Jiajing Chengming

Zhu Houcong nodded after hearing this.

Then, Zhu Houcong asked Ge Hao: "Are there any difficulties at the moment?"

"Your Majesty, the main difficulty right now is the resettlement of so many people."

"It is impossible for the imperial court and local wealthy families to continue providing relief. Many of their landless people have limited grain to buy land for, not to mention that they also need to grow seeds."

Ge Hao replied.

Zhu Houcong looked at the huge number of hungry people in front of him, pondered for a while, and said: "It seems that I have to settle them!"

"Dispatch troops and food, and organize the resettlement of disaster victims in batches to Beijing."

At this time, Zhu Houcong turned around and gave Zhang Cong an instruction.

Zhang Cong quickly agreed.

Seeing a large number of bankrupt disaster victims heading north under the organization of the officers and soldiers, Dai Fu couldn't help but smile, and said to Dai Shi: "Brother, the emperor really still wants to take care of the lives of these disaster victims, but how many times can his treasury afford to do this?"

"It shouldn't take too long!"

"After all, the world has always been plagued by disasters. In addition, the wealthy and powerful are dissatisfied with the current government and are using natural disasters to stage man-made disasters. Even the prosperous times of Zhenguan and Kaiyuan could not afford to suffer such disasters a few times!"

"Sooner or later, our Majesty will shoot himself in the foot!"

Dai Shi smiled and said, "Donate another 3,000 dan of grain and say that you are moved by the emperor's benevolence. Although we, the local officials, are not as wealthy as the court, even if we no longer implement the system of reporting, we will also sacrifice our wealth for the country and the people in order to express our gratitude to the emperor and the people!"

"it is good!"

……

……

"This is an open conspiracy!"

"I can do nothing but praise you."

Zhu Houcong looked at the list of local officials who donated grain presented by Henan Governor Ge Hao, and sighed to Zhang Cong in front of the emperor.

talking.

Zhu Houcong slammed the list of local officials who donated grain on the table.

At this time.

Huang Jin walked over quickly and handed two urgent documents to Zhu Houcong with tears in his eyes.

Seeing this, Zhu Houcong felt something was wrong and asked hurriedly, "What happened?"

"Your Majesty, take care of yourself!"

"An urgent message came from the capital: an explosion occurred in Wanggongchang, hundreds of houses around it collapsed, nearly a thousand people were killed or injured, the palace was also affected, and the emperor's second daughter died of fright!"

Huang Jin replied.

After hearing this, Zhu Houcong took a few steps back and couldn't help but touch his chest.

"My second daughter is gone?"

Zhu Houcong asked, and because he saw that Huang Jin had two urgent documents in his hand, he asked, "What is the other one?"

"Songjiang Prefecture reported that the seawall had burst, and the strong winds blew up a large amount of seawater, flooding more than a thousand houses. Nearly a thousand people were killed or injured, and nearly a hundred were missing!"

Huang Jin replied again.

After hearing this, Zhu Houcong fell directly into his chair.

The room suddenly became so quiet that you could hear a pin drop.

After a while, Zhu Houcong suddenly spoke, and smiled maliciously: "Before, the Yellow River burst its banks, and recently there was a huge explosion that killed my second daughter, and there was also seawater backflow."

Keng!
"Do they think this will scare me?!"

Zhu Houcong suddenly stood up and threw a cup of tea beside him to the ground, while shouting a question, his eyes bloodshot and filled with tears.

"Your Majesty, calm down!"

Zhang Cong, who was in front of the emperor, immediately knelt down, bowed his head and said something distressing.

Zhu Houcong looked at Zhang Cong and said, "It's not your daughter who died. Of course you can persuade me to calm down! Otherwise, you will just want to kill them all!"

"But your majesty, they are using an open conspiracy against the court!"

"There are so many wealthy families in the world, and the Ming Dynasty is so large that natural disasters occur in some places almost every month. And it is hard to tell whether it is just a natural disaster or a man-made disaster in addition to the natural disaster." "So, we can't find the murderer. Even if we hold him accountable, we can only hold him accountable to the chief officer. But the chief officer is a vagrant official, so most of them are wrongly accused, and some have even been killed!"

