Zhu Yuan first learned in-depth about what was going on at the grassroots level. Fangshan’s impact was great. Zhu Yuan was a child and was always by Zhu Hongsan’s side when he was a child. He spent his childhood in Guangzhou and Nanjing, and young people spent his youth in Beijing. These three places are the core of Zhu Hongsan’s power. Those officials wanted to show their most glorious side to the emperor, and naturally cut the tofu with their sides.

But it is different if you leave the capital. Fangshan is only more than fifty miles away from the capital, and there are disaster victims everywhere and refugees everywhere, which is completely different from what Zhu Yuan heard in the court.

When Yu Chenglong saw Zhu Yuan’s depressed consciousness, he didn’t know what to say. In fact, Shuntian Prefecture is pretty good. At least Fangshan is close to the capital, and the relief grain transported from the south can still be leaked into the county. If those remote prefectures, such as Shanxi and Shaanxi, are intoxicated by people, the situation is tens of thousands of times worse than here.

Zhu Yuan's imperial envoy set out south the next day, and Xu Youdao came to see him off. Zhu Yuan did not see him at all, which made Xu Youdao very embarrassed.

After more than ten years of war in northern China, coupled with the years of occupation by the Qing Dynasty, the number of people in various prefectures and counties fled, which formed a large number of refugees. In Shuntian Prefecture, which was close to the capital, Baoding Prefecture was still a little short of it. Because it was close to the capital, local officials naturally did not want these refugees to delay His Majesty's happy life, so they sent inspection departments and local yamen runners to either resettle the refugees or drive them directly to Henan. Anyway, the court has a law that Henan needs a large number of people, so it saves some trouble to drive these refugees to Henan.

Zhu Yuan and his party passed by Zhending Prefecture, which was later Shijiazhuang. The number of large refugees around began to increase. Of course, unlike the situation when hundreds of thousands or millions of refugees passed through the prefectures and provinces at the Ming Dynasty, the refugees are now divided into small groups ranging from dozens or hundreds of people. Driven by local officials from various prefectures and counties along the way, they slowly followed the official road to Henan. As for how many people could reach Henan alive, it was not controlled by local officials.

Zhu Yuan's team had more than 700 people, and they were all armed with guns and ammunition. It was obvious that they were not good at it. So when the large refugees on the official road saw the government's army coming, they fled to the distance to hide, leaving only some old and weak standing on both sides of the official road, hoping to beg for some food from these officials.

Zhu Yuan stood in the carriage and looked at the refugees on both sides. They were like skeletons. Some women were completely unclothed in their clothes, but they were so hungry that they were not ashamed. They looked at the convoy with empty eyes, trying to get some food to survive.

Although Zhu Yuan was considered an adult in the Ming Dynasty, he was only a junior high school student of fifteen or sixteen years old in his later generations, and he had seen this there. At this time, a shout came from the front of the team: "Damn it, these corpses are trampling away, why don't you know if you block the old man's way?"

When Zhu Yuan heard that he was talking, he was the deputy commander Ding Changsheng, who was accompanying the guard. How did this guy look so heartless? These refugees are so pitiful that they still want to scold them?

Zhu Yuan said to the guards beside him: "Go and find Commander Ding!"

After a while, Ding Changsheng came. Ding Changsheng was originally a military household in Shaanxi and later joined the bandits. He was one of the bandits captured by Zhu Hongsan in Xinyang. Ding Changsheng had a high qualification in the army. If he was placed in the local army, he would be a regiment commander, but he would be half a square in the Imperial Guard Division, so he became a deputy regiment commander and battalion commander.

Ding Changsheng, who was in his forties and covered in tendons, came to Zhu Yuan and bowed and asked, "Prince, are those corpses on the road hindering the prince's view? The official will send someone to drive them away!"

Zhu Yuan knew that the battalion commanders of these imperial guard divisions were the absolute confidants of his father, so he could not speak too much, so he had to say earnestly: "Captain Ding, these people are so pitiful, don't drive them away and give them some of the rations we brought!"

Ding Changsheng was stunned and asked, "What? Prince, do you want to share our rations with them?"

Zhu Yuan nodded firmly and said, "Yes!"

"Prince, we have just left Zhending Mansion, and it is still hundreds of miles away from Shunde Mansion ahead. What should we eat for these roads?"

Ding Changsheng was born into a military household in Shaanxi. The war started in Shaanxi at the end of the Ming Dynasty. Ding Changsheng naturally became accustomed to the refugees who were about to starve to death, so he did not take it seriously. However, he did not expect that this little prince discovered his conscience and insisted on saving these poor people.

Zhu Yuan disliked this rude and unlearning Qiu Ba along the way, but there was no way. This guy was the confidant of his father and was sent to protect him. So Zhu Yuan suppressed his dissatisfaction and said, "Captain Ding, I am the imperial envoy and the supervisor of this team. Now I order you to take out half of the food and give it to those refugees!"

Ding Changsheng is the third leader of this team, so he naturally knows that Zhu Yuan is the ears of a deaf person. The actual person in charge of this imperial envoy team is Yu Chenglong, the teacher of King Yan. So Ding Changsheng looked at Yu Chenglong with his eyes and asked what to do!

