In March of the ninth year of Hongxing's reign in the Ming Dynasty, Hanyang Mansion, Kingdom of Korea.
Both sides of the royal road outside the Donhwamun Gate of Changdeokgung Palace were crowded with people today. It seemed that the entire Hanyang Prefecture residents came here. These North Korean officials, civilians, and common people all put on their best clothes and crowded into different areas according to their status.
Although King Jin Erbo of the Jin Dynasty issued a decree that "the imperial examinations for legitimate sons and concubines", the hierarchy of North Korean society is still very strong. As long as the two classes of concubines did not pass the imperial examination, they would still be in the lower class, second or third class, and could not be ranked in the same category as the direct descendants. Because Jin Duoduo was an outsider and did not know enough about the Korean hierarchy, he equated the concubines with the concubines. In China, even if the concubine of a noble family has no higher status than the direct descendant (the eldest son of the direct descendant can inherit the title), the difference in status between them is not too big. But here in North Korea, concubines belong to the middle class (they do not belong to the Yangban, but are higher than civilians and can serve as middle and lower military attachés), while nisheng belongs to the untouchables, whose status is even lower than that of ordinary commoners. They cannot register as household members, nor can they If you recognize your father (everyone knows it, but cannot recognize him), his status is similar to that of a slave.
As for Jin Duoduo himself, he was a direct descendant, so of course he did not look down on his brothers who were born in a common birth, but he could not treat his good half-brothers as slaves! So he took it for granted that the concubines were all included in the ranks of scholar-bureaucrats... These evil students from the Eight Paths of Korea, as long as they had the conditions, came to Hanyang Mansion to take part in the imperial examination!
Even if you don’t pass the exam, you don’t want to leave right away. Today, you have been waiting on both sides of the royal road outside the Donhwa Gate of Changdeokgung Palace to kowtow to Jin Duodu and Jin Erbo, who are closer than your parents. You didn’t pass the Jinshi exam. On top of that, they still have the status of scholar-officials, so they can still enjoy the treatment of scholar-officials during the later land grant.
So starting from the Dunhua Gate, there were thousands of unborn scholar-bureaucrats lined up behind the official and concubine scholar-bureaucrats. They were all wearing white Confucian clothes and Korean-style high hats, stretching their necks and looking in the direction of Dunhua Gate.
Today is not an ordinary day, today is the day of "roll call outside Dunhua Gate"!
The so-called roll call outside Dunhua Gate is actually a good day for the Jinshi of middle and high schools in the Korean imperial examination in the spring of the ninth year of Hongxing to parade and praise their officials!
Because this is the first subject in the Jin Dynasty, according to the decree of King Jin, all officials in the Eighth Routes of Korea must be replaced by Jinshi in the New Dynasty (original officials can also take the exam), so the number of people taking the scholarships is particularly large, and there are many high school scholars. Up to 6,600, I have to go out for a walk today.
In order to show grandeur, after the Jinshis walked the streets, Jin Duoduo would go out of Dunhua Gate and circle the city under the escort of the cavalry of the Anton Army to show the power of the Jin Dynasty.
The Dunhua Gate has been opened wide, and 6,600 Korean scholars wearing red robes and black gauze hats are lining up to come out. Most of them are from concubines, and every one of them is full of ambition.
There are already more concubines than direct descendants! Moreover, the Jin Dynasty's policies were beneficial to concubines, so they were highly motivated to participate in the imperial examinations, so most of the "winners" were concubines. These people now have official status. No matter how you calculate it, they are already ranked in the second class. What a majestic grace!
This group of bastard Jinshi were undoubtedly the pillars of the Jin Dynasty's rule!
When Jin Duoduo, Prince Jin of the Ming Dynasty, the Great Protector of Anton and the King of Korea, rode out of Dunhua Gate on an Iberian horse given to him by the Zhibani Kingdom, all the Korean scholars on both sides of the royal road knelt on the ground. , always shout loudly in Chinese.
"The king is a thousand years old, a thousand years old! Lord Yuan is a thousand years old, a thousand years old..."
Listening to the hoarse cheers of the North Koreans, Jin Duoduo couldn't hide the smile on his face. He was so happy! It was not because of the heartfelt support of the Korean scholars, but because of the great news coming from the Dagukou Commercial Port - the Ming Dynasty was in financial crisis again and had no money to fight the war, so it had no choice but to return to the Ming Dynasty!
