Dragon Sea Empire

"There is no difference between an official and a Jia, and there is no difference between a Jia and an official. There is no official but no Jia, and there is no Jia but no official,"

This is a true portrayal of the officialdom in the late Ming Dynasty. Almost all the officials and gentry along the coast of Fujian were linked to commercial trade. Even in the period when the imperial court strictly banned the sea, the officials formed an interest-related body with wealthy businessmen. The new governor Chen Xingxue and the tax envoy eunuch Gao Cai re-imposed various exorbitant taxes, which has seriously threatened the interests of officials, gentry, and merchants in the province.

Yin Feng and representatives of [-] wealthy businessmen from the whole province went to Fuzhou, and the governor's office refused to pay at all, while the tax envoys and eunuchs sent to Taiwan had already set off for Quanzhou.

Yin Feng discussed with Lin Xiao and others overnight that Zeng Qi, Zeng Ke, Huang Cheng and others planned to spend money to eliminate disasters, but Yin Feng disagreed. People like Gao Cai are people who have a lot of desires. If he tastes the benefits, he will intensify his efforts and get out of hand. Yin Feng absolutely does not want the Taiwan and Hong Kong he has worked so hard to become a place for eunuchs to gather wealth. Moreover, once the tax collectors and eunuchs are stationed in Taiwan, it will make the Chinese United Company Many trade actions cannot be carried out: the imperial court still prohibits trade with Japan, and cooperating with Japanese is a serious crime, but Chinese companies get millions of taels of silver from trade with Japan every year, and it is impossible to stop cooperating with Japanese.

Everyone is also aware of the problem of "passing the Japanese", even if these eunuchs can be dismissed with a sum of bribes, if they get the evidence of the Chinese company's access to the Japanese and use it as a threat, although they will not immediately attract the imperial court's ban Order, but it is a troublesome matter after all.

In the collusion between officials and businessmen in the Ming Dynasty, the bureaucrats always took the initiative; they could choose any businessman as a business agent, and they could steal the wealth of a businessman who had no background in a fit of anger. However, in Fujian, Chinese companies monopolized the most lucrative overseas For the trade route, officials in the whole province have to cooperate with Yin Feng, but the tax collectors and eunuchs are different. They collect taxes on behalf of the emperor, and there is no need to cooperate with local officials, gentry and merchants. Moreover, they were unscrupulous, and the local officials could not govern them at all. Therefore, when facing the mine supervisor and tax envoy, merchants from all over the place at that time had to rebel and make trouble except to accept it.

Zeng Qi, Zeng Ke, and Huang Cheng couldn't think of any good way to prevent the tax envoys from landing in Taiwan, but Yin Feng remembered the local underworld organization "Daxing", and immediately decided to spend money to sell people, and put those The tax envoy who intends to go to Taiwan will kill him.

The tax envoys and accompanying companions sent by Gao Cai were all newly arrived from the capital. They were completely lawless and unscrupulous gang of young eunuchs. The mine supervisor and tax envoy searched him for money, but only one-tenth of the total amount ended up in the royal treasury, and most of the rest fell into the hands of the eunuchs and their accomplices. The townsmen began to steal and plunder, which caused chaos along the way. Countless small merchants not only broke their money, but also had to be beaten and scolded. Many innocent people died. People in Quanzhou, who had just experienced the earthquake disaster, were full of complaints. This was a godsend opportunity for Yin Feng.

There are not many people working in the "Daxing" group in Quanzhou. When Yin Feng was assassinated at the south gate of Quanzhou last time, there were Daxing involved. The special team copied Daxing's lair in the Guandi Temple in the north of the city and killed many hooligans who had participated in the assassination. Now, Yin Feng and Zhonghua Company in the entire Quanzhou city are almost half of the magistrates. He and the Zeng family's business should avoid it.

On the night when the eunuchs of the tax eunuchs arrived in Quanzhou, Yin Feng sent Li Qi, a hidden stake in charge of Xu Xinsu, to find the leader of the "Daxing", and made an agreement with the "Daxing" people with a sum of money.

The next day, the tax envoy eunuchs sent people to block the gates of various cities in Quanzhou, and wanted to collect some "city entry tax".

From the third day to the sixth day, because there were no ships willing to carry the tax collectors and eunuchs to the sea, they continued to harm the people in Quanzhou City, and began to collect taxes in various names, and collected taxes on everyone’s belongings. The merchant's clerk was killed; on the fourth day, two shops were ransacked, and the yamen of Quanzhou Prefecture was used as a warehouse for piles of stolen goods by tax collectors and eunuchs.

On the seventh day, when the tax envoys and eunuchs mobilized the ships of the officers, soldiers and navy to go to Taiwan, this group of arrogant eunuchs was attacked by hundreds of "fighting" elements at the south gate.

At this time, Yin Feng finished worshiping Zeng Yue's cemetery, and was returning to Beicheng with the Zeng family. Lin Xiao greeted him excitedly, and whispered to him: "It's started, let's make a move."

Yin Feng nodded: "Have our people mixed in?"

"Luo Aquan personally supervised the battle, and none of these people can escape,"

The members of the special team of the Chinese company's escort also dressed up like members of the local gang, and rushed into the south gate. The officers and soldiers guarding the tax envoy and eunuch were personal soldiers of the chief soldier Zhu Wenda, and they still had some combat effectiveness. They were still at the city gate at first. There was a little resistance nearby.

Then, the development of the matter was completely out of Yin Feng's expectation: the people inside and outside the city who were entering and exiting the city gates surged up and down, and took the initiative to join in the attack on the tax eunuchs. As soon as there was a response, a riot was triggered.

