Chaos of the Three Kingdoms Summons

Chapter 2777 Touring the World, Controlling the Yellow River

The emperor had not left Luoyang for many years, so this was a rare opportunity for him to visit the Central Plains.

Therefore, after the Fengshan ceremony at Mount Tai, he did not rush back to Luoyang, the capital, but instead planned to tour the Central Plains and the South first.

After that, he traveled through Yangzhou, then south, and returned to Guanzhong from Yizhou. From then on, most of the country was within his inspection range.

Of course, apart from a few ministers, most of the civil and military officials had been sent back to Luoyang.

It's one thing to take them with you when you perform the Fengshan ceremony at Mount Tai, but if you take them all with you when you tour the country, who will be left to handle the important affairs of the state?

Incidentally, the crown prince was also sent back!

When the emperor tours the country, the crown prince naturally oversees the state!
Since the Prince of Jin was enfeoffed to the Kushan Empire, the Crown Prince has obviously been under less pressure.

Appropriately, we should give him more responsibilities.

It is now winter, and the Yellow River is desolate and cold. The flow is slow and the water level is low, almost to the point of drying up. Looking down from a high place, one can almost feel the weight of the riverbed.

The management of the Yellow River has always been a top priority for every feudal dynasty.

The Yellow River floods have always been one of the most troublesome problems for every feudal dynasty.

The Jin Dynasty never neglected the issue of river defense along the Yellow River, spending a large amount of silver every year.

When touring the world, one must naturally take a look at the handling of the Yellow River flood control, as this concerns the lives of millions of people in several prefectures across two dynasties.

From the beginning of the Yuan Dynasty, for about twenty years, Li Xiang has always been generous in his investment in the Yellow River.

Even during the recovery period from the pandemic in the early years, the country needed money for everything.

However, Li Xiang still gritted his teeth and tightened his belt, even while constantly reducing the palace's expenditures, he still had to set aside enough budget for this place.

Over the years, the total investment of the imperial court in water conservancy projects across the country has reached tens of millions of strings of cash, which is by no means a small amount.

The Yellow River, Huai River, and Bian River in the north were the most important of a series of water conservancy projects. The imperial court specifically consulted the advice of relevant water management technicians and formulated policies and performance indicators for matters such as dredging, canal construction, soil reinforcement, and dike building.

For officials in coastal prefectures and counties, the ability to manage water resources and handle floods is an important criterion for evaluating their performance.

Even so, this only reduces the possibility of flooding to some extent, but cannot solve the problem once and for all.

Since the Yuanshi era, for so many years, the imperial court has not received any reports from the local areas regarding the Yellow River floods.

However, this does not mean that there are no problems in this area.

However, while there were no major floods, there were still some minor disasters and troubles.

However, local governments are able to handle these minor disasters and calamities on their own, and can provide timely relief to the victims.

Therefore, there was no need to report it to the central government.

With the last major war beyond the Great Wall over three years, and the court having no wars during the last two years of the Qianyuan era and the first year of the Jian'an era, the court accumulated a sum of money during these three years.

Therefore, this year, the imperial court transferred another batch of personnel to continue using them for water defense projects.

The stability of this region is of paramount importance to the imperial court; any major problems with the Yellow River could shake the very foundation of the nation. Li Xiang's inspection tour of the Yellow River's flood control efforts included a stop at the Dongjun Dike.

During the Yongping era of the Eastern Han Dynasty, Wang Jing managed the Yellow River. On the one hand, he built a more than 1,000-li (approximately 500 km) long dike along the Yellow River, stretching from the south of Puyang City to Qiancheng in Bohai. On the other hand, he also dredged the Bian Canal and built new sluice gates along it.

The Jin Dynasty's approach to managing the Yellow River largely followed Wang Jing's approach, continuously reinforcing existing engineering works.

Among them, Dongjun is of paramount importance.

Li Xiang was quite familiar with Dongjun.

During the Central Plains War, he briefly toured various states in the Central Plains, one of which was Dongjun.

If his trip had simply been a tour of the Dongjun Dam, it would have been a perfect ending, with little room for criticism or fault-finding.

When faced with inspections from higher authorities, local officials are most afraid that their leaders will act unpredictably, make decisions on the spot, and not give them a chance to prepare.

Li Xiang did the same; he did not stay at the Dongjun embankment for too long. Instead, he ordered someone to lead the way and set off quickly with a group of light cavalry to inspect other sections of the embankment.

He inspected other sections of the dike, and by the time he reached the Jiyin section, things had spiraled out of control, developing in a direction that officials along the Yellow River were unwilling to face.

The north wind howled, and the local officials who came upon hearing the news knelt on the ground with long faces, as if their own parents had died, not daring to say another word.

Along the way, following Li Xiang's path, the accompanying generals and officials who caught up watched as hundreds of river workers painstakingly took out some stone slabs and sandbags and arranged them in a row.

The stone slabs that were carried up were very brittle and could be broken with little effort. The sandbags were almost entirely filled with silt and rotten soil.

After this result was announced, the weather seemed to grow even colder. The accompanying generals and officials all knew that a large number of heads would likely roll next.

The accompanying Governor of Yanzhou, Wei Renpu, had an even darker face. Without saying much, he simply knelt down on the ground as well.

He was transferred to Yanzhou at the end of last year, and in less than a year, he just happened to run into this incident. He can only accept his bad luck.

Those officials kneeling on the ground were trembling, but it was definitely not from the winter wind.

On the surface, Li Xiang seemed relatively calm, but his face was flushed red from the cold river wind.

The emperor, though aged, still possessed a formidable presence. His gaze was as cold as the wind as he looked around, pointed at the broken stone slabs on the ground, and said coldly, "Is this the material you used to reinforce the dikes and prevent flooding?"

"In my opinion, what's rotten isn't the stone slabs or the sandbags, but the corrupted hearts of you people!"

"Your Majesty, please calm down. This old minister will definitely investigate this matter thoroughly and give Your Majesty an explanation!" Governor Wei Renpu said, still kneeling, but quickly regaining his composure.

Give me an explanation!

"Daoji, you are a veteran minister. Don't you owe me an explanation for this matter?"

"You owe an explanation to the millions of people on both sides of the strait!" Emperor Li Xiang practically roared.

"Order Bao Zheng of the Court of Judicial Review to thoroughly investigate this matter, with the Ministry of Justice and the Censorate assisting!"

"Furthermore, temporarily entrust my imperial sword to Bao Zheng. If he encounters any obstruction while wielding the sword, there is no need to report it; just execute them all!" Li Xiang coldly ordered.