hairpin flower support temple Chang'an step

Chapter 371

Just when Wan Tianci was being manipulated by Cui Pu in various ways in the government office, and Mu Jiaojiao was sitting in the backyard watching the show, a fierce quarrel broke out in the backyard of the county government office in Tianchang County.

Wu Lixin woke up after a long sleep, only to be told by the master what happened last night, he was anxious and angry, and hurried to Pei's room.

"You did it, didn't you?"

"Yes." Pei said firmly.

"You're crazy!" Wu Lixin yelled, pacing back and forth, "You're going to kill me, do you know? Do you know who Wan Tianci belongs to? If you dare to provoke them, you're provoking Li Zhongshu. Li Zhongshu This person is narrow-minded and will take revenge, and he has always disliked us. You are doing such a thing now, don’t you just put the blame in their hands and let them toss me casually? I’m really going to die of anger, you woman’s eyesight Why are you so short-sighted! Our whole family will be killed by you!"

"Is it you who are really short-sighted?" Pei said quietly.

Wu Lixin was taken aback, his face suddenly darkened. "What did you say? Say it again!"

"I said, you are the one who is really short-sighted." Mrs. Pei raised her eyes to look him squarely, and said word by word.

"you……"

"Didn't you think about it? Now that the Wu family has lost power, the people in Chang'an City have long been in chaos, and we are alone here. Now, King Shou is hopeless, and you don't have the self-reliance. If we don’t have the ability, then we must quickly grab a support for ourselves. However, Li Linfu is impossible, so we can only look for Li Linfu’s deadly enemy.”

"So you chose Cui Liu?" Wu Lixin whispered, his face full of disbelief.

Pei nodded. "Now the closest and most promising person to us is only him."

"I think you're really crazy!" Wu Lixin almost exploded, "You say I'm incompetent, how is that bastard better than me? He just relied on his father and his wife to get what he is today You are betting on him now, which is worse than betting on King Shou! Our family is really going to be killed by you!"

In his heart, he still refuses to admit the fact that Cui Pu is better than him, and insists that Cui Pu is lucky, and all kinds of luck will make him what he is today.

Pei Shi was too lazy to talk to him, and only said: "Instead of sitting and waiting to die, it is better to fight to the death. At least after fighting, maybe there will be a little more hope of life."

"But it's more likely that we will die sooner!" Wu Lixin was very pessimistic, "Just watch now, Cui Liu and Wan Tianci are fighting, it is very likely that the gods are fighting, and mortals suffer. Now the entire Yangzhou mansion , there is no one else who will be pushed out as a scapegoat except me! I am really going to be killed by you!"

"No." Mrs. Pei shook her head, her tone was absolutely incomparable.

Wu Lixin was already dying. "If you say you can't, then you won't? Okay, explain it to me, why can't it be legal?"

"This time, Prefect Cui didn't choose to make a big deal out of it like before, but chose to deal with it in a low-key manner. In other words, he planned to solve the matter under the table this time. In this way, Wan Tianci can only eat one It's a big loss, he knocked his teeth down and swallowed it. Even if he returned to Chang'an, he would not be so stupid as to tell Li Linfu about it. After all, it was so easy for him to get such a position. A big somersault, if people know this, they can only make people laugh at him for being incompetent!"

Pei Shi really explained it to him slowly. "Wan Tianci is not you. You are the heir chosen by the Wu family at the beginning. You are a big guy. Since you are chosen, there is no way to change it. If you do something wrong, they can only slowly clean up the mess and fill in the holes for you. Then help you correct the way forward bit by bit. But Wan Tianci is just a dog by Li Linfu’s side, and this is what he needs most. If a dog is useless, he will abandon him and choose another one that is as well-behaved. Obedient, but more useful. Expect him to train him patiently, stand up for this dog, and even help him vent his anger? Do you think Li Linfu, the Zhongshu Ling, is so idle?"

