At the beginning, his wife came to him, and he became rich by selling kidney treasures.

"Get up." Ren Hao waved his hand and quickly asked the old man who looked to be in his eighties to get up.

On the way back to the government office with Yu Qian, Ren Hao looked him up and down, and doubts arose in his heart.

There is an age limit for officials in the imperial court.

Generally speaking, civil servants retire at the age of 65, and military officers retire at the age of 60. If some of them are in good health, they can stay in office until they are around 70 years old, but no more than 75.

In this era, it is rare for people to live past seventy.

Thirty-five is the average life expectancy in this era, and many people don’t even live past thirty.

Therefore, people who can live to be eighty years old are already rare.

Yu Qian looks to be eighty years old. Even if his facial features do not match his age, he is already seventy years old, which is long over the retirement age of sixty-five. He also does not look to be in very good health. He needed help to stand up just now.

When they arrived at the government office and sat down, Ren Hao quickly asked Yu Qian to sit down first.

"Prefect Yu, how old are you?" Ren Hao asked curiously.

Yu Qian was about to stand up and salute, but was held down by Ren Hao. It would be bad if the old man sprained his ankle in excitement.

"Your Excellency, I am seventy-nine years old this year..."

"Uh..." Ren Hao held his forehead with his hand. What's the difference between this and eighty?

"You are already 79 years old and should have retired long ago. Why are you still in office? Do you still have the energy to work?" Ren Hao asked.

Hearing this, Yu Qian forced a bitter smile on his old face, "Your Excellency, you may not know that I had originally resigned and retired a long time ago. It was only a month ago that His Majesty executed the former prefect and asked me to take over for a period of time, saying that a suitable person would be sent to take over later. However, it has been more than a month, and I am really unable to do the job."

"I see..." Ren Hao nodded in agreement.

At the same time, thinking of the handsome pretty emperor, he couldn't help shaking his head.

What kind of emperor is this? It's fine if he lets an old man take over temporarily, but it's been more than a month, almost two months, and he still hasn't found a new candidate. Not to mention whether something will go wrong at his age, he may not have enough energy. How can he handle the heavy workload of the government?

Isn’t this nonsense!

"So how do we handle official business now?" Ren Hao asked.

Yu Qian quickly replied, "Your Excellency, the Tongpan and Zhizhou are handling it. I will review it briefly and if there are no major problems, I will handle it."

“That’s not bad…” Ren Hao nodded slightly. If all official business really had to be handled by this old man, he would probably die before all the official business was handled.

Thinking of this, Ren Hao immediately summoned the Tongpan and the prefect and explained the matter to them according to the previous procedure.

Soon, within two days, all the merchants and craftsmen were ready.

Ren Hao led a large group of people and marched towards Qiantang County in a mighty manner.

Not long after Ren Hao left the city, a fast horse caught up with him.

When looking at Hongyao, Ren Hao couldn't help but widen his eyes: "Why is it you!"

"What are you doing here? Where's Wen Yan?"

Hearing Ren Hao's words, Hongyao pursed her lips and smiled: "Master Ren, this time I came here not on the orders of the military chief, but on the orders of His Majesty, to be by your side and obey your orders."

"Come to my side and take orders?" Ren Hao was stunned, and then his face looked a little awkward.

The pretty boy emperor sent Hongyao here, probably to monitor him!

The feeling of being monitored was not good, but Ren Hao did not drive Hongyao away and kept her.

"When did you return to Beijing?" Ren Hao asked.

Before, Hongyao was left in the coal mine by him to be in charge of the coal mine affairs, while Xu Hu was in charge of exploration, and the two cooperated with each other.

"I just came back not long ago. Don't worry, sir. Zhou Qi has been put in charge of the coal mine." Hongyao said.

"Oh." Ren Hao nodded. Zhou Qi was one of his deputies at the time. He was fairly steady in his work, so there wouldn't be too many problems if he handed the job over to him.

However, Hongyao's official position was not high, yet the emperor personally arranged for her to come and monitor him. She must be trusted by the pretty boy emperor. What was her relationship with the emperor?

Ren Hao was thinking about it in his mind, but he didn't ask because Hongyao wouldn't tell him even if he asked.

time flies.

Soon, Ren Hao brought thousands of people to Qiantang County.

Qiantang County is located at the confluence of two rivers and is close to the canal.

Although floods did occur, the geographical location was extremely important and almost all river transportation from north to south passed through Qiantang County.

This made Qiantang County a transportation hub, and the imperial court attached great importance to it.

A county magistrate of Qiantang County was comparable to a prefect of an ordinary prefecture, and some were even appointed by the imperial court.

As to why Qiantang County was not upgraded to a prefecture, there are two reasons.

The first is that Qiantang County is of great importance, and it is better to be precise than to be general. If it is expanded into a prefecture, the area must be expanded, which will make the people in charge work hard and may not be able to take care of everything.

The second is that the surrounding prefectures and counties have already reached a certain size and are not suitable for further division.

Therefore, Qiantang County became a unique place in Scorpion Baba, and its county size was comparable to that of a prefecture.

Later, as more and more people traveled back and forth between the south and the north, the entire county became more and more prosperous, and gradually it became a trading place for people traveling between the north and the south.

Most of these trading places are stalls rented out by the government, and vendors rent them for a short period of time to buy and sell goods.

Rich businessmen directly buy shops and sell them.

Although the population of Qiantang County as a whole is not large, the floating population is very large, even beyond the reach of the capital.

But now, standing on a high place and overlooking Qiantang County below, it is just a vast ocean!

There were scattered houses and buildings floating in the vast ocean, most of them were submerged in water, with only a small part exposed.

On the high ground on both sides, there were countless tents, and densely packed victims were hiding in the tents, and every other place, there was a porridge stall for distributing porridge.

Homes were destroyed and people were displaced, and Ren Hao felt heavy in his heart.

He had seen such scenes on the news.

Just seeing such a scene with his own eyes, he couldn't help but feel shocked.

"I am Li Tang, the magistrate of Qiantang County, and I am honored to meet you, Your Excellency!" A haggard middle-aged man, wearing tattered official uniform, came up to Ren Hao and saluted respectfully.

"Please stand up, Lord Li." Ren Hao stepped forward and helped Li Tang up.

Seeing that Li Tang seemed to have not rested for a long time, Ren Hao could not help but nodded. This Li Tang seemed to be a good official.

"What's the situation now?" Ren Hao asked.

Li Tang sighed and said, "Your Excellency, the flood has not subsided yet. The entire county's 200,000 people are all here. All their property and grain have been destroyed by the flood. I have mobilized grain from the surrounding prefectures and counties, which is barely enough to keep the people from starving to death."

"I am really ashamed to see Your Majesty." At the end, Li Tang burst into tears.