King Luhuang of the Ming Dynasty: My father, Ming Taizu

Zhang Mao was a little unhappy. He hadn't made his position clear yet! It was already this late, and they were still so eager to punish him. This was too disrespectful!

However, when the butler said this, everyone was stunned.

"My lord, it's bad, the Marquis of Shouning has passed away."

Who is Shouning Hou? Zhang Heling is the uncle of the current emperor, how could he be killed just like that?
The steward swallowed his saliva and said, "Just now, Zhang Heling's house was burned down, and bandits rushed in and killed Zhang Heling, his wife and children."

Zhang Mao jumped up immediately. This matter was of no trivial importance. It was a terrible murder case.

"Notify the five military garrisons immediately and cooperate with Shuntian Palace in the investigation. I will go there in person and then report this matter to the emperor."

In the capital, the emperor's uncle was killed. This is no joke.

Even the Ministry of Rites examination scheduled for tomorrow was overshadowed by this incident. The streets were full of detectives and soldiers, and the entire capital was on alert.

Bad news also reached the ears of Zhu Youtang and his wife.

Although the fire of Shouning Marquis was put out, most of it was burned to ashes. Only a few servants escaped. Zhang Heling and his relatives were not spared.

The Minister of Justice, Zhang Mao, the Lord of Shuntian Prefecture, came to Zhu Youtang and told him the news he had received.

Although Zhu Youtang did not have a good impression of Zhang Heling, he was heartbroken and angry when he saw Zhang Heling was so seriously injured, and he scolded Zhang Mao and others.

Empress Zhang had already fainted, and her mother, Jin, was also there. Her youngest son was driven out of the palace, and her eldest son was dead. What should she do?

After Zhu Tan learned about this, he was stunned for a long time. Although he did not have any good feelings towards Zhang Heling, he was still his own brother after all. Why did he die suddenly?

It was not until Liu Jin and Zhang Yong returned that Zhu Tan realized that he was the one who should be killed, and Zhang Heling was just going to die in his place.

Since the murderers had marked themselves in the Shouning Marquis' Mansion, their identities were revealed to be Yang Hu and Qi Yanming, the two big thieves in the Bazhou area.

Zhu Tan fought with Yang Hu and Qi Yanming in the street, beheaded two of them, and then let the other escape.

However, these desperate criminals were not willing to let it go and even dared to come back to kill people.

However, they didn't know much about the capital, so they just asked about the residence of the emperor's uncle, and then they were told about Zhang Heling, and then this incident happened.

If the truth is uncovered, the entire Marquis of Jianchang might be killed.

Liu Jin and Zhang Yong were still frightened and thought that these daring guys were very courageous, but Liu Jin had other plans.

"My Lord, the murderer carved his name on the wall, but only a few of us know who Yang Hu and Qi Yanming are. You must distance yourself from this matter, otherwise you will be blamed by the Emperor and the Empress."

Zhu Tan stared at Liu Jin with a meaningful look. What this damn eunuch said was absolutely right.

He nodded and said, "Just do as you say. Tell Zhang Wei to inform the others, Wang Hua and his son. I will tell them."

Liu Jin turned and left. Zhu Tan ordered Zhang Yong, "Go find the governor of the capital, Ma Cong, and tell him to arrest Yang Hu, Qi Yanming and others at all costs."

His own brother is already dead, let alone Zhu Tan is extorting money, even if he is not extorting money, he must show up.

So, supported by Shen Qionglian, he walked up to Zhu Youtang and his wife and said that he would personally mourn for Zhang Heling.

This matter still had to be handled by Zhu Tan. Zhu Youtang and his wife looked at each other, and then reluctantly agreed, repeatedly promising to find the murderer and avenge Zhang Heling.

Zhu Tan also started crying hypocritically. In short, he looked down on Zhang Heling from the bottom of his heart and hated this man. It would be better to kill him, and he could also take the blame for himself.

In Chu Xian's eyes, Shen Qionglian was also a beautiful woman, and she left the palace with her.

Yes, she is just a beautiful woman. The reason why Zhu Tan likes Shen Qionglian is because Shen Qionglian is beautiful and is her dream lover. She will feel comfortable when she holds her in her arms while sleeping.

Zhu Tan did not go home, but went straight to the Shouning Marquis Mansion.

I saw that the huge mansion had turned into a ruin, with faint smoke rising. It was obvious that the people from Shuntian Palace, the Five Military Commandery and the Ministry of Justice had not left.

Even if he couldn't find out anything, he had to pretend to do it to make Zhu Youtang unhappy.

As soon as Zhang Mao met Zhu Tan, he clasped his fists towards Zhu Tan somewhat embarrassedly.

"Marquis Jianchang, please accept my condolences. If there is anything I can help you with, just let me know. As for the trouble Yuanying caused, I will seek justice from Marquis Jianchang."

