"Bang!" There was a gunshot, and the bullet hit Master Qiu's supporting leg accurately.

Master Qiu lost his center of gravity and fell to the ground, letting out a heartbreaking scream.

The revolver in Lu Zhu's hand was smoking, and she glanced at Master Qiu with disdain: "If you want to die, you have to say everything you need to say before you die. Governor Yang has been offended. Take him away!"

As soon as she finished speaking, two men in black from the Overwatch Council came over, lifted Master Qiu up like a dog and left.

"Bold! Unbridled!" Yang Sichang jumped in anger, but no one listened to him.

It seemed that all the servants of the Yang family and the guards of the Governor's Mansion were dead, and no one showed up.

"Farewell!" Luzhu put away the gun, turned around and walked out of Yang Sichang's yard.

Yang Sichang watched everyone leave blankly, as if nothing had happened except for a pool of blood on the ground.

It was not until the last man in black left the yard that the servants of the Yang family came to the door of the study cautiously.

"Get out! Get out!" Yang Sichang roared, and the servants and family members receded like the tide.

The words "Lao Ji Fu Feng Aiming for a Thousand Miles" on the wall were still there, but now Yang Sichang felt more and more heartbroken as he looked at them. He stretched out his hand to pull off the words and tore them into pieces in handfuls.

He turned back and overturned the chessboard, and the fine clouds fell to the ground and kept jumping around.

It’s over!

A quarter of an hour ago, he was dreaming of entering Beijing. A quarter of an hour later, Yang Sichang knew clearly that his political career was over.

If your staff is arrested today, I'm afraid it will be you who is arrested tomorrow.

Master Qiu had guessed everything wrong. Li Xiao didn't want to be the emperor yet. He disarmed the army and canceled agricultural taxes, all in fact to kill himself.

As the governor of the five provinces south of the Yangtze River, Yang Sichang had great power. It can be said that he was the local emperor of the south of the Yangtze River for ten years. After sitting in this position for ten years, he is almost certain that he can join the cabinet.

Even after Sun Chengzong and Zhang Huangyan, we can touch the position of chief assistant.

He cherished the Zhu Ming Dynasty and believed that the Zhu family was the cornerstone of the Ming Dynasty's orthodoxy. In Jiangnan, he always consciously or unconsciously protected the princes of the Zhu family, and he also always protected the officials who had gained fame by reading the sages' books.

After all, the country has been without Enke for many years. Those people who studied eight-legged essays in these ten years of hardship are the only remaining descendants of Donglin.

Under his rule, Yuelu Academy and Jinling Academy became the largest academies in the south of the Yangtze River. The schools that studied modern science that Li Xiao advocated basically could not cross the Yangtze River. Even because of Yang Sichang's influence, those schools in Yangzhou and other places in the north of the Yangtze River had a hard time.

People are very reluctant to send their children to school, thinking that it is a place for poor people and lower-class talents. Students who come out of school are often looked down upon, and even ganged up by rich kids to bully.

After ten years, Yang Sichang once felt that Li Xiao would always acquiesce to the existence of these things. After all, these are the orthodoxy of Chinese culture. Those things done in the north will sooner or later be swept into the garbage dump.

Even the land reform promoted by Li Xiao has changed its flavor in Jiangnan. The so-called land reform is just a joint venture between landlords and the government. After paying taxes on the output of the land, the government will return part of it to those landowners.

This is more trouble-free and convenient than the previous landlords collecting the rent directly, and it is also guaranteed. You don't have to worry about those poor people coming to you to plead for mercy, and you can waive the one-year tenant rent in a moment of soft-heartedness.

But he was wrong. Li Xiao was not acquiescing, but tolerating.

Li Xiao must unite all the forces that can be united in the country to ensure that nothing happens in the country.

Now that the external expansion is over, Ming Dynasty does not have the strength to control more land. If it continues to fight, it will most likely suffer from indigestion.

