The capital was the capital of the Ming Empire and its undoubtedly core area. If it were in the past, no matter how difficult the court was, it would not have any levies here.

Because after all, it is the capital of the empire, and there are many officials here at the foot of the emperor, especially in the concentrated areas of Qingliu officials. If you are not careful, you will impeach and write a letter, which will cause a lot of controversy in the world. Even the emperor cannot withstand it. Therefore, if you have a levy, you will not do it here. You cannot be called a political and harmonious person, but at least you will not be a random levy.

This time, the Ming Dynasty court was in a state of rage and had no choice but to make a choice.

The Ming Dynasty's finances have always been on the verge of collapse. They demolished the east wall and repaired the west wall every day. After filling holes, new one appeared in other places, but the cut of the Grand Canal made them unable to play with this trick again.

Therefore, the actions of the Liu family army also became a 7-inch vital point. They could not ignore anything they said. They could only try their best to mobilize all the forces that could be mobilized to deal with Liu thieves, and at least to regain control of the canal.

There were still several provinces in the north of the Ming Dynasty, and they did not have to rely entirely on the canal to transport the tax and silver. However, these provinces were either war or natural disasters, and most of them were in famine years.

It would be good if the court didn’t need to release money and food to provide disaster relief. Even if the court knocked on bones and sucked marrow and wanted to use it for money from this place, it would take time.

The officials of the court all knew that if the more than 100,000 troops outside the Xizhimen of the capital were not removed, there would be chaos sooner or later.

That's why they used this trick to make a big leverage from the capital and collect some money first.

In this way, all the officials were happy because they could make up for the losses from the donations a while ago, while the people complained and complained.

After all, the capital was the richest place in the Ming Dynasty. The officials decided to make money, and they really got a lot of money. The money was finally handed over to Hong Chengchou and Lu Xiangsheng and others with 500,000 taels as their military expenditure.

It can be imagined that there are 500,000 taels in their hands, and after these officials layer by layer, they plucked their hair, and they don’t know how many of them are collected. No wonder the people in the capital complained.

But they had complained, and they finally raised a life-saving money and immediately sent Hong Chengshou and Lu Xiangsheng's army to the army below, and then asked them to set off immediately.

No matter how stupid the court was, they knew that there were no ones who were officers who were not deducted military pay. Therefore, in order to prevent the little money that the court had finally obtained for life was embezzled by these officers. So this time, the six ministries and the censors of the Censorate took the roster and went to the military camp to pay. The military pay was paid for two months, but they had to be based on the hair of the human beings. The officers could not report as much as the officers, otherwise the money would be greedy.

This made the officers extremely angry. You should know that military pay has always been allocated by superiors to generals, and then to officers at all levels. This is a common practice. This is also a reflection of the authority of generals and officers. Now, it is better not to be paid directly, but to the soldiers.

This is what Liu Family Army did, but isn’t Liu Family Army a thief? Isn’t it our enemy? Why should we learn their tricks? This is also an extreme distrust of officials, which also makes these officers and generals complain, believing that if this continues, they will be in trouble.

No matter what, they finally got a sum of money, so they immediately went south to wipe out the Liu bandits in Shandong. However, there may be some problems in the process of raising the funds, that is, the court owed military pay and food pay. They just raised military pay, but the military rations were still not enough.

You should know that people are iron and food is steel. It is impossible for soldiers to go to war on hunger. The court just cared for them to raise silver for them, but forgot about military rations. In the end, there was no way. They could only ask them to buy grain in the city with the silver first, buy grain and cotton coats, and then go south in large numbers.

But the merchants in the capital discovered business opportunities. They knew that so many people wanted to buy food would definitely cause great demand, so they immediately raised the price of grain and cotton coats. These prices could only barely make people feel saturated and put on a new outfit, and then they had to fight desperately. The money in their hands flowed into the hands of merchants in a blink of an eye.

This made the soldiers complain. The soldiers were still happy after a month or two. The money was obtained. Who knew that before the money was heated up, you had to buy grain and cotton coats with the money, otherwise you would have to go to war on hunger. This really made the soldiers so angry.

You should know that the court issued grain sound, which was called grain sound. In fact, it included two parts, one part was grain, and one part was military sound. Most of the time, these soldiers had to be distributed separately. Now the court only cares about military pay, but the food pay is not paid. The soldiers have to buy it themselves. Such a magical operation is nothing, and it really makes the soldiers angry.

