Chen Kan's almost questioning tone made Su Zhen feel dazed for a moment.
After a moment, Su Zhen suddenly smiled bitterly and said: "My lord, I don't know something. The matter here is quite complicated. I am worried about this matter."
"What's the meaning?"
Maggie suddenly said angrily: "How complicated is this? Where did my brother go wrong? It was obviously those Hui Hui people who made the mistake first. I think you Ming officials are all fools!"
As soon as Maggie said this, several Ming officials around him suddenly became unhappy.
We didn't do anything. We were scolded when we first arrived in Yunnan. What's the deal?
Chen Kan frowned, he was also an official of the Ming Dynasty.
The impact of Maggie's words was too wide, and everyone was speechless for a moment.
Su Zhen smiled helplessly. He didn't want to argue with a toast girl like Maggie, but he was definitely unhappy.
He cupped his hands towards Chen Kan and said, "Your Excellency will know in a moment."
While several people were talking, the county government was already in front of them.
Just as they approached the county government office, a group of people heard bursts of quarrels coming from the government office.
However, the voices arguing were in a dialect that Chen Kan and others could not understand.
Hearing this voice, Su Zhen cupped his hands and said, "The official is trying this case. Unfortunately, there is no progress."
Chen Kan said thoughtfully: "Go in and take a look!"
Leaving the large army at the yamen gate, Chen Kan followed Su Zhen into the yamen with Maggie, three censors, and two personal guards, Fang Xu and Zhang San.
In the yamen, two groups of people were exchanging words in native dialects. The county yamen servants were holding water and fire sticks to separate the two groups of people. Each yamen servant had an irritated look on his face.
There were two waves of people scolding each other, one of which consisted of about ten people. The leader was a rather masculine-looking young man. The young man's appearance was somewhat similar to Maggie's.
Another wave of people was slightly larger, wearing long robes and white headscarves that covered their entire bodies. They were all dressed similarly, and it was hard to tell who was the leader.
However, Chen Kan did not look at them. Instead, his eyes were attracted by the row of corpses displayed in the county government office.
Su Zhen pointed to the row of corpses on the ground and said with a wry smile: "Sir, this is the reason why the official took them to the county government office. More than one life was lost."
Chen Kan's face became solemn. If a case involved a human life, it would be a big case, and there would be more than one life.
If it were placed in the capital, such a case would have been handed over to Dali Temple or the Ministry of Punishment for processing.
"quiet!"
Listening to the two groups of people greeting each other in dialect, Su Zhen gave a loud shout.
The government officials simultaneously pounded the water and fire sticks in their hands on the floor tiles. Forced by the power of the county government, both parties temporarily stopped and then looked at Su Zhen at the same time.
Just now, Magistrate Su was asking them about the origin of the matter, when he was suddenly called away by the doorman, saying that an imperial envoy from the imperial court had arrived.
When they saw a young man standing next to Su Zhen, they all fixed their eyes on Chen Kan.
Could it be that the imperial envoy of the imperial court was this young man?
The young man who looked exactly like Maggie saw that Maggie was standing beside the young man, and his eyes suddenly softened.
The two siblings immediately started talking in a dialect that Chen Kan couldn't understand. Maggie pointed at Chen Kan and made signs while talking.
After talking for a while, Chen Kan noticed that there was a hint of suspicion in the young man's eyes.
Su Zhen asked someone to move a stool for Chen Kan and place it next to the county magistrate's seat.
Then he turned to look at Chen Kan: "Sir, please take a seat."
Chen Kan came to the stool and sat down, nodded to the young man, then looked at Su Zhen and said, "You continue the trial."
But Chen Kan's words aroused Maggie's dissatisfaction.
He glared at Chen Kan, pointed at Su Zhen and asked, "Didn't you say that your official is older than them? Why didn't you ask them to let my brother go?"
Chen Kan said calmly: "I made it very clear to you when I came here. If your brother violated the laws of the Ming Dynasty, I would not be able to protect him. Now you have seen that there are seven lives. I need to deal with these seven." Responsible for human life.”
Maggie asked confidently: "The dead are all pigs, what does your Ming law have to do with it?"
Chen Kan: "..."
He wisely chose to keep his mouth shut.
He finally understood that these chieftains were used to being arrogant and had no regard for human life at all, even if five of the seven corpses lying there were theirs.
But Chen Kan's ignorance made her very unhappy.
She was just about to summon the tiger when she heard Chen Kan say calmly: "If you dare to let the tiger hurt people, your tiger may not be able to walk out of the county office alive today. It just so happens that my wife is celebrating her birthday soon and is short of a tiger skin." Make a big cloak. If you don’t believe it, you can try it!”
Chen Kan originally planned to reason with her, but he found that he was wrong, very wrong.
