In the study.

Seeing that Zhao Shouzheng did not accept his resignation, County Magistrate Shi was about to cry.

"Your Excellency, has the court decided to investigate me? So I am not even allowed to resign? Are the Imperial Guards already on the way?"

He scared himself so much that tears finally flowed down his cheeks.

"Don't talk nonsense." Zhao Shouzheng looked at his pitiful appearance and couldn't help but laugh: "If the court really wanted to punish you, I would have asked you to go home long ago. Why are you still talking nonsense with you?"

"Ah?" Shi Wending asked cleverly, "Is there still room for change?"

"You're lucky." Zhao Shouzheng smiled and said, "Someone in the province wanted to use you as a scapegoat. It happened that Lin Zhongcheng came to the government to inspect and told me that Yin Butang would go to suppress Lan Yiqing and Lai Yuanjue's troops at the end of the year. I took the opportunity to advise that the overall situation should be given priority. If you start now, you can stabilize the two hundred miles of mountainous area in Jiexi and maybe avoid chaos. If you change the generals at the last minute, the new county magistrate will not be able to take office until several months later, and everything will be delayed. Right?"

"Hmm..." Shi Wendi nodded heavily.

"Lin Zhongcheng thinks what I said makes sense. Finally, I agree to give you another year. During this year, you must do your best to appease the villagers in Jiexi and make more than half of the villages withdraw from the village to protect themselves." Zhao Shouzheng also poured him a cup of tea and said, "How is it, do you have confidence?"

"Your Excellency is truly my adopted parent." Shi Wending shed tears of emotion and said in a sobbing voice, "When I return, I will go deep into the mountains and talk to each village. I won't come back until the talks are halfway through!"

"Not bad, not bad, your attitude is commendable." Mr. Zhao smiled and handed him the "Jieyang County Performance Book" and said, "But you also have to pay attention to the method."

Shi Wending quickly took it with both hands, flipped it open, and saw that the main items of this year's assessment were two items. Jiexi was the stability rate of the people, and Jiedong was the Fengjiang Water Conservancy Project.

"Feng River?" Shi Wending was naturally familiar with the rivers in his territory. He hesitated for a moment and said, "Does the Lord want to rebuild Sanli Creek?"

Sanli Creek is a water conservancy project built during the Yuanyou period of the Song Dynasty. It connects the Han River and the Rong River. It starts from the city, goes down through Jieyang, and flows into the sea at the border of Chaoyang. It is named after the three counties that benefit from it. However, it has been blocked for many years. It was dredged once in the fifth year of Hongzhi, but it was blocked again a few years later. Now there is only a small ditch left, which can only discharge floodwaters during the rainy season. It has no benefits for irrigation and transportation.

People have forgotten the name "Sanli Creek", which has benefited the people of the three counties for hundreds of years, and only call the small river connecting Hanjiang River and Lianjiang River Fengjiang River.

"That's right." Zhao Shouzheng nodded and said, "This time we need to summarize the lessons learned during the Hongzhi period and start all over again. We will straighten the river channel, drain the water and flush the sand, and ensure that we don't need to dredge again for at least 20 years!"

"This is a huge project..." Shi Wending couldn't help but nodded and said, "There are only 50,000 to 60,000 people in this county, and half of them are still in the Jiexi mountainous area and refuse to serve..."

"They live in the mountains and cannot enjoy the benefits of water conservancy. Of course, they don't want to work for nothing and have to bring their own food." Zhao Shouzheng said with a smile: "Don't worry, this time we won't use the common people for nothing. We will provide them with food and accommodation, and pay them monthly. Do you think they are willing to work?"

"Of course I am willing. Those mountain folks are so poor that they will definitely rush to work even if they are not paid, as long as they can have a full meal." Shi Wending's eyes lit up and said, "Who would follow Lan Yiqing, Lai Yuanjue and the others to make trouble in that case?"