Yu Chenglong sighed. He knew that there were thousands of refugees on the road now, and there were still thousands of refugees watching from afar. The food he brought was really like a drop in the bucket. But now that Zhu Yuan’s love is flooded, he couldn’t refuse Zhu Yuan’s opinion in person, so he had to say to Ding Changsheng: "Captain Ding, go and see how much food there is in the team, leave enough for us to go to Shunde, and all the others will be distributed to the refugees!"

When Ding Changsheng saw Yu Chenglong speaking, he had no choice but to take a platoon of soldiers to distribute the food.

Zhu Hongsan has always treated his soldiers well. He ate the fine rice produced in Guangdong, and also prepared a large number of bacon and other non-staple foods. Now all of them are cheaper than those refugees.

These refugees who were already hungry and breathed in one breath rushed up like hungry wolves. Whether it was rice, bacon or raw, they opened their pockets and ate. Ding Changsheng saw that the refugees gathered more and more, so he did not dare to stay here. He quickly placed the food on the ground and rushed out of the crowd with the imperial envoy team.

These foods have become delicacies to attract sharks. Displaced people far away saw food here and began to gather. Some strong men began to rob the food from the hands of the old and weak. At first, they just robbed them, and then someone was killed. For a moment, there was a wailing sound among the refugees.

But there was only so much food, but there were five or six thousand refugees. Those who did not grab the food put their hopes on the team again. Some malicious refugees began to pick up wooden sticks and stones to grab the food.

Ding Changsheng had already expected this ending, and these starving ghosts would definitely not give up. Ding Changsheng saw the refugees gathered up with bad intentions and directly ordered his soldiers to shoot. For a moment, gunfire sounds were everywhere, and a large number of refugees were killed on the spot. However, the musket still had some effect, and the remaining refugees began to flee in all directions. After all, they could have been hungry for a few days to escape, and there was no way out when they faced the musket.

When Zhu Yuan saw hundreds of refugees who were beaten to death in front of him, and those who were beaten to death for robbing food in the distance, he did not expect that he just wanted to give them a way out and actually killed them.

Ding Changsheng walked over cursingly: "King Yan, old... the lower official said that these roads are not pitiful at all. You see, these guys are just arrogant and can kill them according to the lower official's wishes, and can also reduce some trouble for local officials! Now, half of our food is gone, and it is still hundreds of miles away from Shunde. What if there is any problem on the way?"

Ding Changsheng followed Zhu Hongsan to fight in the north and south, and was extremely convinced by the emperor, but he really didn't respect this young prince of fifteen or sixteen. The reason was very simple. The army looked at military achievements, and his background was useless. Moreover, Zhu Yuan was not the prince yet. As the emperor's confidant, Ding Changsheng naturally did not attach much importance to Zhu Yuan.

Yu Chenglong looked at Ding Changsheng who was chattering, and then looked at Zhu Yuan's face getting worse and worse. Yu Chenglong interrupted Ding Changsheng and said, "Captain Ding, there is nothing you have to do here, go ahead!"

Ding Changsheng left with his fists. Zhu Yuan looked at the dead refugees and sighed for a long time before sighing and asked: "Teacher, I used to think that I had the rule of my father in the palace. Although there were people in the world who couldn't eat enough, there were absolutely no refugees. Now this way really opened my eyes!"

"The prince, Zhang Yanghao of the Yuan Dynasty, said in the remarks of Tongguan: Prosperity means the suffering of the people; destruction means the suffering of the people, it is not unreasonable!"

"Teacher, I think the letters from the Guangdong governor to his father's emperor are transported to hundreds of ships of food in the north every year. How could there be so many refugees in Zhending Prefecture?"

"Prince, hundreds of ships of grain are seen as a lot, but there are more than a billion people in the northern provinces? In addition to these refugees, there are also hundreds of thousands of troops from Liaodong and the northwest. They also want to eat. These hundreds of ships of grain are really a drop in the bucket!"

Speaking of the war between Liao, East and West, Zhu Yuan couldn't help but ask: "Teacher, students don't understand why there is no major war in Liaodong and northwest, why does the father still have to maintain such a number of troops in these two places. I heard from Master Chen of the Military Affairs Office that there are 60,000 new troops in Liaodong, 80,000 other auxiliary troops, 50,000 new troops in the northwest, 70,000 other guards and patrol battalions, which is too wasteful to the people and money!"

This point mentioned by Zhu Yuan was one of the main contradictions between Zhu Hongsan and the cabinet. The cabinet believed that there was no major war in the country and that domestic production should be fully developed now. There is no need to maintain so many troops on the border. However, Emperor Zhu Hongsan insisted on maintaining a total of more than 500,000 troops in the northwest, Liaodong and southwest. This was really a big burden for the Ming Dynasty that had just ended the war.

Yu Chenglong is also one of the civil servants, so he naturally opposes the emperor's military and military style, but what can he say in front of the emperor's son? There is no way Yu Chenglong had to sigh and said, "His Majesty the Emperor started his business with those military generals, so he naturally needs to give them convenience. This is reasonable!"

Yu Chenglong did not dare to say bad things about the emperor, so he had to put all his shit on the leaders of the military generals.
Chapter completed!