The Li Dongxiang brothers finally chose to return to Renzhou with 60,000 taels of silver, and opened two shops on West Street, one is a porcelain shop and the other is a silk village, which is the business of the Li family.

Such an inconspicuous little thing turned into a piece of Chen three days later, and the last line of text was reported to the hands of Qin Ziyan, the deputy governor of Longwei Liuzhou and the governor of Huazhou. Qin Ziyan, who was quickly browsing Tiao Chen, paused slightly, he knew about these two shops, and he also sent someone to send He Yi, because these two shops belonged to the Li family, and the main person was Jiang Li's wife, Jiang Li's wife.

After three dynasties, Longwei Yamen has a history of more than 50 years, and it can be regarded as deep-rooted and sound, and it is perfect in all aspects, from financial personnel to case-handling procedures. The number of people in Long Weiming's office is close to 10,000, and there are also 10,000 spies lurking in the house of the Minister of Civil and Military Affairs. There are 337 people in Longwei in Huazhou, and these more than 300 people are scattered in 53 counties in Huazhou, and there are not five or six people in Shangxian County, and there are only two or three people in Xiaxian County.

In contrast, the dark guard was established only a few years ago, most of the manpower was deployed from the dragon guard and the sixteen guards in Beijing, still in the initial stage, Feng Zhong took the opportunity of the world competition to recruit a large number of masters of the rivers and lakes to enrich the dark guard, ambitious to make contributions during the Northern Expedition, and then expand the dark guard to all states in the world.

Huazhou is the earliest place for the dark guards, Xin Fei came to Huazhou with Jiang Anyi, and served as the supervisor of the two families of Longwei and the dark guard, and later gave birth to a child and stepped down to worship, her position let Feng Yucai go, and the court also served as two deputy supervisors, Wang Zuoguo and Qin Ziyan. Feng Yucai put Wang Zuoguo in charge of the affairs of the secret guard, and Qin Ziyan was in charge of the affairs of the dragon guard, and there was both cooperation and struggle between the two, needless to say.

Recently, Qin Ziyan received a reward of 500 taels of silver from the court to reward him for capturing the Yuan Tianjiao people who made trouble in Hecheng County. The silver was distributed to the entourage and subordinates, and he paid out of his own pocket to feast Jiang Tingshi in Qixian Tower to express his gratitude, and this credit was given to him by Jiang Tingshi.

His eyes stopped on a piece of news, many years of errands in Longwei gave Qin Ziyan an instinctive intuition, this news was strange. A short sentence: There are Taoist priests in Jinxia Cave of Cangzhu Mountain in the south of Huiye Mansion to pray for the people's illness, and the number of believers is increasing day by day. Each message was preceded by a mark, and Qin Ziyan instructed the scribe beside him: "Adjust the file No. 3327." ”

Soon, a dossier was placed in front of Qin Ziyan, recording in detail that on August 14, the old Taoist priest led three disciples to perform in the West Market. Lao Dao set the rules, at the end of every ten years to treat one person, so far has been treated eleven people, after investigation, these eleven people are the people of Huiye Mansion, sick and riddling, after the treatment of Lao Dao the disease has indeed been reduced. The old Taoist ruler does not collect money, but only asks the people to recite the "Sutra of Saving People" to open the book.

Qin Ziyan asked people to find the "Duren Sutra" to read the scriptures carefully, the full name of the "Duren Sutra" is "Taishang Cave Xuanling Bao Wuliang People on the Wonderful Sutra", a total of sixty-one volumes, the old Tao let the people recite the open volume, more than 800 words, by the Taoists called the head of the group of scriptures, the part of the sect of ten thousand laws. Judging from the scriptures, there is nothing wrong with preaching, preaching the principle of "fasting and chanting, the merit is very heavy, the upper eliminates natural disasters, protects the king, and lowers the people, all are protected, and the salty life is immortal", which is a scripture often recited by Taoist disciples.

