"It's just a rooster. Why is Mr. Han making such a fuss?" Zheng Chenggong couldn't stand it anymore and questioned him in front of everyone.

"Who is this gentleman?" Han Yuan asked.

"Zheng Chenggong, deputy commander-in-chief of the Fujian Navy." Zheng Chenggong replied.

"Oh!" Han Yuan suddenly realized, "So those people who stole the rooster are your soldiers?"

"They are my soldiers!" Zheng Chenggong did not deny it.

"Lord Zheng wants to favor them?" Han Yuan asked with a smile.

"Haha," Zheng Chenggong also laughed, "No matter whose soldier he is, he will not be beheaded for stealing a chicken."

"It was robbery in broad daylight, not stealing," Han Yuan emphasized.

Here it comes again... Zheng Chenggong was both angry and helpless.

He had never served as a local official and didn't know much about the crime.

He stood up and said to Han Yuan: “It is indeed wrong for them to steal the rooster, but the beheading is completely nonsense.”

"How does Lord Zheng want to deal with this?" Han Yuan asked again.

"The big rooster will be converted into silver, ten times the compensation. In addition, I will punish the mastermind of this incident with a cane after returning to the camp, and the other accomplices will also be punished accordingly. What do you think, Mr. Han?"

"Sure!" Han Yuan immediately added after he finished speaking: "But I have one small request."

"Tell me about it." Zheng Chenggong suddenly felt that Han Yuan was a good person who could actually discuss solutions to problems with him.

"Lord Zheng's navy is about to go to Liaodong to fight. Lord Zheng and his men will go to Liaodong." Han Yuan pointed at the scholars outside and said, "Even if we die, we must get to the bottom of the matter of Duke Yansheng."

"Impossible, there is no room for negotiation on this matter." Zheng Chenggong immediately refused.

No one dared to take this group of scholars to Liaodong.

After all, no one knows what they will do after going to Liaodong.

It would be fine if he just summoned Jiannu to verify the matter of Duke Yansheng, but if he committed an act of treason, he would be the one who would be implicated in the end.

"Then there is no room for negotiation on what happened just now!" Han Yuan said immediately.

"You..." Zheng Chenggong's good impression of Han Yuan suddenly dropped to zero.

He had never met such an unreasonable and pedantic scholar.

Han Yuan said to himself, "I am a scholar. Now I see with my own eyes that Duke Yansheng has been humiliated. My heart is broken. If Lord Zheng doesn't help me, I can't help Lord Zheng either."

Yuan Shu coughed lightly, drawing everyone's attention to himself: "Mr. Han, I am the governor of Dengzhou. I have the final say on how to deal with the case. Why are you pointing fingers here?"

"Please forgive me, sir," Han Yuan apologized immediately, and said apologetically, "I have been busy urging the people to pay taxes recently, and I offended you for a moment. I will never dare to do it again next time."

Han Yuan's words seemed like an apology, but in fact they were a threat.

In the Ming Dynasty, an important indicator for evaluating officials was tax collection.

Those who collect taxes on time and in full are competent.

If taxes are not collected on time but in full, the assessment will be normal.

Taxes were neither collected on time nor in full.

The assessment was incompetent.

At that time, the collection of taxes mainly relied on the help of gentry.

Not only were they relied on to convey messages, but they were also relied on to make up the taxes whenever they were insufficient.

October to December every year is the time for collecting autumn grain.

Han Yuan used this to threaten Yuan Shu, trying to make him compromise.

Who is Yuan Shu?

A man whose bones are harder than stone.

He immediately slammed the table and stood up: "Han Yuan, how dare you threaten me with the tax issue?"

"I dare not!" Han Yuan lowered his head.

Yuan Shu was not fooled by his illusion and said sternly: "You still say you don't dare? First you roared in the court, and then threatened me with the tax issue to satisfy your own selfish desires. Come on, kick him out of the hall!"

"Yes." The officers on both sides immediately rushed forward and pushed Han Yuan out.

If it were someone else, Yuan Shu would have punished him with a caning long ago.

However, the Han family was too powerful in the local area. If he was really attacked, the subsequent chain reaction would not be something that he, the governor of Dengzhou, could control.

What's more, with war imminent, tax collection is at a critical moment.

Try to make big things small and small things nothing.

After driving Han Yuan away, Yuan Shu could no longer continue the trial.

He could only order his men to "put the prisoner in jail and retry him tomorrow."

The next day.

The news quickly spread throughout the city.

The people in the city were talking about it, and the morale of the soldiers in the army was unstable.

In the eyes of the common people, if the soldiers dared to steal from the gentry, they would also dare to rob the common people.

This kind of thing must be severely punished.

To the soldiers, it was just stealing a chicken.

If he is beheaded just because of this incident, it would be useless for him to be a soldier.

The result of the day was the same, Han Yuan kept harping on the matter.

Either behead the soldiers or take them to Liaodong.

The case can only be postponed.

In the next ten days.

Every day, Han Yuan and Sun Zhixie brought a large group of scholars to surround the Dengzhou government office, trying to make Yuan Shu compromise.

Yuan Shu could neither take action against them nor successfully close the case.

The case can only be postponed.

The longer you delay, the more people will know.

The more people knew about it and the more widely it spread, the more people came to the government office to watch.

Not only did the collection of taxes get delayed, but even daily official business was affected.

Just when Yuan Shu was feeling helpless, he received a piece of news: the new East Factory commander-in-chief Zhang Rong had arrived.

"Where is he?" Yuan Shu stood up and asked the messenger.

"He is among the crowd outside, but he asked me to tell you not to go out to meet him. He will find you when the time is right."

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