Standalone Northern and Southern Dynasties

Chapter 91: All about human relations (4k, available at night)
When he returned home, he saw Su Suan with a mysterious smile, sitting by the oil lamp waiting for Su Ze.

After Su Ze pushed the door open, Su Suan immediately took out a cloth bag from his waist and poured out the gold, silver and jewelry inside.

"what is this?"

"My Lord, this is a gift from the officer in charge of the granary in the Cavalry Battalion."

Su Ze looked at Su Suan in confusion. Your entry was clearly [Corrupt Household Official], how come you suddenly became honest and upright?

All I heard was Su Suan saying, "I can't take these gold, silver and jewelry, because I can't handle this matter."

"There is a way to be greedy. If you accept everything and fail to accomplish what you have received, you are caught between your master and the gift giver, and you are not a human being on either side."

"Since their task cannot be accomplished, I can only hand the things over to the Lord. This way, if something goes wrong in the future, the Lord will protect me."

As expected, he is the purple follower of the system. Su Ze looked at Su Suan. His "corruption" entry seemed really interesting.

Su Ze did not directly ask about the account books of the Tunqiying. Even the armory and the stables had become like that, so the situation within the Tunqiying must be even more of a mess. He asked, "Then what kind of greed can there be?"

Su Suan said: "The most greedy thing in this world is to sell information."

"Sell news?"

"Yes, for example, if the master wants to promote someone, I can tell this person the news in advance. Anyone who is ambitious will naturally send a gift. The master wants to promote this person anyway, and he will feel that I played a role in his future success. Then there will be gifts in early summer, autumn and winter."

"This kind of thing is just a convenient way to get things done. It's something that both of us are willing to do, so I feel most at ease."

Su Ze became interested and asked, "What's next?"

"The second is to deceive the superiors and conceal the truth from the subordinates. For example, if a subordinate makes a mistake, you can give him a gift to cover it up for him or tell him when he is in a better mood to calm the situation down."

"You have to be careful with this kind of money. Some big things can't be settled. Some things will get bigger and bigger as they are concealed, and eventually get to a point where they can't be managed."

"But generally speaking, subordinates usually do things without bad intentions. They are all working for their masters. As long as the mistakes are not particularly serious, the gifts can be accepted."

Su Ze asked: "Then what can't be collected?"

Su Suan said, "We can't accept this kind of gift today. They want to fight against the Lord. If we accept their gift, we will be caught in the middle and it will be difficult to be a human being."

Su Ze looked at Su Suan. Sure enough, the follower with purple attributes was not simple. Just the ability to receive gifts was much better than that of ordinary corrupt officials.

However, his ability is so strong that the harm he causes is not small.

Whether it is "selling information" in advance or "deceiving superiors and concealing the truth from subordinates", it is essentially damaging the authority of the entire system and will also lower the level of administration of the entire system.

If everyone becomes bribing, the final result will be like the Northern Wei court, where capable ministers need to bribe to get things done, and ministers who do things do so in order to plunder more money. The court's atmosphere will be completely ruined.

"Tell me, what are the problems in the military books and registers?"

Su Suan immediately said, "The Tunqi Battalion has twelve volumes of military books and a quota of five hundred people, but there are many duplicate names in these twelve volumes, and some are simply 'account personnel' who have no birthdays."

"What is an account holder?"

"They are fictitious people who exist only in the account books, and are recorded in the military books as people who are not paid for their work."

A military book is a list of soldiers that records their names, hometowns and ages. A military book comes in two copies, one is hidden in the military granary, and the other is given to the families of the conscripted soldiers as proof of their reduction in government rent and exemption from labor service.

The "twelve volumes of military books, every volume has my father's name on it" in "The Ballad of Mulan" refers to the conscription order issued to Hua Mulan's grandfather.

It's just that the military book sent to Hua Mulan's grandfather was a conscription order. The presence of the grandfather's name on the book simply indicated that the military conscription was urgent. However, the repeated names were found in the military books in the Tunqi Camp, which was obviously a fabricated list to collect empty salaries.

"These counterfeiting methods are very low-level, right? Didn't the police come to check it a while ago? Why didn't they find any problems?"

Su Suan smiled and said, "My Lord, the key to making false accounts is never to make the accounts perfect, but to make sure that the auditors cannot find any problems."

Su Ze immediately understood what Su Suan meant. It was just a routine matter for the Duguancao to check the accounts. Even if they found problems, they could just give gold, silver and jewelry as they did today. The entire political system of the Northern Wei court had failed and had completely lost the ability to correct mistakes.

"Then according to your estimation, how many people are actually on the roster in the Tunqi Battalion now?"