Looking at the country, the first person to deal with is Sun Chengzong who is protecting him. The second person is himself who controls Jiangnan and adopts non-violent non-cooperation.

Luzhu's shot made him think clearly, and unknowingly his ideas had a fierce conflict with Li Xiao.

The history of the past twenty years proves that most people who conflict with Li Xiao do not end well, without exception!

"Hehehehe!" Yang Sichang laughed miserably, but it was too late to understand.

Li Xiao had no intention of cooperating with him, he just wanted to stabilize him so that he could have a stable rear.

"Let those beasts come in, I have something to say." Yang Sichang ordered, and the eldest son who was waiting at the door immediately ran out like an arrow had been shot in the butt.

Li Xiao lay leisurely on the recliner, watching the telegram sent back from Luzhu.

"Yang Sichang will come to Beijing in a few days. Since you are in charge of the judicial prison, it is up to you to talk to him." Li Xiao handed Luzhu's telegram to Li Hao, who was sitting next to him.

The young Li Hao was already an assistant minister of the Ming Dynasty. He entered the cabinet at such a young age, the only one in the Ming Dynasty for more than 200 years. Even his elder brother Li Xiao did not receive such an honor.

"I know, brother, but if Yang Sichang knew that going to Beijing this time would mean death, would he still go to Beijing? This old guy has been in charge of Jiangnan for ten years and was made the leader of the Donglin Party.

If he ascends to the south of the Yangtze River and makes a noise, it is inevitable that some people will be bewitched by him. What if...!"

"What if? You mean he wants to rebel? OK! Just let him have it. The boil will pus sooner or later. It's better to squeeze the pus out now than to keep it in the body.

It is better to deal with his cronies as soon as they are exposed earlier than to hide them and come out to mess with us in the future.

Besides, what capital does he have to rebel? Just those scholars? Haha, I’m afraid the first thing they did after rebelling was to quarrel because of different political opinions.”

Li Xiao despised these scholars very much, and the scholar rebellion failed for three years. Besides, the Ming Dynasty's guns were in his own hands. In addition to overseas arsenals, all the arsenals were in Hebei, Shandong, and Liaodong where heavy industry was gathered.

In other words, if Yang Sichang and his people rebelled, they wouldn't even get a bullet!

The security forces with only guns and no heavy weapons would be facing death when facing a division armed to the teeth. In front of the cannons of the first division, the security forces would be nothing but piles of meat.

"There will be a lecture at Yenching University in a few days, and Zhang Huangyan insists on letting me go. You can go on my behalf!"

"Brother, this is a bit inappropriate. Besides, there are too many things to do these two days, and I am too busy. Not only do I have to deal with Yang Sichang's affairs, I also have to deal with the problems discovered by the Liaodong patrol team.

You don’t know that Liaodong is not peaceful now either. Something is going on...!"

"Oh! What happened to Liaodong?" Li Xiao opened his eyes and looked at Li Hao attentively.

Liaodong is the foundation of the Li family and the foundation of the Ming Dynasty. Some of the heavy industries in the Ming Dynasty are entirely in Liaodong. Half of the steel production in the Ming Dynasty is produced in Anshanyi.

If something goes wrong in Liaodong, the consequences will be disastrous.

"Hey...! Today's Liaodong can be said to be rampant in corruption. Although local officials do not have the same cliques as in Jiangnan, most of them are from the Liao army, and their comrades help each other.

In terms of employment, there are endless cases of nepotism and asking for services. Yamen, large and small, are filled with people who come in through various connections.

Because they have connections, all promotion opportunities are occupied by them. But those who are truly talented can only work at the grassroots level and will not be promoted when they reach retirement age.

Wealthy households often spend a lot of money to get their children into government offices and various units.

Corruption in employment is still one thing, but the waste in all kinds of money and food is gone. Colleagues have to entertain when they come, superiors have to entertain when they come, and subordinates have to entertain when they come.

