Xu Hongzhi drank the wine in the cup and sighed: "Now King Yong is generous. He used to give ten taels of silver for travel expenses, but now he has doubled it and given twenty taels. Twenty taels! You can exchange it for one hundred taels on the black market." Sixty guan of money is equal to my salary for two years. When will the imperial court be so generous?"
"Count on the imperial court?"
Shen Jiangnan, another secretary-provincial official, snorted, "The imperial court only has Jiangnan and Fujian Road left. Adding in Lingnan, it will have to support an army of 300,000 people. There will also be so many concubines and palace servants in the palace. There will be money." To pay for your travel expenses? It’s just a daydream!”
"But when it comes to the scope of the imperial court, something doesn't seem right. If King Yong takes Hebei this time, wouldn't he win nine out of ten? Who is the imperial court?"
"Is this still a question? Justice lies in the hearts of the people. Who is expelling the Tartars and who is killing loyal people? Everyone has a balance in their hearts!"
At this moment, the shopkeeper hurriedly ran over and said: "Everyone, be careful, the Plum Blossom Guard is coming!"
Everyone immediately stopped talking. At this time, a Plum Blossom Guard general walked into the store with several of his men, "Your store's business is not bad!"
The shop owner smiled and said: "It's a small business, not worth mentioning!"
The Plum Blossom Guard general looked around, walked to the back room, and was stunned for a moment, "Hey! You four are here too!"
The four of them just drank and no one paid attention to him.
Meihuawei found that there were no officials in the restaurant, and they were probably hiding in the tiles to drink, so he sent his generals to check the tiles, and sure enough he found a lot of them.
The commander of the Plum Blossom Guard was originally a palace guard, and he knew most of the officials. He had already met five groups today.
When he saw that everyone was ignoring him, he laughed dryly and said, "There are so many restaurants outside, and you guys come here to drink. Are you discussing some secret?"
Xu Hongzhi said coldly: "The imperial court does not pay salaries and we are very poor. We can only come here to eat cheap food."
"That's right! We haven't paid our salaries for a long time. No wonder everyone comes to Wazi to drink. It seems that I have to report to the superiors and help everyone get their salaries..."
At this time, Shen Jiangnan said with disgust on his face: "Commander, what are you doing? If you have nothing to do, please do as you please! Don't interfere with our drinking."
The commander laughed, "You guys keep drinking, I'm working hard and continue patrolling."
The general stretched out his hand to the shopkeeper, and the shopkeeper had no choice but to grab a handful of copper coins and give it to him. The general refused to take his hand back, which meant that it was not enough, so the shopkeeper had to grab another handful and give it to him. The general then took his men to the next shop to extort money. went.
Everyone in the room could see clearly that Xu Hongzhi spat heavily, "It's rotten to the core."
He said to everyone: "Everyone, I have also decided to go to Jingzhao. I don't want to stay in such a court anymore. Do you want to go with me?"
Another young official, Lu Zhengxing, said: "I am also planning to go to Jingzhao, just in time we can be together!"
"Okay! I will resign tomorrow. Where are you two?"
Xu Hongzhi asked the other two people, "Jiangnan, your cousin is in charge of the Criminal Investigation Department in Jingzhao. Don't you want to join him?"
Shen Jiangnan hesitated and said, "It's not up to me to decide whether to leave or not. My family has a long-term perspective and they will make arrangements."
"It's understandable. Your Shen family is a distinguished family, so it's different. But when Jiangnan talks about the long term, I suddenly remembered something big!"
"What's the big deal?" everyone asked with a smile.
Xu Hongzhi lowered his voice, "Have you heard rumors in the past two days? Rumors about Xu Xiangguo."
"What are the rumors? Tell me!" The three of them came forward with great interest.
Xu Hongzhi said with a mysterious face: "It seems to be related to his son. Someone in Yuchi County, Kaifeng Prefecture discovered that the new county magistrate looks very much like Xu Xianggong's son Xu Shou."
"real or fake?"
Everyone couldn't believe it, "Xiangong Xu is a confidant of the emperor, how is it possible? I'm afraid I have mistakenly admitted the wrong person!"
"Not necessarily, Xianggong Xu is from Yuchi County, and his son has been away from Lin'an for several years. A person as slippery as Xianggong Xu, will he not leave a way out for himself?"
Another official, Wang Fang, sighed: "If this is really the case, I would also consider resigning and going to Jingzhao."
"Isn't your mother in poor health and unable to travel long distances?"
"You can go by boat. Take the boat all the way to Shangluo, and then take an ox cart. It's not far."
The four of them became more and more excited as they talked and began to discuss the details of resignation.
On the Yangtze River in Huangzhou, a fleet is sailing through the waves. The leader is a huge ship, twice the size of the Wanshi Ship. This is a thirty thousand stone blessing ship. It is so big that it can be called
The best ship in the world.
This giant ship was a special gift from Zheng Tongquan to Chen Qing. The 30,000-stone Fuzhou ship had thick walls and was made of the best materials and craftsmen. It cost 100,000 guan and took five years to build.
