Chapter 75 Borrowing orders
After Liu Bei and Liu Bei walked away, the county magistrate stood on the high steps and stared at the light of the torch disappearing in the night. The magistrate suddenly snorted coldly.
Twenty-eight points? It’s not up to you.
The county magistrate ridiculed him as Li Mengxi was just a baby, and he wanted to play tricks on you, but in the end, you were trapped in a cocoon.
Li Mengxi may indeed be immature, but since the county magistrate has already wanted to collect grain, it is unclear how much of the grain can be used to appease the Yellow Turbans, and whether it can be as Li Mengxi wishes.
Liu Bei was a white man and had no power. Li Mengxi wanted to be a chess player. Although Liu Bei had the ability to be a chess player, Liu Bei was weak and it was difficult for him to compete with his superiors.
Taking advantage of the darkness, Liu Bei took Li Mengxi's hand and went back to Zhang Fei's house together.
At Zhang Fei's house, Guan and Zhang drank and ate meat, enjoying themselves. While drinking, they waited for Liu Bei and Li Mengxi to return.
While Guan Yu was drinking, he held up Xiao Bian with one hand. Xiao Bian was gnawing meat and bones in his hand. He sat in Guan Yu's arms, gnawing and asking from time to time, "Why hasn't my brother come back yet?"
Guan Yu put down the wine bowl and said, "Come on, come on." Guan Yu comforted him with a smile.
While he was talking, the sound of footsteps was heard, and Guan Zhang looked up.
"Brother!" Before Guan Yu could open his mouth, Xiao Zhuan quickly ran out of Guan Yu's arms and ran towards Li Mengxi.
Little Brick ran over with a thump, held up the bones in his hands, and stood on tiptoe to hand the bones to Li Mengxi, "Brother, here you go, Rourou!"
Li Mengxi pinched his younger brother's face in disgust and smiled, "Yeah! You can eat it."
As he spoke, Li Mengxi showed the duck leg in his hand, bent down and handed it to his brother, "Look, what did your brother bring you?"
My brother's eyes lit up.
"Take it and eat it." Li Mengxi patted his little brother's head.
When the younger brother saw the duck legs, he forgot to give the bones to his older brother.
He was so happy that he ate the fat duck legs happily.
Zhang Fei is not a person who likes to follow rules. At this time, Zhang Fei moved the low table to the middle of the hall. The two low tables were put together, and four or five wine jars and two large plates of meat were placed on them. It can be seen that Zhang Fei did not come back here.
After a while, Guan and Zhang also ate happily.
Liu Bei sat down, and Li Mengxi also sat down. After Li Mengxi came back, his younger brother no longer clung to Guan Yu, and sat obediently with Li Mengxi.
However, Li Mengxi was sitting on his knees, and his younger brother felt that his knees hurt from kneeling, so he sat cross-legged in an imageless manner.
Because the younger brother is young, everyone ignores him and lets him go.
Guan and Zhang knew that the eldest brother was going to the banquet and knew that this was the case. However, because Li Mengxi also went there that night, the two of them were even more curious about what was discussed during the banquet.
Not only was it closed, Liu Bei also had no time to ask what Li Mengxi had discussed with the county magistrate, and why he had allowed the county magistrate to agree to the grain requisition.
Liu, Guan, and Zhang gathered their gazes, and Li Mengxi pondered for a moment, "The county magistrate was unwilling to give him food, so I taught him the method of exploitation."
"What is the method of exploitation?" Liu Bei asked impatiently.
Li Mengxi then told the three people that they should return all the food provided by the government and the food provided by the powerful family in twenty-eight accounts.
After Li Mengxi finished speaking, Liu Bei and the other three looked at each other in shock.
"Alas," Liu Bei scratched his head, "Xi'er, you really don't know that the government and the powerful are closely intertwined. How can the government collect grain from the powerful?
I think food will still fall on the people."
Li Mengxi was stunned, and then fell silent. He knew that he had simplified the problem. Li Mengxi had not expected the social structure of the late Han Dynasty.
If the county magistrate can be the county magistrate, how can he be a powerless and lonely person? He must be from one of the top wealthy families in the county.
Powerful people often strengthen their ties through marriage and other means, so they are intertwined and prosperous.
