Flourishing of the Ming Dynasty Novel - Chapter 29

Chapter 29 Sad County Magistrate Lu
“Ah, looks like I was wrong. County Magistrate Lu’s life is far from as easy as I thought.” After watching the little girl Cuimei leave, Lu Zhen sighed and silently made a judgment in his heart.

This was already seven days after he entered the Guangling County Government as county magistrate Lu Zhen. He had already seen some clues from the reactions and words of the people around him, as well as the things he could come into contact with.

Lu Zhen had originally thought that County Magistrate Lu’s young man’s ambition and his family’s beautiful wife were truly enviable. However, after staying in the back office for only two days, he discovered that the relationship between the two couples was extremely indifferent. There was practically no communication between them. Moreover, as the husband, County Magistrate Lu was actually driven to the study room to sleep. This alone showed that he was at a complete disadvantage in the relationship between the husband and wife.

One had to know that this was the Great Ming Dynasty hundreds of years ago. Normally, men in the family were in the dominant position. It was the heavens of their wives. Why was it that they were completely reversed when they arrived here?

For this reason, Lu Zhen repeatedly attacked Cuimei from the sidelines. Fortunately, this little girl did not have much scheming, nor did she expect that her master would actually change people, so he asked a lot of questions about County Magistrate Lu and his wife, Yun Rong.

It turned out that Yun Rong’s surname was Chu, and he came from Jiangnan Suzhou City just like County Magistrate Lu. Because the Chu and Lu Clans had always been good friends, especially their father’s generation, they had already arranged a marriage for the two of them.

Unfortunately, the weather was unpredictable. County Magistrate Lu’s father had passed away before he reached adulthood. Soon after, his mother also went. As a result, County Magistrate Lu could only rely on the support of his clansmen to survive when he was young. Fortunately, he was quite smart, especially when it came to studying. He was considered to be an upper-middle-class talent, and he had already passed the three rankings at a young age, which made the villagers not dare to be underestimated.

However, after all, he had lost his parents since he was young, so County Magistrate Lu’s temperament was a little strange. Not only was he greedy in money, but he was also a little timid. After becoming an official, his personality did not change much.

As his fianc é e, Chu Yunrong had already seen her personality in her eyes, so she naturally did not like it. It was only because of his previous engagement and his father’s insistence that he had no choice but to marry County Magistrate Lu before he came to Guangling.

However, the relationship between the husband and wife was extremely cold, because the Chu Clan’s background was far better than County Magistrate Lu’s. There were even more officials in the clan. In addition, Chu Yunrong was born beautiful and had a strong personality. She actually firmly ate her husband, causing him to not dare to do anything wrong. Not to mention the way other husbands drank and shouted at their wives, they had to look at Chu Yunrong’s expression and act, and they couldn’t even share a room with her.

Therefore, after arriving at Guangling County, County Magistrate Lu had always stayed in the study room beside him. Even Chu Yunrong’s room hadn’t stepped into it a few times. It was only when she returned that night that she let him in to take a look and said a few greetings.

After understanding all of this, Lu Zhen felt great sympathy for this county magistrate with the same name, but he couldn’t touch such a beautiful wife. He must have had a hard time these days. Moreover, in terms of what happened to him, it was understandable for him to have such a personality. According to the research in later generations, every orphan who had lost his parents since childhood had more or less some mental illness. County magistrate Lu was still able to enter the examination at such a young age-although he was a fellow student, he was still one of the top two or three hundred examinees in the country-it was enough to show that he was extraordinary.

This was not the worst problem County Magistrate Lu had encountered. Later, Lu Zhen discovered that not only did he have an awkward position in the Houya Clan, but he did not have much prestige even in the government’s yamen.

In the beginning, Lu Zhen had always said that he was sick and hid in his back office to rest because he was guilty and worried that he would be seen through. After five days, he felt that not going out would cause suspicion, so he had no choice but to show his face.

However, what happened immediately surprised him greatly. Although the officials in the yamen were very respectful on the surface to the county magistrate of the main hall, they even gave him some kind greetings. However, Lu Zhen discovered that there were only a few books on the Second Hall’s book desk that he was working on, and there was no place for him to make decisions on them.

In the next two days, as he stayed in front for a long time, the feeling of being deliberately ignored became even more obvious. Only when he brought over some documents that required the magistrate’s seal would the officials below laugh, and when he scanned the contents of the documents, a few of them would show impatience.

What shocked Lu Zhen even more was that those documents had already given instructions in the tone of a county magistrate, and they didn’t even give him any place to write. His only function was to seal the documents after the officials had handed them over and make them legal official documents.

