Just one pregnancy and four babies, but the prince actually pledged his love to her

Chapter 541 Veterans

After all, every soldier who survived the battlefield could never go back to the battlefield again, which to a large extent meant that the soldier either had a broken arm or a broken leg, or had other injuries on his body.

In a nutshell, the retired veterans became disabled and could no longer fight on the battlefield, so they had to retire and return home.

Although Xie Ruiyuan was born into a royal family, born to the empress and the emperor's legitimate son, he went to the military camp when he was very young.

After so many years of fighting in the military camp and making great military achievements, he also has a deep understanding of the lives of the most basic soldiers. He understands the difficulties of people's livelihood and the sufferings of the people. He can understand that when a disabled soldier returns home, he will not only be looked down upon by his fellow villagers, but also find it difficult to find a job to make a living.

In order to prevent these soldiers who once risked their lives to defend their country from returning home injured and unable to survive, he took the initiative to assume this responsibility and used all his savings to support 500,000 veterans.

Li Mengyue did not think that Xie Ruiyuan's behavior was wrong. On the contrary, she felt that Xie Ruiyuan was a prince who cared about the world and was concerned about the country and the people.

But there is a big disadvantage to doing this, which is that Xie Ruiyuan has to keep supporting these people.

Although she also heard from Xie Ruiyuan that those retired veterans did not eat and drink for free, they also reclaimed wasteland and planted some crops, which gave them some subsidies.

After hearing what Xie Ruiyuan said, she knew that the situation was not very optimistic. She knew the grain production in this era, and it was so low that she was speechless.

A family of five cultivated five acres of land. After paying taxes on the grain they harvested each year, it was still not enough to feed the whole family. They had to dig wild vegetables frequently, or the men in the family had to go out to work to earn some pocket money to supplement the family income.

Life is hard enough for ordinary people, let alone these veterans with physical disabilities. They cannot do heavy physical work, and the harvest of crops in the fields may be poor. The food harvested from the fields each year is only enough to eat for two or three months. For the remaining eight or nine months, they have to rely on Xie Ruiyuan.

She had also asked why those retired veterans didn't go home and whether there was no one left at home.

Xie Ruiyuan told her that those who were able to join the army had very poor family conditions, otherwise they would definitely pay five taels of silver to be exempted from military service.

The reason why they had to serve in the army was, of course, that they were a poor family who could not afford the money. Since they could not even afford five taels of silver, they certainly could not afford to support a disabled person.

Things were fine in the first one or two years, as the disabled veterans had money given by the court and could still live a normal life.

But this is just the beginning. When the money is spent and you can't find a job, those with a slightly better family condition may be treated well by their family members, otherwise you can only listen to cold words.

This is nothing. The worst thing is being disliked by family and kicked out of the house.

Xie Ruiyuan said that the reason he had the idea of ​​rescuing veterans was that he once saw with his own eyes that a soldier who followed him once went to the battlefield and was unlucky and had his arm chopped off by the enemy.

Although he managed to survive, he could never go to the battlefield again.

After all, swords and knives are blind on the battlefield. Even people with healthy limbs have to be extra careful, let alone a broken arm, which means they will never have to fight on the battlefield again.

Even though he felt it was a pity, there was nothing he could do to change it. The military camp would never accept people with disabilities or illnesses, so he had to let the soldier retire and go home.

Since the soldier followed him, in addition to the silver given by the court, he also gave him an extra fifty taels.

Logically speaking, this amount of silver is quite a lot, enough for the soldier to return home and live a good life.

As a result, he accidentally arrived at Xiaobing's hometown and sent someone to ask how Xiaobing was doing. What he didn't expect was that he got the news that Xiaobing had passed away.

He didn't believe it. He thought that the soldier, who was always optimistic and cheerful, just lost an arm and had a very strong physique, otherwise he wouldn't have come to him.

Only half a year had passed since the last battle when the soldier broke his arm. Now the strong young man was gone. He just didn't want to believe it.

So he asked people to investigate. It would have been fine if they hadn’t investigated, but when they did, they were shocked.

It turned out that when the soldier returned home after retiring from the army, he was not welcomed by his family. Instead, they despised him for being incompetent and unable to even save an arm. They asked him why he came back and thought it would be better for him to die on the battlefield so that his family could receive more pension.

Faced with the ridicule from his family, the soldier said nothing, but the eyes of the usually cheerful soldier dimmed and he accepted the sarcasm from his family.

Under such circumstances, the soldier silently endured his family's dislike for him. Even though he took out sixty taels of silver, he did not get a smile from his family. Instead, they felt that he should not go back alive because the money the court would give him if he died was more than if he was alive.

In fact, what the soldier’s family didn’t know was that even if the soldier died on the battlefield, the pension he would receive would only be twenty taels, which was only ten taels more than if he were alive.

However, these soldiers did not tell their families. As the days passed, the soldiers gradually lost the confidence to live under the cold words of their families. One night, they ran to the river in the village and jumped in without hesitation.

The next day, the villagers found Xiaobing's body. Xiaobing's family members did not shed tears. Instead, they felt that once Xiaobing was dead, he would no longer be a burden to them.

In private, he also said that it would be a good thing to die, as he could save two meals a day.

When she heard from Xie Ruiyuan that Xiaobing's family treated Xiaobing so coldly and selfishly, she had the urge to shoot Xiaobing's family.

She knew that the soldier Xie Ruiyuan was talking about was just one of the thousands of veterans, and in places they couldn't see, there were even more veterans living a life without dignity.

From Xie Ruiyuan's words, she could guess what Xie Ruiyuan did.

She also understood why Xie Ruiyuan cared about the affairs of retired veterans.

But she felt that Xie Ruiyuan was thinking too simply. As a big country, the Great Zhou had more than tens of thousands of veterans retiring every year. If you add those who retired in previous years, the number would definitely be a huge one.

Sure enough, when Xie Ruiyuan started doing this, he had already discovered it, but once the arrow is shot, there is no turning back. No matter how difficult it is, he will continue to do it.

The consequence of doing so was that the treasury of Prince Chen's Mansion was gradually emptied, and all the income from Xie Ruiyuan's industries was also invested in it.

Li Mengyue also understood that Xie Ruiyuan already had an army of 300,000 soldiers, so how could he afford to support 500,000 retired veterans? It would be fine for one or two years, but five years would be a bit stretched.

If this continues, even if Xie Ruiyuan has more money, it will not be enough.

She felt so distressed when she thought about the money that was spent like water every year.

You have to know that Xie Ruiyuan is the man she has chosen. She and Xie Ruiyuan are one. Spending Xie Ruiyuan's money is equivalent to spending hers.

She was not so generous as to let five hundred thousand people spend her money and let her support them willingly. This was absolutely something she could not tolerate.