The Red Mansion: From a Small Pawn to a Leader

Chapter 27: Lost

In the blink of an eye, it was the beginning of May in the lunar calendar, and the weather in the capital was unusually hot.

The windows and doors were wide open, but there was still not a breath of wind, and the cicadas in the back garden were chirping even louder.

Sitting at the desk by the window, Li Hu, wearing a short coarse cloth jacket, was reading a pile of official documents while waving a palm-leaf fan in his left hand.

There was a sound of footsteps. Li Hu looked over and his eyes lit up immediately.

Li San walked in sweating profusely, holding a box wrapped in cloth. As soon as he entered the door, he said with a smile, "Second Master, the person who went to Yangzhou is back." Then he put the bundle on the desk and untied it.

Li Hu stood up and walked to a copper basin with a large piece of ice in it. He took out a porcelain cup from the basin and opened the lid. It was lotus seed soup. He walked to the desk and handed it to Li San: "Go away from the heat."

Li San took it with both hands and walked out.

Li Hu took out a key from the box on the desk, unlocked it, and opened the lid.

Inside the box was an extremely delicate embroidered purse with orchid patterns embroidered on it. The stitches were neat and the embroidery threads were fine, which showed that a lot of effort had been put into it.

Li Hu picked up the purse and took a closer look at it, then smiled happily. He had just mentioned it in the letter, but he didn't expect Lin Daiyu to really embroider a purse for him. It was a pity that it had an orchid pattern. It would have been better if it had a mandarin duck pattern.

There were two letters in the box, one from Lin Ruhai and the other from Lin Daiyu.

Li Hu first picked up Lin Ruhai's letter, opened the seal and began to read. After reading only a few lines, his face darkened.

In this era, salt tax was an important source of national fiscal revenue, and even accounted for half of the national tax revenue. The collection and use of salt tax enabled the court to control a certain amount of fiscal revenue to support the court's operations and military expenses.

However, since the reign of the retired emperor, the salt tax has been declining sharply year by year. In the year when the retired emperor abdicated, not even 30% of the salt tax was collected.

Half of the country's tax revenue comes from salt. Half of the country's tax revenue comes from Lianghuai.

After Emperor Yongchang ascended the throne, he directly killed the prefect of Yangzhou, the Lianghuai Salt Transport Commissioner, the Salt Inspector, and all the officials of the Patrol Battalion and the River Defense Battalion. Then he replaced the prefect of Yangzhou, the Lianghuai Salt Transport Commissioner, and the Salt Inspector with his cronies.

The effect was immediate. The salt tax in Lianghuai increased to 256 million taels that year, and exceeded 400 million taels last year. The total salt tax revenue in the whole country was only 701 million taels.

Lin Ruhai said that the salt tax in Lianghuai was 6-7 million yuan per year in the first 30 years after the founding of the country. After that, it decreased year by year, but the population in the Central Plains was increasing rapidly.

Lin Ruhai said in the letter that the emperor had issued a strict decree that Lianghuai must pay 6 million in salt tax this year.

Cutting off someone's financial resources is like killing their parents! Two million taels is enough to make the salt merchants and the interest groups behind them take risks!

The reason why the emperor was so anxious was not only because Shaanxi was in chaos. The prince said that the spies lurking in Shengjing had sent news that the Mongolian kings had gathered in Shengjing City and would definitely go south to invade the border on a large scale in the second half of the year.

With the emperor's indulgence, riots broke out in some places in northern Shaanxi starting from mid-April.

Those in charge of disaster relief were all promoted by the second prince. All the money and grain were embezzled by them layer by layer, and the victims could only drink two bowls of thin porridge every day.

The victims were hungry and had to fight the drought while catching and killing locusts, and they complained bitterly.

I heard from the prince that as long as the mastermind behind the incident is revealed, the court will immediately start disaster relief.

I hope there won’t be too much trouble!
Li Hu sighed deeply, then wrote a letter back to Lin Ruhai, reminding him to pay attention to safety and not to take action personally, but to let the Lianghuai Salt Transport Commissioner and the Yangzhou Prefect take the lead.

After opening Lin Daiyu's letters, Li Hu read them carefully one by one with a smile on his face.

