As a traveler, Sun Tu came to the prestigious capital of the Great Song Dynasty thousands of years ago, and he also brought an elegant girl with him, so he naturally wanted to take a good stroll and appreciate the various beauties and characteristics of Bianliang City in Tokyo. But before that, he felt that he should get down to business first, so that he could completely let go of his heart.

So the day after he arrived in Bianjing, he entrusted Ya'er to the shopkeeper to take care of him, and after inquiring about the way, he walked in the direction of the inner city, carrying a large package with the one hundred and thirty-four taels of tax silver that should be handed over to the household department.

The amount of taxes and silver that Yuncheng County has to pay to the imperial court in a year is naturally far more than that. In fact, logically speaking, the tax money was not sent directly to Bianjing by the county government, but was handed over to the Yamen of the transfer envoy all the way to Shandong. However, there are exceptions to everything, because of various reasons, all states and counties in the world will always owe a lot of money and grain taxes, and this delay will last for a few years, until the imperial household department issues a document to recover, and the local yamen will hand it over. It's just that at this point, the tax can no longer be sent to the Transit Division, but they have to send someone to deliver it themselves.

The more than 100 taels of tax silver that Sun Tu brought on his body today are the accumulated arrears of Yuncheng County in the previous three years, if he can't hand it over in time, the assessment of the Zhengtang County Order at that time - now called grinding - will have problems, and Sun Tu, who messed things up, will definitely be disappointed. So he didn't dare to slack off today, and deliberately rushed over early in the morning.

The early morning in June is quite pleasant, there is no blazing sun, and there is a light breeze, which makes the pedestrians on the street more comfortable, and the flow of people is almost uninterrupted.

After a short time, he turned into the two hundred pace-wide Imperial Road Heavenly Street, which led to the inner city, which was more than twice as wide as the official road outside the city. However, this royal street is not the whole road that can be walked by pedestrians and horses, but there is a passage of nearly fifty steps in the middle that is separated by two aqueducts, and the black wooden fence blocking the side of the aqueduct divides it into three columns, and pedestrians can only walk around the street on both sides, because the passage inside is the royal road that can only be used by the Son of Heaven to travel.

Sun Tu browsed the surroundings while moving forward, his footsteps were not slow, and after an hour, he finally came to a towering city gate with carved railings and paintings, which was the Suzaku Gate, the north gate of the inner city. Although this gate is much lower than the outer city gate, it still looks tall and straight, and people dare not despise it.

Thinking of the majestic outer city wall he saw yesterday, Sun Tu couldn't help but wonder how this easy-to-defend and difficult-to-attack capital of the Northern Song Dynasty could be easily captured by the Jin people. The Jurchen clan may be extremely sharp in field combat, but siege should not be their forte, and the Song army has always been known for defending, how could they let them enter this fortified city and lead to the destruction of the country?

He didn't know much about this history, but he didn't know that the fall of Tokyo City was caused by a series of wrong decisions made by the entire Northern Song court. It can even be said that the Jin army didn't even bother to attack the city, and the Song people themselves gave up the capital, and the standard door was opened to thieves.

Before coming to the city gate, Sun Tu was a little strange to find that the name of the city gate inscribed in seal script on it was not the three words "Vermilion Bird Gate" that everyone said, but the word "Vermilion Bird Gate", which was pronounced as "Vermilion Bird Gate", which looked really weird.

In fact, the special name of the Vermilion Bird Gate in Bianjing City was already before the founding of the Northern Song Dynasty, and then the dynasty changed, and in the hands of Taizu Zhao Kuangyin, the name on the city gate was still written as the Vermilion Bird Gate. In this regard, Zhao Kuangyin was also very puzzled, and asked his prime minister Zhao Pu what was the reason for.

And Zhao Pu's answer is very simple: "Without him, Yu Zhuer." That is, it is a simple mood particle.