"As long as Wan Tianci has a brain, he won't dig his own grave. So this time, since he has already suffered a certain loss from Cui Zhifu, then we don't have to be afraid anymore. On the contrary, what happened last night, because we released water You deserve merit, and the magistrate Cui always remembers it in his heart! If anything happens in the future, he will help us no matter what. At least, your position as the county magistrate is temporarily secured."

Hearing her talk about him and the Wu family like that, Wu Lixin felt very uncomfortable.But after hearing her analyze Wan Tianci's situation, Wu Lixin immediately understood.

"That's right! Wan Tianci is just the brother-in-law of Li Linfu's concubine, and he doesn't have a deep friendship with him. It's tantamount to a fool's dream, and it's completely impossible! Wan Tianci Since he can get to this point today, he must not be a fool, and he will definitely not make this matter public! I really think too much!"

"But..." He immediately glared at Mrs. Pei again, "If that's the case, why didn't you tell me earlier? It made me worry for so long!"

Say it earlier, will you believe it?I'm afraid that if I discussed with you last night to help them do bad things, you would be the first to interrupt me, and you might even report to Wan!
Mrs. Pei couldn't be more clear about this husband's temperament, so she just said coldly: "It's not too late to say. Next, you just need to be a magistrate of yours. When Wan Tianci and his party come again, you let them go Liang, just let Master Wang and the master of our county government follow, so you don't have to join in the fun anymore."

Wu Lixin felt feverish again.

"I see, do you still need to say this?" He flicked his sleeves and left in a hurry.

Only then did Mrs. Pei let out a sigh of relief, she couldn't help closing her eyes, and leaned against the wall weakly.

In the days that followed, Wan Tianci took people back through the towns that he had passed through before, and returned all the overcollected food.Of course, since Hailing County only collected [-] shi more, this amount is not too much, so it is exempted.

The process of returning food can almost be written into a book, which is full of the joy of the people and the bitter blood and tears of Wan Tianci and his party.

Cui Pu and Mu Jiaojiao would listen to a passage of Wang Shiqi's letter read after dinner every day.Whenever they heard that Wan Tianci and his group were surrounded and scolded by the people, and were thrown rotten eggs and rotten leaves from time to time, they were in a good mood and could eat half a bowl more of their meals.

It was so easy to pay off the overcollected grain, and the reputation of Wan Tianci and his group in Yangzhou Mansion was completely stink.Next, they didn't have the face to show off their power everywhere, they just collected the grain that should be harvested hastily according to the regulations, and went back to Chang'an by boat in desperation, and they didn't even share the meal with Cui Pu.

Cui Pu took a look at the account books prepared by Wang Shiqi again, and he was in a good mood: "It's really good. This year, the grain paid by the common people is several thousand shi less than in previous years. This is also a great achievement! I merit!"

According to the old rules, if the imperial court collects grain, if a family has to hand over ten buckets, the grain collector will always kick the basket before harvesting, and kick down one or two buckets. This is considered the grain officials trip hard work.In other words, the common people said that they were handing over ten dou of grain, but in fact they handed over at least twelve dou.If such a family deducts a little, the sum of hundreds of thousands of households in the entire Yangzhou Prefecture will be very impressive.

This is a tacit way of making money in the officialdom. Although Cui Pu hated it, he did not stop it.If it wasn't for the fact that Wan Tianci and his group had gone too far this time, he wouldn't have made a move at all.

As a result of Cui Pu's efforts to suppress it, Wan Tianci also fished an extra three hundred shi of grain in Hailing County this time, which is far worse than the previous achievement of several thousand shi for grain!
On the way back, Wan Tianci was afraid of vomiting blood, right?But when he arrived in Chang'an, he still had to slap his face swollen to pretend to be fat, lest people would know that he fell into the hands of Cui Pu the first time he set out on a horse!
Just thinking about it makes him feel good.

Mu Jiaojiao also pulled his son and daughter to congratulate him: "Congratulations to Governor Cui. After this incident, your image in the eyes of the people in Yangzhou Prefecture will be even higher. I hope you will continue to work hard."

"We're happy together, this is our family's victory. Tonight, ask the kitchen to add some good dishes, so we can have a good time together as a family!" Cui Pu helped them all up with a smile, and said pretendingly.

this man!
I just praised him a few words, but he actually climbed up the ladder!
The corners of Mu Jiaojiao's mouth twitched, so speechless.

