Wentang

Chapter 495

"Find out? How?" Li Shimin asked as soon as he met him.

"It's been found out, you should see for yourself how the situation is." Yue Shan handed over a thick booklet.

After Li Shimin took it, he quickly flipped through it. The more he looked at it, the expression on his face became more ferocious. Before he finished flipping through, he couldn't help but angrily said: "It's unreasonable, it's really unreasonable, a bunch of bastards, it's really pissing me off."

"It's too late to get angry now, let's make up your mind on how to deal with it." Yue Shan said calmly.

"What about the auxiliary machine and Dai Zhou, why didn't they come together?" Li Shimin asked.

"After seeing this report, they went to deal with it as soon as possible. I will stay in Beijing and report the latest progress to the saint at any time." Yue Shan said.

At this time, Li Shimin also restrained his anger, and said: "I really didn't expect that corruption has become so serious in the few years since the founding of the Tang Dynasty."

"Food is the place where corruption is most likely to breed. It can be covered up reasonably and legally by saying that moths are eaten by rats and rats are bitten." Yue Shan said.

"But now several storage warehouses are short of 30 shi. Is this something that can be covered up by the bites of moths and rats?" Li Shimin's anger, which he had finally suppressed, came up again.

"It's not 30 stones. This is the preliminary data. If we dig deeper, the number will be several times that." Yue Shan reminded.

"You don't seem surprised at all?" Li Shimin asked.

"There's nothing to be surprised about. The saint also knows in his heart that there is no granary in the world that is not in shortfall, it's just a matter of how much." Yue Shan said lightly.

"But how did you know that the corruption in the storage warehouse would be so serious?" Li Shimin asked.

"The deficit in the Changping warehouse is equally serious, but the grain flow in the Changping warehouse is so large that it cannot be seen every day. Before the audit, the officials will mobilize grain and grass from other places to fill the deficit, so it cannot be seen at will." Yue Shan explained:

"The storage warehouse is different. Under normal circumstances, you can only go in and out. It is clear at a glance how much food is in and how much is missing. Moreover, the imperial court has the final say on how much grain is put into the storage warehouse. They have no chance to fill it. As time goes by, the deficit will naturally increase. more."

"What about the reviewing officials, isn't the imperial court sending people to review them every year? What do they do for food?" Li Shimin said.

"Let's not talk about whether the reviewing officials will be bought, but how to review the hundreds of thousands of millions of shi of grain? It can't be weighed by catty, right?" Yue Shan replied:
"So auditing generally means looking at the accounts and visually checking how much food is there. It's too easy to fake."

"Then how did you find out this time?" Li Shimin said.

"Because this time we asked people to turn all the warehouses upside down, and their deficit was too large, so they were naturally discovered." Yue Shan said.

"Now I finally know why you have to mobilize so many officials to take over the storage warehouse. It turns out that the food transfer is fake, and the corruption investigation is true." Li Shimin sighed.

"No, I'm really going to take out all the grain in the storage warehouse and sell it to the victims." Yue Shan said with a smile:
"Most of the grain in the storage warehouse is old grain, some even five or six years ago, and they will rot if they are not replaced in time. So I want to take this opportunity to replace all of them with new grain."

"Also, guess again why I let Wan ride over."

"Isn't it to prevent people from making trouble?" Li Shimin asked doubtfully.

"No, I'm afraid someone will set fire to it." Yue Shan said.

"Arson? Are you saying that someone dares to fire the fire and burn the granary? No way, it's just that corruption is not as bad as family members. Setting fire to the granary is a serious crime. Do they dare?" Li Shimin said incredulously.

"Then who do you think set the fire? The officials in the official reserve warehouse? They really dare not, and they are afraid of other people involved." Yue Shan said:

"Does the sage think that the officials in the reserve warehouse alone can create a deficit of hundreds of thousands of pennies? There must be more high-ranking people involved in the back. If those officials dare not burn, the people behind them may not dare."

"It's a one-shot fire, and all the charges have been recited by the warehouse officials. What do you think?"

Li Shimin shook his head again and again and said, "I don't believe it, my Tang Dynasty has only been established for more than ten years, and the government has been corrupted to this point."

"The sage is wrong again. Where did the officials of my Tang Dynasty come from? Did my Tang Dynasty cultivate them one by one? No, most of them were officials from the previous dynasty. After the establishment of the Tang Dynasty, they suddenly became officials of the new dynasty. .” Yue Shan sneered and said:

"Could it be that these corrupt officials can change their minds and become honest and good officials after they become officials of my Tang Dynasty? And there are powerful children from aristocratic families behind them."

"The establishment of the so-called new dynasty is just another person being the emperor. The family is still the family, and the bureaucrats are still bureaucrats. Nothing has changed."

"It's the so-called royal family with a family of iron and water, isn't it exactly so?"

"Enough." Li Shimin's face was gloomy, and he waited for him fiercely, "If you talk nonsense, believe it or not, I'll kill you."

However, Yue Shan was not afraid at all, and continued: "Looking at the history, there are two people who really created a new dynasty. One is Xia Qi who founded the Xia Dynasty and changed the abdication system to an inheritance system. The other is the First Emperor, who should be divided into counties County system."

"The subsequent Han Sui until now have followed the methods of the first emperor, which is not a new dynasty."

"So, saint, do you want to continue to follow the wisdom of the first emperor, or do you want to be the third person to start a new dynasty?"

Li Shimin snorted coldly and said: "Don't provoke me, you just want to punish these people severely. Well, I will do what you wish and investigate severely, but all those involved will be severely punished regardless of their status."

"The sage is wise." Yue Shan said respectfully.

Did he just want to provoke Li Shimin to kill?No, another purpose is to deepen Li Shimin's dissatisfaction with the aristocratic family and the existing official selection system, and pave the way for the academy system and the imperial examination system.

There is no impenetrable wall in the world, and the news of the corruption case in the reserve warehouse quickly spread throughout the country, causing an uproar.

For the people in the disaster area, this is the bad news of the five thunders.

There is not enough food in the storage warehouse, so is it true that there will be a food shortage?In addition, the plague of locusts became more and more serious day by day, and it seemed that there would be a large area of ​​crop failure in Guanzhong... So the craze for buying grain that had just subsided rose again, and people rushed to the grain shops to buy grain.

At this time, food prices skyrocketed again, soaring all the way to the height of a bucket of rice.

The situation was about to collapse, and Yue Shan and others had no choice but to open the storage warehouse to release grain.But this release of grain did not have the effect of soothing people's hearts. This time, the people are determined to exchange all their property in the family for grain.

And the evil consequences of high food prices finally emerged, and the people who did not have a strong family background soon became penniless.

Although the sale of children and daughters has not yet occurred, but if the disaster worsens, this situation will inevitably occur.

Whether to continue to maintain high grain prices, or sell grain at low prices to adjust grain prices.

This problem was once again placed in front of the court.

In the end, Li Shimin gritted his teeth and released grain at a low price, and unlimited grain at twenty coins for a bucket of rice.

(End of this chapter)