It was called the King's Ship as soon as it appeared. Not only was it the largest and sturdiest, ordinary ships would only be humiliated if they rammed it. It was also equipped with eight medium-sized trebuchets, which could accurately launch fireballs and kerosene barrels.
Throw it onto the opponent's ship.
When the idea of this ship appeared in Zheng Tongquan's mind, it was built for King Yong Chen Qing. Although it was not luxurious and not paved with gold and jade, it was extremely comfortable.
The ship is divided into four floors. The first floor is the cabin for 300 personal guards. The second floor is the court cabin, where official business is handled. The third and fourth floors are Chen Qing's living quarters. Apart from him and his attendants,
In addition to my concubine Yao Mei, there are eight female guards and four maids.
The boatman's cabin and the cabin for storing food and fresh water are all below the deck. In addition to the cabins for the guards, there is a large kitchen and warehouse at the back on the first floor, as well as a large dining hall for soldiers to eat.
In addition to the main ship, there were thirty large ships sailing forward and backward, transporting three thousand soldiers and three hundred horses.
In the living cabin on the third floor, Yao Mei sat in front of the window and admired the scenery of the North Shore. She was full of praise for the beautiful green mountains. She grew up in Saibei and later came to Jingzhao. All she saw was the vastness.
Grasslands, majestic and stretching mountains, I am used to seeing all kinds of rough and cold northern scenery.
When she came to the south for the first time, she saw the mountains and rivers in the south, which were either handsome, gentle, or verdant, like exquisite bonsais. Yao Mei, who was new to the south, was in awe and was really fascinated by her.
On the other side of the cabin, Chen Qing sat at the table and concentrated on sketching, deducing, and thinking on the map.
This time to attack Hebei Road, he considered attacking from four routes, all the way to Hanoi, all the way to Fukouxing, all the way to Baimadu in the Central Plains, and all the way to the sea route.
Of course, the focus of these four roads is Fukouxing and Baimadu, and the other two roads are only auxiliary.
Niu Gao led an army of 50,000 out of Fukouxing to attack Xiangzhou. Yang Zaixing led an army of 100,000 across the Yellow River on white horses. There were 20,000 troops in Hanoi, led by deputy capital Wang Duo, and 30,000 troops by sea, led by veteran general Tang Huaihe.
Commander Zhang Gongyu.
This is the 200,000-strong army, and then Chen Qing personally leads another 200,000-strong army as the rear army, stationed in Luzhou, Shandong, with troops directed at Daming Mansion to contain Wan Yanchang's main force.
A total of 400,000 troops, Chen Qing put down his pen, this time he was determined to win.
"What! A fire broke out in a paper mill in Xiaoshan County, killing eight people?"
Wang Mut stood up abruptly. The sudden news caught him off guard. He was preparing to increase the printing volume of the newspaper from 50,000 to 80,000 copies in the past few days to ensure that people's enthusiasm and attention to the recovery of Hebei would be increased, so that everyone would start from
I recognize King Yong in my heart.
This meant that he needed to increase the amount of paper, more ink, more typefaces, and more craftsmen. However, he did not expect that at this critical moment, his most important paper supply mill, Xiaoshan County Paper Mill, would actually catch fire and burn down. This is simply ridiculous.
Give him a head-on blow.
The steward bowed and said: "The news is accurate, but..."
"But what?"
"But the manager of the paper mill said that several torches were found at the scene and it was suspected to be arson."
"Bang!" Wang Mu slammed his fist on the table. He immediately understood that "Jingzhao" published an article calling for the recovery of Hebei, which caused a sensation in Lin'an and Jiangnan, and made certain forces unable to hold back their hatred.
He had been worried that they would retaliate, and sure enough they came.
He forced himself to calm down and asked: "How much paper stock do we still have in the warehouse?"
"Based on the current print run, it can still last for seven or eight days, and the same goes for other inks and the like."
Wang Mu thought for a while and said: "Go to several other paper workshops and tell them two things. One is to ask them to make paper to the maximum extent, and I will buy as much as they can. The other is to pay attention to protecting the workshops, especially at night."
The steward said worriedly: "Master, I'm worried that other workshops will not be willing to supply paper to us."
"Why?"
"They must be afraid of offending those who can't afford to offend, and then being set on fire. Besides, the supply they give us is not large, so they definitely won't take this risk."
Is this really the case? All kinds of inside information cannot be hidden among colleagues.
Wang Mu walked a few steps with his hands behind his back: "Let's do this! Tell them that I promise to keep them safe. As long as they are willing to supply a large amount of paper, I guarantee that they will get more business in the future. If they don't believe it, I will
Go talk to them, I will go to Special Envoy Hu now and ask him to come forward and warn the arsonist!"
"I understand, I'll go talk to them!"
The steward bowed and left. Wang Mu thought for a moment, then put on his outer robe and hurried to find Hu Yun.