The edict for the return of the teacher to the court has been officially issued, and the date for the return of the teacher has been set, which is March 18th. The candidate for the left-behind minister in Beijing has also been finalized. The annoying traitor Shi Kefa has been appointed as the left-behind minister in Beijing and the envoy of the mountain tombs. He is not only responsible for staying in Beijing, but also in charge of the repair project of the Twelve Tombs of Tianshou Mountain. It is said that six people have been allocated. One million taels of silver were used to repair the imperial tomb...
There are also rumors at the Dagukou Commercial Port that Emperor Zhu lost money in relocating several vassal towns in the Central Plains and Shaanxi Province. He has spent 20 to 30 million yuan, and has to spend tens of millions of taels of silver every year on maintenance expenses!
In addition, the Ming court also fulfilled its promise of "three-year tax exemption" and exempted all land taxes from the seventh to ninth years of Hongxing in Henan, Shandong (parts of areas), Shanxi, Hebei and other places.
While exempting land taxes, the Ming court also dispatched a large number of officials to these newly recovered areas, established local governments at all levels, and also spread large amounts of silver and copper coins to purchase hired labor.
These new lands have expenses but no income, and they are a huge deficit.
In addition, hundreds of thousands of Northern Expedition troops have been struggling for two or three years! In addition to fighting the Qing army, these troops also took care of public security and various projects, built roads and forts, dredged rivers, strengthened the Yellow River dams in key places, and fortunately renovated the Beijing Castle.
This is a lot of money to throw out!
Even if the Ming Dynasty had a mountain of gold and silver, it couldn’t help but spend it like this!
It's okay now. Emperor Zhu's family doesn't have any food left. Without the food left, it should be able to calm down for a while.
As long as there is stability for three to five years, the area under the jurisdiction of the Andong Protectorate will be able to regain its vitality, and the rule of the Jin Dynasty in Korea will be stable.
...
"Returning the army to the court? Why? The remnants of the Donglu have not been eliminated yet, so why did they return to the army? Do you want to send troops to attack the Eda Shun Dynasty?"
Sichuan, Chongqing Prefecture, Chaotian Palace. Emperor Dashun Li Guo, who had just returned to Chongqing from Kunming, Yunnan, at the beginning of the year, had just received the bad news that the Emperor of Ming Dynasty had returned to the court with his troops.
This is good news for Jin Duoduo, but not good news for Dashun?
After the news that Beijing was recaptured by the Ming Dynasty reached the Dashun court, the whole Dashun court immediately felt that something was not going well!
Once Beijing is recovered, the Ming Dynasty will be "almost" able to occupy all the Han territory in Guan Guan, and that "little bit" seems to be Sichuan occupied by the Dashun Dynasty!
"Your Majesty," the news about the Ming Emperor's squadron was brought to Li Guo by the military advisor Song Xiance. "The news I got is that the Ming Dynasty has no money... The Ming Dynasty Emperor spent a lot of money on his Northern Expedition. , tens of millions were spent in less than three years. Now the national treasury is empty, people's livelihood is in ruins, the source of wealth in the southeast has become difficult for people to live, and there is no more money for Zhu Cihong to squander."
"Tens of tens of millions?" Liu Zongmin took a breath, "Isn't Zhu Cixiang too wasteful? He spent tens of millions in less than three years!"
"You can also make money!" Sun Kewang interjected, "Tens of tens of millions of silver! It's a mountain when piled together. How did you find it?"
Niu Jinxing smiled bitterly: "That's enough land! We have occupied the Land of Abundance and added Yunnan. The rented grain fields on the books (the fields used to raise soldiers are called military fields) are more than 53 million acres. The fields put into storage in a year The rent is a little over 10 million. In the Ming Dynasty, the four rivers, two lakes, Fujian and Guangdong, plus Shandong and Guangxi, had 530 million acres of registered grain fields, right? How difficult is it to earn 100 million shi per year? Plus, It is not difficult to add another 20 million taels of silver to cover commercial taxes, customs duties, and salt taxes. It is not impossible to save tens of millions taels... But the Ming Dynasty earned more and spent a lot! Every year The expenses are over tens of millions. This Northern Expedition did cost a lot. It is estimated that we will have to save for another three or two years before we can have the money to attack our Sichuan.
Your Majesty, I estimate that we can live a peaceful life for another three years, and then we may have to fight for years! "
"Just fight!" Liu Zongmin snorted, "Who is afraid of whom? Let's see, we might as well strike first! Taking advantage of the fact that the Ming Dynasty has no military spending, let's fight someone first. Don't call it the Zhu family's soldiers. The horse has the upper hand!”
()
full text
