Three Kingdoms: My Strategy Simulator.

What caused Liu Bei the most anxiety was how to settle the displaced people and whether the money and grain in Wu Commandery would be sufficient.

These two problems… were almost unsolvable.

Liu Bei was well aware that the arable land in Wu Commandery was nearly saturated. The original plan was to improve water conservancy while arranging for the displaced people to cultivate new land, thereby forming a virtuous cycle.

As for the other problem, when Li Ji saw the grain consumption feedback from Jian Yong's resettlement of the displaced people, he felt his head buzzing.

No wonder Mi Zhu was so anxious that he was jumping up and down, even directly stopping Li Ji midway.

Considering that the number of displaced people would only continue to increase, the money and grain that was originally sufficient for Wu Commandery's development for three to five years would be completely exhausted in less than half a year.

And if the displaced people could not be properly settled during this half year and transformed into real productivity, then the Wu Commandery government would face only one result—bankruptcy and paralysis.

Therefore, the problems faced by Wu Commandery ultimately came down to resettlement and money and grain.

If it were during the reign of an enlightened monarch, the imperial court would naturally solve these two problems.

Unfortunately, the current emperor was willing to sell official positions in order to amass wealth, so how could he be willing to open the national treasury to save the lives of commoners?

Moreover, the imperial court had just emptied the national treasury the year before to quell the Yellow Turban Rebellion, so it was even less likely to spend huge sums of money and grain on disaster relief and saving the people.

Since he could not rely on the imperial court at all, Li Ji could only focus his attention on the surrounding commanderies and counties, especially those within Yang Province.

Yang Province was vast and sparsely populated!

Compared with the commanderies and counties in the Central Plains, there would obviously be a certain degree of enthusiasm for accepting displaced people.

However, the officialdom of this era was generally corrupt, and corrupt officials were rampant. Even those officials who were lazy and unwilling to govern could be considered good officials.

Under this general environment, Li Ji obviously could not expect the other commanderies and counties to exert any subjective initiative.

"Without a doubt, Wu Commandery cannot settle such a huge number of displaced people in a short period of time. It is necessary to carry out a certain degree of diversion and use the convenience of the water network south of the Yangtze River to disperse the displaced people for resettlement."

Li Ji muttered to himself, suddenly feeling that this might be an unexpected good thing for future undertakings.

The development south of the Yangtze River in history has experienced three major southward migrations of population: the late Han Dynasty, the Three Kingdoms to the Southern and Northern Dynasties, the An Lushan Rebellion, and the Southern and Northern Song Dynasties. Each southward migration of population was undoubtedly a road paved with corpses.

Relatively speaking, if this operation is properly handled, it will undoubtedly be a much gentler southward migration of population, thereby greatly increasing the population potential south of the Yangtze River, including Wu Commandery.

The population base is extremely important!

‘Lord now has the identity of the Inspector of Yang Province, and in name only has the right to supervise the counties of Yang Province. It's a pity that he can't directly command the other commandery administrators in righteousness like a governor… Perhaps… send a persuader to lobby the counties on behalf of the lord?’

At this thought, Li Ji's heart could not help but stir.

With Liu Bei's reputation and status, the commandery administrators of Yang Province might be afraid of Liu Bei's intervention in their counties, but they would definitely not dare to easily offend Liu Bei.

As long as a eloquent person is sent to lobby the counties of Yang Province and explain the advantages and disadvantages, something can be achieved.

Immediately, Li Ji quickly recalled the commandery administrators information of Yang Province in his mind.

The Administrator of Jiujiang Commandery, Fu Qian, courtesy name Zishen, was good at governing the classics, and his administration was mediocre;

The Administrator of Danyang Commandery, Tong Hui, courtesy name Hanzong, was fair and upright, and had many acts of caring for the people, but recently he seemed to be seriously ill and bedridden;

The Administrator of Lujiang Commandery, Lu Kang, courtesy name Jining, was quite talented and learned, and was a member of the Lu family in Wu County. Moreover, Lu Xun (two years old), whom Li Ji had been paying attention to since he arrived in Jiangdong, was his great-grandson and was following Lu Kang;

The Administrator of Kuaiji Commandery, Guo Yi, courtesy name Yuanping, was rumored to be a distant relative of Guo Sheng, one of the Ten Attendants. Relying on his background, he acted greedily and violently after taking office, and often oppressed the people. Liu Bei had impeached him many times as Inspector, but to no avail;

The Administrator of Yuzhang Commandery… was vacant! Its situation was similar to that of Wu Commandery before. The position of Administrator of Yuzhang Commandery had been vacant for many years, and the entire Yuzhang Commandery was almost controlled by various aristocratic families.

Immediately, Li Ji understood that even if he sent a persuader to lobby the counties.

I am afraid that only Lu Kang, the Administrator of Lujiang Commandery, would take into account that the Lu family was in Wu County, and his character was also upright, so he would cooperate more.

In addition, Fu Qian, the Administrator of Jiujiang Commandery, was a scholar who was good at studying, but even controlling the internal affairs of Jiujiang Commandery mostly followed the doctrine of the mean and let things take their course, so even if he helped, he would be unable to do what he wanted.

As for Tong Hui, the Administrator of Danyang Commandery, who was originally the most active in accepting displaced people, was bedridden, and was also unable to do what he wanted.

The situation in Kuaiji Commandery and Yuzhang Commandery was such that even if Zhuge Kongming himself were to persuade them, it would not have the slightest effect, let alone sending a persuader.

