March, the willow trees by the lake had already sprouted and drifted with the spring breeze. The number of pleasure boats on the lake began to increase. Although many people died in Taipingmen during the Nanjing Defense Battle, this cannot delay the nobles in the city's travel to the lake to relax.

Ma Cheng's villa is from the former Duke of Wei's Mansion, and the pleasure boat is naturally very luxurious. Ma Cheng's family is sitting on the pleasure boat and traveling through Xuanwu Lake. Several wives and concubines stood by the boat and watched the scenery, but Ma Cheng did not have the leisure to sit in the boat warehouse and stared outside in a daze. Ma Cheng's women knew that their master was in a bad mood, so no one dared to come over and talk to Ma Cheng to the point of being bad.

Kou Baimen is an alternative among Ma Cheng's wives and concubines. She was not accepted by others because of her background problems, so Kou Baimen stood with his wife Gu Miaoyin for a while before returning to the ship warehouse.

When Kou Baimen saw Ma Cheng sitting there in a daze, he knew why his master was depressed. Ma Cheng's wife and concubines were either young and didn't know the taste of sorrow, or they were too old and had seen through the world. Although Kou Baimen came from a prostitute, he always cared about the world, so he understood the master's suffering very much.

Kou Baimen came to Ma Cheng and asked in a low voice, "Master, the weather is good today, don't you go out to watch the scenery with your wife?"

Ma Cheng sighed, pulled Kou Baimen over and sat on his lap, then touched Kou Baimen's small hand and asked, "Master Kou, are you Han Shizhong or Yue Fei?"

Baimen heard Ma Cheng say this and smiled, "Master, you are not Han Shizhong or Yue Fei's, and the current emperor is not Zhao Gou! If Master, you are Yue Fei, then wouldn't the old master become Qin Hui?"

Ma Cheng smiled when he heard Kou Baimen say this. Although he is idle by the emperor now, his situation is much stronger than Han Shizhong and Yue Fei. Needless to say, the ending of Yue Fei, Han Shizhong was also exempted from all official positions and went home to retire. But now the emperor just asked Ma Cheng to go home to recuperate, and the rights in his hands have not been reduced at all. Of course, the promotion of Lu Siye and Mei Chun is just the emperor protecting himself. After all, he trusts you, Ma Cheng, and the emperor will never put his safety on Ma Cheng alone.

"Don't worry, Master, the threat from the Northern Barbarians is still very great. As long as the emperor wants to restore the Ming Dynasty, he will definitely re-activate the master. Maybe the emperor really wants to give the master a rest?"

Ma Cheng felt much more relaxed when he heard Kou Baimen's persuasion. Without pressure, Ma Cheng's hand began to be honest. He was about to put his hand into Kou Baimen's underwear and stroked it. When he knew that the curtain was lifted, Ma Cheng's eldest wife Gu Miaoyin walked in.

Gu Miaoyin was just watching the scenery outside. He was from the mountainous area of ​​Guizhou and had never seen such beautiful scenery as Jiangnan, so he was in a very good mood. According to etiquette, the eldest lady had to accompany all her wives and concubines outside, so Ma Cheng's other concubines stood beside Gu Miaoyin to serve. After a long time, Gu Miaoyin realized that Kou Baimen was missing.

Gu Miaoyin originally looked down on Kou Baimen, who was born in a prostitute, and believed that such bad women would only seduce their men, so she was very careful about Kou Baimen. Now that he was stunned, Kou Baimen has lost his sight. Do you still need to think about it? He must have entered the warehouse to seduce the master while he was not paying attention.

With jealous thoughts, Gu Miaoyin didn't have the heart to see the scenery. She turned around and got off the observation platform and entered the boat warehouse.

After entering the warehouse, he was just seeing Ma Cheng touching Kou Baimen, and Kou Baimen looked like he was eager to refuse and greet him. Gu Miaoyin was so moved that he saw that he looked shameless. Gu Miaoyin was so angry that he saw Ma Cheng's shameless look. He glared at Kou Baimen, and then asked, "Aunt Kou is so kind, I'm waiting outside to watch the scenery, but you came in to seduce the master?"

Kou Baimen saw Gu Miaoyin coming in, and quickly stood up to tidy up his clothes, then stood behind Ma Cheng without saying a word. Kou Baimen knew that nothing was useful in such an occasion, but it would be better if he didn't say a word.

Sure enough, Kou Baimen’s failure to speak made Gu Miaoyin’s attention shift to Ma Cheng. Gu Miaoyin sneered, “Didn’t the master say he’s in a bad mood? Didn’t he say he wanted to visit the lake? Why do he still have the intention to tease his concubine?”

