Lu Wenhuan slapped the case and got up, furious.

The situation in Suzhou is changing rapidly every day, and its development is far beyond everyone's expectations.

"Chief Assistant, I will arrange troops and horses to enter Suzhou as quickly as possible to put down the rebellion!" Lu Wenhuan said sternly. At this moment, what happened in Suzhou has been defined by him as a rebellion.

"Lü Shangshu, the surrounding areas must be sealed tightly. They must not be allowed to roam around. Including Suzhou, the surrounding areas are rich and prosperous. If they are allowed to wreak havoc everywhere, our losses will be huge." Cen Zhong

warned.

Lu Wenhuan nodded and said: "Don't worry, Mr. Cen. After the incident happened, I immediately issued an order to the surrounding imperial troops, asking them to abide by their duties, take care of their own people, and guard their own doors."

"How did things develop to this point all of a sudden?" Cen Zhong picked up a report that had just been delivered to him on the table, still a little surprised.

Suzhou is no longer just a small-scale civil unrest.

Shi Jie, the commander of the imperial army stationed in Suzhou, didn't know that he had made a mistake. He actually led his men to rebel. After killing all the officials in Suzhou Mansion and looting the treasury and arsenal, he teamed up with the Taihu Navy and escaped in a hurry.

They entered Tai Lake. According to intelligence, there were thousands of people fleeing with them.

And a robbery before leaving caused great disaster to Suzhou.

The trouble is really big now.

Taihu Lake borders Wuxi, Jiangsu to the north, Huzhou, Zhejiang to the south, and Changzhou, Jiangsu to the west, traveling thousands of miles away. There are many islands in the lake, and these people who escaped into Taihu Lake this time are basically locals. Regarding the surrounding situation, the lake

All the situations are familiar.

The difficulty of annihilating them suddenly rose to the level of hell.

"Wu Ke, tell me!" Xiao Cheng rubbed his brows and had a headache.

Wu Ke nodded: "Judging from some of the information currently available, it should be that spies from the Qi State or the Liao people have infiltrated into Suzhou. The method of attacking Xueshi Zheng this time is quite familiar.

.”

"Yes, quite familiar!" Xiao Cheng said coldly: "They used this method many times in Tokyo back then. I didn't expect that Lin Ping's bones were rotten, but these skills he had from back then were inherited by others.

Come down."

"Chongwen, so the whole thing was done by Liao spies?" Cen Zhong said.

"They are just taking advantage of the situation!" Xiao Cheng exhaled and shook his head: "This person is really not simple. He is well aware of our internal difficulties today, and he has also keenly discovered that our current reforms have caused harm to the interests of some people.

It caused great damage, first instigating the first civil unrest in Suzhou, and then advancing step by step, making the matter bigger and bigger, and finally resulted in the current situation!"

"But even so, it's just ringworm!" Lu Wenhuan sneered.

"Lv Shangshu, this person's original intention is to cause a civil war in the south!" Xiao Cheng shook his head and said: "All the evidence is increasingly pointing to specific people. If these evidences are confirmed, for these people, we will

What should we do? Should we do it according to the law or should we pretend not to know? If we want to do it according to the law, will these people be caught without any help? Moreover, for these people, this time, they are really unjust!"

"I'm afraid it's not very unfair!" Lu Wenhuan said.

Xiao Cheng shook his head: "I'd better investigate Shi Jie, the governor of Suzhou. His behavior is unreasonable."

"Do you suspect that this person has been bribed by the Liao people a long time ago?"

"Maybe it's the Puppet Qi!" Xiao Cheng said. "There are two things right now. The first thing is to stabilize Suzhou as quickly as possible. This requires our court to send senior officials to take charge. The second thing is

Try to wipe out these traitors who have escaped into Taihu Lake as quickly as possible. Lu Shangshu?"

"Don't worry, Chief Assistant, Lu Duan has already set off. Shi Congming will be able to enter Taihu Lake in ten days at the latest!" Lu Wenhuan said, "I will rush to Suzhou to take charge."

"Lu Shangshu is going, why don't I go!" A tired voice came from outside the door.

Everyone looked up, but it was the Second Assistant Secretary Junchao who limped in.

Seeing him, Lu Wenhuan stood up suddenly, snorted coldly, and walked away without even saying hello, flicking his sleeves.

Wu Xiao smiled, clasped his fists and bowed, and silently exited the Chief Assistant's Office.

Seeing these two people leaving, Cen Zhong also stood up, smiled at Si Junchao and said, "Sir, you played a little too much this time."

"Qianli, do you believe me when I say I don't know?" Si Junchao looked at Cen Zhong and said seriously.

Cen Zhong was startled, and then he laughed again: "Whether I believe it or not, it doesn't matter right now. What matters is how it ends! I still have official business to deal with, so I won't accompany you anymore and I'll take my leave!"

Xiao Cheng clapped his hands, and the clerk outside came in and cleared away the tea cups in the room.

Xiao Cheng made an inviting gesture and motioned for Si Junchao to sit down, but the position was directly opposite Xiao Cheng's major case.

After looking at the position between the two of them, Si Junchao sighed silently and sat down.

Last time I came, I still had three cups of tea.

This time, there wasn’t even a decent seat left.

"Chief Assistant, the situation in Suzhou has developed to this point, which is beyond my expectation and definitely not my original intention!" Si Junchao said.

"Company, so you know about the first civil unrest!"

Si Junchao remained silent, which was regarded as acquiescence.

"Company, I remember I said to you in private that no matter what conflicts there are, we can talk about them openly, but as long as they are passed by the court, everyone must give their full support without any restrictions.

.”