Although Cui Pu tried his best to control this incident and kept it from spreading, almost everyone in Yangzhou Mansion knew about it.

As soon as Wan Tianci left on the front foot, Wei Zhuang and his wife threw another big banquet on the back foot. They invited Mu Jiaojiao and Mu Yiyi and his wife over to drink, in the pretentious name of helping them serve wine to suppress the panic.

Actually, what really needs to be suppressed is Wan Tianci, right?
But it's not a bad thing for sisters-in-law to get together to bond.Cui Pu readily agreed.

And on the day of the party, they learned another piece of news from Wei Zhuang——Chen Junbi, the current magistrate of Hailing County, was also thrown rotten leaves by the people!

The reason is actually very simple: Why did the entire Yangzhou government and other places collect grain according to the rules, but only Hailing County collected [-] shi more?
Although this figure is within the range acceptable to everyone, Mencius has a good saying-do not worry about scarcity but inequality.Since everyone else paid that number, even if they paid one more grain of rice than others, the common people would be dissatisfied.

This is the wisdom of small farmers.Few of them can see the long-term benefits, and all of them just grasp the immediate benefits.Of course, there is really no long-term benefit to this matter now.Therefore, this made the people even more angry.

At this time, the common people will not blame Cui Pu.After all, considering that the prefect Cui had already stood up for the people in Tianchang County, and what he did when he was the county magistrate in Hailing County, this Chen Junbi was once again compared.Some people even concluded that Chen Junbi and Wan Tianci must have colluded in secret, that's why no one came to pay back the food!
This guess has been affirmed by many people.

After being collectively ignored by a hundred militiamen, now even the people of Hailing County began to despise him.Chen Junbi was walking on the road, when suddenly a rotten cabbage flew into the air, hitting him all over his head and face, and he still couldn't find the culprit!The number of times was too high, and he hardly went out, lest he would be attacked suddenly again, and then he would be laughed at all the way in disgrace.

Poor man, he wanted to come here like Wu Lixin to pick the peaches that Cui Pu had planted a long time ago.It turned out that the peaches Cui Pu planted were not so easy to pick!
Of course, he also ordered people to strictly seal the news of this matter in Hailing County, especially not to let Cui Pu know!

However, Cui Pu still knew.

"Hahaha, it's cool, it's really cool!" Cui Pu was in a good mood after hearing Wei Zhuang's story, "I really didn't expect that I just did one thing, but it turned out to be a success in one fell swoop!"

Although the incident was not a big one this time, and his reputation did not spread throughout the country again, this feeling of exhilaration was unparalleled. He was so happy!

The result of being happy is that he drank too much again.

Drunk and moved back to the government office, he still couldn't help holding Mu Jiaojiao to sing and dance, like a child.

Seeing this, the eldest lady twitched her little mouth: "Father drank too much." The disgust on her face was exactly the same as that of Cui Pu.

Mr. Dalang blinked his eyes, and quickly seized the opportunity to come over and grab Mu Jiaojiao's hand: "Mother, Daddy smelly! Today, sleep by yourself! Let's go together!"

Mu Jiaojiao was unable to support his forehead.

But when Cui Pu heard this, he pushed his son away with his hands, and put Mu Jiaojiao into his arms. "Don't even think about it! Your mother is mine, and you will only sleep with me in this life. You brat wants to hug a woman, and you can talk about it when you grow up and find a wife yourself! Hmph!"

Mr. Dalang flattened his mouth, and called out pitifully: "Mother..."

"It's useless to call you grandma!" Cui Pu hurriedly shouted to Cui Wai, "Come on, take Mr. Da Lang out! He should go to bed!"

The wet nurse rushed to hug him, but Mr. Dalang refused.It's just such a small doll, how can it fight a grown-up wet nurse?In desperation, he still pushed away the nurse's embrace: "Go by yourself!"

He straightened his body, raised his chin, and walked out step by step.

(End of this chapter)