Zhu Tan knew that this was not the time to pursue the matter of being kicked. Zhang Heling's death was the most important thing, so there was no need for him to care about anything else. He just nodded and said, "Thank you, Lord Duke. There may be something else in my brother's mansion. We need the soldiers to help find it. Also, clean up this mansion!"

Zhu Tan then chatted with the people from the Ministry of Justice and Shuntian Division. There was no need for him to do anything. The two divisions would definitely do their best to investigate the case and bring the murderer to justice.

Zhu Tan did not want to capture all the people in Bazhou in one fell swoop, so as to avoid being implicated in the death of Zhang Heling.

Zhang Wei and others quickly set up a mourning shed and a ancestral hall here, and bought a fine coffin to bury Zhang Heling and his family here.

Zhu Tan is his brother, and he cannot leave, so his days are spent in busyness.

As dusk approached, members of the Zhang family and officials from the imperial court came to express their condolences, and Zhu Tan went to greet them personally.

Zhang Heling was the emperor's uncle. No matter how many shameful deeds or hateful things he had done in his life, everything would be over as long as he died.

Even the two "Shao Xi" of the Zhou family, who originally had some conflicts with the Zhang family, came to express their condolences. However, whether they were willing to see the Zhang family make a fool of themselves was entirely up to them.

Wang Hua and Wang Shouren, who were going to take part in the imperial examination tomorrow, also came to mourn. They all knew that Zhang Heling died for Zhu Tan, so their decision was very interesting.

Wang Hua did not speak. Wang Shouren lit incense and said softly to Zhu Tan, "Brother, I am sorry for your loss. You taught me to do this. This is what I should do."

Zhu Tan was stunned for a moment, and then realized that the father and son of the Wang family were just comforting him and would not say anything nonsense.

Zhu Tan couldn't help but think to himself that this was a well-educated person! He would explain every word vaguely, but this also made him feel relieved.

Zhu Youtang and the Queen's favorability towards him is probably going to plummet.

After everyone left, Zhang Wei went to attend Zhu Tan's funeral. There was a hint of smile in his tears, and he couldn't stop it.

"Second Master, I found a basement behind the house. In that basement, there are 37 watermelons, worth 360,000 taels of silver, as well as some gold and silver jewelry, and a stack of treasure coins. Together, they are worth more than 200,000 taels of silver. As for the land deeds and shop contracts, I only saw some of them. I guess they were burned. The rest is only about 20,000 taels of silver."

Zhu Tan calculated in his mind that this was probably the amount of wealth that Zhang Heling's family had, nothing more.

"Let Zhang Laoliu and Jia Zhang carry these things to the Marquis's Mansion. When they get there, don't forget to write my name on it." Zhang Wei continued, "Second Master, the master's wife is Wang, the daughter of Princess Jiashan, and Wang Ji is his mother. Should we notify them and let them arrange their funeral?"

Although Zhu Tan had heard of his sister-in-law's true identity, he had never met her.

But in order to avoid Wang's pursuit, Zhang Wei still gave a warning in advance. Besides, the deceased was already dead, and Zhu Tan didn't mind holding a grand funeral for Zhang Heling. After all, the dead could still be sold.

"Tomorrow you go and tell him in person that the cost of the burial will be 20,000 yuan, and it should be done beautifully and grandly."

Zhu Tan felt tired and a little painful. He had been busy all day, entertaining guests and seeing them off. He could not hold on any longer, so he went back home to rest. He didn't even bother taking a bath or rubbing his back. He just fell on the bed and fell into a deep sleep.

After Zhu Tan fell asleep, a small incident occurred.

Shen Qionglian came back with them, and after settling down a bit, she met Luzhu unexpectedly.

When Luzhu saw Shen Qionglian, her face was full of surprise and a bit of joy.

"Sister Lian, why are you here?"

Shen Qionglian knew that Luzhu was bullied by Zhu Tan and was finally taken out of the palace. After hearing Luzhu's questions, a bitter look appeared on her face.

"Thanks to the Queen's grace, His Majesty has approved of granting me to the Marquis of Jianchang as his concubine."

Luzhu exclaimed, she was just a maid when she entered the palace, but Shen Qionglian was a female official of a high rank in the Internal Affairs Bureau.

She had been in the palace for more than ten years and was highly respected among the palace maids. Unexpectedly, she was expelled from the palace for such a reason.

Shen Qionglian is more than ten years older than Luzhu, and she was an official in the palace. Whether it is her aura or other aspects, she can suppress Luzhu.

Shen Qionglian knew that things were difficult to change at this point, so she took Luzhu's hand and asked about the affairs of Jianchang Marquis' Mansion.

When Shen Qionglian learned that Marquis Jianchang had not yet married, she felt relieved at first.

