Chapter 1743 Aristocratic Family, Check the Truth

It's the twelfth lunar month again.

It's freezing cold.

Su Mingzhe took a rare day off and spent time at home eating hotpot with his woman.

Because there was a fire basket under the floor tiles, the heat in the house kept the cold wind out.

A dozen young and beautiful maids, wearing cool thin waist skirts designed by men, surrounded the man, some lowered their shoulders and pinched his legs, some poured tea and wine, some played musical instruments and sang, making the man very happy.

"My dear husband, your greenhouse design is so good. I don't have to worry about not having vegetables and fruits to eat during the twelfth lunar month."

Wang Yanzhi, fifteen years old, is thirteen years younger than Xie Daoyuan, at the age when she is lively and lovely.

Ever since she entered the Su Mansion, Su Mingzhe and Xie Daoyuan have both doted on her, and the girl has gradually regained her girlish nature, urging the two of them to busy themselves with eating, drinking and having fun for her all day long.

“This greenhouse technology is really good.”

Xie Daoyun looked at the man with a look as gentle as water:
"Husband, let's expand the greenhouse next year. The extra vegetables and fruits can be given away as gifts, which will not be impolite!"

It's more than just being rude.

In this era, being able to eat a handful of green vegetables in the middle of winter is absolutely a supreme enjoyment. Who can dislike this?

Not only that, the seasonal fruit and vegetable storage technology that Su Mingzhe came up with is also epoch-making.

In winter, the stored fruits and vegetables were presented to the emperor, who would be ecstatic.

Unfortunately, this was Su Mingzhe’s first time in charge of the household and he had no time to build more greenhouses or store more fruits and vegetables.

If he really had some extra, he wouldn't be so stingy as to hide at home every day and enjoy these things alone.

……

Su Mingzhe, Xie Daoyuan and Wang Yanzhi had a hotpot meal. Qingyin, Yu Wuxia, Gu Xinlian and more than a dozen other maids were drooling with greed.

Unfortunately, their status is not even that of concubines. When there is a principal wife, they are not even qualified to sit at the table to eat and can only stand on the side and serve.

If they also wanted to enjoy it, either the main wife Xie Daoyuan was not there, or the male owner Su Mingzhe was not there.

……

Su Mingzhe and the two women had eaten and drunk their fill and were about to go to the bedroom to rest when Mingyan, who had been promoted to housekeeper, ran in and said:

"Sir, the governor, please come to my house!"

Su Mingzhe's residence is right next to the prefect's mansion.

When Su Mingzhe arrived at the prefect's mansion on foot, he saw Wang Yun drunk and drinking sobering soup under the service of Amber.

Amber saw it and quickly reminded:

"Master, Mr. Su is here."

"Mr. Su...Oh, my brother-in-law is here."

Wang Yun was an alcoholic who couldn't live without alcohol. When he heard that Su Mingzhe was coming, he subconsciously said:

"Amber, go prepare the banquet. I want to have a good drink with my brother-in-law..."

After hearing this, Amber smiled at Su Mingzhe, quickly took a wet towel, wiped his master's face, and reminded him:

"Master, you are here to ask Mr. Su to come on official business."

"Official business? Yes, yes, official business..."

Wang Yun was stimulated by the cold towel and his mind cleared up. He finally remembered the purpose of calling Su Mingzhe:

"Brother-in-law, I just received a message from the prince (Langya Prince Sima Pi) that Murong Jun has sent a large army to be active on the border, and Fu Jian is also preparing for war in Chang'an. I'm afraid that the two families will invade the south together next year. The court is preparing to issue a conscription order, and all counties in the south of the Yangtze River must send 30,000 soldiers and horses..."

"Thirty thousand? That much?"

After hearing this, Su Mingzhe suddenly felt a headache.

You should know that there are a total of ten counties in the entire Wuxing County, and the registered population is only more than 300,000 (excluding slaves of the aristocratic families).

