Chapter Thirteen: Young people should mind their own business
The north wind howls and the white snow falls.
This year, the first snow after the frost came earlier than usual.
It was an increasingly unfriendly day for travelers, but Sun Yixie and Huang Donglai didn't care much about it; especially Sun Yixie, because his home was in the south of the Yangtze River and he rarely saw snow, so
Now that I have encountered it, it can be regarded as something new.
Let's talk about Sun and Huang. After Anqiu and the two heads of the Yiyong Escort Bureau discussed a plan to deal with Xiao Zhun, they went on the road again.
Their destination has not changed, and they will continue to drive to Huang Donglai's hometown. If the journey goes smoothly, Huang Donglai may be able to go home to celebrate the New Year this year.
The two of them didn't waste much time on this section of the road. After coming out of Anqiu, they drove along the official road towards Jining and soon arrived at the boundary of Yanzhou.
On this day, they left the inn around noon. They had lunch in the wind and snow, and finally arrived at a place called Fengjiazhuang before sunset.
As for the village itself, there's nothing special about it. It doesn't look big or small, neither poor nor rich...that's it.
But there was one thing that made Sun and Huang more concerned - as soon as they entered the village, they discovered that every household in Fengjiazhuang had a small flag hanging at the door.
The flag was black, with a ball of red printed on the black background. The red thing looked like fire but not fire, or lotus but not lotus. It was really eye-catching.
As soon as Sun Yixie and Huang Donglai sat down in the inn, they asked the waiter in the village what the flag was about.
Upon hearing this, the waiter instinctively looked left and right first, as if he was afraid of someone eavesdropping, and then lowered his voice and replied: "I think the two guests are from out of town. I don't think they are here..."
This is the flag of the 'Fire Lotus Sect', and according to the rules, every household in the local area must hang it in front of their door."
"What? Fire Lotus Sect?" Huang Donglai responded casually, "I've never heard of it..." He was also idle and asked one more question, "Eh? What will happen if you don't die?"
As soon as he said these words, several pairs of eyes in the hotel lobby began to look at him.
The waiter in the shop also reacted quickly. He smiled apologetically and said: "Hey, sir, what you said..." When he said this, he suddenly raised his voice a little higher, "The Fire Lotus Sect is owned by the young prince of Yanzhou Prefecture.
The 'Holy Cult' who has been granted the title is a great benefactor to our people... They asked us to fly the 'Fire Lotus Flag', but we are too late to be grateful. How could anyone not hang it up?"
Let's make a digression here. The term "Little Prince" is common in novels and storytelling, but it is not actually a standard term.
A prince is a prince, and there is no distinction between great or small, no matter how young he is; as for the prince's sons, the one who inherits his title is called the prince, and the others are called county princes (on this point, the rules of Dazu and Ming Dynasty are different)
, we will discuss this in detail below).
Storytellers call young princes or princes "little princes" just to sound nice and not look old.
Anyway, you have remembered that the person mentioned by the waiter at the moment refers to the crown prince of the local Prince Lu's Palace.
"Oh~" Sun Yixie had come to his senses now, and while pretending to be suddenly enlightened, he kicked Huang Donglai under the table, "I see... that's because we are ignorant.
Disrespect, disrespect."
"Ah? Ah...yes, yes..." Huang Donglai was reminded by Sun Yixie, and he also reacted, and continued, "It's because we are shallow."
The two of them had a hahaha, and then just put this article aside.
The waiter breathed a sigh of relief, and several pairs of eyes nearby also looked away.
Nothing happened at that time. The two of them chatted with the waiter for a while, inquired about some local conditions, and then returned to the guest room after eating and drinking as usual.
But when the two of them entered the room and closed the doors and windows, the chat box full of vulgar words opened up...
"Damn it, luckily I reacted quickly, otherwise we would have been in trouble again." When Sun Yixie said this, he had already checked the doors, windows and beams to make sure no one was eavesdropping.
"I was so fucking stupid just now." Huang Donglai said, "I have been in this world for twenty years, and this is the first time I heard that the son of a vassal king can confer a certain religious organization as a 'holy religion'. This is
He is going to rebel."
"Ah?" Sun Yixie just noticed something was wrong with the atmosphere around him, but he didn't know how outrageous this thing was. So after hearing Huang Donglai's words, he wondered, "Is it that serious?"
"Nonsense." Whether in the past or in today's world, Huang Donglai was better than Sun Yixie in terms of culture. At least he knew some common sense, "The power of enfeoffment is imperial power. Those nobles of the vassal kings, others
They say they are conferring a title on something, even if it is their own son, they have no right to confer a title... That must be carried out from generation to generation in accordance with the rules of inheritance by the eldest son, no direct concubine, and no son to eliminate the country, and all must be
Report to the court."
"Oh~" Sun Yixie raised his eyebrows upon hearing this, "Then this so-called 'little prince'..."
"It's transgression." Huang Donglai immediately answered, "If this matter is brought to the capital, the emperor might have to pick off the heads of all the people in Prince Lu's palace."
"No way?" Sun Yixie said, "The prince and the emperor are all members of the same family. How can he destroy the family just because of this?"