Zhang Cong replied seriously.

Zhu Houcong said nothing.

Zhang Cong continued, "In my humble opinion, they are using an open conspiracy to deal with the court, so we can only use an open conspiracy to deal with them."

Zhu Houcong raised his head and looked at him: "What do you mean?"

"In my humble opinion, we should prepare and implement the survey of all the land in the country!"

"As the saying goes, besiege Wei to save Zhao. Since they have forced the imperial court to spend a lot of national treasury to resettle a large number of new disaster victims, the imperial court will force them to spit out more profits! Increase the number of officers and soldiers! At the same time, this will also help us understand the situation of land annexation in the world and strengthen supervision of the areas where small people's fields are concentrated and have not yet been annexed in large numbers!"

"In this case, unless the wealthy and powerful families allow disasters to happen in the areas where their lands are located, they will have no choice but to stop thinking about causing trouble for the local areas!"

"In addition, land reclamation is a move that hits the local wealthy families hard. They should either hand over all their hidden land and pay all the taxes owed, or they will have to wait for the imperial court's iron fist!"

"Then, Your Majesty will be able to kill them with a clear conscience! Whether it's the bureaucrats who are not active in the land reclamation or pretend to obey but actually disobey, or the wealthy and powerful who resist the national policy, you will know whether they should be killed or not. It's better than not knowing who is loyal and who is treacherous now!"

Zhang Cong replied.

Zhu Houcong nodded: "That's right!"

then.

Zhu Houcong raised his still red eyes and clenched his trembling fists to say to Zhang Cong: "I originally planned to wait a few more years or even more than ten years before thoroughly surveying the land in the world. Although I have trained many mathematical talents in Xingming Academy and Daming Practical School, I think we can't punish the wealthy and powerful too harshly, lest they overreact."

"But now I understand."

"If you take their benefits or their lives, they won't be grateful for your kindness."

"This is not just a county or a city, it is truly a vast country stretching thousands of miles. The people are as numerous as ants. Even if there are a small number of extreme people, multiplied by this base number, it is still a large number."

Zhu Houcong patted Zhang Cong on the shoulder and said, "Mr. Zhang, I approve your request! However, you should know that they dared to provoke me like this, and they will be even more excessive for your future!"

"I am willing to sacrifice my life for your majesty and give up my family and career!"

"This is great loyalty and filial piety. The previous emperors and my ancestors will not blame me!"

Zhang Cong then kowtowed in response.

Zhu Houcong was deeply moved after hearing this: "You are a loyal minister to the country!"

Then Zhu Houcong fell into deep thought, then rubbed his hands and looked around.

Then, Zhu Houcong pointed to the black gilded cloak on the hanger and said to Huang Jin, "Bring it here!"

"Yes!"

Huang Jin agreed and got up to get it.

Zhu Houcong took the cloak and put it on Zhang Cong himself.

Zhang Cong shuddered suddenly, raised his head and asked, "Your Majesty, what is this?"

"This is not my formal dress, so it is not an act of usurpation. I am giving it to you now only to prove that I will not let you down in the future. In addition, it is also to prevent foolish kings in the future from being deceived by the real treacherous ministers and taking revenge on you a hundred years later. You can let your descendants take this out. If the kings in the future still want to use it to deal with you, it will definitely be disloyalty and unfilial!"

Zhu Houcong said.

Zhang Cong kowtowed with tears in his eyes and replied: "Your Majesty has treated me so well that I cannot repay you even if I die a hundred times!"

……

……

“How much land did you buy this time?”

The Dai family of Henan Prefecture.

Dai Shi asked about Dai Fulai that night.

Dai Fu held up five fingers and said with a smile: "More than 56,000 acres have all been registered under some fake households. As long as the court does not survey the land, they will not know that we have added so many hidden fields."

Dai Shi nodded.

Dai Fu asked Dai Shi: "Brother, do you think that with the current emperor's efforts to govern the country, will the court survey all the land in the country?"

"If you want the emperor to not thoroughly survey the land of the country, the key is to drive out treacherous officials like Zhang Fujing and Gui E from the court!" (End of this chapter)