So he simply started to be unreasonable.
Hearing this, the woman looked back at Chen Kan, her eyes full of shock after being deceived.
Chen Kan continued to finish the attack and said: "If you want your brother to return home safely, you have to listen to me. The laws of the Ming Dynasty will not wrong any good person, nor will they let any bad person go."
"you……"
Maggie's eyes suddenly filled with mist.
She now feels deep regret, regretting that she violated her father's teachings.
Sure enough, the officials of the Ming Dynasty were very cunning.
If she had known earlier, she should have led her men to defeat the county government office and snatch his brother back.
The young man listened to their conversation word for word. He glared at Chen Kan and said, "My sister said you were here to bring justice to us. Now it seems that you are also a confused official!"
Chen Kan rolled his eyes, pointed at the seven corpses in the middle of the hall and replied: "You see clearly, it was you who killed people first. We are only trying the case according to the rules of the Ming Dynasty. If you are innocent, I will Naturally, I will give you justice."
He said angrily: "What is there to judge? They have robbed the canals that our ancestors have used to irrigate the fields for generations. If you want to judge them, you should judge them."
The chieftain who was pointed at by the young man said angrily: "You fart, that canal was obviously dug by us, and you took it away by force. We just want to get our things back!"
"you……"
"..."
After two sentences, the two sides began to argue again. At first, they used Ming Dynasty Mandarin, but after arguing, they turned into dialect.
Chen Kan, one big and the other big, quickly gave Su Zhen a look.
Su Zhen also had a bitter look on his face. If these people in the hall were Han people and dared to roar like this in the courtroom, he would have started beating them with ten sticks each.
However, these people were all chieftains and had always refused to obey the government's discipline, so he did not dare to fight.
Once he dared to take action, the two chieftains would immediately put aside their hatred and join forces to target the government.
Who told them that the Han people were immigrants? These chieftains had no idea what the Ming Dynasty was. They only knew who had the bigger fist and who was right.
"quiet!"
As soon as the gavel was struck, the courtroom fell into silence.
Su Zhen's face became serious. He picked up the half-formed confession and decided to cut the knot quickly.
After all, the Imperial Envoy was sitting next to him, and it was not a problem for them to keep arguing in the court. He could not leave an incompetent comment in the Imperial Envoy's mind.
He shouted: "Maina Aza, where is Ma Bao'er!"
Hearing Su Zhen's serious voice, one person from each of the two waves reluctantly walked out.
Maina Aza is the young man who looks exactly like Maggie, and Ma Baoer is a man dressed like a terrorist.
When the two of them came out, Su Zhen asked: "Maggie Aza, you said that you, the Aza clan, were the first to dig the ditch outside the city?"
Maina nodded and said: "Not bad!"
Seeing Maggie's confirmation, Su Zhen turned around and asked: "Ma Bao'er, you said that the canal dug by the Aza clan has long been blocked, and the new canal was re-drilled on top of the old canal by your Hui people?"
Ma Baoer responded: "Back to the county magistrate, that's exactly what happened."
Seeing that both of them confirmed that their confessions were correct, Su Zhen asked: "Since the canal was jointly built by people from your two tribes, and the fields of your two tribes are not far apart, why don't you want to share the same canal?"
Ma Baoer cupped his hands and said: "Sir, originally our tribe was willing to share a canal with them, but Aza and the others were so overbearing that they blocked the canal halfway, leaving our fields without water. Our fields are far from the sea. You are far away, please seek justice for us!"
Maina retorted: "The canal was originally built by us, why should it be used by you?"
"You fart, your drains have been blocked a long time ago. Those are the drains we have dredged."
"..."
"quiet!"
Seeing that the two were about to start a war of words again, Su Zhen hurriedly slapped the table with the gavel, and then gave Chen Kan a wry smile.
Chen Kan nodded, knowing that Su Zhen was explaining the ins and outs of the case to him.
It doesn't sound like a big deal, but it's just two clans fighting for a water canal. Such things are common in the Central Plains. It's normal for clans to fight for water canals and land and be beaten to death.
Not to mention that in a remote place like Yunnan, which has many mountains and little land, chieftains can fight over the ownership of a tree.
The matter is not a big deal, but for the county government, this kind of case is the most difficult to handle.
If the water canal is awarded to one party, the other party will be dissatisfied. If each party has a fifty-fifty deal, it will be a mess and cannot solve the problem. After leaving the county government, the two waves of people will continue to fight.
Of course, the most important thing is that both sides lost lives.
No matter what kind of lawsuit, once human life is involved in it, the nature changes immediately.
It's no wonder that Su Zhen would have a headache. If Chen Kan came, it would be difficult to come up with a rationale.
