It's still dark.
A thin shadow wrapped in darkness slowly walked towards the river.
She raised her delicate hand and took off the wooden hairpin. Her long hair fell down, swaying gently in the weak wind.
Looking back.
Tears flowed down slowly, her pale lips moved slightly, she turned around and jumped into the river.
Boom!
Gu Zhengchen was awakened, put on his clothes, and looked at the uneasy Gu Cheng outside the door, feeling a bad feeling in his heart.
"The master is in trouble, Mrs. Zhang, she jumped into the river and committed suicide."
Gu Cheng said anxiously.
Gu Zhengchen's eyes widened in shock, and he quickly asked: "Where is it? Take me there!"
Gu Cheng pointed in the direction of the dock: "It has been salvaged by people from the Inspection Department. People from the county government have also gone and are looking for someone to find him."
When Gu Zhengchen arrived, he explained the situation to the county government officials and went to identify the body. Looking at Zhao Yaer, who had been dead for a long time, Gu Zhengchen's heart trembled slightly, he pulled up the white cloth and closed his eyes in pain.
"She was holding her hair in both hands and covering her face with her hair when she died. It took a lot of effort to salvage her. Do you really know this person..."
Zaoli asked.
Gu Zhengchen arranged for Gu Cheng to explain and returned to the inn alone.
Liang Jiajun looked sad and handed a letter to Gu Zhengchen: "Ms. Zhang left a letter."
Gu Zhengchen opened the letter. The content was very simple. It was just a commission, asking Gu Zhengchen and Liang Jiajun to send a letter to the Zhang family in Teng County, asking them to send someone to collect Zhang Shiping's bones and leave the specific location and mark.
As for her own affairs, not a word was mentioned, and it seemed of no importance.
It seems that even writing a sentence is a shame.
Liang Jiajun sat down and poured a cup of tea: "When I saw her talking yesterday, she had a death wish."
Gu Zhengchen folded the letter and put it on the table. After a long silence, he said, "Brother Liang, do you think the court will vigorously arrest the salt disciples after her death?"
Liang Jiajun thought about it seriously, shook his head and said: "The imperial court has set up inspection departments everywhere to catch thieves. But for now, the effect is limited. The imperial court will never settle for a few cases because of one or two cases. There are dozens of salt disciples, mobilize the army to search and suppress them. This is a stubborn disease that cannot be overcome in a day."
Gu Zhengchen stood up suddenly, his face as frosty as ice: "Then didn't she die in vain, and those two servants also died in vain?!"
Liang Jiajun looked at the excited Gu Zhengchen, tapped his fingers on the table, and sighed helplessly: "We have no control over the affairs of the court. We can only say that their lives are bad."
"Life?"
Gu Zhengchen secretly gritted his teeth.
Living is life, dying is life too!
Living well is destiny, living poorly is destiny too!
Go to hell!
There is no so-called fate in this world, there are only countless choices and actions that are constantly intertwined and colliding in a certain time and space, carving out the present moment!
The deaths of Zhao Ya'er and the two servants were the fault of the salt disciples!
The people who should die are not them, but the salt disciples!
"where you go?"
Liang Jiajun watched Gu Zhengchen walk out of the room.
Gu Zhengchen raised his hand and left the inn without saying anything. Sun Shiba followed.
The river flows southward and flows quietly.
The willows on the shore are no longer completely green, some leaves wither and die first.
Gu Cheng came looking for her and said to Gu Zhengchen, "The Suqian County Government will find a place to bury Zhang."
"only these?"
Gu Zhengchen frowned.
Gu Cheng said helplessly: "The county government is also powerless in dealing with the salt disciples."
Gu Zhengchen took a deep breath.
really.
The armed force of the county government is very limited. Except for the inspection department, which has at least ten to more than thirty people, the only people the county government can arrest are the officials. These people are not regular workers, but are recruited from corvee service. The common people, not to mention taking turns, don't have much combat power. They can deal with a few gangsters and thieves, but it is a bit difficult for them to deal with the salt disciples who are unknown and ruthless.
