Huang Cheng stood in front of the gate of the Marshal's Mansion. The cold wind that penetrated the valley crossed the city wall and hit his collar. Even though he was wrapped in a short coat whose original color could not be seen clearly, the stand-collar autumn shirt was still not enough to keep out the cold.
He looked at the two stone lions in front of the Marshal's Mansion, then at the clean granite steps, and finally looked down at the thick cloth shoes with the big toes pierced.
The rag shoes with pulpy soles were already stained with mud.
The mail warrior standing at the door urged him. Huang Cheng was worried, took off his cloth shoes, placed them under the lion pedestal at the door, and stepped onto the stone steps with bare feet.
Tianbao looked at the farmer from the east and did not tell him that according to the law, no one could put anything down in front of the handsome man's house.
He knew that the generalissimo would give the farmer a pair of shoes, maybe cowhide boots, or maybe more than just a pair of boots.
Sure enough, not long after the farmer entered the front hall, a guard walked out of the front hall and went back to get a pair of cotton-padded clothes and leather boots.
Tianbao smiled, tightened the wide belt around the waist of the earth-colored arrow-sleeved long coat with both hands, pressed the handle of the knife with his left hand, and put his right hand into the arms of the long coat with cross collars to keep warm.
Liu Chengzong and Liu Chengzu, who had returned to Juerwan with him, were sitting in the hall. Looking at the farmer named Huang Cheng, he raised his hand and said: "Change on, sit down and talk."
When he returned from Xining this time, he brought back three people, the most important of whom was Huang Cheng, because according to his father, the people who came from Nianbo to ask for food all followed Huang Cheng.
Huang Cheng is a poor man, but also a very courageous man. He is neither humble nor arrogant, but he dares to move.
It's very courageous to dare to move. In a place like the Marshal's Mansion, even a Xining chieftain might not dare to move.
Huang Cheng was given clothes and boots and put them on. In the blink of an eye, he stripped himself naked in the hall, put on a brand new khaki jacket and trousers with a cross-collar and right hem, and black cotton trousers with a belt, and tied up the belt.
He put on his cowhide boots, put on his long coat with arrow sleeves, and then sat down after saluting.
Seeing his movements of tying and wrapping, Liu Chengzong nodded secretly in his heart. His movements were very skillful and he had indeed served as a soldier.
Liu Chengzong was willing to meet Huang Cheng, not because of his poverty or his ability to convince people, but mainly because this man's resume aroused Liu Shishi's curiosity.
He discovered that he had the physique to attract unlucky people.
He asked: "You are a horse household, and your family has land, but it was lost to horses?"
Huang Cheng shook his head and told the truth: "It's not all because of Ma's troubles. The main reason is that I was busy with the funeral and sold the land at home."
Liu Chengzong nodded slowly. Being a horseman in the Ming Dynasty meant that he had suffered eight lifetimes of bad luck. However, this was nothing to Huang Cheng. He did not rebel.
Liu Shizi asked again: "After selling the land, you became a postman?"
"Yes, at that time the horse of Datong Horse Station died and there was a shortage of horses." Huang Cheng nodded and said: "I brought the last horse at home to the station and went in."
Liu Chengzong glanced at his father's letter on the table with an expressionless expression, and then asked: "After working as a postman for four years, you were dismissed by the imperial court and you became a soldier?"
"No, I was idle at home for half a year, and then I worked as a part-time laborer for three months at my neighbor Li Shan's house. His family was my old employer. They planted more than 200 acres of alfalfa. I needed help when it was time to adjust hay. I used to be in Dada.
I always go over to help.”
After Huang Cheng finished speaking, Liu Chengzong asked: "How much does it cost to help you for three months?"
"I get hungry easily, so Li Shanren takes care of me three meals a day." Huang Cheng smiled happily: "What more wages do I need... Later, Gaodianzi recruited soldiers, so I borrowed two taels of silver from Dashanren and became a soldier." "Huh?"
