The Jagged Cavalry of the Three Kingdoms

Chapter 412 Chapter 411
Mi Zhu was stumped by Zhang Yan's question. He was indeed a businessman. Although he was very good at doing business, the money he got from business was not obtained all at once. It was through the continuous efforts of the businessman. A little accumulated wealth.

At present, the problem Zhang Yan is facing is that the national treasury is empty, he cannot make ends meet, and his desire for money is even more imminent. How to get money quickly is simply not something that can be done through business.

Mi Zhu thought for a long time before slowly answering: "King Yan, the imperial court has always adopted a strategy of emphasizing agriculture and suppressing business. In today's strict hierarchy, the status of businessmen is very low. Even if they have The wealth that rivals the enemy may not be able to exchange for a status symbol. In the eyes of others, they are not even as good as a farmer or a craftsman. If King Yan can improve their status and status, those businessmen can even Willing to contribute money."

After Zhang Yan listened to Mi Zhu's words, he pondered for a moment, and asked, "Brother, what do you mean, you want me to be an official?"

Mi Zhu nodded, and said: "I'm afraid this is one of the fastest ways to get money at present. I just put forward a suggestion for the reference of King Yan. As for what to do, His Highness Yan will make the decision." .”

In the feudal society, the hierarchy was strict, and the hierarchy of scholars, farmers, industry, and merchants was established very early, and this hierarchy has been followed for a long time, deeply affecting the future history.Because most people think that businessmen are cunning people, the so-called no business, no evil, is the best explanation for this hierarchy.

Selling officials and nobles, although it sounds a little disgraceful, is indeed a way to solve the current financial difficulties.However, unless it is absolutely necessary, Zhang Yan will not do this, so as not to arouse the dissatisfaction of the officials.

"Besides this method, is there any other way to get money quickly?" Zhang Yan asked again.

Mi Zhu said: "Yes, it is also a way to get it done once and for all."

"What way?" After Zhang Yan listened, he was stunned and asked hastily.

Mi Zhu said, "Mining gold mines!"

"That's right!" Zhang Yan patted his thigh suddenly, and said happily, "Why didn't I think of this method? Find a gold mine, smelt the mined ore, and then you can get a steady stream of gold , It is indeed once and for all!"

"His Royal Highness Yan Wang, don't be too happy so early. If you want to mine gold mines, you must first find out the gold mines. In addition, you must recruit miners and dig mines. Although this is a once-and-for-all method, it will take a long time. It's too long, and it's not suitable for King Yan's needs at this stage. But King Yan can consider including mining gold mines in his political affairs, and send people to explore gold mines across the country first, and then organize people to dig mines In the end, a smelting plant will be built to extract gold from the ore, just like His Royal Highness King Yan mined iron ore." Mi Zhu said.

Zhang Yan nodded repeatedly after hearing this, feeling that this trip to Tancheng was quite rewarding and worthwhile.

Then, Mi Zhu suggested to Zhang Yan to open the business road to Jiangdong. In fact, Mi Zhu did not agree with Chen Deng's economic sanctions on Jiangdong, because when he sanctioned others, he also sanctioned himself. Jiang, Huai, Ru, etc. Local goods could not be transported to Jiangdong, and the interests of merchants were also damaged to a certain extent.

If the commercial road can be reopened and the goods from the north can be transported to Jiangdong, more and more money can be made back.

However, in Mi Zhu's suggestion, to open the commercial road leading to Jiangdong, it must be independently operated by the government, which is the so-called official business.

Because Jiangdong is a huge market. After two years of economic sanctions, there is a great demand for external commodities. If there is a steady stream of commodities imported into Jiangdong at this time, it will open up a way of making money. Impact on Jiangdong's local business.

Zhang Yan's sphere of influence can be described as vast and abundant. Anything can be sold as a commodity. As long as it is not available in Jiangdong, it can be transported to Jiangdong to be sold as a commodity.

Although Mi Zhu's suggestion was good, Zhang Yan still hesitated.Because it was Chen Deng who advocated economic sanctions, and not long after Chen Deng passed away, Zhang Yan broke his strategy. To a certain extent, it may seem a bit too dishonest.

After Chen Deng passed away, the news spread to Pengcheng. Because Chen Deng's father, Chen Gui, couldn't accept the bad news, he fell ill and was still lying on the hospital bed.Although after Fan A's recuperation, he barely managed to maintain his life, but he still needed heart medicine for his heart disease. Chen Gui was hit by Chen Deng's death. If he wanted to heal Chen Gui, he had to keep Chen Deng alive.This kind of sad pain from a white-haired person to a black-haired person is incomprehensible to ordinary people. If Chen Deng's original strategy is broken at this time, once it reaches Chen Gui's ears, it may make Chen Gui's condition worse.

