Chapter 203 I Don’t Want to Be a Loyal Servant!
The brother-in-law of the Marquis of Zhenbei is called Wang Jinyun, a descendant of the aristocratic Wang family. Although he is only from a side branch, he is still quite smart.
Wang Jinyun had no talent for the imperial examinations and failed even after taking them for many years. Later, he simply lived in his sister and brother-in-law's house and instigated his brother-in-law, Zhenbei Hou, who already had rebellious intentions, to rebel directly.
Because of his marriage relationship and some ruthless cleverness, Wang Jinyun became a trusted aide to the Marquis of Zhenbei and gave him advice.
For example, when the army of Marquis Zhenbei was short of food and fodder, Wang Jinyun gave him a very evil idea. He arranged an army to pretend to be robbers to rob those wealthy families who had no background or support, and to massacre the villages and landlords outside the city who had just harvested grain and directly robbed the grain.
Although this idea was immoral and unscrupulous, the Marquis of Zhenbei did not care about the lives of those people, and he did not take human lives seriously, so he thought that his brother-in-law's idea was very good, which solved his food crisis in one go.
However, they couldn't rob too much food. The entire north had just experienced a severe drought, and most places had no harvest. Only a few places near water sources were lucky enough to have some harvest, but it was not enough to feed his army of more than 100,000 for too long.
So Wang Jinyun came up with another idea. He targeted the chambers of commerce that came to the north from the south to do business. He let the Marquis of Zhenbei marry his daughter and use the opportunity to annex those wealthy chambers of commerce with justification. He would get all the money and food in the hands of those chambers of commerce. Would he still worry about not being able to support the army?
The Chamber of Commerce targeted by the Marquis of Zhenbei was not only Lin Shu's Huimin Chamber of Commerce, but other Chambers of Commerce also received letters from the Marquis of Zhenbei. The letters contained similar content, promising to marry his legitimate daughter in exchange for their service.
I just don't know where the Marquis of Zhenbei and his wife Wang, who only had one legitimate daughter, came from, and where were so many legitimate daughters who were promised off to win over power?
Wang Jinyun also helped to come up with this idea, because he felt that it was not worth marrying off a concubine's daughter. It would be better to adopt a few orphans and record them as legitimate daughters, and then marry them off. In this way, the Marquis of Zhenbei would be the legitimate son-in-law, and it would be more legitimate for the Marquis of Zhenbei to take over the son-in-law's family business.
The only ones who were probably dissatisfied were Lady Wang, the wife of the Marquis of Zhenbei, and her legitimate daughter. She was a noble legitimate daughter of the Marquis, but inexplicably she had many legitimate sisters from outside the Eighth Route Army, which lowered her daughter's status.
But Wang Jinyun is her own brother, and her family took the initiative to suggest that her husband do this. What basis did Wang have to object? And Wang's legitimate daughter was betrothed to a member of the Wang family. Even if she was dissatisfied, she could not speak out against it and offend the Wang family.
Therefore, Lady Wang, the wife of the Marquis of Zhenbei, could only hold her nose and accept that she had one legitimate daughter after another.
Wang Jinyun stopped Zhenbei Hou from tearing up the letter and asked, "Brother-in-law, what happened? What made you so angry?"
Zhenbei Hou took a deep breath, suppressed his anger, and handed the letter in his hand to Wang Jinyun.
After Wang Jinyun took it, he read it quickly and was quite angry.
After all, the eldest daughter that the Fang family wanted to marry to the Marquis of Zhenbei was his niece, the granddaughter of their Wang family, and the future daughter-in-law of their Wang family. How could Wang Jinyun not be angry when the Fang family, a mere merchant, dared to covet the eldest daughter of the Marquis of Zhenbei?
However, compared with the great cause of Marquis Zhenbei, this niece is not that important in Wang Jinyun's heart.
Wang Jinyun said to Zhenbei Hou: "Brother-in-law, the Fang family is the owner of Huimin Chamber of Commerce, which is the largest chamber of commerce in the south. They may not have the most money, but they definitely have the most food. We must take down Huimin Chamber of Commerce!"
Marquis Zhenbei also knew the importance of food, but he really couldn't bear this.
Wang Jinyun smiled and said, "Brother-in-law, this distance is so far, who knows whether the daughter you married is the real eldest daughter or a fake one? Just deal with the Fang family verbally. The Fang family has never seen the eldest daughter of the Zhenbei Marquis Mansion."
Just like those fake legitimate daughters who were promised in marriage before, who says that the legitimate eldest daughter must be the real one?
For the time being, let's use a maid to borrow the identity of the eldest daughter. After annexing the Huimin Chamber of Commerce and destroying the Fang family, all those who know about it will be silenced. Then the eldest daughter of the Zhenbei Marquis's Mansion will still be a clean young lady.
Perhaps if someone from the Zhenbei Marquis's side knew about this, it would damage the reputation of his niece, but it didn't matter, because his niece was going to marry back into the Wang family anyway, so it wouldn't affect his niece's marriage.
Moreover, if the Marquis of Zhenbei succeeds, his niece will become the honorable eldest princess. Who will mention such a small matter then?
Wang Jinyun's words moved Marquis Zhenbei. After hesitating for a while, he quickly decided to do as Wang Jinyun suggested.