Liu Chengzong frowned, checked the letter again, and asked: "But you are a deserter from Zhenhai Camp, and Gaodianzi is grinding against Bo."
"Yes."
Huang Cheng nodded, glanced at Liu Chengzong with a strange expression, and said: "It was good at Gaodianzi at first, but then I was transferred to Zhenhaiying. I ran away because it was too far from home."
In fact, he was transferred from Gaodianzi to Zhenhai Camp because Liu Chengzong led his army into the Hehuang Valley. Huang Cheng was able to desert the army and go home as if nothing happened. It was also because Xining City was controlled by Liu Chengzong and cut off the connection between the east and the west. Zhenhai Camp did not pursue the deserters.
Things.
"Then what happened later? Why didn't Luocao go back?"
Huang Cheng was sitting not far from Liu Chengzong, and his tone and expression had always been upright. But when it came to this question, he hesitated and his tone became a little more bitter: "No horse."
He shook his head: "Others can live a good life, but I can't. I'm stupid."
In fact, Huang Cheng was only one step away from falling in love. He had already thought of a plan.
Those forts and fences couldn't be robbed. He had to start small, first rob two horses, and then call on the deserters from the same area to rob the road and rob a merchant who went to the Marshal's Mansion to buy goods in Juerwan. If he had money, he would have food.
If you have food, you will have people, and if you have people, you can become bigger and stronger.
So he squatted in the haystack of Mahu's house in the neighboring village for three days with a guillotine in his pocket, just to steal a horse.
This can only be done at night. There will be no one in the village during the day. If someone finds it, it will be difficult to run away. Even if you are shot with an arrow or scratched, it will be very troublesome.
But for three whole days, the old man had his feet bare during the day and stayed awake on the bed in the house at night. He slept in the stable all day long.
When the horse was hungry, he would wake up the old man with his big head, and the old man would kick his rag shoes with exposed toes, hunched over and talk to himself to eat the horse grass.
Huang Cheng listened to himself for three days. Unless the horse could understand human speech, he might know more about the old man than anyone else in the world.
The old man is not old, but his mother-in-law died in childbirth when she gave birth to her second child. When Du Miaomiao was six years old, she contracted smallpox and died. She never took care of herself. The house was a mess and everyone was in a mess. She aged quickly and looked like an old man.
, actually just in his early forties.
Since the year when my mother-in-law died, no one has made clothes or shoes for him anymore, so he never wears shoes when going to the field. The shoes are only used to keep his feet warm while sleeping at home.
The old man treated his horse better than his own son, exactly the same as when his father was alive, but the horse his father raised like this day and night was given to the inn to be used as a postman.
Until the early morning of the fourth day, when the old man went out during the Qingming Festival, Huang Cheng did not steal the horse.
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He tidied up the house, brought two large jars of water from the well, used mud to seal the holes in the window paper, used a guillotine to pile up the old man's hay, and worked until dusk. Only when he walked to the door did he find the old man.
Lock the door tightly.
Huang Cheng was tired and hungry from working, and he was blocked by the door. He thought that there was nothing in this broken house, and the old rat had to wipe his tears when he came in. Why the hell could he lock the door?
Then his eyes saw the big head of the horse in the stable, and there were two big mouths on it, which slapped the horse: I have been waited on by others for several years, and I have never been wronged like this!
The horse was barking, grinning, and just by looking at the yellow expression on his face, you could tell he was scolding him.
But when he heard Ma scolding, Huang Cheng felt better. He sighed, threw the cavalry boots given to him by the Gaodianzi camp and the mandarin duck jacket of the same color on the old man's bed, and kicked on the pair of bare-chested boots.
The rag shoes on the toes ran over the wall while the horse was cursing.
He didn't even have time to rest when he returned home. Li Dashan, who heard that he had returned home, rushed to collect the debt. When he saw the way he was dressed, he looked so poor that he was almost wearing his pants. He also had a guillotine in his hand, so he decided to forget it.