Furthermore, the imperial power cannot yet go to the countryside, so how can a small county magistrate be able to recruit the food of the powerful?
Wrong, totally wrong.
Li Mengxi frowned.
"It's a disaster. In this current situation, if the people have no food, they will throw themselves into the yellow turban to survive. Those who have little food will barely turn to thieves, but they can still survive.
Now the grain requisition order is about to be issued, and grain taxes will be imposed. When the time comes, the Yellow Turbans will not be settled, and the people will be forced to rebel.
The situation in Zhuozhou is at stake."
Liu, Guan, and Zhang all looked heavy when they showed up.
"Xi'er, I'll go there later and persuade the county magistrate to take back his life..."
Li Mengxi shook his head, "With the current situation in Zhuozhou, what do we want?
Is it a cleaning yellow towel?
No, it is easy to clean up the Yellow Turbans, but if it is delayed for a long time, the people in the surrounding areas will be in trouble.
So I used the method of appeasement, so I asked the county magistrate for food during the banquet."
"And food must be obtained from powerful people, and cannot exploit the people. This is the crux.
It is easy to untie this knot."
Li Mengxi looked at Liu Bei and said, "Earlier, a certain person and Duke Xuande discussed major world affairs. A certain person said that the Han Dynasty would be destroyed and the world would be in chaos.
In troubled times, the king is the one with strong soldiers and horses.
Xuande Gong's soldiers and horses are strong, and Zhuozhou has no one to resist."
"The magistrate of another county wants to levy grain from the people. How can he be allowed to do this, which will bring disaster?"
"Gong Xuande persuaded him to take back his fame. This is one of them."
"Of course, it may not be necessary."
"The county magistrate is about to collect grain. If he orders only the people's grain, the people will complain a lot."
"I expect that the county magistrate will follow my plan and issue an order asking the powerful families and the common people to provide food. Then, the powerful people's food will be returned in full, and the people's food will be deducted from them and they will give me 20-30%."
"He enriched his own pockets in the name of recruitment."
"Of course, I just want to use this order."
"I don't know if Mr. Xuande dared to lead his troops to overwhelm the county government and force the county magistrate to submit?" Li Mengxi looked at Liu Bei.
"Ah? This..." Liu Bei was shocked, "Xi'er, don't talk nonsense. This is equivalent to treason."
"No!" Li Mengxi smiled and shook his head, "If we have no soldiers and no weapons, no matter how good we are, if they want to seize my food, they will say that we are treason. If we don't rebel, we are treason."
"However, our army has hundreds of strong soldiers. Even if we are really rebels, the county magistrate is afraid of our power, so he will help us to argue, saying that it is impulsive and not rebellion. He is afraid that we will be really angry.
Against him."
"Therefore, the reason why we are suppressing the county government should not be because we are afraid of being accused of treason, but because the county magistrate is afraid of forcing us to rebel."
Li Mengxi was smiling and his expression was as usual.
However, when Liu Bei looked at Li Mengxi, he suddenly felt a sense of fear in his heart.
Xi'er...he is so bold...
After a long time, Liu Bei hesitated again and again, and sighed, "Xi'er, we will consider this matter in the long run and don't go too far."
Li Mengxi was unmoved because he already had a countermeasure at this time.
"The key lies in the fact that the county magistrate issued the order to collect grain.
My strategy is to use his orders to seize the food of the powerful.
In this way, if the name is justified and the power of the army is used to persecute the powerful, the food of appeasement can be obtained.
Then, Lord Xuande, you will return all the people’s food to the people.”
"In this way, the Yellow Turban appeases the people, avoids war disasters, and does not tax the people's food. Killing three birds with one stone."
Li Mengxi planned and told the truth.
This is a remedy to previous plans.
The success is very good, it depends on whether Liu Bei has the courage to plan for the people and fight against the powerful.
If Liu Bei doesn't dare, there's nothing he can do.
There is not enough food, so we can only use the last resort to cut down the Yellow Turbans.
There has long been a strategy of using the fox to fake the tiger's power, but now Li Mengxi has the strategy of using the government decree as a fake, let's see how effective it can be.
***The author has something to say***
I saw so many book reviews today and it turned out that this book was recommended.
Chapter completed!