Molested Zulong at the beginning

"In addition to rewarding soldiers, officials have closed roads, maintained embankments and pipelines in various places, and dealt with Yellow River embankment breaches, floods and droughts. There is basically not much left in the treasury."

"The folks are farming. After the harvest, they sell their grain and don't have much money left in their hands. They buy a few bolts of cloth and build a small house, which is basically nothing."

"If His Majesty has any grand plans and wishes in the future, and wants to send hundreds of thousands of troops to conquer the four directions, and wants the rivers and rivers to make the sun and the moon all summer land."

"However, due to the lack of money in hand and the excessive consumption of food and grass in logistics, even if His Majesty has a million soldiers in hand, there is a limit to the scope of expansion. If you want to go further, there is no way at all. .”

Sister Zheng raised her slender willow eyebrows, thought about it carefully, and realized that this is really the case.

Before Bai Su proposed to use business as a supplement, when the imperial court could only rely on agriculture and mulberry for taxation, the expansion of the Central Plains to the south to Baiyue and the north to the Hetao area was almost at its limit.

The common people are full of resentment towards Daxia due to the heavy corvee. If it weren't for her high prestige, which suppressed all the forces that were ready to move, maybe Daxia would fall apart because of too much squeezing of people's power.

But now, Bai Su, with the help of commerce, has reduced or exempted taxes for a large number of peasants. While the pressure of life has dropped sharply, the taxes of the imperial court have not decreased but increased.

After pondering for a moment, Sister Zheng couldn't help but ask, "Isn't the way you said to strengthen the country and enrich the people a business?"

Bai Su shook his head slightly, and said with a smile: "Business and trade are just a means. To truly create a prosperous world, the imperial court needs to take the lead and formulate a century-old plan to strengthen the country through industry."

"Strengthen the country with labor?"

Sister Zheng raised her slender willow eyebrows slightly, she couldn't understand what Bai Su said for a while.

Bai Su explained: "Let me ask Your Majesty, what is the value of bamboo, sawdust, and straw, and how much food can be exchanged for?"

Sister Zheng replied without hesitation: "This thing is worthless at all. Even if it is filled with a whole cart, it can't be sold for seven or eight yuan. It can only be exchanged for a catty or two of grain."

Bai Su said with a smile: "If you use papermaking technology to make paper and then sell it, how much is it worth? How much food can you exchange for?"

"A cart of rice paper can be sold at a high price of [-] Wen, enough for food..."

Sister Zheng was stunned for a moment, as if she had realized something, she asked tentatively, "Could it be that this is what you mean by strengthening the country through labor?"

Bai Su nodded, and said, "This cart of worthless straw and sawdust is made by craftsmen through papermaking techniques. Once it changes hands, the price will soar more than a hundred times in an instant."

"In the same way, there are also porcelain, tea, cloth made by steam looms, cotton clothes..."

"These are ordinary mud, leaves, cotton, etc., and it is difficult to exchange half a catty of grain, but after our processing, the price has soared immediately, dozens of times, hundreds of times."

"So, the next thing we have to do is very simple. Let the surrounding foreign countries always maintain the idea of ​​agriculture-oriented, and work hard to farm and graze."

"And we vigorously develop the workshops in the Central Plains, and continue to expand the scale of the workshops that were originally limited to the fields of papermaking and porcelain, and expand them to various non-governmental industries. We produce a large number of commodities and sell them at high prices through trade. them."

"Their grain sells for three Wen per catty, while we sell a piece of porcelain for thousands of Wen, and a cotton coat for hundreds of Wen. Moreover, there is no influence of the four seasons of the year, and we can continue to produce continuously."

"As the trade continues, our treasury will become richer and richer, the grain in the granary will be more and more full, and the scale of iron smelting will become larger and larger."

"And the price of wine and meat on the dinner table of the common people will become cheaper and cheaper, but they have no idle land in the world, and the farmers are still starving to death."

"It can be said that the food they have grown and the livestock they have raised through their hard work are all for our table."

"This is the real way to enrich the country and strengthen the people."

After hearing Bai Su's words, Sister Zheng's phoenix eyes froze, her red lips parted slightly, and she just felt that there was a door to a new world, which was suddenly pushed open.

She tried to think about it, the scene Bai Su described, what a prosperous world it was.

Food is inexhaustible, treasury money is inexhaustible, and the scale of folk craftsmen will far exceed the combined dynasties of all dynasties. The people in the Central Plains live affluently, the population doubles every year, and there are sufficient sources of soldiers.

In the past, the army of the Central Plains could already be called a powerful country simply by providing fine iron armor, swords, bows and crossbows to thousands of elites.

But today's Great Xia can easily arm with a scale of [-] to [-] elites, and with the development of domestic workshops, this number will continue to rise.

Great Xia can pass this kind of free trade rules to continuously strengthen its own national power.

