At the foot of Lingyan Mountain, about twenty miles southwest of Changzhou County, Suzhou, there is a manor covering an area of ​​thousands of acres. The manor is surrounded by mountains and water, with beautiful scenery. The manor is surrounded by high walls, and the situation inside the manor cannot be seen from the outside.

However, climbing up the nearby mountains can still see the layout of the manor clearly. The entire manor is covered with green trees and gurgling water. The flat avenue runs straight from north to south through the manor, as if it is the central axis of the manor.

A group of palace-style buildings were built in the center of the manor, covering an area of ​​about 500 acres. The core is a small hill in the shape of a longevity peach. The surrounding lake surface is sparkling, and various buildings, waterfronts, curved bridges and corridors are particularly exquisite.

All around are covered with various rockery stones, which are larger and more rare than the Taihu stones in the palace. A moon-watching building in the center of the lake is made of all sandalwood. It is not only extremely expensive, but also ingenious. On the side of the lake, there are several magnificent halls, each of which can accommodate thousands of people.

If the master craftsmen in the palace saw this building, they would be shocked. This was clearly a reduced version of Yanfu Palace, which was completely made of a drawing, especially several core halls, which were exactly the same as the Ruizhu Palace and the Golden Light Hall in Yanfu Palace.

This is Zhu Xie's other house, called Yanshou Villa. In fact, Zhu Xie was built according to the drawings of Yanfu Palace, spending nearly 500,000 taels of silver, and selected hundreds of beauties in Suzhou and Hangzhou. Their dresses were exactly the same as those of the palace maids, and their luxury and wealth were even greater than that of the palace. More than ten generations of the Zhu family lived here, enjoying the luxury of the emperor.

Zhu Xie's father Zhu Chong was a rogue in Suzhou. He claimed to be a miracle doctor because of his knowledge of several herbal prescriptions. In addition, he was eloquent and good at leveraging. With the support of capital and backstage power, the Zhu family turned to business and sold low and expensive, and the family business gradually developed.

The real development of the Zhu family was to cling to Cai Jing. When Cai Jing was demoted to Jiangnan, the Zhu family seized the opportunity and tried their best to please him, which made Cai Jing, who was frustrated in the officialdom, feel warmer. When Cai Jing was re-activated, he brought the Zhu family and his son back to Beijing and recommended Zhu Xie to the young and fun emperor Zhao Ji.

Zhu Xie was good at welcoming Feng and gradually became Zhao Ji's favorite minister. It was under the instigation of Zhu Xie that in the first year of Zhenghe that Zhao Ji, who was greedy for enjoyment, decided to expand the Yanfu Palace in accordance with the Jiangnan style, and appointed Zhu Xie to return to his hometown of Suzhou to establish Yingfeng Bureau, responsible for purchasing Huashigang.

Zhu Xie, who held great power, fully demonstrated his greed and arrogance at this time. He used the excuse of collecting strange stones and trees to plunder property in Suzhou and nearby prefectures and counties. In just two years, all middle-class and above families in Suzhou went bankrupt and their property was covered. After plundering Suzhou, Zhu Xie also established a construction bureau in Hangzhou on the excuse of many strange stones and trees in Zhejiang and began to plunder Zhejiang prefectures and counties.

In just six years, tens of thousands of middle-class and wealthy families in Jiangsu and Zhejiang went bankrupt, but Zhu Xie only transported strange stones and flowers to Beijing, and he swallowed up all the countless gold, silver, jewelry and beautiful houses. The fertile land he occupied alone reached as many as 300,000 acres. Not only were the wealthy families destroyed, but the lower-class people also had a heavy tax. The endless taxes and endless labor, and the people in Jiangnan could not satisfy Zhu Xie's bone-killing and marrow-sucking.

It was Zhu Xie's crazy plunder that was finally seized by the ambitious Fang La and began to incite the people to carry out a large-scale rebellion uprising.

Zhu Xie's crazy money-making in Jiangnan for nearly seven years was not only filled with public grievances, but also complained about the officialdom in Jiangnan. The letter of impeachment and report was sent to the capital like snowflakes. In order to deal with the local officials, Zhu Xie also used huge amounts of money to deal with important officials of the court. In the past seven years, he was unscathed. Emperor Zhao Ji turned a blind eye to him. Until Zhu Xie was burned by the squandered wealth and began to imitate Yanfu Palace to build a villa, which violated Zhao Ji's rebellion.

In the moon-watching hall of Yanshou Villa, Zhu Xie paced back and forth in the room with his hands behind his back. Zhu Xie was about forty years old. Although he was middle-aged, it was still obvious that he was very handsome when he was young. He was not tall, but he was very strong. After his father Zhu Chong became a family, he sent him to learn martial arts for several years, making him more agile and flexible than ordinary people.

