Thief Emperor

Chapter 188 Take over completely!

The main business, of course, does not refer to suppressing bandits, but robbery.

If the size of Li Yun's troops were larger, for example, if the size increased tenfold, relying on robbery would be of no use and would not be able to be maintained for long.

But now, all his men together would not exceed a thousand. With this scale, plus the tens of millions of wealthy families in Jiangnan, if he sent a group of people to specifically rob the wealthy, he would definitely be able to make a considerable fortune in a short period of time.

Li Zheng looked up at Li Yun and scratched his head: "Second brother, are you serious?"

"Of course I'm serious."

Li Yun said, "I have been thinking about this for the past few days. The imperial court is in such a mess right now. There are bandits in Jiangnan, and the imperial court is unable to take care of them."

"There are so many wealthy families in Jiangnan..."

Li Zheng saw Li Yun's gloomy eyes, hesitated for a moment, and finally said: "Second brother, I think this kind of thing can't last long. More importantly, Second brother said before that no matter where we go, we must not disturb the people. If we send a team of people out to rob and plunder, it will be even more difficult to manage military discipline in the future."

Now, the group of people closest to Li Yun, namely Li Zheng and Liu Bo, have more or less seen some of Li Yun's ambitions, or lofty aspirations.

They knew very well that Li Yun's future would not be limited to Yuezhou, and Yuezhou was just their current foothold.

Mr. Li sat in his seat and sighed, "Of course I understand what you said. If we send people out to do business without capital, then these people will never be incorporated into the army in the future."

"That's all."

Li Yun waved his hand and said, "We still have enough money and food to support us for a while. I will slowly think of a way. Now, the most important thing for us is to take control of the entire Yuezhou."

He paused for a moment and continued, "The affairs of each county have been arranged. Your staff should be arranged as soon as possible. If they can work hard, the government affairs of Yuezhou will soon be running again, and the government affairs of the Yuezhou Governor's Office."

Li Yun reached out and knocked on the table, then said, "In a few days, I will go to the governor's office and temporarily take over the governor's post and take over all the political affairs of Yuezhou."

There is no other way. Now that he has no one under his command, Li Yun has to do it himself even if he has to bite the bullet.

However, this is also a rare opportunity and experience for him to try to handle the affairs of a state so that he can handle larger local affairs in the future.

At this point, he patted Li Zheng on the shoulder and said, "In the future, you should focus on arranging manpower for each county. When doing things, remember to be attentive and don't just do it perfunctorily."

"This is the most critical time for us."

Li Yun whispered: "After we survive this stage, there will naturally be talented people coming to join us in the future."

The beginning of a business is always the most difficult. For example, Li Yun is at this stage now. Everything has to be created out of nothing, and everything has to be managed and handled bit by bit.

There is no way around it. Now is the time to lay the foundation. Only when the foundation is solid can there be a foundation in the future.

Li Yun calls this stage the foundation-building period.

The reason why Qiu Dian suddenly prospered and then suddenly declined, apart from being unpopular, was mostly because he was too impatient and irritable, and his foundation was not solid.

After this difficult stage, when his career is on the right track and can run on its own, Li Yun can look beyond the small Yuezhou and look outside of Yuezhou.

Of course, it's too early to tell.

Whether Li Yun, who had previously only managed a few hundred people, could manage the six counties of Yuezhou and hundreds of thousands of people was a difficult test.

What's worse is that before taking this exam, he had hardly learned any knowledge in this area.

Fortunately, this exam lasts for a long time. Even if calculated based on the time when the new governor takes office, Li Yun still has three or four months to intern and experience this position that is in charge of both military and political affairs in Yuezhou.

After arranging Li Zheng's affairs, the next day Li Yun arranged for Liu Bo to go to the governor's office first to get in touch with the affairs of the governor's office. Just as he was about to enter the governor's office, Zhou Liang, who was leading troops to patrol and suppress bandits outside the city, finally returned to Yuezhou City and met Li Yun.

"General."

Maybe because he was originally from the military, Zhou Liang could be said to be the person who changed his words the fastest in the old village. Now he seldom called Li Yun the village chief. Only when there was no one around or only people from the old village were present, would he call him the village chief once or twice.

This old village refers to Cangshan Dazhai.

Whenever there is someone present who is not from Cangshan Village, he will call Li Yun "General".