Compared with this unprecedented prosperous scene, the development potential of Shang Yang's agriculture-oriented route is indeed far inferior.

Chapter 420 VII I Give You A Unique Gift

Sister Zheng's slender fingers tapped on the table lightly.

After pondering for a long time, she couldn't help but said: "This is indeed a good strategy for strengthening the country. With the big granary of the Maurya Dynasty, the Central Plains doesn't have to worry about lack of money and food, but..."

Bai Su was stunned: "Just what?"

Zheng Jie looked at Bai Su with her phoenix eyes, and asked, "It's just such a country with a huge population and vast territory, how do you plan to govern it?"

Since ancient times, it is easy to conquer the world, but it is difficult to defend the world.

Especially for a country with a large population and a vast territory, if it wants to govern in a short period of time, it may be difficult to stabilize the local situation.

After all, Great Xia was able to sweep the six kingdoms today and unify the Central Plains, but the foundation laid by the six generations of Mingjun came first.

It took so long even for her.

Now in this Maurya Dynasty, Bai Su has no foundation.

It is not an easy task for Bai Su to manage such a large territory stably in a short period of time.

Bai Su put down the teacup in his hand, with a smile on his face, he said, "Your Majesty, there is no need to worry. The Maurya Dynasty seems to be a giant, but it is actually just a mass of loose sand, so there is nothing to worry about."

Sister Zheng was taken aback for a moment, and couldn't help but ask, "What do you mean by that?"

Bai Su lightly touched the tea with his fingers, and drew a circle on the table: "My Central Plains has undergone the baptism of the Spring and Autumn and Warring States, from more than 200 vassal states to seven states, and finally to one state."

"Under His Majesty's reform, the original different characters, weights and measures have unified standards, so the Central Plains has formed a whole. Therefore, when you want to govern, you need to be more cautious."

"But this Maurya Dynasty is different. They have more than 600 different dialects and dozens of different scripts. There is almost no connection between the various city-states, and they are even hostile to each other."

"It can be said that apart from the fact that they also believe in Buddhism and kneel down and pray together, there is almost no cohesion."

Sister Zheng's phoenix eyes froze for a moment, and she couldn't help but froze for a moment.

Dozens of characters, more than 600 languages, what a mess.

It's thinner than water.

After all, even if the rites and music of the Central Plains collapsed, it wasn't so chaotic when all the heroes came together.

Bai Su stroked his chin and said, "Therefore, facing the Maurya Dynasty, which is a mess of loose sand, we only need to divide and conquer."

"For example, let some people from the northern city-states become nobles to manage the southern city-states, and let the people from the east manage the west. They always choose to support some minorities and manage the majority."

"Because these people are outsiders, they lack connections and prestige in the local area, they can only choose to cling to Daxia as much as possible, rely on our help to secure their positions, and act as domestic dogs to bite people everywhere for us."

"Even if there are any conflicts in the future, the locals will only hate the city lord, and they don't know about us who are hiding behind the scenes and manipulating the marionette..."

"In the future, if the food grown by local farmers is dedicated to the Central Plains, and there is a famine in the local area, when these people hate the city lord one after another, we only need to abandon that city lord and choose another city lord to support the superior."

"During this period of time, it's a little bit less wool, and then I shouted, the city lord has come, and Goose City will be peaceful, and the city lord has come, and the blue sky will be there."

"When the local people see that their lives have really improved recently, they will kowtow and thank them one after another, thinking that the Bodhisattva who saves the suffering has come."

"In this way, even if we have just arrived and have not established a firm foothold in the local area, we can also use this method of manipulation behind the scenes to establish the Tianzhu Protectorate to manage the local situation."

"After the local situation is almost stable, private schools can be built there, so that their local nobles can start to learn Chinese characters, wear Chinese clothes, go to Xianyang to study abroad, and come back to be proud of being an official there."

"When the language, culture, and clothing of a country are replaced by another country, then this nation is not far from being conquered..."

Sister Zheng looked at Bai Su who was eloquently talking about her plan.

She went from being surprised at the beginning to sighing, and at the end she was stunned for a while.

At this moment, she only has one thought in her mind, can she still play like this?

Originally, according to the past practice of the Central Plains, to lay down a piece of land, if you want to manage it, you must first send hundreds of thousands of troops to level the land, and then migrate the people from the Central Plains to carry out farming and production.

After the establishment of the prefecture and county system, the imperial court will appoint officials and officials to further manage and collect taxes.

It can be said that the way the Central Plains used to open up territory basically lost money in the early stage, and some even lost money for several generations, and I don't know how long it will take to recover the cost.

Therefore, even if the Central Plains has abundant military virtues and the army is very capable of fighting, due to the limited treasury finances, wars often lose money, so the expansion speed is very slow.

A little faster, may lead to excessive oppression of the people, resulting in resentment towards the court, causing various conflicts, and even chaos in the world.

