"Your Highness might as well go and talk to the three elders of Yangli. All three elders are elders, and there may be some different opinions..." Zhang Yue said to Liu Jin softly.

Liu Jin nodded after hearing this.

So everyone waited in the corridor in front of the hall for about two quarters of an hour.

The old man in the hall seemed to have seen something, so he stood up gently, walked to the door, looked at Zhang Yue and his party, and asked, "Where are all gentlemen coming from and where are they going?"

Liu Jin and Zhang Yue hurriedly stepped forward to see each other and said, "I dare not hide it from the elders. We come from Chang'an to collect folk songs between Xinfeng..."

"Oh..." The old man nodded slightly and smiled: "I have lived for more than 60 years. Since Yuanguang, I have never seen a young man who comes to collect folk songs with sincerity as sincerely as all the friends..."

Liu Jin listened, his face slightly slightly unhurried.

Since the Yuanguang period, the world's extravagance has become increasingly popular, especially the nobles in Chang'an City, who are competing to show off their wealth.

A dancer from Handan, with a slightly better appearance, can be sold for as much as 100 gold!

The slaves from the country of Wu are even more expensive and have no market.

At that time, the king's army defeated Miyue and took the place of Jiaozhi and Fanyu, and set it as a county.

Then, Chang'an nobles began to become popular with specialties such as lychees and longans from Nanyue.

Some merchants even opened up special express delivery channels to satisfy the desires of Chang'an nobles.

The children of the Marquis and the relatives of the foreigners are basically either fighting cocks or losing their own families.

A few years ago, his grandfather was even furious because of Longyan and mobilized the army to close the Chang'an city gate. He searched for more than ten days and attacked the extravagant style of nobles and ministers.

Many people were arrested and a lot of fines were fined.

But the result was only for the nobles in Chang'an to fade away for a few months, and then continued to do so.

As for the voluntary field trips of the Han nobles and ministers, they were completely reduced to public funds to travel and eat and drink.

Along the way, under the banner of field trips, they bully men and women, and there are not too many nobles in the area of ​​fish and meat.

"The elder Miao Zan..." Zhang Yue came out at the right time to relieve the embarrassment and said to the old man: "Dare you ask the elder's surname?"

"I am Xu Rong!" The old man shook his beard and said proudly: "The Emperor Meng refused to abandon him. He once appointed him as the commander of Jiuquan. He was granted the right to hold the rituals and was handed over between Hexi!"

Recalling the glorious years of the past, Xu Rong's eyebrows jumped: "Sima had drunk with me at the beginning!" He looked proud, as if he could have had a happy conversation with Huo Qubing in his life, and he had no regrets.

Zhang Yue also felt awe-inspiring and bowed: "It turns out that it was the old general in front of him!"

"I'm waiting for Xinfeng to find a livestock search. I want to ask the old general for some questions. I wonder if the old general is willing to appreciate his face?" Zhang Yue bowed again.

"Of course this is OK!" Xu Rong looked at the juniors in front of him and said happily.

As a military officer who retired, he has not exercised his muscles for too long.

Now, I can meet a few scholars from Chang'an, and these young people are quite fond of him, so he is naturally happy that someone is nagging with him.

So, he took Zhang Yue and his party into the backyard hall of the township school.

After the host and the guest sat down, a maid brought melons, fruits, snacks and wine.

"Everyone can try it..." The old general introduced it enthusiastically: "These are the courgettes and pomegranates grown by me at home... You are here at a good time, just when the courgettes and pomegranates are ripe..."

When Zhang Yue saw that it was the cucumbers and pomegranates from later generations.

Both crops were imported from China recently. The Han Dynasty was very strange at this time. Generally speaking, ordinary people probably had never seen them.

Zhang Yue and others were not polite, so they picked up a cucumber and started to chew. The crisp and sweet taste made Zhang Yue sigh and recalled the deliciousness of the cold cucumber.

After eating a cucumber, Zhang Yue stood up and bowed: "I have something to do, I want to ask the elders..."

"Say..." Xu Rong was in a very happy mood now, and said with a wave of his hand when he heard this.

"I came from Chang'an and saw Yangli Township School. Even in the midsummer, there were boys who entered it and had almost nothing left behind. The elders' teachings were the most good!" Zhang Yue bowed lightly and said, "The book says: To cultivate the righteous is the holy work! What the elders do can be called holy work..."

Listening to Zhang Yue's words, Xu Rong was fluttering all over and waved his hand and said, "I just did my job and did my duty..."

But he was so happy that he couldn't find the North. After retiring, he worked hard in this Yangli to build this village school, making the entire pavilion convinced him and obeyed him. It took him a lot of time to get this done.

Isn’t it just to show off one day in front of others and make people praise his reputation?

But after waiting for many years, Xu Rong had never heard of any literati who praised his reputation in Chang'an City.

This made the old general very unhappy.