"Hit the eunuch,"

"Kill these eggless things,"

"Hit, hit, hit,"

Thousands of people roared in, chasing and intercepting the eunuchs, companions, guards, and yamen servants around the south gate. A young eunuch and his two companions were killed on the spot.

The news spread all over the city immediately, and the people of Quanzhou, who had suffered enough grievances for seven days, rioted throughout the city. People in the streets and alleys ran towards the south gate with sticks, chairs, benches, kitchen knives and so on, scrambling to be the first.

Within 10 minutes, the crowd gathered at the South Gate had exceeded [-]. Lin Xiao, who came to investigate the situation, saw the dark crowd in a restaurant. Sticks were flying inside and outside the South Gate, fists were heaving, and voices were buzzing. He couldn't help being dumbfounded.

Under the protection of guard officers and soldiers, the tax eunuchs and eunuchs who hid in the south gate tower were almost all wounded, with bruised noses and swollen faces, and ragged clothes. , public anger has accumulated for many days, once it erupts at this moment, it will almost have an unstoppable momentum, and even the Quanzhou Government Yamen was surrounded by people. Suddenly, they broke into the houses of rich families and robbed them. Several houses caught fire, and the whole city of Quanzhou was plunged into chaos.

Luo Aquan was accidentally injured by the crowd, and went up to the restaurant to meet Lin Xiao with his panda eyes, "Brother Guangming, before the brothers could make a move, the crowd has already surrounded them. We can get closer, or we can solve it with muskets." Close combat is not Luo Aquan's forte, although some of his team members are good at close combat, but tens of thousands of people crowded together at the scene, it is impossible to get close to those eunuchs.

Lin Xiao shook his head: "No, the ship owner said, you must not use firearms. We are the best firearms in the entire Ming Dynasty. That will expose our identities."

"Kill," an eunuch accidentally fell into the hands of the crowd, and immediately disappeared into the crowd. After a while, there was no body left. Most eunuchs were still hiding on the tower, countless stones, mud, bricks and tiles rained It generally fell on the heads of the guarding officers and soldiers, but the officers and soldiers had long spears and swords, as well as a blunderbuss, guarding the only step up to the tower, and the angry crowd could not rush up.

Lin Xiao anxiously watched more and more people coming from the whole city, gritted his teeth and said, "We can't delay any longer, otherwise, when the officers and soldiers of Quanzhou Guard arrive, these eggless bastards will escape. Luo Ahquan, inform the brothers in front and set fire to the tower, "

"Set it on fire," Luo Aquan was taken aback: "It will burn down the residential buildings in the city,"

"It doesn't matter so much, the ship owner doesn't want to see these people appear in Taiwan, understand, go and set the fire," Lin Xiao said through gritted teeth.

Luo Aquan was also a decisive person, so he had nothing to say at the moment, and immediately ran away.

Soon, someone from the crowd gathered at the south gate exclaimed, "It's gone!"

A puff of black smoke suddenly rose from the city gate, followed by a fire that rose more than a foot high. The crowd retreated like a tide. The city tower was engulfed in the blink of an eye, and none of the eunuchs escaped. They were all beaten to death and burned to death. More than a hundred officers, soldiers and servants of the guards were also beaten to death and burned to death. Injured, most of them trampled on each other to death, few were killed by officers and soldiers, the fire spread to the surrounding houses and was only extinguished in the afternoon, burning more than 300 houses near the south gate, the riot lasted for three days On that day, the city of Quanzhou was full of flames and smoke, and the losses suffered by the people were no less than that of the earthquake a few months ago.

The news that the people in Quanzhou City beat the tax envoy eunuch to death immediately spread throughout Fujian.

The whole province of Fujian was in turmoil, and the people were turbulent. The officials and gentlemen unanimously accused the governor Chen Xingxue and the eunuch Gao Cai for causing the civil uprising.

Civil uprisings were raging, and broke out simultaneously in coastal areas of the entire province within a few days. The subalterns and tax supervisors of the Haicheng Supervisor and Tax Supervisor who were in charge of tax collection at the Yuegang Port were beaten to the ground and tied up like rice dumplings. After leaving Haicheng County, the first to smash the Duanguan was the wharf coolies of Huaxing United. A large number of people also smashed the county government. Living with the dividends from Yuegang's overseas trade, the tax inspectors have already violated their interests by wantonly searching Yuegang, so they are not willing to fight against the merchants and people of Haicheng for these eunuchs.

For three days in a row, there were businessmen and civilians parading on the streets of Fuzhou. Even a group of famous imperial examination students carried tablets of Confucius to the streets to petition. Countless bricks, tiles and stones were thrown into his residence, and finally Zhu Wenda had to transfer the officers and soldiers of Fuzhou Wei and Funing Wei into the city to strictly guard the mansion of the government office.

Except in Haichengyuegang, Zhonghua United Company is behind the scenes in other places and will never take the initiative to show up. However, at this time, the development of the incident no longer needs Yin Feng and the company to promote it. Many local officials, gentry and wealthy businessmen in Fujian took advantage Taking this opportunity, he stood up and encouraged the public to oppose the mining tax envoy.

Chen Xingxue was promoted to governor of Fujian only three months ago, and he offended all the officials, gentry and businessmen in Fujian, causing riots and riots everywhere. Now he has to be busy fighting fires everywhere, and he has no intention of calculating Taiwan anymore. It was even better than Yin Feng expected. The Fujian government didn't have the energy to manage Taiwan's affairs in a short period of time.