This was the fourth letter Lin Daiyu had written to him. It was obvious that Lin Daiyu had a closer relationship with Li Hu, and the content of the letter was a bit more casual. In addition to normal greetings, she also wrote about some daily things, such as the peonies in the backyard were blooming, she caught a fish in the lotus pond, and she also introduced the snow geese. She wrote five pages of letters.

Lin Daiyu's first letter was half a page long, and it was written in a very sloppy way. The general meaning of the letter was to thank Li Hu for giving her so many valuable things, and she also said that she didn't need to spend so much money in the future. You can't just listen to what a girl says.

This time, Li Hu did not give her any jewelry, but instead gave her a few poetry collections, and mentioned his illness in the letter.

Sure enough, the personal soldiers brought back Lin Daiyu's letter, as well as Lin Ruhai's letter and two hundred-year-old ginsengs.

In this era, the carriages were slow and the letters had to travel far. It would take half a year or even the next year to receive a reply after sending a letter. But they were ordinary people. Li Hu had a permit from the Ministry of War, and his personal soldiers could change horses at the post station. He didn't dare to use the 600-mile express, but 400 miles was no problem. It only took ten days for the round trip.

As for feelings, they develop as time goes by, not to mention an engagement.

When watching the TV series before, Li Hu didn’t like Lin Daiyu. He disliked her for being petty, pretentious and crying. Later, after reading the original novel, he began to appreciate her true nature. She was worldly-wise but not worldly, and even though she was occasionally straightforward and mean, she was still lovable.

After reading the last page, Li Hu picked up the purse again, opened it, and sure enough, there were a few pink peony petals.

Li Hu looked down at the peony flowers in his pouch, brought them under his nose and smelled them, then smiled. Lin Daiyu had not lied to him. The fragrance of the peony flowers was fresh, elegant, distant and long-lasting.

There is still some vacant space in the back garden, maybe I should plant a few peonies.

Li Hu made up his mind to plant a few beds. Next year, he would put two peonies with soil and mud in a bamboo basket and send it to her. This girl would be so moved that she would be very happy. It would be easy for him!
While imagining, Li Hu carefully folded Lin Daiyu's letter and put it away in a special box.

Spreading out the blank letter paper, Li Hu held the pen, dipped it in the inkstone and prepared to write back to Lin Daiyu.

At this moment, Wang Daniu rushed in from the moon gate of the courtyard like a gust of wind and shouted loudly: "General, there is an order from the camp, please return to the camp immediately!"

Li Hu was startled, and a few drops of thick ink dripped onto the letter!

Suddenly, a hurried running sound was heard and Li Hu looked over.

The eunuch who was close to the prince ran in and shouted "General Li!" while running towards Li Hufei.

The eunuch took out a letter from his bosom and said breathlessly: "A letter from the prince."

Li Hu took the letter, tore it open and read it. His eyes suddenly widened!

The war has begun in Shaanxi!

Just as the second prince was drawing troops from various prefectures in Guanzhong and southern Shaanxi to go to northern Shaanxi to suppress the civil unrest, the bandits hiding at the junction of Sichuan, Shaanxi and Gansu provinces broke through Zheng County, south of Hanzhong Prefecture, and quickly occupied Hanzhong Prefecture.

Hanzhong's geographical location is very important. It can attack Shaanxi and Gansu in the north, enter Sichuan in the south, and even enter the Central Plains. It cannot be lost.

Shaanxi General Yun Guang sent 5,000 elite troops to defend Xi'an, but they were ambushed and annihilated. On the third day of May, a bandit group attacked Xi'an Prefecture and defeated the reinforcements that had just arrived from Fengxiang Prefecture and Qianzhou outside the city.

Is this a bandit?

The troops mobilized by the second prince were stuck in northern Shaanxi, the troops in Sichuan and Gansu could not move, and the combat effectiveness of the troops in the neighboring provinces of Henan and Hubei was unknown, so they had to draw troops from the Beijing camp to provide support.

Xi'an is more than 2,000 miles away from the capital, and it takes more than a month to get there at the fastest. Xi'an has high and thick walls, sufficient food and grass, and complete city defense equipment. It is difficult for bandits to break into the city, but other places are dangerous. It is estimated that when the reinforcements arrive, Xi'an will be the only pure land left in Guanzhong.

The last few words in the letter were a little too bold and black, which showed that this matter was beyond the prince's expectations, and perhaps also beyond Emperor Yongchang's expectations.

In a word, this father and son have gone too far!

(End of this chapter)