Nowadays, it would be great if these noble men from Chang'an could help him promote it after they go back.

"But..." Zhang Yue turned his mind and asked, "I'm outside the Yangli, and I've seen many slaves working in the fields, but I don't see the farmer farming in my Pavilion... I don't know why?"

When Xu Rong heard this, he laughed and said, "This is easy. All the people in Yangli are over twenty-three years old, either officials or scholars!"

"My four sons are now all in Juyan guarding the border!" When talking about this, the old general's face was full of pride.

It is his greatest honor in his life to be able to cultivate all four sons and inherit his own legacy!

The family can produce military generals from generation to generation, which is the basis for evaluating the family of military generals.

"As for farming..." Xu Rong sighed softly: "How can a good man work in the fields? There are great achievements in this world waiting for a good man to seize it. Therefore, there are no farmers in the Yang area!"

"Even if it is an orphan or a lost son, the villagers will adopt it, treat it as their own and send it to my village school for training!"

"When I was a child, I learned to read and count. When I grew up, I learned the art of craftsmanship and the method of formation fighting. At the age of 23, I applied to the court... Only a few unsavvy people became officials..."

"And even though the people who come out of Yangli are far away, they will also care about the welfare of their fellow villagers. They will receive their salary every year, and they will earn eleven military salaries to me to support the orphans and widows and build the village school..."

Listening to Xu Rong's narrative, Liu Jin and others' expressions changed drastically.

If it were indeed what Xu Rong said, the Yangli would not be a village at all, but a military camp!

All men were labeled as military after they were born.

They don't study how to farm at all, and they don't bother to study it.

The only goal of everyone's life is to train, apply for recruitment, join the army, and eat imperial food.

Men from Yangli are indeed more likely to be selected into the elite troops of the Han army under the same conditions.

The children of the Tsuyu Society! After Emperor Gao’s personal army, there is no more likely to impress the officers of the army than this label.

So much so that even eliminated and defective products can be easily used as clerks here...

Zhang Yue was even more stunned when he heard this. The pattern in Yangli gave him an inexplicable sense of familiarity.

It seems like I have seen it somewhere before.

It is based on me, feeds on others, and the benefits of pretending to be the benefit of policies, and the benefits of private villages.

It seems like some places where he once knew it.

I just can't remember it, and I dare not remember it.

But no matter what, this model in Yangli seems to be successful now.

And it can be a virtuous cycle.

Since childhood, everyone has been instilled with the idea of ​​martial arts and everyone yearns for military merits.

After they joined the army and became middle- and senior officers of the Han army, they began to feed back.

Then it's like a snowball. As long as the policy remains unchanged, the country will remain martial and tough on the outside.

This pattern in Yangli cannot be attenuated.

This made Liu Jin feel a little uncomfortable.

The countryside he fantasized was once the carefree and harmonious pastoral country described in the book, "Chicken and dogs hear each other, and the people will never interact until they die."

At least it is a normal world where sunrise works and sunsets.

But Yangli's situation completely broke his inner fantasy.

"Why don't the elders tell the story of culture and education to make all boys follow the sages..." Liu Jin couldn't help but bow: "After all, there are many ominous things when swords and swords come and go, but in the world of culture and education, there is no such concern..."

"Haha..." Xu Rong seemed to be very disdainful of the civil servants. He smiled and said, "Just like those Confucian scholars? Those who are all day long ask about mulberry crops, but they don't know when to water a mulberry field, when to grow, and when to harvest?"

"Since I retired, Xinfeng County has changed four county magistrates, but none of them have ever been to the town pavilion. They all sit in the county government office, shaking their heads, and the clerks below believe whatever they say..."

"No one has taken care of the channels and roads in Xinfeng County for five years..."

"It's okay for Yuyu Society. We have the ability to repair it ourselves, but the other township pavilions are in trouble!"

"Young people, where do you think that my slaves from Yangli came from?" Xu Rong stood up and asked.

Not only Liu Jin was scolded by Xu Rong, but even Gong Yu, Wang Ji and others who were originally indignant, lowered their heads.

Before Confucianism came to power, she felt very good about herself.

From Dong Zhongshu to his disciples, they all felt that as long as the country can govern the world with its own principles, the world will definitely be governed and three generations will be expected.

However, after decades of Confucian rule, even the ruling Gongyang School fell into deep self-doubt.

Since Yuanguang, the world has encountered twenty or thirty major natural disasters.

The people are displaced, and hundreds of millions of people are trapped in water and fire.

But the ruling Confucian scholars could not come up with any good solutions, so they had to deceive themselves and say, "There is a disaster in heaven, so they should warn others and rulers, and they should cultivate their virtues and thank them."

Then, looking back, Confucian scholars found that in many places, the remnants of some Huang-Lao School of Medicine or the Legalists ruled, the impact of disasters was relatively weakened.
To be continued...