"The first assistant is good at it. Now I understand the original intention of the first assistant in formulating this court meeting. Now we only need the first assistant to propose any plan. Will there be anything that fails the court meeting?" Si Junchao shook his head and said: "

It always gets passed."

"It wasn't like this at first." Xiao Cheng said calmly: "If you get the right way, you will get a lot of help, but if you don't get the right way, you will get little help. It's nothing more than that."

"Originally, in the Suzhou Rebellion, a few insignificant people died. This is a pouring of cold water on you, Chief Minister. I want you to calm down and think about the interests of the people of Jiangnan. You cannot put the people of Jiangnan at risk for your Northern Expedition plan.

All are in the water and fire." Si Junchao said: "Seizing profits from the people and imposing all kinds of harsh policies on the people of Jiangnan are unacceptable to the people of Jiangnan."

"Are you talking about the method of recruiting soldiers, the method of young crops, or the method of paying taxes and grain as one body?" Xiao Cheng said.

"They are all!" Si Junchao said seriously. "Taizu said back then that you and the scholar-bureaucrats will rule the world together. Over the past hundreds of years, the Song Dynasty has been prosperous and this has been the case. But Chief Assistant, you have gone too far now.

In your eyes, the gentry is worse than the poor people in Guizhou!"

Xiao Cheng did not speak, but stood up, took down a file from the bookshelf behind him, and pushed it in front of Si Junchao.

"This is a series of statistics and analysis on the population, acres of land, merchants, looms, agricultural taxes, commercial taxes and other issues related to the national economy and people's livelihood in various places in the south of the Yangtze River in the past ten years." Xiao Cheng said: "It looks like flowers are blooming, but in reality

I was already sitting on the crater of the volcano this morning. Let’s not talk about other places. Let’s talk about how many proletarians there are in Jiangning Prefecture. How many people don’t have overnight food? How many people don’t have a roof over their heads?

There is no trace of soil under the body? In the past ten years, the population has not increased but decreased. Is this true? If it is not true, where did these extra people go? Agricultural taxes were originally in our Song Dynasty.

It is very low, but even with such a low tax, it is still getting less and less, because there are fewer and fewer homesteaders. Where have they gone? Where have those acres gone? When you walk to the street, you can see that commercial activities are extremely prosperous.

Commercial tax itself is also the foundation of the Song Dynasty, but the current commercial tax revenue is still the same as the commercial tax revenue ten years ago."

Having said this, Xiao Cheng's face turned very ugly.

"Even in the transactions of bulk materials controlled by the imperial court, you have to get involved in those transactions and seek benefits from them. Maritime trade has such huge interests, but you are unwilling to pay taxes and still engage in large-scale smuggling.

Company, if Taizu knew that the scholar-bureaucrat he spoke of looked like this, do you think he would kick open the coffin board, jump out, and beat you to death one by one with a stick?"

Si Junchao's face looked extremely ugly.

"A gentleman loves money and gets it in a wise way!" Xiao Cheng said coldly: "The scholar-bureaucrat class is an elite class. They should know that only when they have a country can they have a family. They should know that if the nest is overturned, how can the eggs be left intact?

But each and every one of them has their eyes covered by greed, unable to get in or out. Don’t you know that if this continues, you will destroy yourself?”

"Shoufu is exaggerating!" Si Junchao said.

"Exaggerating?" Xiao Cheng said angrily: "Can't the Suzhou incident explain the problem? Are you not allowed to participate in the Qingmiao Law? You despise the 10% interest rate as too little. What you want is huge profits. The tax bureau is stationed.

Why are you afraid? Because the amount of taxes you have evaded over the years is too huge!"

"Chief Assistant, no matter what happened before, when things have developed to this point, there is definitely a third party force that is adding fuel to the flames and sowing discord. This is definitely not our intention!" Si Junchao shouted.

"You are not stupid, and you know that someone is taking advantage of you!" Xiao Cheng said: "But there are no seams in the eggs, how can flies bite in? The fence is not tied properly, and wild dogs can get in, how can you complain?

Who?"

"Go back to Suzhou and let Suzhou return to normal within one month!"

"Then what? You can restrain the traitors in Taihu Lake with just one word!" Xiao Cheng asked with a sneer.

Si Junchao looked extremely ugly.

It certainly can't be done.

Shi Jie killed dozens of people in the Suzhou government office and robbed the government treasury, grain warehouse, and arsenal. This was already a serious crime that implicated the nine clans. It would be a daydream to try to keep him tied up.

"I won't bother you with the pacification of Suzhou. Luo Xin is already ready to set off." Xiao Cheng said coldly.

Luo Xin, the nephew of Luo Kaixian, the leader of the Jiangnan Silk Weaving Guild, is currently in the Sixth Division.

The Luo family has considerable influence in the Jiangnan areas, and his own family is even richer. In order to make his nephew prosperous, Luo family will definitely try his best to help Luo Xin restore peace to Suzhou in the shortest possible time.

"As for countering the rebellion in Taihu Lake, hehe, Lu Shangshu has also made arrangements. The various garrisons around Taihu Lake are already in full formation. We don't ask them to suppress the bandits. We only need to keep an eye on our homes. And Lu Duan and Shi Congming will set off soon.

.I would like to see how long this Shi Jie can last?"

Both Lu Duan and Shi Congming were experienced and brave generals who followed Lu Conghuan and fought in the mountains of corpses and seas of blood in Xiangfan. Although Shi Jie was also a senior general, he had never experienced a major disaster in his life.

Fighting, comparing the two, Xiao Cheng didn't think that the other party could stir up much trouble with the full cooperation of these two people.

He was worried that something might happen to the generals stationed nearby.
To be continued...