Zhou Liang clasped his fists towards Li Yun and said, "In the past few days, through investigations and reports from the people, I have arrested more than 200 of Qiu Dian's former subordinates. They are now on their way back to Yuezhou."

At this point, he took a deep breath, lowered his head and said, "General, please tell me how to deal with them."

Hearing this, Li Yun touched his chin and said with a smile: "From what Third Uncle said, Third Uncle doesn't want to kill them."

Logically, these rebels should all be killed, so there was no need to ask Li Yun how to deal with them. However, Zhou Liang asked anyway, which already showed his intention.

Zhou Liang lowered his head and said, "How to deal with it naturally depends on the general."

He paused and continued, "However, most of these people were coerced by Qiu Dian to join the rebels. Although they had fought with the imperial army before,..." "Most of them are innocent."

"What I mean is that the general can consider forgiving them and use them for his own benefit. In this way, those who are forgiven will become the general's loyal followers in the future."

"No more second thoughts."

Li Yun touched his chin, thought for a while, and said, "Well, Uncle San, you go and do this. Interrogate them one by one and ask them if they killed civilians when they were rebels before."

"You can report on each other."

"If there are no lives lost, consider retaining them."

"We can't keep too many. We can't support too many people right now. Just 200 people, and we don't have to choose all of them from this batch."

Li Yun closed his eyes, thought for a moment, and then said, "The rest of them can be sent back to their hometowns, but Uncle San, you have to make it clear to them that they must keep their mouths shut when they return. If they brag or talk nonsense and are caught by the court in the future, not only will their lives be cut short, but their entire family will also be killed."

In fact, after this kind of large-scale peasant rebellion was suppressed, it was impossible to kill all the rebels. Historically, most of them were exiled.

There would have been no problem if Li Yun sent them back home, but the new official of Yuezhou next year would most likely be Li's political enemy. If the people released talked nonsense, they would likely find evidence against them and write a letter to report Li Yun.

Although Li Yun was not afraid, after all, by that time, he would most likely have completely controlled Yuezhou, but it would still be a trouble, so he tried to avoid it if possible.

Zhou Liang breathed a sigh of relief, bowed his head deeply and said, "Then I will do it right away."

Li Yun hummed, and said, "There are more than 200 people. At least 20% must be convicted as traitors. This way we can have an explanation to the court. As for the others, after Uncle San selects them, let me know."

"I'll go over and give the lecture myself."

Favors come from above. This is the principle that Li Yun read in the book. That is to say, within a team, the one who bestows favors must be the highest authority. If subordinates are allowed to do these things, then the people who receive the favors will not necessarily recognize the highest authority.

Li Yun is currently the highest authority in Yuezhou Group.

Therefore, specific matters can be handed over to Zhou Liang, but those matters of bestowing favors must be done by him personally, otherwise those who are granted grace and pardon will be grateful to Zhou Liang instead of him, Li Yun.

Although this matter is a trivial one, in the long run, the details must be grasped from now on. Otherwise, in the future, the highest power of the entire team will be unclear, and there is a high possibility of major chaos.

Zhou Liang lowered his head quickly: "I understand. I will do it right away."

Li Yun patted Zhou Liang on the shoulder and said with a smile: "The son of Third Uncle has also come to Yuezhou. What does Third Uncle plan to let him do?"

"All is up to the general."

"Let him follow the skinny monkey."

Li Yun said softly: "He is short of manpower."

Zhou Liang nodded: "Yes."

The two chatted for a few more words, and then Zhou Liang said goodbye and left to do some work.

Li Yun also left his residence and came to the governor's office.

At this moment, the governor's office was already full of Li Yun's subordinates inside and out. He entered the office without any hindrance. After looking around, he met Liu Bo in a study.

Liu Bo had a pile of documents in front of him, and he was overwhelmed. When he saw Li Yun coming, he breathed a sigh of relief and said, "Second brother is finally here."

Li Yun glanced at him and asked with a smile: "What's wrong? What happened?"

"Don't understand how to deal with it?"

“It’s not that I don’t understand how to handle it.”

Liu Bo took a document from the table and handed it to Li Yun.

"It has just been delivered. It seems that a high-ranking official will come to Yuezhou in a few days."

"What's his name? His surname is Zheng, but I don't know his name..."

"Zheng Wei."

Li Yun took over, put down the document, and spoke slowly.

"I've seen him."

(End of this chapter)