Ma Cheng was not embarrassed when the good thing was caught by his eldest wife. He coughed and said, "It's nothing. Kou Mei was feeling uncomfortable just now. Master, I'll check her health!"

Ma Cheng's wife had been checked and knew what this meant. For a moment, several women were blushing and couldn't speak.

In order to ease the awkward atmosphere, Ma Cheng had to stand up and hug his eldest son Ma Yuan. Now Ma Cheng's eldest son is one year old and is three years old according to the rules of the Ming Dynasty. Ma Cheng brought his son and kissed him a few times on the face, and then asked, "Baby, is the scenery outside good?"

Ma Yuan had just turned one year old and knew what scenery was not there, but I was still very happy to hold him. He hugged Ma Cheng's face and chewed it, making Ma Cheng's face saliva.

Ma Cheng

This action made my concubine Yun Niang jealous. Yun Niang gave birth to Ma Cheng's second son, Ma Ying, three months ago. Although she was also Ma Cheng's biological son, her status was far from that of her eldest son Ma Yuan.

When Ma Yuan was born, Ma Shiying worshiped his ancestors and gave Ma Yuan a name. At the same time, the old lady Gu also visited Gu Xiying in person. However, Ma Ying had no such thing since she was born. At that time, the siege of Nanjing was in the most difficult time, and the status of the concubine's son could not be compared with the eldest son, so the old lady did not visit her mansion. Even the name was two months after she was born. Ma Shiying gave the name Ma Ying.

At the same time, we can see from the name that Ma Shiying is different about these two grandsons. The word "Ma Yuan" represents the origin, which shows that Ma Shiying attaches great importance to this eldest grandson and hopes that this eldest grandson will carry forward the Ma family in the future. But Ma Ying is different. Ying represents the clarity. Ma Shiying just hopes that this grandson will be a pure and inaction good person in the future.

"The master only knows how to get close to Brother Yuan, and forgot Brother Ying!" Yun Niang had a temper like a little pepper, but now she saw Ma Cheng being biased and naturally wanted to say a few fair words for her son.

Seeing that the concubine was unhappy, Ma Cheng glared and cursed, "What do you know? Brother Yuan, Brother Ying is the master's son, so he naturally has to treat him equally! Brother Yuan is now the commander of the light chariot. In the future, I will make contributions to the master and seek a title for Brother Ying!"

Yun Niang felt relieved when she heard Ma Cheng say this, and quickly said, "Master, Brother Ying hasn't seen Master for many days. He has been crying all these days. Did you ask Master to go back to the house to see Brother Ying?" Today I didn't bring Ma Ying when I went out to visit the lake because the wind was strong on the lake. There were no antibiotics in this era, and it would be bad if I caught a cold.

Ma Cheng nodded when he heard Yun Niang say this, "Okay, I'm fine for the past few months. I'll go to Yun Niang's yard tonight to stay in the first half of the month!"

Yun Niang was overjoyed when she heard Ma Cheng say this, and the other wives and concubines were jealous. If her eyes could kill someone, Yun Niang had already died ten thousand times.

Just when Ma Cheng's wife and concubine were jealous, Chen Qi, the butler outside the door, said, "Master, Lord Xu of the Ministry of Works, is asking for a meeting!"

Xu Zhenye was originally the Minister of Works and was mainly responsible for weapons production. This time he made great contributions to ensuring the supply of weapons in the Nanjing Defense War, so after the war, he was promoted to the Minister of Taichang Temple.

Although the Taichang Temple Minister had no rights, he was one of the little nine ministers after all, and he was definitely a second-ranked one, so Xu Zhenye was quite satisfied.

Now the biggest civil servant under Ma Cheng is Xu Zhenye. Originally, Ma Cheng's teacher Song Yingxing should have been promoted, but Old Song had already seen through the officialdom. So let alone the promotion, even the former Minister of Works resigned and devoted himself to the Military Weapons Bureau to deal with his heavy artillery. So now the only senior official close to Ma Cheng is Xu Zhenye.

As for several other civil officials who were related to Ma Cheng, Wu Jiazhou, the former prefect of Yingtian Prefecture, went to the Censorate to be the censor, and Xu Zhan, the former magistrate of Lishui County, replaced Wu Jiazhou and became the prefect of Yingtian. Although Yingtian Prefecture was considered a third-rank official, he was a local official after all, and some rumors in the court could not be heard.

Ma Cheng knew that Xu Zhenye must have something important to come at this time, so he quickly said to Chen Qi, "Please!"
Chapter completed!