After saying that, he sighed again and said dejectedly: "But the county is too poor, we can't even afford to provide food."

"The county doesn't have to pay." Zhao Shouzheng waved his hand and brought out what he had just said to Huang Yilong, explaining the model of the development company in the Jiangnan area. After he finished, he smiled and said, "Do you think it's a good idea?"

"Hahaha!" Shi Wending was a Juren official, and he didn't have as many concerns as Huang Yilong, who was a Jinshi. Besides, it was time to try his luck, so he didn't care if the wine was poisonous or not, as long as it could quench his thirst.

The matter was settled.

~~

The next person was Puning County Magistrate Dai Jiuchou. The top priority Zhao Shouzheng gave him was to connect the Rongjiang South River with the Longjiang River.

Then came Cai Nan, the magistrate of Chenghai, whose top priority was the widening project of the lower reaches of the Hanjiang River.

As for Chengxiang County Magistrate Hong Fuyan, Dapu County Magistrate Zeng Guanghan, and Pingyuan County Magistrate Teng Biaozhang, these three county magistrates from old revolutionary areas, in addition to the important task of maintaining stability, were also given the task of comprehensive management of Meijiang River, the upper reaches of the Hanjiang River.

Even Huilai County Magistrate Ye Chaozhen was given the important task of dredging the Longjiang River and comprehensively regulating the Shenquangang River Basin.

Although the real work will be undertaken by the future Chaozhou Development Corporation, it will be impossible without the full cooperation of the county magistrates.

"In the coming year, all counties must give top priority to the construction of water conservancy projects. As long as all counties can complete the projects successfully, then our ten prefectures in Chaozhou will no longer be a loose group, but an interconnected whole!" Master Zhao stood in front of the Chaozhou water conservancy project map made by Pan Jixun, and repeatedly expressed his grand ambitions to his county magistrates.

On the half-wall-sized blueprint, the most eye-catching are the Hanjiang River, its upstream main stream Meijiang River, Lianjiang River, Rongjiang River, Rongjiang South River, and Huanggang River, these six broad rivers. The county towns of Chaozhou's ten counties are all located on the large and small plains along these six rivers. It is these six rivers that nourish the people of Chaozhou's ten counties.

However, most of these six rivers are not connected to each other, making it impossible for the counties to be closely connected like in the Jiangnan area where there is a dense network of rivers, with all prefectures, counties, towns and villages.

Pan Jixun, a natural river engineer, realized the crux of Chaozhou in his first year of junior high school and tailored this interconnected water conservancy plan for them. Through a series of projects to widen natural rivers and dig artificial rivers, he vowed to connect these six rivers together!

Guangdong's rivers have a very rich flow of water. Once this series of projects is completed, it will ensure that 400-ton sand ships can travel freely between the ten counties. It would be a shame not to make use of this unique advantage!

It was precisely because of this grand plan that Lin Run directly announced that he would serve as the long-term prefect of Chaozhou, instead of returning to the provincial capital to inform the governor's office first.

There is no other reason. Whoever delays this matter will be the sinner of Chaozhou and Guangdong!

Looking at the Ming Dynasty, no one can do this except Zhao Shouzheng!

In this situation, if you still look ahead and behind, you will be looked down upon by those officials in the provincial capital!

~~

The last person to come in was Qin Shunhan, the magistrate of Haiyang.

At this time, Master Zhao had done it nine times in a row and collapsed on the bed exhausted. When he saw him come in, he couldn't even lift his eyelids.

"Oh, brother, you are really working too hard. Let them go back two days later so that they can talk slowly." County Magistrate Qin felt so distressed that he quickly took out a piece of old ginseng from the small silver box in his sleeve and put it in his mouth.

"I did it on purpose, so that they would have a sense of urgency. If I relax, they won't take it seriously anymore." Master Zhao leaned on the big pillow and said hoarsely, "So many things have been decided recently. I have to implement them one by one, so that I can feel at ease."