What makes Qin Ziyan suspicious is that Taoism is not prevalent in Huazhou, most people believe in Buddhism and Yilanism, and there are only three Taoist temples in the entire Huazhou, and these Taoist priests are obviously not from these three Taoist temples. On August 14, he was performing in the West Market, and on August 15, Yang Siqi appeared in Qixian Tower, and Yuan Tianjiao appeared and disappeared in Huazhou, and the origin of these Taoist priests was suspicious, and he thought that Yuan Tianjiao was the beginning of Taoism.

Seeing Qin Ziyan thinking about the file, Chen Han, who was standing in front of the hall, said: "My lord, do you want to bring someone to investigate?" ”

"No need", Qin Ziyan closed the file, his fingers tapped on the surface of the file, thought for a moment, and ordered: "Let people spy secretly, don't startle the snake, maybe you can catch a big fish." ”

A guard hurriedly walked in and reported, "My lord, urgent news from the Western Regions." ”

Huazhou had just been invaded by the Western Regions coalition two years ago, and the Son of Heaven angrily reprimanded Longwei for lagging behind in spying reports, which made the Anxi Protectorate unable to help. After Xin Fei took up the post of supervisor with Jiang Anyi, he focused on strengthening the espionage work of the Western Regions, and the Longwei headquarters handed over the spies of the Western Regions to the management of the Huazhou Prefecture.

Qin Ziyan served as the commander of Huazhou Prefecture, and he had more than 200 secret spies in the Western Regions in his hands, and he was very clear about the turmoil in the Western Regions. Recently, the Rongmi Kingdom and the subordinate countries of Weiche and Jusu have persecuted the Shasu Kingdom, the lord of the Shasu Kingdom fell ill, and the princess was regent, and sent an envoy to the Rongmi Kingdom to ask for peace, and at the same time asked for help from other countries.

The information was sent by the spies of the Shasu Kingdom, and it was seven days ago that it arrived at Aino Mansion through the caravan. The Shasu country's peace mission was refused, and Rong Mi sent an ultimatum to the Shasu country: send 40,000 troops, subsidize 50,000 taels of gold, 500,000 taels of silver, and pay 1 million stones of grain and grass for military salaries, otherwise the army will overwhelm the border and divide the country.

Shasu asked for help from other countries, and Huli agreed to mediate, but the conditions offered were extremely harsh, and Shasu could not agree to cede the five counties in the north, you must know that the land of Shasu is only one-third of Huazhou, and there are only sixteen counties under its jurisdiction. Qianglan replied that he would appoint his violent son Longhai as the crown prince, abolish the princess, and send troops to help after depriving the Tule family of power.

"Report to the State Governor's Office as usual." Qin Ziyan commanded, handed over the spy report to the scribe for filing, but his brows furrowed. The wind in the Western Regions is getting tighter, and the civil war will start, which is a good thing for Da Zheng, but once the Rong Mi Kingdom captures the Shasu Kingdom, the power will inevitably become stronger, and then with the power of destroying the country, Huazhou will face another catastrophe. In Huazhou for two years, Qin Ziyan witnessed the transformation of Huazhou from withering to prosperous, the people lived and worked in peace and contentment, and their lives began to be stable.

This year's tax collection totaled more than 4.5 million yuan, reaching as much as 4.63 million yuan, including 600,000 taels of land tax and 4.03 million yuan of commercial tax. The land tax is divided into three or three by the central government, the state capital, and the county, each with 200,000 taels; This year's commercial tax is 4.03 million taels, deducting the 800,000 checkpoint tax of the Anxi Metropolitan Protectorate, which should be 2.26 million taels, plus 200,000 yuan of land tax and 300,000 yuan of misappropriation, Fengle 16 years Huazhou has solved the tax silver as high as 2.76 million taels.