In addition, Chen Deng's younger brother, Chen Yingzheng, led the army to garrison in Shaopo, and the Chen family is also quite influential in Xuzhou. In addition, more than half of Jiangdong used to be Chen Deng's confidantes. Shangdao, I'm afraid it will cause an uproar.

However, it is imminent to open up a new source of income. After much deliberation, Zhang Yan decided to ask Mi Zhu to set up a caravan, and he would take full charge of managing the caravan. He set off from Xuzhou, took a sea boat, and traveled by sea to smuggle the caravan. , to trade with Jiangnan.

Under Zhang Yan's instructions, this trade area has expanded a lot, including Jiangdong, but not limited to Jiangdong, and the more remote Jiaozhou. These are the main areas for this caravan to trade.

For this reason, Zhang Yan also specially asked Mi Zhu to form a military force capable of protecting the caravan to avoid being attacked by pirates.

Zhang Yan and Mi Zhu had a long talk together. Zhang Yan learned a lot from this meeting. During the two-hour long talk, Zhang Yan basically confirmed the future business policy. All difficulties and obstacles must be cleared away. This is also the focus of Zhang Yan's future work. He hopes that in the region he rules, not only agriculture will be developed, but commerce will also be developed as well.

And Mi Zhu even told Zhang Yan a story about Guan Zhong's governance of the country, asking Zhang Yan to emulate Guan Zhong's philosophy of governing the country, first enrich the people, then enrich the country, and finally strengthen the army.

Mi Zhu even asked someone to take out a hand-copied "Guanzi" and presented the book to Zhang Yan, hoping that Zhang Yan could read the contents of the book carefully.

Zhang Yan took the book and found a bookmark in the book. He took it off and looked at it, but saw that the bookmark reads "The way to govern a country is to enrich the people first. A rich people makes the country rich. A rich country makes the army strong. A strong army leads to victory. The land is wide" such a small piece of text, the handwriting of this text is very familiar to Zhang Yan, it seems to be written by Mi Zhu himself.

"King Yan, the person I admire the most in my life is Guan Zhong. I was born as a businessman. Guan Zhong also went through business in his early years, but in the end he abandoned business and entered politics. So I followed Guan Zhong's example and abandoned business to enter politics. However, I don't have Guan Zhong's background. Wisdom cannot help the King of Yan, I hope Zhang Yan can find some ways to govern the country from the book "Guan Zi"." Mi Zhu said very sincerely and sincerely.

Zhang Yan held "Guanzi" tightly in his hand, and said to Mi Zhu, "Don't worry, brother, I will definitely read this book carefully."

That night, Zhang Yan stayed in Mi Zhu's mansion. Zhang Yan lit a candle and began to read the book "Guan Zi" all night. He found that Mi Zhu had made notes beside the book, putting forward his own views, which made the book look more popular. Easy to understand.

I have to say that Zhang Yan did get a lot of help from this book. He seemed to be able to get a glimpse of Guan Zhong's thoughts from this book. Tao cognition.

Early the next morning, Zhang Yan finished reading the entire "Guanzi", but he still didn't understand some parts, so he asked Mi Zhu for advice, and Mi Zhu was willing to explain the meaning of the book to Zhang Yan. , Zhang Yan comprehended all the essence of Guanzi's book.

Afterwards, Zhang Yan bid farewell to Mi Zhu and wanted to return to Pengcheng. Mi Zhu did not stop him. Before Zhang Yan left, he suddenly made a major decision to contribute [-]% of his current family property unconditionally.

After Zhang Yan heard the decision made by Mi Zhu, he was very surprised and shirked it many times, because Mi Zhu was worthy of him enough. Without Mi Zhu's support for him, he would never be where he is today.

However, Mi Zhu insisted on giving it to him. After all, this is his brother-in-law, and he should help him.

Zhang Yan was extremely moved, but insisted on not wanting it, and rode back to Pengcheng alone on a white dragon horse.

Not long after Zhang Yan left, Mi Zhu asked people to distribute invitations to various wealthy businessmen in Xuzhou one by one, and held a banquet in his own mansion three days later.

……

Zhang Yan returned to Pengcheng that day, after some thinking, he finally decided to solve the immediate difficulties by selling officials and nobles, even if the court ministers would object, he had to do it.

For this reason, Zhang Yan specially formulated a set of detailed price points for selling officials and nobles, and clearly marked the price according to the level of selling officials and nobles.