Su Suan counted on his fingers and said, "Excluding those who are over the age limit, fictitious account holders, and duplicate names, there are less than 200 people in the Tunqi Battalion at present."

There is so much water in the military books alone. We don't even know whether these 200 people are all in the camp. No wonder the imperial guards basically did nothing in the military records of the late Northern Wei Dynasty. This is really too bad.

"Besides the military books, what other questions are there?"

Su Suan immediately said, "There is also a problem with the land register."

"Tian Ce?"

"According to the military settlement system established by Emperor Xiaowen, the number of military settlements is determined by the number of acres of land initially granted to the common people, which is 40 acres for each regular soldier. According to this calculation, the Cavalry Camp should be granted 20,000 acres of land."

"How is this possible? Where are there 20,000 acres of farmland near Luoyang? With so many imperial guards, there must be military settlements around Luoyang?"

Su Suan said, "Of course it's impossible. Forty mu per regular soldier was the number of military farms when the Yulin Huben was first established. Later, as Luoyang became more prosperous, the Shangshutai ordered the Yulin Huben to withdraw the military farms and use military pay to replace the farms."

"However, the army still retains some garrison land, especially the Tunqi Battalion, which is the elite of the Imperial Guards. There are still 3,000 acres of grassland and 2,000 acres of good farmland in the land register. These lands should be given to the families of the Tunqi Battalion to cultivate, and the income from cultivation should be added to the public treasury of the Tunqi Battalion as a supplement to the court's military pay."

"but?"

"In fact, these fields only exist in the account books, because they were not given to the Yulin family to cultivate, and no harvest was added to the public treasury every year." "So where did these fields go?"

Su Suan said, "In fact, this kind of thing often happens in the farmland managed by the Household Department. There are only two possible outcomes: either the farmland is occupied by powerful families, or it is secretly rented out by the upper echelons of the Tunqiying, and the rent goes into their pockets."

"When the Lord took office today, the money that the military commander presented was the standard payment for the commander of the Cavalry Battalion."

Su Ze looked at Su Suan, and then he understood why he was rated as a purple follower.

Su Suan's strength lies not in his ability to read and check accounts, but in his ability to understand the unspoken rules of corruption in the entire Northern Wei government and analyze the specific flow of money and grain.

Only then did Su Ze understand the dilemma Su Chao felt when answering the question about how to use corruption. Talent is hard to come by, and when faced with a talent shortage, being able to resist not using a corrupt subordinate requires extremely high moral pursuits and abundant talent reserves. For example, Su Ze now has to use Su Suan.

Su Ze pointed at the gold, silver and jewelry on the table and said, "Since these things are given to you, please accept them."

Su Suan was delighted when he heard this, and immediately put away the gold, silver and jewelry skillfully.

Su Ze asked again: "If I want to give a gift to Guangyang Wang Yuanshen, what should I give?"

Su Suan thought for a moment and said, "King Guangyang worships Buddhism, so a Buddha statue would be the best gift."

Buddha statue? Su Ze suddenly thought of Su Tong who stayed in Yongning Temple to cast Buddha statues. He had also made several gilded Buddha statues in the past few days. He could take one from him and give it to King Guangyang.

Su Ze suddenly thought of Erzhu Rong who was far away in Xiurong. Before the chaos in the world, Erzhu Rong and his son were geese ministers. Every autumn when they "brought geese" from Xiurong to Luoyang, they would bring a large number of Xiurong horses to give to the court to maintain good relations with the Northern Wei court.

Since Erzhu Rong did this, it is only right for me to do the same.

Su Ze thought about it and thought, among the powerful people he knows now, which ones can he give gifts to?
The first one is Guangyang King Yuan Shen. If he really wants to secure his position as the commander of the Tunqiying Camp, Duguan Cao, who is in charge of military discipline, will be his greatest helper, so it is imperative to take care of Yuan Shen.

Apart from Yuan Shen, the other important official Su Ze knew was Li Daoyuan.

It is definitely not okay to give Li Daoyuan gold, silver or jewelry, but finding some books or something can please him. Can giving books to a scholar be considered a gift?
Supporting Li Daoyuan behind the scenes were Cui Guang, the chief academic officer of the Imperial College, and Li Chong, the general of the cavalry.

Needless to say, Li Chong has made great military achievements and is now the number one military officer in the Northern Wei court. And although Li Chong is old now, he actually has several opportunities to go on expeditions in the next few years, and Su Ze, who is a member of the imperial guards, may also go with him at that time.

Cui Guang, the chief academic officer of the Imperial College, is an old fox. He has served three dynasties. He is from the Qinghe Cui family, a top family, and has a deep influence in the Secretariat.