Now, come to my house and work to pay off your debts. I don’t care if you have enough food to eat, but you don’t have to make money or even kill yourself for the sake of two people.
Huang Cheng thought about it all night. If you say he was unlucky, he met all good people; but if he was lucky, he was really not very good at reincarnation.
Good is not good enough; bad is not bad enough.
Huang Cheng felt that the problem still lay with himself. He didn't seize the opportunity to serve as a soldier in the Zhenhai Camp. Even Luocao didn't have the heart to seize the old man, and he didn't have the ability to seize the fort.
And he is so poor that he is not worthy of being robbed.
If his luck were worse and a wealthy businessman or dignitary tried to bully him, he might get angry and embark on a criminal path.
No matter how bad it is, even if he can't bully others, he can still punch the sleeping old man unconscious in the stable, and he will already be a big thief on a high horse.
Unfortunately, life has been frozen.
Huang Cheng failed and worked at Li Shanren's house for a few more months, until Marshal Liu went to war in Huangnan and the imperial court gathered troops at the mouth of the river. The price of food in the Hehuang Valley rose faster than when he ran away from the old man's house. p>
Li Shanren can no longer afford to support him.
Huang Cheng also knows that when food prices were low, he relied on others to support him. It was difficult for him to repay this kindness. Now that food prices have risen so high, if he eats three months of food from others, he can still afford to buy a barrage.
He could not afford to pay back his life.
Li Shanren tried many times to persuade him to stay, but he didn't. Knowing that he was going to make a living elsewhere, he gave him two taels of silver and a few kilograms of dry food for transportation, and then let him leave home.
Huang Cheng smiled and said: "Before leaving, Li Shanren also said that it would be difficult. It's okay to go out and have a try. If you can't make it, go back. There is food at home, so the commander-in-chief doesn't need to give me rations. I'm just using it as an excuse for others."
I can think of another way."
Liu Chengzong nodded slowly and said with a smile: "This Li Shanren is really nice to you."
"Yes." Huang Cheng nodded and said: "His reputation is known to people from all over the country. He is a young boy with a lot of knowledge. He always says he is afraid that he will leave me alone. If he goes down, I will blame him."
When Liu Chengzong smiled, the hidden nervousness in Huang Cheng's heart dissipated, and he said imitatingly: "My boss, I have worked hard for you for half my life, why don't you care about the life or death of my Chengba?"
However, his words did not make Liu Chengzong laugh. On the contrary, the smile on Liu Chengzong's face gradually faded: "In your place, wealthy landlords and bosses all help the people like this. Are they not being unkind for the sake of wealth?"
"Well, there are good people everywhere, and there are bad people everywhere, but I have never seen them." Huang Cheng shook his head and said: "People are all in the Baozi enclosure, and they don't even want to bully me."
Liu Chengzong didn't have any special reaction to this sentence. He was just estimating the difficulty of sending troops eastward. When he learned all the news he wanted to know from Huang Cheng, he asked Huang Cheng to be taken to the Fuzhong Porridge House for dinner. p>
Liu Chengzu shook his head and said: "If the situation is like this, it will be difficult to handle."
Liu Chengzong smiled and said: "Brother, what is the difficulty?"
"It's not easy to do anything anywhere." Liu Chengzu was puzzled by his brother's ease: "I heard him say that there are not many landlords in the east, so robbing the rich and giving to the poor will hurt good people by mistake..."
Before Liu Chengzu finished speaking, Liu Chengzong waved his hand and interrupted: "Brother, we are not rogue bandits who moved to fight in northern Shaanxi. This is not robbing the rich and giving to the poor."
Liu Chengzu said nothing and motioned for him to continue.
"First of all, can we solve our food ration problem by robbing all the landowners in Hehuang?"
Liu Chengzu was confused, then thought carefully, and finally said: "It can always last us until next autumn's harvest."
Regarding this answer, Liu Chengzong was noncommittal and just continued to ask: "Then what if we still need to distribute food to the people? If we distribute it to the people, how can we ensure that the autumn harvest will be enough to last until the next autumn? The problem in Hehuang is not that we have no food.
