Daming: I am the most powerful emperor grandson, please abdicate the throne

Chapter 501 Bandits?

"No...of course not, His Highness thinks too much."

Zhou Anyan, the prefect of Suzhou, shook his head quickly, trying to explain, but also tried hard to show that I was really fine.

"Are you sure, really not?"

Zhu Xuan didn't believe this guy. Looking at his reaction, he understood what should happen in Suzhou Mansion. There must be something wrong here: "Yan Guan, take him down and treat him well. I want to know what happened in Suzhou Mansion."

Yan Guan stepped forward to capture Zhou Anyan.

Seeing the flying fish robe and the embroidered spring knife right in front of him, Zhou Anyan trembled all over and said quickly: "Your Highness doesn't want it! I...actually have something to do, but I didn't want to trouble Your Highness."

"what's up?"

Zhu Xuan asked with interest.

Zhou Anyan hesitated for a while, and finally said: "Some bandits suddenly appeared in our Suzhou Prefecture to cause trouble. We have already thought of a way and sent soldiers from the guard station to suppress them. We dare not trouble Your Highness."

Within the scope of one's own governance, if bandits cause trouble, it will easily affect political performance. Not only will they not be promoted in the future, but they might also be investigated by the imperial court and asked to be investigated by the Jin Yiwei.

After all, if a place is good, how can bandits appear for no reason?
  Either there is a natural disaster or it is a man-made disaster. If there are no natural disasters in Suzhou recently, it may be a man-made disaster, such as incompetent officials, huge corruption, etc.

Even if the matter has nothing to do with officials, if someone from above is sent down to investigate, it will cost half of his life and a lot of money.

For this reason, Zhou Anyan thought not to report it yet.

He did not expect that as soon as the bandits appeared, he would get the news that His Highness the Young Emperor Sun had come to Suzhou. He had not yet decided whether to tell His Highness.

Because Zhu Xuan came to Suzhou for business and had no interactions with bandits.

"Bandits?"

"In the prosperous land south of the Yangtze River, there are also bandits causing trouble?"

"There have been no natural disasters in Suzhou Prefecture recently. That's the problem of your officials. Mr. Zhou seemed to want to hide it from me just now. It should be your problem, right?"

Zhu Xuan said first.

As soon as he opened his mouth, he said what Zhou Anyan was most worried about and what he least wanted to hear. He quickly knelt down and said, "Your Highness, it has nothing to do with me. This is Zhang Shicheng's problem. Those bandits are all Zhang Shicheng's old subordinates."

"Zhang Shicheng?"

When Zhu Xuan heard about it, he found out that it was related to the former enemy of Grandpa Huang.

However, Suzhou was Zhang Shicheng's former base camp. The businessmen and people here still had a certain sense of belonging to Zhang Shicheng in the past few decades. This was one of the reasons why Lao Zhu was so unhappy with Suzhou Prefecture.

"Yan Guan, take Mr. Zhou back to the government office."

Zhu Xuan added: "Control all other officials and let them go to the government office together. No one can leave without my instructions."

"Yes!"

Yan Guan led the Jin Yiwei and took action quickly.

Zhou Anyan was controlled and brought back to the government office.

Other officials were brought back one after another. They had known for a long time that the young emperor's grandson was coming, but as soon as he arrived, he was asked to be captured by the Jin Yiwei. They were all on tenterhooks.

"Master Zhou, how are the bandits related to Zhang Shicheng?"

Zhu Xuan asked curiously.

Zhou Anyan explained: "Those bandits are all related to Zhang Shicheng's descendant Zhang Fuchu, who is a businessman from Suzhou..."

"and many more!"

Zhu Xuan interrupted: "Zhang Shicheng's descendants can still stay in Suzhou and work as merchants. You, the prefect of Suzhou, know this and are indifferent?"

"This... Chen... Chen deserves to die!"

Zhou Anyan knelt down again.

Other officials had to kneel down. Zhang Fuchu could bring his family back to Suzhou from overseas, and he would definitely give them filial money. All the officials in Suzhou, big and small, were well managed.

Otherwise, Zhang Fuchu would not be able to do this.

Zhu Xuan had known about the existence of Zhang Fuchu for a long time, and even Lao Zhu knew about it, but Lao Zhu did not let the Jin Yiwei come to Suzhou to kill people, and only killed people from the Zhang family, as if he wanted to let this matter go.

After all, Lao Zhu was willing to take back Zhang Shicheng and Fang Guozhen's old troops, and didn't care too much about the others.

However, the officials of Suzhou Prefecture were trembling with fear, with cold sweat on their foreheads.

"Okay, you guys get up."

Zhu Xuan said again: "Keep talking."

Zhou Anyan wiped the sweat from his forehead, stood up tremblingly, stood in front of Zhu Xuan, lowered his head and continued: "Zhang Fuchu brought people to Beijing to frame His Highness. After being found out by the Jin Yiwei, all the Zhang family members were killed, but Those old members of the Zhang family got the news, gathered a crowd to rebel, and became bandits."

Zhu Xuan asked: "Are the old members of the Zhang family the same people that Grandpa Huang brought back a few years ago?"

"It's not!"

"no?"

Zhu Xuan asked again: "How many old members of the Zhang family are there in Suzhou Mansion? They shouldn't have been killed. Could it be that Zhang Fuchu secretly developed a private army after he came back?"

"This one……"

Zhou Anyan felt that this was also a life-threatening issue. If Zhang Fuchu really secretly developed a private army, no official in the entire Suzhou government would be able to discover it. It would be dereliction of duty and poor supervision. He hesitated for a moment and said bravely: "I don't know very well either. But we have investigated and monitored the people His Majesty brought back. They are keeping to themselves, doing their daily farming and living, and do nothing else."

"That's weird."

Zhu Xuan feels that private soldiers are very likely, but he does not rule out the possibility of others using the name of the Zhang family to do so.

Zhou Anyan was really scared. His fate was entirely in Zhu Xuan's hands.

"Where are those bandits?"

Zhu Xuan asked again.

Unexpectedly, when I arrived in Suzhou, the trade zone had not yet been established, and I had to help Suzhou suppress bandits.

However, the news of the trade area has spread, and other merchants came to gather first to give them a reassurance. After the bandit suppression is over, they can then trouble others.

"Mowu Mountain on the edge of Taihu Lake, and actually several small islands in Taihu Lake, are all occupied by them. There seem to be more than 2,000 people."

"Just yesterday, I already called the government officials and the soldiers of the Zhenhai Guard to try to suppress the bandits and test the authenticity of the traitors."

"But those thieves, when they saw our people coming, turned around and fled towards Taihu Lake. There was absolutely nothing we could do against them."

"We don't have enough ships to chase them out."

Zhou Anyan said again.

Zhu Xuan said: "There are so many private soldiers of the Zhang family, more than 2,000 people, and you can't find them at all. This Suzhou prefect has done a good job!"

"I deserve to die!"

Zhou Anyan almost cried.

The other officials almost cried, this was indeed their problem.

But according to their knowledge, there could not be that many people in the Zhang family. They had no idea how these two thousand people appeared. In short, they were going to be killed by Zhang Fuchu.

Fortunately, they thought that His Royal Highness the Young Emperor was still very kind and easy to talk to, so he did not arrest them immediately.

"If you really knew you deserved to die, you would have hanged yourself from a tree long ago, so as not to waste Ming Dynasty's salary on supporting incompetent officials like you."

Zhu Xuan snorted coldly, glanced at all the officials in the government office, and asked: "Who is the commander of the guard post here? Stand up for me."

(End of this chapter)