When Liu Bowen first heard that His Highness of the Liao King was going to summon the students to calculate the accounts of the central and local finances, he also looked surprised.

Although Liu Bowen knew that the mathematics textbooks compiled by His Highness the King of Liao were simply recreating the peak of mathematics in the Tang Dynasty.

But can these students who have only studied for more than a year really accomplish such an important task?

Liu Bowen didn't know the true abilities of these students. After all, Liu Bowen did not study the course of mathematics systematically like Zheng Shiyuan in the academy.

He is so old and has no special interests in mathematics.

So, when Zheng Shiyuan heard Liu Bowen say such doubts privately, Zheng Shiyuan just smiled and said to Liu Bowen:

"Zhengyi Bo, I dare not say anything else, but in mathematics, His Highness of the Liao King said that he was the first in the Ming Dynasty, so no one dared to claim that he was the second in the Ming Dynasty.

Even I just learned a little bit of fur from behind His Highness Liao.”

When Liu Bowen saw that Zheng Shiyuan was so confident, he was also interested and followed Zheng Shiyuan to the places where the students were calculating the data.

The Jinyiwei's speed was already very fast, and it had been investigating for a long time. They had already held the books of the various governors in their hands.

At this time, His Highness of the King of Liao wanted to come over these accounts, and he just moved them from the government office to Zhu Qi.

And those students were all in the Imperial College, and they were all very easy to gather. Zhu Qi specially arranged a big house to let these Imperial College students who studied mathematics perform financial calculations in this room.

Their calculation methods are also the latest mathematical knowledge learned in school. Not only that, Zhu Qi also gave them the latest abacus beads.

This abacus is not the type of abacus that was popular in the Song Dynasty to the early Ming Dynasty, but is a very modern abacus.

In fact, the real popularity of abacus also began to become popular around the end of Hongwu.

But the modern abacus has to wait until the middle and late Ming Dynasty, and Zhu Qi was a hundred years ahead of schedule to let the real abacus appear.

I saw that in the whole room, these students were separated in small compartments and could not see each other, just like Zhu Qi's later office.

But this advanced working environment still shocked Liu Bowen. Is this sure it is not the site of the annual imperial examination?

The students, one by one, lowered their heads, quickly tugged the abacus in their hands with their fingers, and at the same time, they held a pencil in one hand and wrote mathematical formulas of Arabic numerals on the paper.

One of the major advantages of Arabic numerals is their simplicity and convenience, and they are small in size and fast in writing. It is really suitable for statistics.

Liu Bowen walked to a student and saw that the student had placed the account book of a county under the governor's office next to him.

Liu Bowen looked at the data written next to the student again, and then picked up the account book that was officially launched.

It is not particularly different from the data counted by the official central government.

Liu Bowen looked at Zheng Shiyuan in surprise, with confidence in the formal principle, nodding and saying:

"His Highness of the King of Liao is really a god."

—————

Zhu Qi didn't know that Zheng Shiyuan could even swear to himself in matters like settlement.

He is now busy checking out the detained officials in the prison.

Of course, it is not to go to the prison to bring warmth to those officials, but mainly to see if anyone knows.

For example, some civil officials, military generals and other famous in history can save some at this time.

Don’t wait until your account book is calculated, these officials will be beaten to death in prison, and only half of their lives will be left after they come out.

You know, Zhu Qi walked around the prison and saw many famous characters in history.

Their achievements may not be as outstanding as Xu Da, or as legendary as Liu Bowen, but they also have a very good reputation and official reputation in the local area.

These officials have at least been verified historically, and they are all relatively good officials who can save them, so of course they can save more.

Zhu Qi is now the commander of the Jinyiwei, and the authority and ability of the Jinyiwei is much greater than that of the Ministry of Justice.

What's more, he was the candidate to investigate the empty seal case appointed by Zhu Yuanzhang, so it was naturally impossible for the officials in this prison to ignore Zhu Qi.

It was soon arranged for those officials to improve their living environment, and except for those officials, Zhu Qi, the other officials, took care of them even after taking care of them.

Anyway, this situation is impossible to kill in prison.

Of course, Zhu Yuanzhang knew all the things Zhu Qi did.

Zhu Yuanzhang hated these officials involved in the air seal case, so he summoned Zhu Qi as soon as possible and asked why he wanted to improve the environment of these officials in prison.

Zhu Qi also knew that Zhu Yuanzhang was angry at this time. If he still spoke to them, it would probably be more of a loss.

