This gave the lower-level clerks and servants more opportunities, allowing them to exploit farmers and embezzle national treasury! This place is almost no longer considered the territory of the Ming Dynasty!

Liu Pei was overjoyed when he learned the news! He immediately mobilized a large number of capable personnel from the Blood Hand Help to enter Henan, and quickly took root in more than a dozen counties in western and southern Henan.

Since local officials are not in charge, the local underground forces are developing extremely large. This gives Liu Pei the opportunity to take action. With Liu Jiang taking action personally, a large number of experts from the martial arts world flocked to Henan and began to fight with the underground forces in his brother's county town!

For a time, the blood was shining in the county towns. The gangs saw each other fighting and fighting, but the government seemed to be invisible and ignored them.

Since the government ignores the matter, the two sides of the fight will naturally fight even more tragic! Therefore, every three or five days, there will be a large-scale battle in each county. There will be many more corpses on the mass graves from time to time.

Fortunately, it did not hurt many people by accident. Although the people were frightened by such days, they could still maintain it.

However, Liu Jiang's actions were quickly subjected to huge resistance. Because all underground forces had to receive support from certain people or families in the local area. In addition, Liu Jiang was eager to occupy these counties, and his power was somewhat dispersed. So he was a little stalemate for a while.

Fortunately, Liu Jiang quickly adjusted his strategy and gathered his staff. He began to focus on Guide Mansion and give priority to cleaning up various counties in Guide Mansion. After such adjustments, the power of the Blood Hand Gang was at an advantage and quickly opened up the situation in Guide Mansion.

In the following period, the bloody hand that concentrated its strength to kill the local underground forces retreated step by step! As for those underground forces that had linked the bandits, they were even more unlucky! Just after Liu Jiang led the snake out of the cave, Qi Qitao pointed out the army and wiped out it. He also followed the clues and broke several major households.

After all, such things as collusion with bandits and horse bandits cannot be put on the table. Once exposed, the counterattack in the officialdom will cause them a headache and they have to cut off their connections with bandits. A small number of families that were not too late to cut were seized by Qi Qitao and was charged with raising private soldiers. The whole family was killed!

In this way, several counties in Guide Prefecture quickly fell into Liu Jiang's control! After Liu Jiang succeeded,

Administrators with gang identity quickly followed up and filled the vacancy in the city.

After stabilizing Guide Mansion, Liu Jiang's command advanced layer by layer and quickly spread outward. The county towns fell into Liu Pei's hands one after another. They were controlled by the underground world.

Then Liu Jiang used all his skills to win over the officials, minor officials and servants in the government, and even directly killed people! Under the attack of the silver and big sticks, the grassroots personnel quickly collapsed and surrendered to the Blood Hand Gang.

As for the local officials, Liu Jiang appeared as a middle-aged man, pretending to represent some people who were eager to seek official positions and reached a private agreement with them. Liu Jiang paid money to assist them in transferring them from the place. At the cost, they would recommend Liu Pei's subordinates to their superiors to take over their positions.

This agreement made the officials who had been scared long ago ecstatic! They used all their tricks to contact their superiors to transfer them away from here. The place they made was sent by Liu Pei to take over. In order to be able to intervene in the officialdom on the surface, Liu Pei had already purchased a quota for his subordinates. In this way, although he did not take all the positions, at least nearly 20% of the land in Henan Province was completely in the hands of Liu Pei.

Regarding buying and selling officials, it was the way Liu Dahai opened in Beijing. Liu Pei didn't know that this happened at all. He was worried about not being able to intervene in the area all day long. When Liu Pei knew that he could buy an official position, he spent a lot of money and bought a large amount of space.

In Chinese history, "buying official and selling official positions" has never been a major news. The court can sell it publicly, which is called donating officials; but if it sells it behind the court, it is a personal act, which means holding a personal pocket and will inevitably be investigated.

In the middle and late Ming Dynasty, due to the intensification of political corruption, the phenomenon of buying and selling officials became more and more serious. The Ming Dynasty had such a "god logic" of selling officials - poor people are prone to embezzlement when they become officials, so it is better to let the rich donate money to be officials. First, they will not be corrupt officials without shortage of money; second, they can also supplement the national finance and enrich the national treasury.

Based on this absurd logic, it was very common for buying and selling official titles in the Ming Dynasty. Volume 78 of "History of Ming Dynasty" says that selling official titles in the Ming Dynasty was called "nanometer". "From Xianzong, the students had more than 100 stones of nanometers and entered the Imperial College. The military and civilians received 250 stones, and were appointed as the official ninth rank scattered officials, with fifty stones added, and increased to the second level to the seventh rank."

In the Ming Dynasty

The practice is that the nobles and the military are inferior, so fame and fortune are all unfavorable. Local officials should respect three points when they see it. If they fail to pass the imperial examination and want to have such honors, the rich people in the middle and late Ming Dynasty had another choice, that is, "donate officials."

During the Hongzhi period (1488-1505), if you pay 40 taels of silver, you can get a crown and become a "righteous official". Forty taels are not a small amount, but in order to make a profit by using the status of a righteous official, those who are rampant in the village will pay silver to donate officials as umbrellas.

Of course, no matter how many ranks of officials you buy, you only have the qualifications to serve as an official and cannot actually take office. "Yiguan" is called "sanguan" in the official position system, but it is just a false title without assigned positions. If you want to actually hold an official position, you can buy the status of a student of the Imperial College through the "Shangma Su" system, wait for the imperial court to be appointed as an official, or use this identity to participate in the imperial examination.

"Shangmanagra" also known as "Namanagra", refers to paying horses, food, silver and other materials in exchange for the crown belt given by the court. Around the seventh year of Zhengtong (1442), in order to make up for the insufficient fiscal revenue and reward local relief, the court had given the crown belt a few times.

The Ming Dynasty vernacular novel "The Legend of Marriage in Awakening the World" has a vivid description of the selling of official positions and titles at that time:

It was said that there was an old scholar named Chao Sixiao who failed the exam many times. Fortunately, he summoned relatives and friends to raise funds and raised 3,000 taels of silver. Through the two disciples of the eunuch Wang Zhen, Liu Jinyi and Su Jinyi, he bought a "fat" from the prefect of Tongzhou. At first, Chao Sixiao felt sorry for the money and only took 2,000 taels of silver. He bribed Liu and Su Erjinyi through the intermediary. As a result, Liu Jinyi said: "This Tongzhou is 5,000 taels of rice. Ask him to take another 1,000 taels, for the sake of the two nephews, he would give him 3,000 taels to do it elsewhere." Unfortunately, Chao Sixiao could only take out the remaining 1,000 taels and send it to the janitor to get his wish.

The vernacular novel here describes the buying and selling of officials in the Ming Dynasty. All official positions in the Ming Dynasty were priced, money became the pioneer of the career of the officialdom, and human relationships became the backing for the smooth career of the officialdom!
Chapter completed!