However, Zhang Yan only sells titles, but not official titles, and the titles are only below the Marquis. Earl, Viscount, and Baron, each title is divided into five grades, and the bid price is also high or low.The highest one is the first-class earl, who sells it directly and publicly, and the price is [-] gold, while the cheapest is the fifth-class baron, who sells it for only [-] gold.And all the titles sold are only titles, not fiefdoms, but the imperial court issues seals and ribbons to prove the legal status of these titles.

Zhang Yan handed the drafted imperial edict to the people below to copy, and these people were all surprised when they saw such an imperial edict to publicly sell their officials.However, fortunately, these people still copied them down. Zhang Yan personally stamped these imperial edicts and passed them on to the Imperial Seal, and then handed them over to Jin Yiwei to officially announce them to the world. And he was also mentally prepared to receive infamy from all over the world!
……

Under the control of Zhang Yan, the emperor who publicly sold titles was brought by Jin Yiwei to various states and counties within the sphere of influence. A few days later, on a certain day, almost overnight, the states and counties within Zhang Yan's sphere of influence were in an uproar.

Selling an official title, this kind of thing was done by the Emperor Ling of the Han Dynasty. Although Zhang Yan was not the first to do this, Zhang Yan has always had a good reputation. As soon as the imperial decree for selling the title was released, Zhang Yan immediately attracted people. There were bursts of abuse.

The officials were also confused for a while, why did the regent King Yan do such a thing?
All of a sudden, the whole country was in an uproar, and the news spread quickly. The speed of its spread was far beyond Zhang Yan's imagination. In just three days, the news spread all over the country, even in remote Liangzhou. Got the news.

This imperial decree caused a lot of abuse at first, and Zhang Yan became the talk of the common people after dinner. In the past, when Emperor Ling of the Han Dynasty sold officials and nobles, it was only done on a small scale, but this time Zhang Yan sold it publicly in the name of the imperial decree, and The high selling price is also unacceptable.

First-class Earl, sell fifty thousand gold!Moreover, the number of seats for each title is limited. Taking the first-class earl as an example, there are only ten places, first come, first served.Twenty second-class earls, thirty third-class earls, forty fourth-class earls, and fifty fifth-class earls.

For example, the first-class viscount has [-] places, the fifth-class has [-] places, the first-class baron has [-] places, and the fifth-class baron has [-] places.

There are a total of 650 knight titles for sale this time. The huge number of knight titles sold and the high price are simply beyond people's imagination.

Such a high price directly makes some people who are just about to move back.Everyone thought that Zhang Yan was crazy about money, and even ridiculed and ridiculed Zhang Yan, feeling that whoever bought it was a fool.

Ten days since the imperial decree was issued, Zhang Yan first received a burst of fierce abuse, but apart from the abuse, Zhang Yan's expected result did not come, and no one came to buy the title.

Even Zhang Yan himself was wondering, could it be that the price he sold was too high?Or, in the end, if you can't steal chickens, you will lose a handful of rice, and instead of getting money, you will be stigmatized by people all over the world.

Just when Zhang Yan was puzzled, a piece of heavy news came. There was a wealthy businessman in Tancheng who decided to buy ten first-class earl titles at once. The wealth of 50 gold was being transported to Pengcheng. Mi Zhu personally led the army to protect along the way.

Once the news spread, the whole country was in an uproar again. One person bought ten earl titles. Who is this person? He is so rich. That is 50 gold, which is enough for many people to eat for a lifetime.Such a heroic feat is really rare in the world.

Once this news spread, those wealthy businessmen who thought they were expensive at first couldn't sit still. There were only ten first-class earls, and now they couldn't buy them even if they wanted to, because they had already been sold out.

With the first person who dares to eat crabs, the wealthy businessmen behind will start to rush to buy the title, for fear that they will be sold out.

As a result, things began to turn around. The government offices that no one cared about before were now overwhelmed by wealthy businessmen, who all came to buy titles.

For a time, there was an endless stream of people buying titles, and the government office could only register on a first-come, first-served basis, and then report to Zhang Yan, who made the decision.

Three days later, the feedback information from all over the place was spread, and the most people bought the second-class earl, but there were only [-] places for the second-class earl, and who to give it became a problem again.

However, since there are so many people who are capable of buying titles, it means that they are not short of money. Zhang Yan simply changed his strategy and increased the sales quota of second-class earls. Anyone who intends to buy second-class earls can purchase them. , but you must bring gold to Pengcheng.

For this reason, Zhang Yan also specially dispatched troops to escort these people who came to buy titles throughout the journey.

A few days later, under the protection of the army, a steady stream of gold was heading towards Pengcheng, while Zhang Yan and others were busy counting the gold they earned...

(End of this chapter)