Chapter 162: Strange
"What are you looking at?" Song Mian asked with a cold face.
Qian Zhubu introduced, "Miss Zhu, this is Mr. Song, the doctor from the Ministry of Water Resources, who came from the Ministry of Works."
Zhu Lan stood up and saluted.
"Sir Song, I am a student from Longchang Academy in Jiangzhou. I have collected some materials and spontaneously came to Long'an County to assist in disaster relief.
Student Zhu Lan wanted to learn more about Long'an County, so he asked Qian Zhubu to look up the county annals of Long'an County.
After saying that, Zhu Lan closed the book in his hand and handed it to Song Mian.
Song Mian took the book, looked at Zhu Lan for a second longer, then lowered his head and saw that the page was indeed written with "Long'an County Chronicles".
"You've been reading this book?"
"Yes, the students came here for the county annals." Zhu Lan answered calmly.
Qian Zhubu also echoed.
Seeing that the female student in front of him looked normal, and that Chief Clerk Qian had indeed said before that what she wanted to read was the county annals, Song Mian's expression eased a little.
I flipped through a few more pages and felt that there seemed to be nothing unusual about this county annals.
"Master Qian, these books are the remains of Magistrate Li, and no one is allowed to move them without permission. You can pack up all the books and send them to my room."
Qian Zhubu nodded repeatedly in agreement.
…
Zhu Lan walked towards his residence, guessing that Zhu Qingyan, Murong Jing and Qiao Youyou were all there, and A Jiang was also in the room.
There were two beds in the room. Zhu Qingyan and Murong Jing slept in a small bed, while Zhu Lan, Qiao Youyou and A Jiang lay on a slightly larger bed.
A Jiang was young and tired after a long day, so he fell into a deep sleep.
Although Zhu Qingyan is no longer at loggerheads with Zhu Lan, they are not that close to each other either. He is even a little restrained in front of Zhu Lan. Instead, he is not as relaxed as when he is with Murong Jing.
When Murong Jing was distributing supplies today, she accidentally tore her sleeve, and was holding the needle and thread to try to sew it herself.
The stitches were crooked and looked like worms crawling around, which made Zhu Qingyan frown and sigh. In the end, Murong Jing handed the needle and thread to her with a smile.
Su's embroidery skills are quite impressive, and Zhu Qingyan has been influenced by her so his skills are naturally not bad either.
She looked at the sleeves that had been sewn into a disgraceful state by Murong Jing, thought for a moment, and then began to sew. She actually sewed a little thrush on Murong Jing's stitches, completely hiding the clumsy stitches.
Murong Jing was standing aside, holding her chin with her hands, looking at the scene in amazement.
"Little Master, you know so much!"
Zhu Qingyan raised his eyebrows slightly with pride.
Murong Jing touched the thrush in amazement, then turned to ask Zhu Qingyan if he could embroider a tiger.
Zhu Qingyan said that she could embroider, but it might be a bit difficult.
"If there's a chance later, please embroider a big tiger on my battle robe. I want to be the most handsome boy in the Northern Frontier Camp!"
"Would you like an apple?"
Qiao Youyou suddenly appeared beside their bed, holding two washed apples in one hand and munching on the apple in the other hand.
Although she was not familiar with Zhu Qingyan and Murong Jing, Sheniu was fearless.
Zhu Lan hadn't come back yet, and A Jiang had fallen asleep again. There was really no one to talk to her, and she was bored to death. Since the relationship between Zhu Qingyan and Zhu Lan eased, she didn't dislike Zhu Qingyan as much as before.
"Thank you." Murong Jing took the apple readily and handed one to Zhu Qingyan.
Zhu Qingyan found some dried fruits made by Su from his bag and gave them to Qiao Youyou.
Friendship between girls can be very simple. After exchanging some fruit snacks, they can sit on the same bed and chat.
The topic turned to things happening in the academy.
"That kid Chen Ziming was thinking about my Lanlan at that time. Bah, why don't you take a piss and look in the mirror!"
"That's right, little master, how could you be attracted to that kind of stuff?"
When Zhu Qingyan was reminded of his dark history, he lowered his eyes silently and took a bite of the apple, "I'm blind."
"If you ask me, this kind of man should be beaten up so badly that he has no descendants!" Qiao Youyou said, waving her little fist.
Murong Jing slapped her thigh, "You and I are thinking the same thing!"
The two of them had similar personalities and felt that they had met each other too late, so much so that they almost wanted to become sworn brothers on the spot.
As they were talking, Zhu Lan suddenly pushed the door open and walked in. He was not surprised to see Qiao Youyou, Zhu Qingyan and Murong Jing sitting on a bed, chatting animatedly.
She nodded slightly to Zhu Qingyan and Murong Jing, then looked at Qiao Youyou.
"Youyou, come here for a moment. I have a few math questions to ask you."
Qiao Youyou rolled over and got out of bed, throwing away the apple core. "It's almost time to go to bed, what questions are you working on... Where are the questions?"
Zhu Qingyan and Murong Jing didn't know much about mathematics, and they had no interest in listening, so they just started chatting among themselves.
Zhu Lan pulled Qiao Youyou back to the big bed, spread out a piece of rice paper, glanced sideways at Zhu Qingyan, and made sure that the distance was safe enough. He wrote on the top of the rice paper with a pencil -
This matter is confidential, please speak in a low voice.
When Qiao Youyou saw the words, her playful expression immediately subsided a bit and she nodded to Zhu Lan.
Just now in Li Yishen's study, before Zhu Lan had time to look at a few more pages of accounts, he heard footsteps outside, and hurriedly stuffed the "Yi Shen Poetry Collection" that contained the accounts at the bottom of a pile of books.
She only remembered the contents of the first two pages, and now she began to rewrite them on paper word for word based on her memory.
For safety reasons, she wrote all amounts in Arabic numerals.
"This seems to be the tax account book of Long'an County over the past few years, as well as the details of where the funds allocated by the court went..."
Qiao Youyou looked at what Zhu Lan had written, then smiled helplessly: "Lanlan, I am a student of financial analysis, how can you use me as an accountant!"
"Master Qiao, you can draw inferences from one instance to another, right? Help me take a look."
As soon as Zhu Lan finished speaking, Qiao Youyou frowned and pointed at a line of numbers on the paper.
"Wait, Lanlan, did you write it wrong? The number of decimal places is wrong."
Zhu Lan looked at the place she pointed to. It seemed to be the small dam breach accident that occurred in Long'an County last year. The purpose of the court's appropriation included purchasing sand and stones for rebuilding the dam.
She thought carefully about what she had just read and shook her head, "No, I remember it correctly, that's the number."
"That's strange, this doesn't match the total amount of funding." Qiao Youyou murmured, his eyes falling on another number.
"And here, this is the tax collected from the people of Long'an County last year. How could there be more than 3,000 taels?"
"What do you mean?" Zhu Lan asked, tilting his head.
"According to the tax laws of this era, transactions between ordinary people are taxed at 1% of the tax rate. Long'an is a small county town, and its economy is not well developed.
For a county of this size, according to the tax rate of 1 in 30, it would normally be very high to receive 1,000 taels. But here it says 3,417 taels, which is simply impossible." Qiao Youyou's tone was firm.
“Could this be a false account?”
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