Now, to mobilize 30,000 people is almost equivalent to drawing one-tenth of the population.

Once this order is issued, it will definitely be a serious blow to Wuxing County.

However, if the Yan and Qin people want to go south, they cannot help but resist. After a moment of silence, Su Mingzhe slowly asked:
"Brother, when will the imperial court issue an edict?"

"Such an imperial decree is an illegitimate order. The ministers in the court are persuading Your Majesty that even if the court really issues such an imperial decree, the major aristocratic families will resist and will not obey it!"

Wang Yun directly refuted the imperial edict as a disorderly order, obviously expressing his dissatisfaction with the young emperor who came to power this year.

……

Wang Yun was born into the Wang family of Taiyuan.

The Wang family of Taiyuan ranks first among the aristocratic families, with thousands of children on the register.

If the imperial court really issued such a "disorderly order", the Wang family of Taiyuan would have to send out at least several thousand troops.

Therefore, even the Wang family of Taiyuan could not accept such a "disorderly order", and other noble families were even more unwilling to obey the order.

……

"The prince said in his heart that something big will happen in Jiangnan recently, so let's collect as many medicinal herbs as possible!"

Wang Yun said as he handed over a prescription.

Su Mingzhe took a look and immediately recognized that the herbs above were nothing special when viewed individually, but if they were randomly combined, they could become a prescription for treating epidemics.

……

Su Mingzhe could never have imagined that Fang Zi, a noble family who was resisting the imperial court's decree, would be so cold-blooded and ruthless.

Just when Wang Yun was giving Su Mingzhe the prescription, winter plague had quietly appeared in various counties in the south of the Yangtze River.

When the epidemic began to spread in Wuxing, Su Mingzhe, who was working from home, couldn't help but sigh:
"These noble families are too ruthless. They actually used the epidemic to defy the imperial edict! As fate would have it, if someone can't stand it anymore, I'm afraid only one out of ten of these noble families will survive!"

"Husband, you can't say such things!"

When Xie Daoyun heard Su Mingzhe "cursing" the aristocratic family, she was so scared that she quickly used her hands to open the man's mouth.

The original saying in the Eastern Jin Dynasty was "The Wang and Ma share the world", but now it has become "The Wang and Xie share the world".

This does not mean that the Xie family's power is comparable to that of the Wang family, but that the power of the royal Sima family is smaller, and even the change of imperial power is controlled by the aristocratic families.

In such a rolling historical trend, anyone who dares to stand in the way will be crushed into pieces.

……

Winter passes and spring comes.

The imperial court originally intended to recruit 30,000 men from each county, but changed the number to 10,000.

The aristocratic families won again.

The price paid was that tens of thousands of poor people died of winter plague in the counties south of the Yangtze River.

However, these common people still regard the aristocratic families who set up free medical clinics and pharmacies as living Bodhisattvas and Buddhas.

Seeing how the aristocratic families were fooling the people, Su Mingzhe silently made a decision in his heart to push history forward.

……

It was February.

Just after finishing spring ploughing, Su Mingzhe received a letter from Liang Shanbo.

Among the several pages of lengthy letters, two of them talk about the winter epidemic in Hangzhou last year, as well as Gu Kaizhi's leaving the academy, and the current guest professor is Tao Yuanming.

The other pages contain Liang Shanbo’s own strategies for controlling floods. Please let Su Mingzhe comment on them.

"Now that Tao Yuanming has entered the academy, Zhu Yingtai should have discovered that she has fallen in love with Liang Shanbo, right?"

As Su Mingzhe spoke, he sighed and decided to go back to the academy.

……

One and a half years after awakening his innate wisdom, Su Mingzhe's cultivation had broken through to the Golden Immortal.

Under the eyes of the Golden Immortal, all evil tricks will be exposed.

He just wanted to see whether Zhu Yingtai and Liang Shanbo really fell in love at first sight or were cursed by Yue Lao.

(End of this chapter)