."
He spread his hands and said: "The weather has been good this year. The imperial court has closed the country, but grain from outside cannot come in. The grain production in Hehuang has not changed. The problem lies with us."
Chen Shiwen once said that there are 500,000 Han, Pan and Mongolian people in Hehuang. This year, the grain production here has not changed much, but has increased by 80,000 people. Outside food cannot come in. The Marshal's Mansion has bought up all the food on the market in order to avoid starvation.
food, so that people in the east are starving.
For this reason, Liu Chengzong said: "Even if we rob all the landowners, there will still be a ration crisis next year. Who will be robbed then? Is it possible that if you have more than 500 acres of land this year, you will be considered a landlord, and next year if you have more than 200 acres of land, you will be considered a landlord?" As he spoke, Liu Chengzong himself laughed and said a word that seemed to have nothing to do with this matter: "power."
To be honest, Liu Chengzu felt a little unable to keep up with his train of thought: "Huh?"
"I mean, the purpose of this battle is power. Inciting people like Huang Cheng to rebel and rob big businesses is just a means. My purpose is power."
Liu Chengzong raised his hand and shook it and said: "It's not because this man has 200 acres of land, I want to rob him; nor is it because this big clan has a small amount of land per household, so I don't care about him, nor is it because a person can
If the evil and powerful local protector in the countryside has neither land nor food, I will let him go."
"I understand what you mean."
Liu Chengzu nodded slowly and followed this train of thought: "Then this battle must start from Xining to take back all local power, just like when all dynasties were founded, in the name of robbing the rich and giving to the poor, and to equalize land and avoid paying taxes.
To induce you to beat up all the gentry, clans and chieftains?"
Liu Chengzong's eyes were full of enthusiasm and he nodded firmly: "Yes!"
But Liu Chengzu was even more confused: "But as you just said, the total number of fields in Hehuang, except for the tens of thousands of acres we have cultivated, will still be short of food."
"And I never think that equalizing land and eliminating taxes is a good idea. We have said it a long time ago..." Liu Chengzu looked troubled and shook his head: "Everyone who fails does this."
"Yes, those who fail do it, and those who succeed do it too. I don't think the problem lies in equalizing land and exempting taxes. It depends on local conditions. There is no law in this world that will last forever, let alone a country that will last forever. It can
Use it as a stage, but not forever."
As Liu Chengzong spoke, he cut the air with his hand: "It is easy to equalize the land, but the land will become uneven again in the second year after equalizing the land. What we have always said is to suppress annexation, that is, to suppress the emergence of landlords. But once
One hundred acres counts as a landlord, or two hundred acres counts as a landlord? If two hundred acres counts as a landlord, what does one hundred and ninety-nine acres count?"
"It is easy to waive the tax, but after the tax is waived, what will the Marshal's Mansion use to support the troops and build roads, bridges and water conservancy projects?"
Liu Chengzong asked and answered himself: "So my idea is to equalize grain and buy taxes... Based on Hehuang, taking back all local power is the first step; establishing households to equalize the people and dividing townships and capitals is the second step." p>
"Each township formation will appoint four officers, one local will be elected by the people, one will be selected by the government from other places, one official will be appointed by the commander's office, one officer will be selected by me, and there will also be a doctor of agriculture and animal husbandry, twenty centurions,
Lead the local people to plant and raise livestock in a unified way, and credit according to work."
"The entire Hehuang is planned by the Marshal's Mansion to plant livestock and livestock, and agricultural and animal husbandry products are priced uniformly. 40% of the harvest is distributed locally according to work, and 60% is purchased by the Marshal's Mansion. Markets are set up along the valleys for unified management."
Liu Chengzong spoke impassionedly, as if a new era was beginning, but when he finished speaking, his momentum dropped by half: "This matter is of great importance, and I have to get Chengyun back as soon as possible."