Even with the repeated urging of Hong Chengchou and the others, the soldiers were unwilling to buy food to fight.

When the situation developed to this point, not only the soldiers were angry, but even Emperor Chongzhen was very angry. Are these soldiers still from the Ming Dynasty? Let them fight a war? Either they want food or sound. After the military pay and food are finished, they want new weapons. This is endless. When will it be the end?

When the emperor got angry, he immediately sent Cao Huachun, who fled back from Shaanxi, to serve as the military commander, and brought a team of Jinyiwei cavalry to force these soldiers to fight. If anyone dared not listen, the officials would be arrested and the soldiers would be executed on the spot, and they would see if these people would still go.

Hong Chengchou and Lu Xiangsheng and others saw that the court's actions really made the soldiers lose their morale at all.

This battle cannot be fought.

Since ancient times, soldiers have never been allowed to fight desperately, and others have to buy food with their own military pay. The food must be covered in the army. Now the court has sent people to fight desperately, but they dare not let people eat enough. How can we fight this battle?

So Hong Chengchou and Lu Xiangsheng immediately wrote to the court, asking the court to release another piece of food. If there was not enough food, they would not be able to fight. Although the court forced them to fight first and raise food on the spot, they knew that they had been looted along the way by Jiannu, and then his army of hundreds of thousands of troops passed by, just like locusts passing through the border. Where could there be any food for them to raise?

Moreover, it is no secret that they lack food. I believe that the people of the Liu family army will also implement the policy of strengthening the walls and clearing the fields, evacuating local people and moving the food away. If you want to attack the Liu family army and then steal the other party's food, this idea is simply unreliable.

Especially Hong Chengchou, he had been taught a lesson by the Liu family army several times and was beaten several times. He knew the power of the Liu family army. It would be good to fight with them and could win the battle. He also hoped that he would steal their food as military pay after winning them. This would be too arrogant.

The court was taught a lesson by Jiannu like a grandson, but the Liu family army forced Huang Taiji's army to repel it in southern Liaoning. I don't know where the court's confidence came from. More than 100,000 people went south to fight the Liu family army, but they didn't even need to prepare food, so they asked them to prepare food by themselves and go to the Liu family army's territory to raise food on the spot.

Hong Chengchou said to Lu Xiangsheng: "The court respects us too much, but I can't do this."

Lu Xiangsheng was the best at fooling others, but when he saw this situation, he felt helpless. The court actually operated like this, and there was no one else. Since ancient times, the three armies had not moved, and the food and grass were first. They were better. The three armies had moved, but the food and grass were not moved, and the food and grass were raised in the enemy war zone. After searching through the military books, he had never heard of such a practice.

Lu Xiangsheng was a very loyal and upright person, a person who swears to be loyal to the court to the death, but when he saw this situation, he had nothing to say. He said: "Unless the court gets a sum of food, we will have no way to go."

At this time, Cao Huachun brought a large number of Jinyiwei cavalry to come. They came to inspect the barracks and found that the officers were very angry. The soldiers were angry and their morale was very low. They were all sitting in groups of three or three in the barracks, not like the barracks at all.

Cao Huachun wanted to arrest people. He thought that only some people took the lead, but when he entered the barracks, he was shocked. This was because no one incited or took the lead, and the morale of the entire army was gone. How could such troops fight?

Cao Huachun also went out to supervise the army. He knew that the first thing that the army had to do was morale. With such an army, you could still expect him to win a battle. Isn’t that too much?

Originally, he came to take the emperor's order to take a group of officers and soldiers to attack, but now he found that everyone is like this. Who should you arrest? Should you arrest Hong Chengchou and Lu Xiangsheng? Should you take the group of generals who commanded the troops in their hands? This is impossible.

Moreover, Cao Huachun also understood one thing: no matter how ignorant a person is, he must understand the most basic truth. This is that if people want to fight, they have to eat a full meal. Now they don’t even have enough food. What should we do?

Cao Huachun hated the unscrupulous merchants in the capital who took the opportunity to raise the price of grain and set the price on the ground. If it weren't for these people's operations, the soldiers could have used some money to buy food for several months. I guess they had nothing to say. Unlike now, their military pay was only barely purchased for two months of food, and they could not be used for other purposes.
Chapter completed!