She knew that it was difficult to be a concubine. Even if she had a good family background and was a good concubine, it would not be easy to live with a mistress.

Later, he learned that in addition to Lu Zhu, there was also a beautiful girl from a small family who took the initiative to ask Zhu Tan to take her in, and there were seven or eight beautiful young women in the mansion, all of whom could be classified as Zhu Tan's concubines.

Luzhu also vaguely mentioned that they occasionally slept in the same bed together.

Shen Qionglian couldn't help but spit. There were rumors in the palace that the second uncle was extremely licentious, and now it was confirmed.

When Shen Qionglian thought that she was most likely one of the people who got caught, she couldn't help but feel sorry for herself. She was afraid that her life in the future would not be so easy!

"Luzhu, what's that in your hand?"

Shen Qionglian took a casual glance and saw that what Luzhu was holding in her hand seemed to be a book.

"The account books! There are the accounts for today's gifts, and the account books for several shops."

Shen Qionglian was shocked. Luzhu had just called her Teng's concubine. According to the rules she knew, things like account books and contracts could only be controlled by the mistress of the house.

"Marquis Jianchang, I'll leave all these to you to take care of?" Shen Qionglian had already guessed whether Zhu Tan was going to promote Lu Zhu to be the legitimate wife.

Lu Zhu nodded, "We all have them! The Marquis said that people should not be idle, so he taught us how to check and record accounts. Each of us is responsible for a part, and then cross-check. Whoever finds faults and errors in the account book will be rewarded!"

When Lu Zhu thought of the reward, her face turned slightly red. That kind of reward was hard to describe.

Shen Qionglian could understand that this was Zhu Tan's way of asking the concubines to supervise each other, but allowing concubines to have access to the account books was already against the rules.

But when she borrowed the account book and took a look at it, she was dumbfounded.

As a descendant of Shen Wansan, Shen Qionglian had a family background in literature and art. Although she entered the palace at the age of fourteen, she learned to keep accounts when she was a child.

Moreover, the Shen family's accounting method is a secret that is not passed on, but when she looked at Zhu Tan's account book now, she was dumbfounded like a primary school student facing a binary equation.

Seeing that Shen Qionglian didn't understand, Luzhu didn't laugh at her.

"It's hard, isn't it? It took us several days of hands-on instruction from the Marquis before we could barely learn this bookkeeping method. The Marquis said this is called accounting."

Shen Qionglian didn't expect that Zhu Tan taught Lu Zhu and others such a profound and unique accounting method, which immediately made her eyes light up.

"Luzhu, can you teach me?"

"Okay! Sister Lian will have to get an account book sooner or later, but it's good to help me calculate now."

Luzhu was very happy. She had a headache when she counted these numbers, especially the curved ones!
Zhang Heling's mourning shed was kept for three days, which made Zhu Tan very exhausted. Then Zhang Heling's coffin had to be transported to Zhang Luan's tomb for burial. The tomb was located in Wanping County in later generations. Fortunately, it was not far from the capital.

These three days are also the examination period for the imperial examination, but Zhu Tan is unable to handle all the tasks, so he can only let Ma Wensheng and Ye Shen keep an eye on it, and also send Jia Zhang, Zhang Laoliu and others to help out.

He felt that with Ma Wensheng and Ye Shen's experience and knowledge in officialdom, there shouldn't be any major problems.

Zhang Heling's wife, Princess Jiashan's daughter, Wang's family also sent her family members headed by Wang Zengqi to help with the funeral arrangements. The group set out for Wanping to the accompaniment of suona music.

This background music gave Zhu Tan a headache. He rubbed his temple and said to Ma Cong beside him, "Brother Shi, have you arranged everything?"

Ma Cong was inspecting the Dusi garrisons around the capital. After receiving Zhu Tan's letter, he immediately came to join the group with 1,200 soldiers from the garrisons.

"We have our men stationed two or three miles away. If anything goes wrong, they can arrive within half an hour. Will the thieves really come?"

Zhu Tan shook his head. "It's better to be prepared! Even if it's impossible, we can't let them take advantage of us. It's better to be safe than sorry."

Wang Zengqi was Wang's younger brother, and he was granted the official position of Zhongshu Sheren by imperial favor. He had never had any contact with Zhu Tan before.

But after meeting him yesterday and today, I found that Marquis Jianchang, who was rumored to have a very bad reputation, was actually very sure of himself and took everything into consideration.

"Your Majesty is right. Those people are desperate criminals who will do anything for money. We must be on guard."

Zhu Tan nodded to Wang Zengqi, and then his eyes moved to the sides of the road and into the distance.

After he traveled through time, he was in the capital, the imperial city, and had a rather partial understanding of the situation of the Ming Dynasty at that time. (End of this chapter)