The state government left 30 percent of the commercial tax 97 taels, minus the temporary loan of 300,000 taels for disaster relief, there were actually 670,000 taels, Jiang Anyi and Fang Beijia discussed, decided to divide it with the counties fifty-fifty, and return the county tax silver 330,000 taels. In the fifty-three counties of Huazhou, with these 330,000 taels plus 200,000 taels of land tax, it is 530,000 taels, and on average, each county is exactly 10,000 taels. The tax standard of Shangxian County is more than 10,000 taels, and it is divided into only 3,300 taels and retained, and now the money retained has tripled.

Of course, there was some emphasis on the distribution of this money, 13,000 taels in the upper county, 10,000 taels in the middle county, and 7,000 taels in the lower county; After the distribution, the surplus of 50,000 taels of silver was distributed by Jiang Anyi to several counties on the border, so that they could take advantage of the slack to recruit people to repair the city gates, build additional walls, and strengthen defenses to prevent another invasion of the Western Regions. The matter of the Rong Mi alliance hung over Jiang Anyi's head like a sword, in addition to training the troops, Jiang Anyi was also ready to work defense.

The richest is still the government office, 540,000 taels of tax silver so that the thrifty side is also arrogant, there is already news that at the end of the year, the annual reward will be issued according to twice the Mid-Autumn Festival reward. Stimulated by money, the people of the Yamen were all beaming, walking with the wind, Jiang Tingshi was not allowed to extort and extort the people after he took office, and many people complained at the beginning, and many people were dismissed. I thought life would be sad, but I didn't expect that the festival reward in a year was worth two salaries, which was more than I earned secretly before.

There is a saying among the people that a good man should not be bad, being a servant is looked down upon, and it is difficult to ask for a daughter-in-law. A while ago, Fang Beijia wanted to recruit some more officials and officials, and the people who came to take the exam lined up on the street, and many Xiucai came to recruit Xu officials, and the private school only paid ten taels of silver a year, and the officials were almost twenty taels, and who couldn't figure out this account.

With Fang Beijia, Jiang Anyi doesn't need to worry about these things, the old man is energetic, and he has to ask about everything, Jiang Anyi is just doing the shopkeeper, and everyone in the mansion, the other driving mansion, and Sima Mansion are busy, but this Lord Thorn Shi is leisurely drinking tea and reading books in the second hall.

Recently, his back house has been much more stable, and after Xinfei learned that Tong'er said that day that she married her husband and followed her husband to put the Jiang family first, her attitude towards Tong'er eased a lot, and now the two of them laugh together a lot more naturally, Tong'er will occasionally hug Xinfei for Morningside, and the two will whisper to each other.

All in all, Jiang Anyi was a lot more relaxed, and finally remembered that he hadn't read a few copies of the set of "Historical Books" he bought, and he had to read more books. Jimin Academy is being built at an accelerated pace, and it is estimated that it will be completed in the spring of next year, and he has already written to Chief Deng Shan, asking him to introduce some teachers to him, and he will definitely come to the stage to say a few words at that time.

While indulging in the book, a servant entered the door and said, "My lord, there is a famous Hu businessman outside who asks to see him, saying that he is your old man." ”

"Let him in." Jiang Anyi put down the book, he couldn't remember which Hu businessman he was an old man, he had seen it with Guo Huaili and he had forgotten it, the New Year was approaching, and he was here to give gifts, thinking that he would take care of it, Jiang Anyi had received a lot of such Hu businessmen during this time.

Someone came to touch his chest and salute Jiang Anyi, Jiang Anyi seemed to have a kind face, and said with a smile: "Jiang Mou looks familiar with you, I can't remember where I saw it, may I ask your name?" ”

"The prince and noble man have a lot of memories, I am Yan Zhifu, the caravan steward of the Tule family in Shasu Kingdom, Yan Zhifu, my lord returned to Zheng Guo from Shasu, I escorted him, my lord can remember."

Jiang Anyi stood up and said with a smile: "Yan Zhifu, it is really an old man." ”