His only appearance is that his eyes are more prominent and he is not very conspicuous when he is young. However, when he is middle-aged, his eyes are particularly protruding and he will become congested when he is angry, making his appearance particularly cruel and cold.

Zhu Xie was extremely sad and angry these two days. His second son Zhu Tao was killed in Bianjing. The murderer had no clues. The news reached Suzhou, which made Zhu Xie furious. But when he calmed down, he felt an indescribable fear in his heart.

Of course, he also knew that the Censor Li Gang impeached the emperor to the emperor for his usurpation. These days he was busy dealing with some items he shouldn't have. The maids took off all the palace maid's clothes and burned them. He sank the precious things into boxes and sank them to the bottom of the lake, but he was a little embarrassed about how to deal with this Yanshou Villa.

Zhu Chong, the father of Zhu Xie next to him, said slowly: "You can demolish the villa and keep the valuable bricks, wood and stones. In the future, we will rebuild another garden, and no one dares to say that we have transgressed."

Zhu Xie's eldest son Zhu Lang also said: "Grandfather is right. The child studied it carefully yesterday. In fact, as long as the three palaces are demolished and the attics are demolished, it will be completely unrecognizable. Moreover, the corridors, roads, bridges and flowers can be preserved, but the losses are not big."

Zhu Jie sighed and said, "Yanshou Villa is a small problem. At worst, I will offer it to Zhao Ji, saying that it was a different palace built for him. I wanted to give him a surprise and deliberately concealed it. I know that Zhao Ji is very soft and greedy for enjoyment. As long as I dedicate the garden to him, there will be no problem. The key difficulty is the army!"

The problem that Zhu Xie was distressed but unable to deal with was the three thousand dead soldiers he raised, nominally called servants, but in fact he was his private army. This army had extremely realistic significance to his family. Zhu Xie knew that his sins were serious. Without this army's protection, he and his family would be torn to pieces by tens of millions of enemies. The imperial army could not protect him, so he could only rely on himself.

The problem lies here. If he disbands the army, who will protect them? If he does not disband the army, how should he explain to the emperor?

"Father, we can actually reduce the army, such as reducing the three thousand people to three hundred. This will not only protect our family members, but also explain to the emperor. After all, we have put in so much effort, and he should understand our difficulties."

Zhu Jie felt a little moved. This was a good idea. He looked at his father and wanted to hear his father's opinions.

Zhu Chong sneered, "It's okay if the little kid in his twenties is childish, but you, a person in his forties, are also childish, and it makes people unable to understand. Do you think Zhao Ji will really build a manor for you and raise thousands of dead soldiers to make things difficult for you? You think the problem is too simple. This is just an excuse, an excuse to kill you!"

Zhu Xie was stunned. He didn't understand why his father said that.

Zhu Chong continued: "You made all your money for him, which made the resentment and people angry. The second child died in the capital. This is a signal. He was going to kill the donkey. Kill you, which not only calmed the public's anger and bought people's hearts. He became a benevolent king again. Fang La had no excuse for rebellion. He made all the benefits. You can bear the bad reputation. How clever is this? Why can't you understand it?"

"What should I do?" Zhu Xie was a little anxious.

"It's a knife to shrink your head and a knife to stretch your head. You can do it yourself!"

After saying that, Zhu Chong turned around and left with a dragon-headed crutch. Zhu Xie sat down, and a cold air rose from his heart, making his mind confused.

At this moment, someone outside the door reported, "Master, an emergency pigeon letter has been delivered in the capital."

"Show me!"

After a moment, a family member came in and presented a pigeon letter to Zhu Xie. This was sent by his wife's brother-in-law Wang Wenyao in Beijing. His wife's brother-in-law was responsible for managing his industry in Beijing, including two restaurants, three brothels and more than a dozen shops. The dyed red Wang family's rouge shop was also one of them. At the same time, Wang Wenyao was also responsible for collecting various related information for him and sending it to him in time with pigeon letters.

Zhu Xie quickly opened the Ge letter. The Ge letter was the news that King Jia Zhao Kai was ordered to appease Jiangnan. Although it was not said that it was targeted, Zhu Xie was worried as if he was clearly a mirror. As expected, his father was right. Since Zhao Ji asked his son to appease Jiangnan, what should he take to appease Jiangnan? It must be Zhu Xie's head.

"A slashing your head and stretching your head is also a slash!"

Zhu Xie thought of his father's words and slowly gritted his teeth. Since Zhao Ji was unkind, don't blame him for being unrighteous. Then let's fight to the death!
Chapter completed!