However, Chen Kan still saw a lot from this case.
First of all, the two chieftain forces have begun to accept the mediation of the government, instead of bypassing the government and directly fighting for victory by force as before.
This is a good start.
However, considering that Tonghai County was originally designated as a pilot county by Mu Sheng to experiment with the land-return policy, Chen Kan still had reservations about whether there would be changes in other places in Yunnan.
Secondly, Chen Kan understood that the reason why conquests often broke out among chieftains was mainly due to the word profit.
Take the dispute between the Aza chieftain and the Huiren chieftain, the benefit they are fighting for is the water canal.
This also shows that the chieftains are not a group of completely uncivilized savages as the princes in the court imagined, and they often go shirtless and scream for rebellion.
In fact, they already have a highly developed civilization. Although it is still far behind the so-called etiquette state in the Central Plains, it is undeniable that in Chen Kan's view, their civilization has reached the level of the feudal clan system. At least it is much more advanced than those peoples in the grasslands and black mountains and white water lands who still rely on fishing, hunting and nomadic life.
"Why don't you let me say a few words?"
Chen Kan spoke, and everyone's eyes immediately turned to him.
Everyone knew that this young man was a high official sent by His Majesty the Emperor.
Although the chieftains didn't quite understand the concept of the Central Plains emperor, they could tell from the county magistrate's attitude towards this young man that what he said would definitely work.
Seeing that everyone was looking at him, Chen Kan spread his hands and said, "Since you are trying to create a canal, why don't you open another canal?"
"There are two canals, one for each family, so there is no need to fight. What do you think?"
As soon as Chen Kan said this, everyone's brows suddenly wrinkled.
Su Zhen smiled bitterly and said: "Sir, this... opening another canal is easy to say, and it's not like I haven't thought about it, but the key point is, who will open it?"
Chen Kan smiled slightly, pointed at Mainaza and Ma Baoer who had been arguing just now, and said, "Of course they are the ones to open it!"
"Why?"
The two of them frowned at the same time. This young man was probably not a fool. Why should they ask them to open an extra canal?
Chen Kan smiled slightly and raised his hand to signal the others to calm down.
Then he said calmly: "Why don't you let me settle the accounts for you?"
Upon hearing this, Su Zhen suddenly became interested, raised his hands to Chen Kan and said, "I wonder what kind of debt you want to settle?"
The Maina brothers and Ma Baoer also looked at Chen Kan in confusion. They didn't quite understand why they were talking about water ditches and now they were talking about settling accounts.
Does this young adult not understand what it means to open an extra canal?
If this ditch is so easy to dig, he doesn't need to say it, they have already dug it!
Chen Kan looked at the few people confidently, as if he hadn't noticed the doubts on their faces.
He certainly knew how difficult it was to open a canal, especially in this era of relying on manpower to dig. A canal that was several miles long would require at least hundreds of strong laborers carrying hoes to dig for a month.
And now spring plowing is about to begin. In this era when food production is not high, every strong laborer is very important. Who is willing to give up farm work at home to dig ditches at this time.
However, the mountain man has a clever plan!
Chen Kan said calmly and brought over the map of Tonghai County.
When Su Zhen heard this, he immediately stood up and left. He also wanted to see how this young imperial envoy could persuade the two chieftains to open another canal.
After a while, Su Zhen placed the map of the county seat on the table and invited Chen Kan to sit in his seat.
Chen Kan was not polite, spread out the Kan map, waved to Maggie, and asked: "Where are your canals and land?"
Although Maggie was confused, she still stretched out her slender fingers and drew on the map.
He said: "Land is precious to us mountain people, so our water channels are dug along the foot of the mountain. As for the land, this piece of land belongs to our Aza tribe, and this piece of land belongs to their Hui tribe."
Chen Kan nodded, called Ma Baoer over and asked, "Is what she said true?"
Ma Baoer nodded hesitantly and said, "That's right."
Chen Kan looked at the place that Maggie pointed out, with an inexplicable smile on his face, and then said lightly: "In this case, it is imperative to build another canal. Not only you two tribes must participate in the construction, The county government also needs to make some efforts.”
"oh?"
"What do you mean, sir?"
Su Zhen sat up straight and waited quietly for Chen Kan's next words.
Chen Kan didn't show off. He took a piece of command arrow from the table, pointed it on the map, and said calmly: "Look, the land of the Aza clan is close to the lake, while the land of the Hui people is close to the foot of the mountain."
Maggie asked, "What's the problem?"
Chen Kan shook his head: "Of course there is no problem, but for such a large piece of land, only one canal is obviously not enough."
Chen Kan observed when he first entered the city that most of the land outside the city was dry fields, and only a few were paddy fields.
