Rebirth of Zhu Di's son

Chapter 292 Your Majesty is aware of the details
Fengtian Temple.

After reading the secret letter written by King Jingjiang himself, Zhu Gaoxu's face gradually became gloomy.

He collected the secret letter and put it into an envelope, and then handed it to Kang Ping, the eunuch who was standing beside him. Then he looked at Meng Xiaowen and said slowly: "Meng Xiaowen, I will give your family justice. As for those evildoers who have done many evil things, I I will never let them go!”

"Caomin bows to His Majesty!"

Meng Xiaowen pulled his sister and knelt down again and kowtowed to Zhu Gaoxu.

"Censor of Zuodu?" Zhu Gaoxu shouted.

Liu Jing walked out of the class, bowed and said, "I'm here."

"You first send someone to settle the Meng family brothers and sisters."

Zhu Gaoxu ordered: "After we find out the truth in the future and catch the gangsters, we will send someone to escort them home."

Liu Jing bowed and said: "I obey your order."

After the Meng family brothers and sisters were taken out of the hall by the royal guards and Liu Jing walked back to the class, Zhu Gaoxu looked around at the ministers in the hall and asked loudly: "Do you have anything else to report?"

When all the civil and military officials heard this, they all remained silent.

"In that case, let's retreat from the court."

Zhu Gaoxu suddenly stood up, shook his sleeves, then turned around and walked towards the middle right door with his hands behind his back.

"I will send you to Your Majesty."

Civil and military officials said in unison.

When Zhu Gaoxu reached the middle right gate, he stopped. He turned sideways and told Kang Ping who was following him: "Go and call the six ministers and nine ministers to the Wuying Hall for discussion."

"The slaves obey the order."

Kang Ping bowed and accepted the order.

A quarter of an hour later.

Hall of Martial Arts.

Zhu Gaoxu changed into regular clothes and sat behind the imperial desk. Prince Zhu Zhanyu sat in the lower left front of the imperial desk. Ten people including the six ministers, the general envoy, the minister of Dali Temple, the censor of Zuodu and the censor of rightdu sat respectively. On the chairs on both sides.

"This is a secret letter written by King Jingjiang himself. You all should read it."

Zhu Gaoxu gave Kang Ping a look, and the latter respectfully handed the letter to Prince Zhu Zhanyu first.

Since the secret letter was less than a thousand words, Zhu Zhanyu quickly read the contents.

After that, the secret letter was circulated among the six ministers and nine ministers in turn.

"I have decided to send troops today to wipe out all the rebels and bandits in Guangxi. What do you think?"

Zhu Gaoxu saw that everyone had read the secret letter, so he got straight to the point and stated his plan directly.

King Jingjiang secretly reported in the letter that there were remnants of the White Lotus Sect traveling around Guangxi to preach, and that Meng Xiaowen's wife and son were all committed by members of the White Lotus Sect in collusion with local officials.

"Your Majesty, I feel that this matter is a bit strange."

Xia Yuanji, the Minister of Household Affairs, did not express his support or opposition, but directed the topic to another aspect.

Zhu Gaoxu smiled slightly and asked: "You want to say that Meng Zhongyi has served King Jingjiang for six or seven years, and it is impossible that he can't even get out 5000 silver yuan, right?"

Xia Yuanji said in astonishment: "Your Majesty is wise, this is indeed what puzzles me."

He was in charge of the household department, so he naturally knew that the salary, money, rewards, goods, etc. allocated by the imperial court to the Jingjiang Palace every year would be at least 5 yuan if converted into silver dollars.

The salary is actually just a drop in the bucket for King Jingjiang. In addition to the annual salary, King Jingjiang also has real estate such as farms, mountain farms, horse farms, and tea farms, as well as corresponding farm laborers, servants, slaves, etc.

Coupled with the special status of King Jingjiang, the annual income of his palace is at least seven to eight hundred thousand taels, not to mention millions of taels.

"Do you, gentlemen, also have this doubt?"

Zhu Gaoxu asked with a smile on his face as he looked at the others. "Your Majesty is aware of everything."

Liu Jing, the censor of Zuodu, and others responded.

“In June of the 19th year of Yongle, I received a secret report from the King of Jingjiang, requesting me to allow him to sign a private contract with the King of Han, that is, to buy out his right to sell tea in the territory of Han for 30 silver yuan per year for a period of ten years. The contract It takes effect the following year.”