The magistrate of Suqian was willing to cooperate with the Taizhuang Inspection Department to catch the horse thieves because he knew his stronghold, how many people, and how many horses there were. He weighed the pros and cons, made sufficient preparations, and surrounded him by surprise. It was a success.
But no one knows where the salt disciples are or how many there are. If you want to carefully investigate and find his traces, it will be very time-consuming and labor-intensive, and there may not be any results. If you lose manpower and lose the face of the county government, it will not be accomplished. That's a mistake.
To take a step back, if the county government really had the ability to deal with the salt disciples, it would not have waited until today. They are powerless, not a pure excuse.
"Go and inquire and see if the county government has caught any salt disciples and hasn't beheaded them yet."
Gu Zhengchen arranged for Gu Cheng.
Gu Cheng didn't know why, but still followed the order.
"Eighteen, I need you to do something for me."
Gu Zhengchen walked to a quiet place, turned around and looked at Sun Shiba seriously.
Sun Shiba solemnly agreed: "Master, the Sun family has given me to you, and my life is yours. No matter what you ask me to do, I will do it."
Gu Zhengchen nodded slightly: "This matter is extremely dangerous. If something goes wrong, you will die. If the matter is completed, the salt disciples will be wiped out! You should think carefully before making a decision."
Are all the salt disciples wiped out? !
Sun Shiba looked at Gu Zhengchen in surprise.
He wasn't kidding!
Sun Shiba thought of the incident where a group of thieves were captured and destroyed in Suqian. Perhaps he really had a way to completely eliminate the salt gangsters!
"Master, I will do it! If something goes wrong, I will commit suicide and I will never bring trouble to the master!"
Sun Shiba raised his hand and swore.
Gu Zhengchen put his hands behind his back and looked towards the river, silent.
Sun Shiba asked: "Is the master taking this risk to avenge Zhao Ya'er?"
Sun Shiba had heard about Gu Zhengchen and Zhao Ya'er. If the imperial court had not suddenly stopped the imperial examination, perhaps Gu Zhengchen had already married Zhao Ya'er, and perhaps there would not have been the tragedy of Zhang Shiping, Zhao Ya'er and others.
"Not for her alone, but for all the insulted, desperate, and dead lives on this river!"
Gu Zhengchen's heart was heavy.
The problem of salt disciples has been around for a long time.
As early as when Lao Zhu was conquering the world, one of the main enemies he faced was the salt disciple Zhang Shicheng.
When Zhang Shicheng was strong, he controlled a large territory, stretching from Shaoxing in the south, to Xuzhou in the north, to Jining, to Yingzhou and Haozhou in the west, and to the sea in the east, spanning more than 2,000 miles.
The richest places in the north and south of the Huaihe River, Suzhou and Hangzhou were all in his hands, and Zhang Shicheng's main force was a group of salt disciples.
After Lao Zhu eliminated Zhang Shicheng, the original salt disciples were almost killed. But after that, a second group of salt disciples appeared, and this group of salt disciples were oppressed salt households.
The salt industry is related to the country's people's livelihood. The Ming Dynasty adopted a monopoly system for salt, which was a government monopoly.
But the problem is that the officials themselves don't dry or cook salt. They only control the kitchen households that produce salt. They collect a fixed amount of salt every month. It's not enough. It's like raising horses. It doesn't matter whether they are born or not. It doesn't matter whether they die. As long as You find a way to fill the hole.
If you don’t have salt, you can take money, and if you don’t have money, you can take things. If you have no money and no things, then what can you take?
Take your life.
Some people risked it with their own lives, some people risked it with the lives of their family members, and some people chose to risk the lives of others. These people are the salt disciples.
More than six years after the founding of the Ming Dynasty, the problem of salt gangsters has always troubled Yangzhou and Huai'an Prefectures. Although there are prefectures and counties to manage and inspection departments to investigate, salt gangsters have not been truly prevented from robbing and harming people.
