Zhao Ning and his people followed the old man and walked all the way to the countryside ahead.

When we arrived at a place not far ahead, we saw a lot of people gathered around us.

A young man, holding an iron rod in his hand, stepped on a young man's head with one foot.

"I told you that the court is short of food now. I am here to buy food under the orders of the government. To buy food, do you understand? I will give you money!"

He crushed the young man's head with his foot.

The young man's face was covered with mud, but he did not dare to resist.

"Fellow folks, we are here to buy food! Baozheng, come here!"

"Come here, come here, Mr. Li." A middle-aged man trotted over with a smile on his face.

In the early years of the Song Dynasty, the traditional rural system was still in place. After Wang Anshi's reforms, the Baojia system was fully implemented in the Song Dynasty.

Until the fall of the Northern Song Dynasty, the Baojia system did not disappear and continued in the Southern Song Dynasty.

Even the Lijia system of the Ming Dynasty had some similarities with the Baojia system.

"Master Li, here we come."

Mr. Li stepped on the young man with one foot, held an iron rod in his left hand, and said in a kind tone: "Wang Baozheng, you have to explain to the villagers that I am here to buy food under the order of the imperial court.

Do not misunderstand."

"I explained everything to them."

"They still ran away after explaining it?"

Wang Guangguao said anxiously: "Master Li, please wait a moment, I will send people to search from house to house now."

"What are you searching for!" Li Zhu said impatiently, "I told you that you are here to buy food. You and I buy it voluntarily, do you understand?"

"I know! I know!" Wang Baozheng nodded quickly.

Li Zhu lowered his voice in Wang Baozheng's ear and gritted his teeth and said: "Wang Baozheng, keep an eye on it. You need to understand that for every stone sold in the city for the food here, you can get 100% of the money! 100%! When can you make money?

So much money!”

"Yes! I'm going now!"

Wang Baozheng and his men turned around and started knocking on doors from door to door.

Li Zhu crushed the young man at his feet: "Resist! You continue to resist! Weren't you very brave just now! You dare to hit me! Do you know that I am sent by the imperial court! Someone come and drag him away.

Go down and break his legs!"

At this time, a middle-aged couple hurried over.

"My lord, spare my life! My lord, spare your life!"

As soon as they came over, they knelt in front of Li Zhu.

"The dog is ignorant and has offended the officials. The officials should spare him. He is the only child in my family."

Li Zhu kicked the middle-aged man on the head: "Hand over all your food. If you hand over all your food, I will spare him!"

"Sir, our family really has no food. If you give it to us any more, we will starve to death!"

"If you don't pay, I will break his legs in front of you!"

The young man lay on the ground and shouted with difficulty: "Dad, don't hand it over, even if you beat me to death!"

"You have such a tough talk! Beat him to death! Let's see if it's the tough talk of these people or the iron rod of this young master!"

Li Zhu's henchmen were about to take action when suddenly a voice came: "Stop!"

Li Zhu and others went looking for a reputation, but saw Zhao Ning and his men galloping towards them on horseback in the distance.

When Li Zhu saw that these people were riding horses, he immediately took his feet away.

He knew that these people had a background.

In the Song Dynasty, common people could not ride horses.

Horses are strategic materials. The Song Dynasty was famous for its shortage of horses. Many officials did not have horses.

Zhao Ning rushed over with his people.

He glanced at the scene in front of him, then looked around, seeing Wang Baozheng leading his henchmen knocking on the door from door to door, and some were even kicking the door.

Zhao Ning was immediately furious.

His eyes fell on Li Zhu and he said in a deep voice: "What are you doing?"

Li Zhu was not afraid either, he said: "This official, I am Li Zhu, Li Huan is my father."

Gao Qiu quickly explained on the side: "Sir, Li Huan is a well-known wealthy businessman in Tokyo City and one of the businessmen who cooperated with the imperial court. Half a year ago, the Li family and the imperial court used Chinese and French money to exchange a lot of grain."

What he said about exchanging grain was that the Li family gave out grain and received salt or tea at the tea farm in the capital.

At that time, the distribution of food in Tokyo was uneven, and Zhao Ding, who had the power to know the governor of Kaifeng, called on many large households to provide food.

Zhao Ning remembers this incident.

Those big players charge very high prices.

After 37 officials were killed last time, he asked the Ministry of Justice to start investigating businessmen who had dealings with those officials.

Unexpectedly, I met a big businessman from Tokyo here today.

I didn’t expect that!

After Li Zhu heard Gao Qiu's explanation, he started to climb up the pole: "My father Li Huan is friends with Wang Qingzhi, the official of Kaifeng Prefecture."

The recommended officials of Kaifeng Prefecture he mentioned were subordinate officials in the Yamen of Kaifeng Prefecture.

Gongsun Ce in "Bao Qingtian" is an official who is in charge of prison litigation and punishment, as well as household registration and tax collection. He is equivalent to a department-level official in the province.

Gao Qiu quickly added in Zhao Ning's ear: "Wang Qingzhi is the official of Kaifeng Prefecture."

Although Gao Qiu is a scoundrel, he is absolutely nothing to say in terms of academics. He was once Su Shi's bookboy, and his endorsement and memory are absolutely fine.

Now that the Imperial City Division is expanding its recruitment, it is also within his duties to write down the list of officials in Kaifeng Prefecture.

If the emperor asked him one day and couldn't answer, he would probably be scolded.

From this point of view, our Captain Gao's work attitude is now very good.

Zhao Ning asked: "What are you doing?"

However, Li Zhu did not answer directly, but said: "Young master, your surname is great and your accent is from Bianjing. It is fate that we meet. Let's make friends."

"I ask you what are you doing?" Zhao Ning's tone became cold, "Don't you understand me?"

When Li Zhu heard Zhao Ning's condescending tone, he immediately felt unhappy.

A young man like Li Zhu, who grew up in a wealthy family, is usually surrounded by stars.

However, when he saw people like Zhao Ning riding horses and having unusual status, he did not dare to be too arrogant.

He smiled and said: "Official, we are here to buy food, and we will leave after buying it."

"Why do you beat people when you buy food?"

"I didn't hit anyone. He just fell down on his own. He fell down in front of me. Ask him if he fell down on his own."

The middle-aged man took the opportunity and immediately came over to help his son up. Without waiting for his son to speak, he hurriedly said: "Yes! We fell down ourselves!"

Li Zhu spread his hands and said, "You heard it too. They all said they fell by themselves."

Zhao Ning sneered. He did not dwell too much on this issue and continued to ask: "Who asked you to buy food?"

"The imperial court!"

"Court?" The smile on Zhao Ning's face became even more kind. This kind of kindness looked very kind to outsiders. Even Han Shizhong, who didn't know the emperor well, felt that the emperor was a kind person.

But Gao Qiu was already prepared.

Zhao Ning continued: "There is a shortage of food everywhere now. Do the people here have extra food at home? Who in the court asked you to buy it?"
Chapter completed!