However, according to Bai Su's thinking, as long as he conquered a foreign country, he would soon be able to make money locally. As for the conflicts caused by the local people, they would all be transferred to the city masters of the marionettes.

Da Xia, who is hiding behind the scenes, is not only safe and sound, but can also use free trade to rake in a lot of wool unscrupulously.

This is a knife stab in the ass, which is really an eye-opener.

After pondering for a long time, Sister Zheng couldn't help asking: "Since you have already made a detailed plan, in your opinion, who is more suitable to be the guardian envoy of Tianzhu?"

Bai Su didn't even think about it, and said directly: "Xiongnu Shanyu, Maodun."

Sister Zheng raised her slender eyebrows slightly: "Modun, can she?"

In her impression, Mao Dun is just a barbarian daughter with little culture, far less far-sighted and thoughtful than Bai Su.

Bai Su said with a smile: "Modun once led the Hun tribe and once dominated the entire grassland. She is very good at such things as dividing and conquering, annexing and suppressing. Let her be the guardian of Tianzhu, which is enough to stabilize the local situation."

"As for Bactria, you can let Han Xin personally lead the army and go to station."

"To the Maurya Dynasty, this Bactria is like Hanzhong, the land of Bashu. Its strategic location is dangerous. If you control it, you can open up the Silk Road and completely connect the Tianzhu Protectorate, the Western Regions, the Grassland, and the Central Plains."

"Even if there are people in the Peacock Dynasty who want to resist the Great Xia, facing Han Xin and Mao Dun, there is no chance of winning with a two-line attack from the south to the north."

Sister Zheng nodded lightly: "I believe in your vision. Since you think highly of the two of them, let them go to the local army."

Bai Su looked at Sister Zheng's graceful body so close at hand, couldn't help smiling, and stretched out his hand to stop her slender waist: "Your Majesty, I have worked so hard, how do you plan to reward me?"

Sister Zheng glanced at Bai Su flirtatiously, her red lips slightly curled up: "I have prepared a gift for you, a unique gift in the world."

Bai Su was taken aback for a moment: "Oh, what gift?"

Sister Zheng didn't explain too much, and called Gong'e to give some instructions.

Gong'e stepped back.

Not long after, a sound of footsteps came from outside the door.

Bai Su followed the trend, and saw that Gong'e was holding a pink girl with a bun, biting her finger, walking in.

The girl staggered to Bai Su's side, lying on his lap, slowly raised her head, with a pair of big black eyes, looking at Bai Su blinking and blinking.

Bai Su couldn't help being stunned for a moment, and subconsciously touched the girl's head: "She... who is she?"

I don't know if it was an illusion, but the moment he saw the girl, he only felt his heartbeat speed up inexplicably.

"Bai...Bai...Bai Su, my lord father."

The girl opened her pink mouth and said in a childish voice.

Bai Su froze as if struck by lightning.

What did she call me just now, father... my lord father, is she sister Zheng and my...

Seeing Bai Su's straight gaze, Sister Zheng's face felt a little hot.

Her slender jade hands lifted the blue hair between her eyebrows, pretending to be calm, she rolled her eyes at Bai Su, and couldn't help but said: "Idiot, who else can there be except you, a damned courtier."

Chapter 420: A Three Inch Tongue

Bai Su was stunned for a moment, then pointed at himself blankly: "I... am I a father?"

After he finished speaking, he wished he could slap himself.

What an idiot, before this Western Expedition, Sister Zheng was already pregnant for October.

To go to crusade against the Maurya Dynasty, the distance along the way alone is close to ten thousand miles, and with the delay of the siege along the way, it took almost one or two years to go back and forth.

Now that a child is born, it is natural.

Bai Su stretched out his hand to gently touch the girl's soft hair. Looking at her chubby face, he couldn't help asking nervously, "She...what's her name."

Sister Zheng looked at her cynicism on weekdays, and when she was joking, she used the world as a chessboard and the surrounding countries as pawns, making everyone admire Daliang Zao.

At this time, like a child who is at a loss, the restrained and tense appearance made her feel amused in her heart.

Her slender jade hands raised her black hair, revealing her fair and delicate collarbone, and her charming phoenix eyes gave Bai Su a look, showing the charm of a wife: "Her name is Yinman, which means that there will be a lot of flowers and a safe life."

"Yin Man, it's really a good name."

Bai Su squatted down, looking closely at the girl in front of him.

The girl looked less than one or two years old, she was biting her finger, tilting her head, blinking her big black eyes curiously.

The exquisite facial features are three points similar to his. The long eyelashes and the way the big eyes are turned away are almost the same as those carved by sister Zheng with a mill.

Let people like it how they see it.

It's a pity that the girl seemed to be a little sleepy, and after looking at him for a while, she staggered towards Sister Zheng's arms.

Bai Su looked at Yin Man with his arms around her, his expression softened, his whole body seemed to exude femininity, and he couldn't help but said: "Your Majesty, you really gave me the most precious gift in the world. "