Zhao Kuangyin pursed his lips very disdainfully when he heard this, and laughed: "It's okay, it's very helpful!" ”

Later generations thought that this was actually Taizu's disdain for scholars, but in fact, in his hands, the power of the civil officials of the Great Song Dynasty was indeed far inferior to that of later, and at most they were just fighting against the generals. However, with the succession of Taizong Zhao Guangyi and the descendants of the Zhao family later, the civil officials completely turned over and completely suppressed the military attachés, and it was difficult to get ahead again, and the combat effectiveness of the Great Song army also plummeted, and they could only defend themselves and have no pioneering heart.

For this kind of historical history and origin, Sun Tu was not clear at this time, he was just bent on looking for the household yamen he wanted to go to. After entering the inner city, the number of shops has decreased a lot, and when approaching the imperial city, I saw a number of government yamen standing beside the road, of which there were six.

The so-called six departments of the imperial court are naturally the military and criminal workers of the ceremonial households, which are passed down from the Sui and Tang dynasties. After the founding of the Great Song Dynasty, many policies still followed the system of the Tang Dynasty, such as the center of the imperial court, which is now called the political affairs hall, is actually the Zhongshu Sect, and then these six official offices, they are still in charge of their own affairs.

As an important yamen in charge of the country's finances, the location of the household department is not far from the imperial city, just on the side of the Xuande Gate at the south gate of the imperial city. At this time, although it was still early, there were already many people waiting here at the entrance of the yamen.

Seeing this, Sun Tu hurriedly stepped forward and saluted a small official who was guarding there: "This official is invited, and he came from Yuncheng County, Shandong Province to pay taxes and silver, I don't know if he can say it?" I don't know which room to go to to pay the money? ”

The little official only raised his head, looked at Sun Tu with his nostrils, and said angrily: "All the officials in the headquarters are busy with important matters in the imperial court, how can they have time to care about such a trivial matter as you, you can wait outside." ”

Sun Tu couldn't help but be a little unhappy when he saw his attitude, but this was someone else's territory, of course he was not good at attacking, so he could only stand there a little stupidly. At this time, a man on the side, who was also dressed as a common man, came over and whispered, "Xiao Langjun is also here to do business?" After seeing Sun Tu's acquiescence, he smiled bitterly: "You don't know the rules of this, if you want a few of them to lead you into the door, it's useless, you have to have some door respect." ”

"And such a thing?" Sun Tumeng frowned, he really didn't have the experience and preparation in this area. Even if he knew that everyone in the officialdom was greedy now, he couldn't imagine that someone would dare to ask for bribes so unscrupulously in front of such an important yamen.

"Xiao Langjun is also here for the first time, right? This is a matter of course, these officials can hardly receive money on an errand here, so they naturally need to make up for it on us. "This person is also a talker, and he is also bold, so he dared to tell some unseemly deeds in front of the household yamen.

As he spoke, several more people who wanted to go in stopped him, and then a man who knew the rules secretly gave the official a little silver, and he was admitted.

When Sun Tu saw this scene, his brows furrowed even tighter. Obviously, the other party's appetite is still very small, and he can't enter the door without one or two taels of silver. And this money is enough to stay in Bianjing City for two or three days.

The Great Song Dynasty has been passed down to the present, and it has long been rotten from the roots. Not only are the officials of the prefectures and counties greedy for ink, but even the central yamen under the root of the imperial city also have people who are up and down, as long as ordinary people rub shoulders with the government, these greedy people will have to take advantage of it, otherwise you don't want to get things done.

It is said that a few years ago, a government official came to the household department to pay taxes and silver, but he failed to complete the errand for a year. For all he had to hand over was a tael of silver, and the bribe that came in at the door alone had to cost two taels.

Although Sun Tu was extremely dissatisfied with such an atmosphere, he could only bow his head under the low wall. After hesitating for a moment, he could only step forward again, and at the same time stuffed a small piece of silver that he had taken out earlier into the official's hand: "I hope that the officials can be accommodating, and such things can not be delayed." ”

The man skillfully weighed the weight of the silver, and then his expression softened a little and smiled: "Since the matter is important, you can go in." The second signing room on the left hand side of the first courtyard is the duty room outside Zuo Cao Chen, you look for him. ”

"Thanks for the pointers." The effect of these two taels of silver is still there, Sun Tu finally found the way, quickly thanked him, and walked to the yamen of the household department.