The six commanderies of Yang Province can be said to have different situations…

Previously, Li Ji had not even secured his own job, so he naturally had no intention of robbing vegetables from his neighbors.

What he thought was to develop Wu Commandery, as the foundation, to a certain extent, and then use Liu Bei's supervisory power as Inspector to find a way to gradually and secretly control the other commanderies of Yang Province.

Now, Li Ji felt a little overwhelmed.

To this end, Li Ji used the "Strategy Simulator" to try to deduce, but found that with the purpose of dispersing the displaced people, even the "Strategy Simulator" did not directly display the option of sending a persuader to lobby the five commanderies of Yang Province.

Obviously, this meant that there was not even a shred of success.

Even if something could be slowly ground out, I am afraid that those displaced people would be almost cooled down.

Not every official understands the importance of accepting displaced people, or some officials may understand, but the term of an official is often only three to five years.

In this case, stability is the most important thing for officials. On the contrary, if accepting displaced people accidentally triggers a rebellion and is held accountable by the imperial court, it is very likely that they will be dismissed by the imperial court.

Moreover, after spending a lot of effort to accept displaced people, it is often just leaving achievements for successors to develop, which can be completely described as thankless.

Under this circumstance, it is conceivable that most of the displaced people, even if they wander to other commanderies and counties full of hope, rarely find a place to stay.

What's more, there are many corrupt officials who oppress the people, so how can they do something that is obviously of no benefit to amassing wealth?

‘This mess is really more of a mess than I imagined…’

Li Ji's eyes narrowed, and his palm unconsciously picked up Liu Bei's commandery administrator's seal and stroked it, but the belief in his heart did not waver at all.

‘As of now, it is impossible to cooperate well with the officials of the other commanderies of Yang Province on an equal footing.’

‘Even if we can persuade some commandery administrators, the officials of the counties and cities below may not cooperate, and those commandery administrators may not be able to completely control the many officials like the lord.’

‘Either from the bottom up, or from the top down…’

As Li Ji's thoughts moved, the ‘Strategy Simulator’ in his mind almost simultaneously displayed these two options.

Among them, there is nothing to say about the bottom-up approach.

The bones of the Great Virtuous Teacher of the Taiping Dao may still have some remnants after being burned, and the slogan "The Azure Sky is dead, the Yellow Sky shall rise" still has endless aftertaste.

As long as Li Ji is willing, as long as he secretly provides weapons, money and grain, and then leads the gathered displaced people to the commanderies of Yang Province, then there will be another "uprising".

Moreover, Li Ji, who is different from the past, is confident that he can control the scale of this "uprising" and allow a large number of displaced people to take the opportunity to integrate into the south of the Yangtze River.

The price is the destruction of a large number of government offices, the casualties of a large number of people and displaced people, and Liu Bei, as the Administrator of Wu Commandery, will completely clear himself… extremely difficult.

Relatively speaking, Li Ji is still a person who likes to follow the rules of the game, and is more inclined to the "top-down" choice.

[In the Han Dynasty, where natural disasters occur frequently, facing the difficult choice of how to settle a large number of people, you chose the "top-down" method!

You immediately sent a large number of messengers straight to Luoyang to contact the important court officials who maintained a certain relationship with Liu Bei and you, and suggested to the court that the commanderies of Yang Province could receive displaced people.

The emperor, who was overwhelmed by this, was thinking about taking advantage of the natural disaster to replace another Grand Commandant and make money again with the position of Grand Commandant. He did not care about the lives of those civilians at all.

Therefore, with your active contact, Lu Zhi, together with the faction led by He Jin, exerted their strength together. Even if the Ten Attendants instinctively wanted to stop it, they still passed this decree.]

[As soon as this imperial decree arrived in Jiangdong, you knew that the ‘righteousness’ you urgently needed was in hand!

With this ‘righteousness’, the other five commanderies of Yang Province could not refuse the resettlement of displaced people.

In order to prevent the internal stability of the commanderies from being impacted by a large number of displaced people, the other commanderies sent envoys or officials to see you, hoping that Wu Commandery could reduce the number of displaced people entering the other commanderies.

In response, in addition to sneering and sorrow in your heart, you quickly began to divert the displaced people and arranged for them to begin entering the other five commanderies of Yang Province.]

[In this process, the resistance from officials and aristocratic families to prevent displaced people from entering the country was beyond your imagination.

Not only did they use various poisonous schemes to assassinate, attack, or ignore those displaced people who began to enter the country, but the memorials impeaching Liu Bei and you flew to the court like snowflakes.

Unfortunately, you now have righteousness, and the emperor and court officials are also unlikely to prevent the resettlement of displaced people.

On the contrary, you took the opportunity to let Liu Bei exercise his supervisory power as the Inspector of Yang Province, constantly countering the poisonous schemes, and began to impeach many officials in Yang Province, and then secretly placed officials who could obey Liu Bei.

In the end, accompanied by a fierce political struggle, you achieved the final victory, and a large number of displaced people flowed into Yang Province for resettlement.]

[Strategy Evaluation: You won!

You vigorously promoted the integration of the population south of the Yangtze River, and also took the opportunity to change the work style of officials within Yangzhou.

Although the number of officials or aristocratic families who died as a result made it difficult for you to even remember the exact figure, fortunately, it was a result that satisfied you, and Liu Bei also gained a huge influence throughout Yangzhou because of this.

Of course, perhaps this has also left behind some hidden dangers???】(End of Chapter)