Especially during the Chinese New Year every year, various group gatherings and dinners within the unit are extremely extravagant. If your unit does well, our unit must do better. Otherwise, the chief officer will be said to be stingy and lose face.

.

Not only do we have to treat them to food, drinks and entertainment, but they also have to give out some souvenirs before leaving. At the beginning, they just give out boxes of fruit, a few kilograms of eggs and so on.

Later it was prawns! Pheasants! Big flying crabs! If you divide the river crabs into several kilograms, people will look down upon you.

But now, the silk from Jiangnan, the porcelain from Jingdezhen, Zhonghua cigarettes, and Wuliangye all have to be of the highest quality!

Take the people from Gaiping Electric Power Bureau in our hometown as an example. They no longer drink Wuliangye and insist on drinking a kind of liquor called Moutai from Kweichow.

The mountains are high and the rivers are far away, and a special airship is sent to deliver it. Not to mention how much the wine costs, the shipping cost is one silver coin a bottle. The market price is less than ten silver coins, so don't even think about it.

These officials in Liaodong would buy boxes upon boxes when they entertained their colleagues. Just to save their face, the Ming Dynasty consumed at least tens of thousands of silver coins every year.

This is just the tip of the iceberg, there is more...!"

"Ten thousand silver coins are still the tip of the iceberg?" Li Xiao's heart sank.

Liaodong is the flesh of my own hand, and it has turned into such a rotten state. Wang Tong, Wang Tong, you have done a really good job with this job.

"Have you ever heard of raid spending?"

Li Xiao shook his head blankly.

"There is a certain amount of budget allocated to the government every year. If it cannot be spent this year, it will be turned over to the finance department. And after it is turned over to the finance department, next year's budget will be reduced.

Guess what these government offices do!"

"Spend the money suddenly at the end of the year?" Li Xiao had heard of this matter, and many departments in later generations did this.

"Spend it out? It's okay to spend it, it's all divided!

They turned the unspent budget into bonuses and distributed them directly. The money that these yamen should spend was not spent, and the things that should be done were not done. They just waited for the big guys to share the money at the end of the year!

Tell me, how can we survive like this?" Li Hao became angrier as he spoke, picked up the tea cup on the coffee table and drank it all in one gulp.

"Corruption!" Li Xiao nodded: "Mr. Sun once said before that official governance is the real thing. Now it seems that he has the foresight."

"Huh! These problems were all caused by him when he was in power." Li Hao felt a little resentful.

"You can't say that. Mr. Sun has been fighting with our family all the time, and Liaodong is our rear base. If we clean up the officials in Liaodong at that time, it will be difficult not to cause some chaos.

At that time, stability was paramount. Only with stability could there be sufficient supplies at the front, and the soldiers would have food, drink, bullets and artillery shells."

"But things can't go on like this. If we continue like this, even if our family has gold and silver, even if we get countless money back from overseas, it won't be enough to cause so many moths."

"Yes! We can't go on like this." Li Xiao nodded.

"You should investigate these matters carefully. Don't call anyone first, conduct a thorough investigation first. You can ask people from Luzhu to help, or you can ask people from Xiao Zhan to help.

In short, we should investigate these shortcomings one by one. After Yang Sichang is eliminated, we can then carry out purges.

If Yang Sichang is dealt with, Jiangnan will definitely become unstable. Lao Si, Jiangnan and the north cannot be in chaos at the same time. The paralysis needs to be eliminated one by one, but it's okay.

We brothers have a long life, and there is enough time to clear up the paralysis."

"I know, brother!" Li Hao nodded. He also knew that the country needed stability and it was impossible for the north and the south to become chaotic at the same time.

Regardless of whether Yang Sichang was willing or not, the imperial court transferred him back to the capital with an imperial edict. Although the excuse for going to Beijing to report on his duties was perfect, Yang Sichang knew that going to the capital this time would be a disaster.

The only thing we can count on is whether Sun Chengzong can help.
To be continued...