Anyway, it only takes a loss of the eldest daughter's reputation to exchange for so much food. The Marquis of Zhenbei hesitated for a while just to prevent his image as a kind father from collapsing. If it really came to a point of interest, let alone exchanging a fake eldest daughter for food, he would be so ruthless even if he had to use the real eldest daughter to exchange food.
Those who achieve great things do not care about trivial matters, so how can they be so sentimental and soft-hearted?
The Marquis of Zhenbei handed the matter over to Wang Jinyun, and also handed his wife Wang over to Wang Jinyun to persuade.
Wang Jinyun went directly to the inner house of the Zhenbei Marquis Mansion to meet his sister Wang and told her about this matter.
Wang was furious: "Jinyun, Ru'er is your niece, you are destroying her reputation like this..."
Wang Jinyun frowned unhappily and said, "Sister, I am doing this for your and Ru'er's sake. My brother-in-law is extremely short of food right now. If I hadn't come up with this idea, he would have directly agreed to marry Ru'er off. Now we are just using someone else to replace Ru'er's identity. As long as we keep it a secret, when my brother-in-law has annexed the Huimin Chamber of Commerce in the future and the Fang family is no longer useful, we can kill the Fang family and no one will know that someone replaced Ru'er's identity and married into the Fang family. And Ru'er will marry back into the Wang family in the future. Why would the Wang family care about Ru'er's reputation flaw?"
Wang covered her face and cried silently, but she really couldn't resist her husband and her brother from her natal family. Wang Jinyun's words also left her speechless.
She was dissatisfied with her husband and brother's choice to sacrifice her daughter, but she could not protect her daughter. She had no choice but to comfort herself that sacrificing her daughter's reputation was better than sacrificing her daughter herself.
Wang could only remind Wang Jinyun to keep the secret confidential and not spread the news if possible.
If they really wanted to marry their daughter to the Fang family, what would happen if the Marquis of Zhenbei kept it a secret and just said that they were marrying an adopted daughter, while the Fang family announced that they were marrying the Marquis of Zhenbei's eldest daughter? The Fang family is in the south, and the distance between the north and the south is so far that the message only needs to be blocked by the Wang family, and it will not be transmitted to the north.
Wang wiped her tears and asked, "Then which one should we choose to marry into the Fang family?" There are many legitimate daughters in the Zhenbei Marquis's mansion who are registered under her name. They are all beautiful girls who were collected before, just to marry them off as the legitimate daughters of the Zhenbei Marquis in exchange for benefits one day.
Wang never thought that the girl who was chosen to marry into the Fang family in place of her daughter would be included in the list of people to be killed when the Marquis of Zhenbei exterminated the Fang family in the future.
However, as the wife of Marquis Zhenbei, she would not care about the lives of these girls who were raised as pawns. After all, the girl who replaced her daughter and married into the Fang family only lost her life, while her daughter lost a little reputation!
Wang Jinyun also didn't care about the life of the girl who might be chosen, and said casually: "Sister, just pick one, someone who is about the same age as Ru'er. Don't choose one that is too big in age, as it will easily arouse the suspicion of the Fang family."
Wang nodded and quickly made a decision.
Soon, Wang Jinyun wrote a reply letter to the Fang family in the name of Marquis Zhenbei.
He first angrily accused the Fang family of being greedy, and then said that if the Fang family was willing to pay 200,000 dan of grain as a betrothal gift, the Marquis of Zhenbei would be willing to marry his eldest daughter.
After all, the status of the eldest daughter is different from that of an ordinary 'legitimate daughter', and the betrothal gift is higher.
After receiving the reply, Mr. Fang went to see Lin Shu immediately with the sealed letter in his hand without even opening it.
At this time, Lin Shu was reporting his recent military training progress to Si Yuan. When he heard the servants report that Father Fang had arrived, Si Yuan waved his hand at Lin Shu and said, "Go and do your own thing. As for your military training progress, you just need to know it yourself. I will write a book on military tactics for you later. You can study it on your own. You don't have to report everything to your father."
Lin Shu said sincerely, "Dad, you taught me everything I learned. Now is the time for you to review my learning achievements."
Si Yuan was immune to Lin Shu's sweet words. After all, there were too many people fawning on him in the previous world, especially Song Ming, who spoke very nicely. Compared with Song Ming in the previous world, Lin Shu, the adopted son of this world, was still a little lacking in skills.
Si Yuan waved his hand again, signaling Lin Shu to leave.
Lin Shu respectfully bowed to Si Yuan, stepped out, and went to meet Fang's father in person.
He saw a letter in Fang's father's hand. Although he had not seen the contents of the envelope or the letter, he guessed that it was most likely a reply from Marquis Zhenbei.
Father Fang respectfully handed the envelope to Lin Shu with both hands and said, "Sir, this is the reply from the Marquis of Zhenbei."
Lin Shu took it and opened the envelope, then unfolded the letter and a smug smile appeared on his face: "Sure enough, the Marquis of Zhenbei is really short of food..." He even agreed to such an unreasonable request that the Marquis of Zhenbei marry his eldest daughter to him. Just 200,000 dan of grain made the Marquis of Zhenbei willing to marry his eldest daughter to him.
As far as he knew, although the eldest daughter of the Marquis of Zhenbei had not yet married, she had already been engaged to a descendant of the Wang family, a noble family in the north. Was he willing to break off the engagement with the Wang family and marry the eldest daughter?
Lin Shu felt that the Marquis of Zhenbei might not be willing to offend the Wang family.
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