By the way, there is also Prince Qinghe. Even if Prince Qinghe would fall according to the development of history, he is still the prime minister of Northern Wei Dynasty. I can also try to give him some gifts.

Besides that, there is Princess Chenliu. Thinking of Princess Chenliu, Su Ze felt a bit complicated. Why not ask the [skilled jeweler] to help her make a batch of jewelry tomorrow?
Although Princess Chenliu is a wealthy woman, no woman can refuse to accept gifts, right?
Princess Chenliu has good relations with many royal family members and nobles, so maybe she can act as a matchmaker.

Next, he made friends with Liu Bozhi, the Su brothers, Gao Huan, and his subordinates in the Yulin Army.

Plus the money needed to refresh the store and purchase, as well as the maintenance costs of these followers.

Su Ze felt that the small treasury that had just been filled was about to run out of money again. Even a mountain of gold and silver could not keep up with such consumption! The idea of ​​continuing to make money came up again. Why was he busy making money every day since he traveled through time?
Su Ze also secretly made up his mind that he could no longer live on windfall gains. As his business expanded in the future, he would need a more stable way to make money.

Yes, make money.

Su Ze looked at his followers and came up with a good way to make money.

However, things still have to be done step by step. Su Ze decided to first get through King Guangyang and take control of the Tunqiying in his own hands.
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At the same time, in the cavalry camp.

Huang Yue, the Sima of the Tunqi Battalion, was drinking and toasting with several other centurions. The barracks, which were supposed to be free of alcohol, were filled with wine jars. The most outrageous thing was that they even called in dancers and singers and openly engaged in lewd pleasures in the barracks.

"Sima Huang is the one who has a solution! Su Ze seems to be a man without any ambitions. He didn't dare to say anything even after receiving the fee."

Huang Yue felt very proud listening to the compliments from all around him.

He had been the Sima of Tunqiying for more than ten years and had served several brigade commanders.

By making use of his connections and deceiving people at all levels, he successfully sidelined the former brigade commander, and finally made him a scapegoat and was dismissed from office by King Qinghe, while he and his men were safe and sound.

The new brigade commander Su Ze looks capable, but Huang Yue has also inquired about it. He has no backing in the court, and his rise to fame is entirely due to his rescue of Prince Qinghe by joining the court.

This lucky guy has no foundation and doesn't understand the tricks of the military camp. As long as I serve him well, I can live as safely as my predecessor, right?
Huang Yue naturally had a backup plan for the disobedient brigade commander. If Su Ze really wanted to check the accounts, he would mobilize the lower-level soldiers of the Tunqi Battalion to make trouble. When the matter got out of hand, it would appear that Su Ze, the brigade commander, had exploited the lower-level Yulin since he took office, completely ruining his reputation.

As a poor Yulin, Su Ze could not maintain a long-term relationship with the King of Qinghe. As time went by, their feelings faded and Su Ze really could not sit on the position of brigade commander, then he would be completely unable to continue his job.

The relationships within the Imperial Guards were complicated and intricate, with colonels, lieutenants and brigade commanders often unable to control the entire camp, and grassroots soldiers often attached themselves to middle and low-level officers such as captains and centurions.

This is also the reason why Huang Yue dared to sideline Su Ze.

Huang Yue added: "By the way, the newly appointed Commander of the Caiguanying, Hou Lushuai, also has a grudge against Su Ze. His father is the General of the Left Guard. As long as Su Ze is defeated, Hou Lushuai will be rewarded handsomely!"

Hearing that Huang Yue had external aid, everyone became even more excited and cursed and swore to be united with Huang Yue and stop Su Ze from interfering in the affairs of the Tunqiying.

Huang Yue drank the wine with satisfaction. He excluded Su Ze not only to target him, but there were real benefits involved.

Huang Yue rented all the horse farms in the Tunqiying Camp to his own people, and the court decided to increase the amount of land granted and reduce the amount of military farms in Luoyang. Huang Yue and others who actually controlled the military farms could manipulate the land and turn these public fields into private fields.

Su Ze's subsequent performance made Huang Yue even happier. Except for the first day when Su Ze came to inspect the Tunqiying and sent that cunning subordinate to check the military books and land registers in the granary, he had been staying at home on sick leave and had not come to the Tunqiying.

Other brigade commanders would at least have three things to do when they took office, but Su Ze simply surrendered without even a single thing to do?
He was indeed a poor commoner, and he became a brigade commander just by luck. At least he had some self-awareness.

Huang Yue and other officers in the army thought so.

(End of this chapter)