"Surely not?"
Seeing how Fang Yunfei was so against being an official, Zhu Yuanzhang felt a headache coming on.
"Why not?"
"Old Zhu, you said that I shouldn't be a happy commoner, but rather a lowly official. Do you think I'm stupid?"
"Did you elect me to be an official on purpose to harm me?”
Fang Yunfei said angrily.
Wu Lin and the others nodded their heads in agreement.
"Forget it! This old man won't argue with you here.”
"My navy still has many things to do. Farewell!”
Realizing that he couldn't outtalk Fang Yunfei, Zhu Yuanzhang decisively found an excuse to slip away.
He finally reacted.
If he still listened to Fang brat's heresy to confuse the masses, not only would his subjects rebel, but even he would be tempted!
Can't you hide if you can't afford to offend me?
He slipped away!
He slipped away!
Once Zhu Yuanzhang left, the Crown Prince, Wu Lin, Li Shan Chang, and the others naturally found an excuse to leave as well.
Only Fang Yunfei was left shouting at Zhu Yuanzhang's back in the huge courtyard.
Remind him to admit defeat and ask His Majesty to retract his order and remove him from his official position!
……
On the way back to the palace, Zhu Yuanzhang became angrier and angrier.
He clearly wanted to do a good deed, but he didn't expect that it would actually become a huge disaster in Fang brat's mouth.
Could it be that the officials of my Great Ming Dynasty are so unlikable?
"Wu Lin, isn't that kid exaggerating?”
Zhu Yuanzhang suddenly stopped and asked Wu Lin beside him.
"Your Majesty, although what little friend Fang said is a little exaggerated, it does make some sense.”
"This lowly official has heard about the things he said in recent years.”
"Let's not talk about anything else.”
"If it wasn't for the fact that this lowly official usually grows a few acres of rice at home, I'm afraid it would be difficult to feed my entire family with the salary Your Majesty gives me.”
Wu Lin said very seriously.
He was an official in a different place and took office alone. There were many things and few people.
He had hit the nail on the head on all the things Fang Yunfei had said.
Fortunately, Wu Lin's family still had some money left over and did not need to be corrupt, so she was safely promoted to the position of minister.
However, she had been getting old these few years and her health was not good. Wu Lin had no choice but to bring her family to take care of her.
But his entire family had moved from Huguang to the capital, and his salary was not enough.
Helplessly, they could only open up the empty space in the residence into grain fields to subsidize the family.
"Alright, alright!"
"I understand."
Zhu Yuanzhang waved his hand helplessly.
Before Wu Lin entered the cabinet, she was a second-rank official of the imperial court. Her salary was already quite high!
Even he had to rely on farming to subsidize his family, so the officials below must be even worse off!
Returning to the palace, Zhu Yuanzhang did not rest. Instead, he asked the chamberlain to go to the Ministry of Civil Affairs to retrieve the files of all officials in the world and read them carefully.
If he didn't check, he wouldn't have known. Once he checked, he was shocked.
The officials recorded in the files were more or less guilty.
Could it be that the salary I give out is really too little, and I need to greatly increase the salary of these officials?
However, although the Ming Dynasty had been established for fifteen years, the Tartars had not been eliminated. They needed to maintain a large army at the northern border.
In the southeast coastal area, Zhang Shicheng's remaining troops had already joined forces with the Japanese pirates. They would run over from time to time and needed the Ming Navy to clear them up.
The southwest chieftain was untamed. Not only did he have to reward and rope him in, but he also had to set up guards to guard against him.
In addition to the construction of irrigation works and relief of disaster victims, there were many places where Ming needed money, and the national treasury was almost empty.
Where would they get the money to raise the salaries of these officials?
If he had the money, he would have built the walls of Jinling first.
Did he have to wait until today?
Sigh!
Even the emperor's family did not have any surplus food!
"Chongba, why are you so down today?”
At this moment, Empress Ma walked in and asked.
Every time Zhu Yuanzhang returned to the palace from Fang Yunfei's place, he would be beaming with joy.
It was the first time he had such a sad face.
"Sigh! It's all because of lack of money."
Zhu Yuanzhang sighed and told Lady Ma about Fang Yunfei's complaints and the current state of the national treasury.
"So you don't have money."
After listening to Zhu Yuanzhang's complaints, Lady Ma was enlightened.
Lady Ma was also born in troubled times and knew the importance of money.
A single penny could stump a hero, let alone a country without money.
"Chongba, I heard that two days ago, a merchant named Shen Wansan was willing to help the imperial court build the city wall.”
"I heard that you're not too happy about it. In my opinion, we might as well ask him to pay for it. Wouldn't the imperial court save a large sum of money this way?”
Empress Ma said kindly.
Jinling was an important city in Jiangnan, the capital of the Six Dynasties, and also the capital.
However, after the chaos at the end of the Yuan Dynasty, the originally majestic walls of Jinling were already in ruins.
Zhu Yuanzhang had long wanted to repair the city walls of Jinling, but he had no money.
Shen Wansan, the so-called " richest man in the world ", took the initiative to write a letter to the court, expressing his willingness to pay for the repair of half of the Jinling city wall.
A businessman actually wanted to pay to help the imperial court build a wall.
This matter had also spread like wildfire back then.
Even Empress Ma, who did not care about the government, had heard of it.
Now that he heard Zhu Yuanzhang say that the imperial court was short of money, he naturally remembered.
"No, no, no!"
"Asking a merchant to pay to repair the wall, where would my Great Ming's face be if word got out?”
"No! No way!"
Zhu Yuanzhang flatly rejected the idea of borrowing money from Shen Wansan to repair the wall.
Emperor Hongwu was proficient in both literature and martial arts, but his biggest flaw was that he cared too much about his face.
Now, he actually wanted the imperial court to borrow money from a merchant to repair the city wall. That was worse than killing him.
"Then what should we do? The construction of the city wall was also a huge expense.”
Empress Ma said with a troubled expression.
"Exactly!"
Hearing Empress Ma's words, Zhu Yuanzhang immediately collapsed on the chair like a deflated ball.
"Chongba, I think Fang Yunfei is full of tricks. If not, you can ask him and see if he has any solutions.”
Seeing Zhu Yuanzhang's dispirited face, Lady Ma couldn't help but come up with an idea.
"Will it work? Today, I made him an official, but I made him complain. Can he still help us?"
Zhu Yuanzhang said with some difficulty.
"It's okay. I think that kid Fang has a sharp tongue but a soft heart. Complaining was complaining, but if you begged him, he would definitely help. Besides, even if he didn't help, there was no harm in trying.”
Empress Ma subconsciously used the word "beg".
However, the two of them did not care, as if it was only natural.
"Alright! Let's try!"
Zhu Yuanzhang slapped his thigh.
"For Big Ming, we'll go all out!”
…………………………………………………………………
Today's second update!
Dear readers, I'm sorry, it's even later!
This book is provided by FunNovel Novel Book | Fan Fiction Novel [Beautiful Free Novel Book]