Zhu Gaoxu did not intend to hide it from everyone, and directly said the answer: "I thought about his identity, so I agreed to his request and ordered him to handle the tea ceremony in accordance with the court rules."

"In June of the 24th year of Yongle, King Jingjiang secretly reported to me again, asking me to allow him to renew his five-year contract with the King of Han. After I agreed, he expanded the tea trade with Han and purchased more tea each time."

Historically, the Ming Dynasty has always allowed private merchants to sell tea, but tea sellers had to pay money to buy tea and accept the control of the court.

Although King Jingjiang has a special status, he still follows the rules when selling tea.

Zhu Gaoxu's few words revealed two crucial pieces of information.

First, starting from the 20th year of Yongle, all tea merchants in the Han Kingdom were sent by King Jingjiang, and the tea sold by these merchants would only be produced in King Jingjiang’s tea house.

But only the rich or powerful in Han Dynasty could afford tea. Even if King Jingjiang monopolized the tea market, the price of tea would not remain static and would always fluctuate.

The tea industry is an industry that not only includes sales, but also tea picking, tea making, packaging, transportation and other links. This will force King Jingjiang to continue to invest the money he earns in all links.

Even though he is still as generous as before and likes to give gifts to his servants, most of them are related to tea.

Guilin is a tea-producing area, and the local tea is not valuable. When converted into money, the rewards Meng Zhongyi received were far less than Xia Yuanji and others imagined.

Second, in the 24th year of Yongle, King Jingjiang renewed a five-year contract with the King of Han, with the purpose of expanding the tea industry and making more money.

Tea merchants in the Han Kingdom could sell tea to neighboring countries and regions after buying tea from the tea merchants sent by King Jingjiang.

While these second-rate tea dealers were making a lot of money, they would definitely contribute a lot of property to King Zhu Gaochi of Han Dynasty. Otherwise, Zhu Gaochi would not have agreed to renew the contract with King Jingjiang.

Faced with this situation, King Jingjiang naturally came up with the idea of ​​expanding the scale of the tea industry. From then on, it became natural for him to continue to invest a lot of money in this industry.

"Your Majesty, I understand."

Xia Yuanji suddenly said: "Although it is the second year of Qianxi, it is not yet the first month, and only two years have passed since the 24th year of Yongle. The money that King Jingjiang invested in expanding the tea industry cannot be earned back so quickly."

His implication is that before the tea industry forms a new virtuous cycle, all the people in Guilin who rely on King Jingjiang for food will live in relatively tight circumstances.

"Meng Zhongyi's family has also had to spend money on living expenses in recent years. Including his wife's family, the annual expenses are not a small amount."

Liu Jing continued: "And Meng Zhongyi is not a greedy person who only knows how to make money. After being framed by Mrs. Liu and others, he was able to raise more than [-] pieces of cash in a short period of time. I guess he should have spent all his money." Lost the family fortune."

With the current purchasing power of 3000 yuan silver yuan, it will be a huge sum of about 200 million yuan in future generations.

If King Jingjiang is compared to the top leader of a listed group in later generations, then Meng Zhongyi is equivalent to the top office clerk. After working as a clerk for six or seven years without corruption, he was able to get a huge fortune of 200 million in a short period of time. He is already quite good at "financial management".

"Whether the Meng brothers may be lying, I will order the Jinyi Guards to verify it secretly."

Zhu Gaoxu said: "The King of Jingjiang secretly reported that there are remnants of the White Lotus Sect who are preaching in Guangxi and colluding with local officials to do evil. Meng Xiaowen's wife and children were harmed by them. I have decided to order Han Guan, the commander of the Guangxi Dusi Dusi, to send troops. What do you think of the suppression of all the rebels and bandits in Guangxi?"

"Your Majesty, if you use troops rashly, you may be able to alert the enemy."

Liu Jing said, "I thought we could first send someone to secretly verify whether the secret report of King Jingjiang is true. If it is true, then let Commander Han send someone to secretly find out where the White Lotus Sect is hiding so that they can all be caught."

"Father, what Uncle Chengyi said is that he will seek the country with his age, and I second my opinion."

Prince Zhu Zhanyu echoed.

Others present also expressed their agreement with Liu Jing's proposal.

Zhu Gaoxu didn't answer, but he had made up his mind.

Then, he called Kang Ping to the imperial court and ordered: "Send Zhao Junchen to come see me."

After a while, Zhao Junchen, who had white hair and beard, walked into the Wuying Hall, bowed and saluted, and said, "I am sorry to see you, Your Majesty."

(End of this chapter)