On the contrary, Zhu Yuanzhang was angry and directly ordered that all the officials be thrown back to the dead cell, which was not good.

So Zhu Qi explained with a righteous explanation.

This is not intentionally to improve their living environment, but to prepare for subsequent interrogation.

Now I am re-investing the errors in central and local finances, as well as data.

If something goes wrong with these data, then the officials locked in the prison will definitely be the first to be interrogated.

However, before these data came out, it was discovered that many officials died in prison because they could not bear the torture of the Jinyiwei.

These corrupt officials died in prison, and the matter was small, but the country's property has been embezzled, and they are still unknown.

It is useless to just search the house. They are not stupid. If they want to transfer the money safely, they may be given to others for safekeeping or hidden in some place. This is a possible thing.

Zhu Yuanzhang made the same sense when he heard this. Although the Jinyiwei had a very good job in spies, there was no such thing as surveillance and monitoring in this era.

Who knows if so many officials, especially local officials, do whatever they do and bury the money where they are.

If you die directly in prison because of torture, the money will really not be returned.

Zhu Qi was relieved when he saw that he had successfully stabilized his father.

I am worthy of His Royal Highness's instructions.

Zhu Qi didn't know that his behavior had quietly accumulated reputation among all officials.

Which of the officials who were locked in prison was not interpersonal relationships in the officialdom?

Many people are under the same teacher and are classmates and colleagues.

Even when you have family friends, you will see your good friends, classmates, and good colleagues being imprisoned, and of course those who have not yet entered are also frightened and uneasy.

Zhu Qi is famously selfless. His cousin Zhu Huan was beheaded and made public by His Highness the King of Liao.

They originally thought that their colleagues who were detained in prison would definitely be in trouble.

This is not the gentle Prince of the Prince. Maybe His Highness of the Liao King will kill them all if he is unhappy.

However, unexpectedly, His Highness the King of Liao took the initiative to improve their living environment.

Regardless of the final result, at least His Highness the King of Liao would be very kind and righteous in doing so.

Many officials actually thank His Highness the King of Liao.

And on Zhu Qi's side, with local financial data, they were calculated one by one.

The real bad consequences of the empty seal case were revealed to Zhu Qi.

In addition to Yunnan, there are a total of twelve administrative departments plus the Gyeonggi region and thirteen administrative regions.

There are only two administrative regions that can be controlled within 10% error, while the errors of all other administrative regions are above 10%.

What does this mean? This means that there is a considerable phenomenon of corruption in the other administrative regions.

It may not be the chief at the level of the governor to embezzle, but the county magistrates or prefects below.

But are these governors no responsibility?

That must be a responsibility!

Everyone thought not to be too troublesome, and they were too lazy to even settle accounts, so they directly sent out empty documents and then went to the Ministry of Revenue to reconcile the accounts.

Directly copy the finance calculated by the central government.

Let alone these officials, if I were a local official and I would go to reconcile the accounts with these blank documents, I wouldn’t help but embezzle them!

For example, a small county town originally collected taxes of 100,000 taels of silver.

The central government’s Ministry of Revenue account books may only have a tax of 80,000 taels.

I made 180,000 taels of tax on this blank document, and the remaining 20,000 taels of silver, isn’t it just a headless silver.

The kind that no one knows when stuffed into his pocket.

I guess these corrupt officials never dreamed that Zhu Qi would take their account books over and then calculate them again. After all, if these officials want to think about the complexity of these account books, they won’t talk about them for now.

With so many county towns across the country, even if there is a problem, it is impossible to find the one on your head.

Every corrupt official has such a lucky mentality in his heart. This is the case in the Ming Dynasty and in modern times. Everyone thinks in his heart that it is impossible to find out their own.

But Zhu Qi is such a serious person. Since he has received the order and wants to investigate the empty seal case, he must investigate it carefully.

Anyway, those students stay in the Imperial College and are learning the Four Books and Five Classics, so why would they be better off practicing mathematics?

It just so happened that there were two or three thousand students who had studied mathematics in the Imperial College. They dragged it out to calculate the tax account books of each administrative region, and they also practiced it in advance.

They will be the main force of the tax bureau in the future.

Zhu Qi originally thought that most of the officials in this golden corridor were innocent. Good guy, if you continue to look at it like this, these innocent officials may not be as much as they thought.

At least after the bill is calculated, local officials alone will be in trouble.
To be continued...