So the purpose is very simple, to persuade them to work together to build another canal, connect it to another one, and then dig a small water channel from the field to introduce the lake water into the field, and convert the dry field into paddy field.
Maggie said disapprovingly: "Of course one canal is not enough, otherwise we wouldn't bother fighting for it."
Chen Kan looked at her with a half-smile and said, "That's true, but if we can build another canal from the foot of the mountain on the other side, connect it with the original canal in an arc, and turn all the dry fields into paddy fields, then It shouldn’t be a big problem to increase grain production in Tonghai County by 30%, right?”
Before Maggie could speak, Su Zhen nodded and said, "If everything can be converted into paddy fields, it will be no problem to increase grain production by 30%."
Chen Kan continued: "Look, everyone, there is only such a small canal that leads water to the fields along the foot of the mountain, but even so, you are still fighting for this small canal. So what if you win it? , the places that can be irrigated are still limited.”
"But what if we open another canal from the other side of the mountain?"
"If you open the canal, you can increase the annual grain production by 30%. If you don't open it, you will continue to fight for a canal, and the food will still be so much every year. Do you think it's a good deal?"
"this……"
As soon as Chen Kan finished speaking, the faces of several people showed contemplative looks.
If you just say it, Chen Kan's plan is very feasible.
Because the terrain of Tonghai County is here, it is a small basin with low south and high north.
The lower side is Qilu Lake, and the higher side is the land that belongs to the two chieftains. If a canal can be dug along the foot of the mountain to wrap up the entire farmland, it will undoubtedly be a great thing for everyone. All beneficial things.
Even the county seat will no longer be short of water.
But again, why should they open this canal?
Especially since the land was close to the lake, Tusi Aza pointed at Ma Baoer and asked: "We have already opened a canal, why don't we let them dig it?"
Chen Kan's expression remained unchanged and he said calmly: "Because this is something that is good for everyone, and as I just said, the county government must also get involved."
Maggie asked thoughtfully: "How can the county government get involved?"
Chen Kan glanced at Su Zhen and said calmly: "It's very simple. The county government will provide the money and you will provide the people. In order not to delay the spring plowing, each of your families will provide 200 people to dig canals. The county government will compensate them ten copper coins every day. "
Hearing this, Su Zhen's expression changed, and he whispered: "Sir, is this inappropriate?"
Chen Kan said slowly: "What's wrong? You withhold so much tax every year, but don't tell me that the county government has no money."
"This... the county government still has some money, but the money is all for precaution..."
Su Zhen was halfway through his words when he quickly changed his words: "The money is all used to develop local people's livelihood and to prevent natural and man-made disasters."
Chen Kan shrugged and said, "In Mr. Su's opinion, doesn't building water conservancy projects count as developing local people's livelihood?"
"Of course it counts!"
Su Zhen replied, then was stunned.
Chen Kan continued: "Changing dry fields to paddy fields will increase grain production by 30%, and Tonghai County's tax revenue will also be increased by 30%. There is hope that the middle county will be converted into a high county. Does Mr. Su think this investment is not worth it?"
"I……"
Su Zhen looked a little tangled, and it was obvious that the pie painted by Chen Kan made him a little moved.
Chen Kan turned to look at Aza and Ma Baoer and asked, "What do you think? This is a major event for future generations of Fuyan."
The two looked at each other and saw a hint of excitement in each other's eyes. If the county government took care of them, it would mean that they would be able to harvest 30% more food every year in the future. Where could they find such a deal?
So, they turned to look at Su Zhen with a tacit understanding.
Now it's not whether they agree or not, but whether Su Zhen, the county magistrate, is willing to back them up.
After all, no matter which one of them spares two hundred strong laborers, it means that their food production will be reduced this year, and people may starve to death.
Seeing that Su Zhen was still struggling, Chen Kan patted him on the shoulder, and then said calmly: "I pointed out the way for you. As for whether to do it or not, you can figure it out yourself."
At least in Chen Kan's view, this is something that is beneficial to all three parties.
However, the officials of the Ming Dynasty were all well-versed in the golden mean, and Chen Kan could not force them to do what he wanted.
Su Zhen was a little confused. If he did as Chen Kan said, it would mean that the supplies intercepted by the county government last year would be squandered in a short time.
If a family had two hundred people, that would be four hundred people. Each person received ten cents, and his daily expenditure was four thousand cents, which was almost equivalent to his monthly salary.
And such a large amount of work cannot be completed in less than a year and a half.
Calculated on a yearly basis, that was nearly fifteen hundred dollars. Such a large amount of money made his scalp numb just thinking about it.
Besides, he doesn't know how long he will be an official here. What if the hole cannot be filled?
"Sir, this matter is of great importance. Could you please let me discuss it with my colleagues in the county government?"