"It's harmful..." Huang Donglai curled his lips and said with a dry smile, "Brother Sun, your history is not very good, let me tell you this... It has been more than three hundred years since the founding of Dazu. The descendants of these princes and the current emperor,
Maybe they were one family three hundred years ago, but now...the emperor wishes they were all dead."
What Huang Donglai said is basically known to anyone who has read a book in Dashu.
Why Brother Sun doesn't know...I won't explain it.
Let’s take the “Ming Dynasty” that everyone is familiar with. Part of the reason why it perished in the later period was because there were too many descendants of the royal family, which brought down the country’s economy.
This chapter is not over yet, please click on the next page to continue reading! Think about it, after the military power of those vassal kings was reduced, they spent all day eating, drinking and having fun on the fiefdom with the salary from the court, even doing some bullying.
No one can care about domineering girls, so their reproduction and survival rates must be much better than those of ordinary people.
The prince's eldest son can also be a prince, a concubine can be a county king, a county king's concubine can be made a general, and so on...
These people are all entitled to a salary since they were born.
During the Jiajing period, the court felt that something was wrong with this situation. You had endless descendants like you, and the court couldn't stand it anymore, so it began to demote the prince's descendants and nephews in various ways, in order to reduce their status.
The overall title of the descendants of the direct royal family, thereby reducing the salary expenditure.
Unfortunately, this is only a drop in the bucket...
By the end of the Ming Dynasty, after more than two hundred years, the descendants of the old Zhu family were still living on their stipends, amounting to two to three hundred thousand... The agricultural economy cannot withstand what you are doing. Can the people not rebel?
So what about "Da Zhao"?
Obviously, Da Zhao has been able to hold up for more than three hundred years, and is still holding on, so the world line must have changed.
The key is just four words - a common man has no title.
Of course, this does not apply to the emperor: the emperor's sons, except for the one who inherits the throne, can be princes regardless of whether they are direct descendants or concubines.
But among the sons of these princes, only the eldest son can succeed his father, and the second son can be granted the title of county prince, while those born from concubines have no title.
No title, no salary.
If the prince wants to use his own salary to support these concubines, there is no problem, but the court will not provide additional salary to these grandchildren.
In this way, the situation will be much better...
Because in the prince's family, the number of concubines is far more than the number of legitimate sons.
Ordinary families usually only have one daughter-in-law, so it is common for the same mother to have several children. However, most of the prince's families have wives and concubines who are too busy to keep busy, and there are not many legitimate sons.
Furthermore, even if the prince's wife could have more children, not all of them would be boys, not to mention that the medical conditions at that time could easily lead to dystocia or premature death of the child.
As for the concubines, whether there are a dozen or dozens, when their father is still alive, they will be prosperous and wealthy, but as soon as their father dies... it will be hard to say.
Do you expect a half-brother to provide for you and your mother all year round? Even if he is willing to do so out of consideration for brotherly love or the honor of the royal family, what will happen to your children in the future? They all rely on their uncle.
support?
This is undoubtedly unrealistic, so in Dashu, the bastards born to princes have nothing to do with the royal family for up to two generations - you can say that your great-grandfather and the great-grandfather of the current prince are the same person, but this does not mean
It won't change the fact that the prince enjoys hot and spicy food in the palace, while you sell straw sandals on the roadside.
Of course, I am just making an analogy. Not all bastards will not do well in life. There are also shrewd ones who have planned their escape plan when their father was alive. When others are arrogant and extravagant, they use what they have at hand.
If you use the resources to train your children to practice literature and martial arts, their lives will not be too bad in the future even without the protection of the royal family.
To sum up, there are far fewer royal descendants of Da Zhao, or royal descendants who can receive royal salary from birth, compared to the Ming Dynasty we know.
But even so, the emperor's attitude towards these relatives who were "one family hundreds of years ago" is not very good. After all... Compared with "less giving" and "no giving", the latter is better, isn't it?
"Then what you say..." At this moment, Sun Yixi, after listening to Huang Donglai's popular science, said again, "Someone should have reported this matter to the court a long time ago, right? This might be a great achievement.
"
"Normally, there is no need to report it." Huang Donglai said, "All the vassal princes in this dynasty are under the surveillance of the court. Each prince's fiefdom has royal guards who are responsible for keeping an eye on them, and the eunuchs used in the prince's palace are also
There are people who work in stuff factories...this is an open secret."
"Is that so..." Sun Yixie thought thoughtfully, "Then it was the so-called 'little prince' who took care of all the spies who were responsible for monitoring them in King Lu's fiefdom?"
"Then who knows where to go?" Huang Donglai said, "But since the waiter just now dared to say so openly and loudly in public that the Fire Lotus Sect is the holy religion conferred by the young prince, it proves that... at least locally, the Fire Lotus Sect is a holy sect conferred by the young prince.
The teaching is definitely covering the sky with one hand... I think the water in this pond is a bit muddy and not easy to swim in..."
"I also think..." Sun Yixie nodded, "We are just passing through. It's better to stay away from this kind of thing that has anything to do with the emperor's relatives. It should be fine once we leave Jining."
After the two of them had discussed this, they went back to their houses to sleep.
At this time, they didn't expect that it was rare for them to have something they didn't want to take care of, but it had only been less than a day... If they didn't want to take care of it, they had to take care of it.