With just a slight probe, Lu Zhen knew that this was the usual practice since County Magistrate Lu arrived. In other words, the County Magistrate Guang Ling didn’t have any power at all, only the puppets in the hands of the local officials were at the mercy of others.

Lu Zhen had also read a lot about the matter of county magistrates being overlooked by their subordinates, which was also a drawback of the system of local officials in the Imperial Court.

According to the system of the Imperial Court, officials usually served once every three years. After three terms of office, they would be transferred elsewhere. There was also the rule that officials from other places were not allowed to serve as officials in the main hall. This was to prevent officials from colluding with local forces because they were too familiar with each other, causing them to end up in trouble.

However, many practical tasks could not be handed over to officials who were completely unfamiliar with the place, so the Imperial Court promoted a number of local officials to be the assistant of the main hall official. As far as the county government was concerned, apart from the county magistrate and county magistrate, the main books (mainly in charge of taxation), the history books (mainly in charge of prison guards), and a series of other petty officials were all handled by local people.

These people on duty didn’t have as many restrictions as county magistrates. Once they took office, there wouldn’t be a term of office. They could occupy this position until they were old, or they didn’t want to do it anymore. Sometimes, this position could be passed on to one’s own children and nephews.

In this way, the power of the lower-level officials in the area became enormous. In fact, they were often able to restrict their superiors, leaving the county magistrate completely helpless against them. This was because any county magistrate who wanted to make achievements would need the cooperation of their subordinates. Once they clashed with each other, not to mention that they were openly opposed to each other, they would just do something secretly. Or, if someone were to give up on them, it would be enough for them to drink a pot of wine.

Unless he was exceptionally powerful and had wrists, or if he was a county magistrate with a deep background in the court, he would be able to open up a path to regain his power in this intertwined formation. Otherwise, he would have to be at the mercy of these officials and become their puppets in many cases.

Of course, these local officials weren’t completely disrespectful to their superiors. After all, the other party still had room for development, and it wouldn’t be good for them to stifle their relationship. Therefore, as long as the county magistrate did not deliberately make enemies with them, they would also leave some face for their superiors.

However, the rules of the bureaucracy that allowed each other more leeway were mostly in the south or the capital. As for some remote places, it was completely different.

And what Lu Zhen was facing now was this situation. The original county magistrate Lu was completely emptied by his subordinates, and he didn’t even have the right to speak. He could only be responsible for stamping the official document with an official seal.

When he understood all of this, Lu Zhen’s sympathy for County Magistrate Lu became even heavier. On the surface, he seemed to be the winner of life, and both inside and outside, he was really feeling wronged. He must have had a hard time before. What was even more tragic about this county magistrate Lu was that he couldn’t even live through this kind of life, and he died outside in a daze. This was a good deal for an imposter like him.

Not only did Lu Zhen not feel unhappy about such an awkward situation, he felt his heart relax. This was really a good thing for him.

Originally, he was worried that his identity as an imposter would be exposed for various reasons. For example, when dealing with the official business in the county government, because of their ignorance of these matters, or misjudgement of the rules, they were found to be very different from the original county magistrate.

He couldn’t always use brain injury as an excuse for such a thing, could he? But now, it seemed that things were much simpler. He didn’t even need to read the contents of those documents carefully. As long as he stamped them like a machine, he would be able to complete the task. Where did he get the flaws?

As for the interaction with those subordinates, it was also very simple. It was often just empty talk. In addition, they were obviously not familiar with County Magistrate Lu, so he actually managed to fool them.

As for the back office, which was the easiest to show off, it was much easier to deal with because of Chu Yunrong’s indifferent relationship with County Magistrate Lu. The two of them didn’t even interact with each other, so they just nodded when they met. Lu Zhen’s secret was naturally easy to guard.

The only person who had more contact with him was Cuimei, apart from a few servants. The latter was too naive and careless, so he couldn’t see any difference between him and his old master. He had only suspected him once, but Lu Zhen quickly prevaricated him.

Thus, perhaps some of the tragic situations for the original county magistrate Lu had helped Lu Zhen greatly, allowing him to safely pass the most dangerous period of time. He believed that as long as he lived a few more days, everyone would get used to the current county magistrate Lu, and no one would have any doubts.

As for seizing the power of the county government from others, Lu Zhen didn’t even think about it. Wasn’t this kind of carefree life not good? Was it necessary to fight with others? Not every traveler likes to fight for power and gain, fight and kill.

The only thing that made Lu Zhen somewhat uneasy was the war in his memory a few years later. He only hoped that he could leave Guang Ling and become an official somewhere else before then.