"No, I'll do it another day. Anyway, you know me. I'm already tight enough, right?" Qin Shunhan said with a smile.

"Well, you feel differently from them, but you still have to be more strict." Zhao Shouzheng smiled and said, "In addition to their daily affairs, they only have one or two big jobs. It's different here. The prefectural capital is the leader of all the counties in the prefecture. You have to do much more big jobs than them, and you have to do them better than them."

"Don't worry, brother. Since I'm staying in the city, I'm going to have a great time with you." Qin Shunhan patted his chest loudly.

"I'm sorry for delaying you." Zhao Shouzheng patted his hand and said apologetically, "Otherwise, you should be enjoying your life in the provincial capital right now."

"Everything is for my brother." Qin Shunhan's body softened, and he quickly said with a red face: "I will stay in Chaozhou as long as you stay."

In fact, he should have left the post. The imperial court had issued an edict before, ordering him to be transferred to the post of Experience Officer of the Provincial Administration of Guangdong. The post of Experience Officer of the Provincial Administration was of the sixth rank, which was considered a promotion of half a grade, but it was useless.

Because the truly promising path is to be transferred to the capital to serve as a supervisory censor after serving as a county magistrate for one term. The next best is to be a supervisor in one of the six ministries. Although the censor and the supervisor are both of the seventh rank, sharpening the knife does not delay the chopping of wood, and within a few years, he can be promoted to prefectural magistrate.

There is no future for people like him who just hang around in the local area, so just hang in there.

But the disappearance of Magistrate Li changed everything. In order to maintain the situation in the city, the province issued an urgent document, asking County Magistrate Qin to postpone handing over the seal and remain in office until the situation calmed down.

In order to avoid causing trouble for him, the newly appointed county magistrate, former Kunshan Dianshi Xiong Xiasheng, was temporarily loaned to the Anchasi Yamen by the provincial government with a transfer order. There were at least a dozen alternate county magistrates in the province. Xiong Xiasheng was a county magistrate who came from a minor official background. What was the point of sacrificing for the overall situation?

Originally, this was only temporary, but the development of the situation made Qin Shunhan gradually unwilling to leave. Especially after Zhao Shouzheng became the acting prefect and made those grand plans, he could not be driven away.

In a person's lifetime, there may be only a few opportunities to achieve success. If you don't seize them and make your name known in history, you would be letting God down!

So he firmly expressed to the Lord Zhongcheng that he was willing to stay and assist Zhao Fuzun and continue to contribute to the construction of Chaozhou.

Lin Run was very touched. Besides, Zhao Shouzheng had just arrived and really needed a magistrate who knew him well to assist him, so he agreed to let him serve as the magistrate of Haiyang concurrently with his experience as a provincial governor.

As for poor Xiong Dianshi, Lin Run asked him to go to the governor's office as a link with Zhao Hao. But having some experience in the province would be of great benefit to Xiong Dianshi's future, but he felt disappointed that he could not serve Zhao Erye in the early stage of his new business...

~~

By the time the two men finished talking about the planning of the Chaozhou Porcelain Park in Bijia Mountain and County Magistrate Qin said goodbye and left, it was already late at night.

Zhao Shouzheng sent him to the gate of Chuihua, then turned back and took a shower in the yard. Then, accompanied by the four Vajras and the last nine-beat cloud board of the day, he fell asleep exhausted.

At this time, the guards also locked the main and second gates of the Tongzhi Yamen.

In the courtyard west of the government office, the jailer ordered the guards to lock and seal the prison doors.

In the front yard, Uncle Yu said in a long voice: "The country is peaceful and the people are safe. There is no trouble in the world. Close the door!"

Then he looked at the doormen calmly as they closed the doors and bolted them one by one.

The entire Chaozhou government office was completely cut off from the outside world. Only the regular sound of the night watch drums on the street could be heard, making this midsummer night even quieter.

p.s. Just two updates.