History does not record when Lao Zhu rectified the problem of salt disciples. We only know that in the late Ming Dynasty, salt disciples were so rampant that they robbed official ships.
Yes, they are all poor people.
However, poor people should not harm poor people. If you want to rob, kill, or do evil, you should go to those officials who bully the salt field and the transfer envoys who specialize in salt administration. If you really can't go to Jinling to find Lao Zhu.
Harming innocent people is an unforgivable evil.
Gu Zhengchen fell ill and had a headache. He went to the doctor to see him, but he couldn't find anything wrong. After some questioning, he wrote a prescription and arranged for someone to take the medicine.
Liang Jiajun looked at Gu Zhengchen lying on the bed and wondered how such a good person could suddenly fall ill.
When a person is sick, he should rest.
Anyway, we still have plenty of time, so stopping in Suqian for a few days will not be a waste.
Gu Zhengchen was worried that the news would be passed on to Liang Jiajun, so he was not allowed to enter the room. Liang Jiajun couldn't resist, so he only went to Gu Cheng and Sun Shiba to tell him something.
The condition is somewhat complex.
First I had a headache, and the doctor prescribed saltpeter.
Later, my waist and kidneys became cold for a long time, and my heart and soul accumulated. I went to another doctor far away for treatment and prescribed some sulfur.
Later, I probably felt uncomfortable and confused, and swallowed a few copper coins by mistake. For this, I need to turn on some charcoal, burn it until it is red, pound it into fine powder while it is hot, decoct it and drink it.
The condition recurred, and I had to get medicine here, medicine there, and sometimes I had to go outside the city to get medicine.
After Liang Jiajun worried about it for five days, Gu Zhengchen's illness finally got better, and he took a boat to travel. When he arrived at Taoyuan, Gu Zhengchen's illness relapsed again, and he stayed in the inn without going out, which made Gu Cheng and Sun Shiba anxious. I started to grab medicine from east to west, south, north and middle again.
Gu Zhengchen persuaded Liang Jiajun to take the first step, but Liang Jiajun refused to agree to anything.
In this way, the illness came and went, and the journey from Suqian to Shanyang County, Huai'an Prefecture, which originally only took two or three days, was extended to twelve days.
Shanyang County is a Fuguo County.
The so-called Fuguo County can be simply understood as a county with its county government attached to Fucheng or Zhoucheng.
In other words, Shanyang County not only has a magistrate's office, but also a prefect's office, because this is also the administrative place of Huai'an Prefecture.
Shanyang is an important town, guarding the main roads of the Huaihe River and the Grand Canal.
Zhu Yuanzhang naturally knew the importance of this place. As early as the second year of Hongwu, he set up Dahe Guard to guard it.
The Zhenhuai Tower, the Governor's Water Transport Office, the Huai'an government office, and the Shanyang County government office are connected end to end and located on the central axis of the city. This is a new government office built in the third year of Hongwu. It was rebuilt on the basis of Hufu and Wutong Temple.
There is a big drum on the Zhenhuai Tower, which is used for calling the clock and calling the police. It is also called the Drum Tower. The gold plaques with "North and South Cardinals" and "Tianche Yunqu" hung in the Yuan Dynasty have disappeared.
Gu Zhengchen and Liang Jiajun were walking in the city.
Liang Jiajun pointed not far away: "That's the Water Transport Office."
Gu Zhengchen stopped, looked in the direction of the Water Transport Office to the east, turned around and looked to the west, looked at the residential houses, and asked softly: "Brother Liang, do you know who lived there?"
Liang Jiajun looked at it and said with a smile: "They must be ordinary houses there. Even some big houses are mostly anonymous."
Gu Zhengchen shook his head, walked towards the residential area, and said with awe, "There lives here a Mr. Zhou, who dedicated his whole life to this land..."
