Chapter 231 The Strange Emperor
Lu Shan let out an "ah" and continued to concentrate on playing Go.

He didn't know when the young master planned to attack the capital, so he wanted to retire early.

That old bastard Qingyun always writes letters to show off how happy he is in Taoyuan City. He is not envious! Humph!
In Beizhu County, in a small, dilapidated courtyard.

Qingyun lay on the kang, feeling hopeless about life.

Xu Yuanzhi wrote to him, saying that a rare mineral was found in the county, so he rushed over with Guiyi, but there was no mineral at all, only a group of dirty and smelly Taoist priests.

This group of Taoists were also unlucky. They were captured by Surile and brought to the grassland to make elixirs for him. After the royal court became chaotic, they fled collectively, got lost in the vast grassland, and ended up in Beizhu County, where they settled down.

Xu Yuanzhi and Wang Li were also shocked when they arrived. After learning what had happened, Xu Yuanzhi let himself go and sent a letter to Qingyun, who was planning to enjoy his old age in Taoyuan City, and tricked him into coming here.

The brat was quite eloquent, saying something like, "They are all Taoists. You are older than them anyway, so I feel relieved if you come and take charge of the situation."

In fact, I am just afraid that they will do something like rubbing gunpowder with their hands. He will be confused when he gets old!
Not every Taoist priest can make gunpowder. You are really young and think too much! Be careful not to grow tall!

Qingyun was exhausted from the long journey and had to take over such a mess. He was so angry that he lay down and couldn't get up.

Over the years, he and his disciple Guiyi had been able to go wherever they wanted, and they had been so free. Now, there were more than 60 Taoists thrown at him, how would he deal with it?
It's really worrying!
The more Qingyun thought about it, the more he gritted his teeth. Tomorrow he would write a letter to the young master to complain about that kid and make sure that kid didn't get a ranking. Let's see if he dares to cheat an old man again!

Xu Yuanzhi didn't know that Qingyun was going to tell on him behind his back, so he set up a school in the county and forced everyone, young and old, regardless of gender, to learn how to read. This tortured the old herdsmen terribly.

But the new county magistrate, oh no, it was the new county chief who said that whoever could learn Thousand Character Classic in the shortest time would be able to get 50 more kilograms of sweet potatoes when they were ripe. For the sake of food, everyone in the county fought hard.

When Xu Yuanzhi first came to Beizhu County, he really planned to turn around and leave.

There is not even a single house in the huge county town. Every household lives in tents. There is livestock feces everywhere. If you are not careful, you will step on it. It is so disgusting that people can even vomit overnight meals.

Not to mention the food, is that for human consumption? It's worse than pig food, not even real food. He didn't even eat that kind of stuff when he was in exile.

Fortunately, he brought a lot of supplies. He first used sweet potatoes as wages, recruited people from the county to build dry toilets, and then organized people to build houses to separate people and livestock.

After dealing with these matters, it was time for spring ploughing, and he led the county residents to reclaim wasteland and plant sweet potatoes and potatoes.

For this purpose, he even sent the silver he brought to Taoyuan City to buy a batch of sweet potato and potato seeds, and found the "Sweet Potato Planting Manual".

The result is predictable. There are no more than a handful of people in the entire county who can read, and they all learned it in the past few months from those Taoist priests.

Xu Yuanzhi was so depressed that he didn't sleep much all night. He finally understood why Yu Chaosheng insisted on teaching everyone literacy on the way to escape.

Without literacy, work simply cannot be carried out.

In just half a year, Xu Yuanzhi and Wang Li were forced to become two old farmers.

Wang Li came back from the field carrying a hoe and saw Xu Yuanzhi lying on the ground writing a plan. He went over to take a look.

"Do you want to build a workshop in the county?" He took off the towel hanging around his neck and wiped his face, then asked in surprise.

His originally dark and red face had been tanned, and when he spoke, a mouthful of white teeth was visible. I guess even if Wang Youcai and Liu Guihua came, they wouldn't be able to recognize him.

Xu Yuanzhi bit the pen and sighed deeply.

"We planted so many sweet potatoes, we have to turn them into silver."

"But as far as I know, other counties also grow sweet potatoes. Selling sweet potatoes alone will definitely not be a market, so I thought about setting up a sweet potato flour or potato flour workshop."

Xu Yuanzhi has been losing a lot of hair these days because of the work in the workshop, and his hairline has moved up even at such a young age.

Wang Li sat cross-legged next to him and picked up the half-written plan and read it carefully. "I think the workshop is feasible, but I don't know if it can be successful."

Xu Yuanzhi threw the pen away, turned over, lay on his back, and murmured, "I don't know if it will work, I have to give it a try."

I was full of confidence when I first came here, but when I actually took over, I realized how difficult each step was. Fortunately, other counties were in a similar situation.

He had written to inquire about it. The worst was Jiang Xinran's. He heard that she led everyone to raise pigs, but it turned out that because of the unfamiliar climate or something else, more than half of the piglets died. She cried for many days. Alas, it's not easy for the friends!
It's not easy but you have to do it, after all, you boasted before leaving.

……

……

Capital, West Market.

After paying the banknote, the old man took a deep breath, closed his eyes and grabbed a box.

Under the gaze of everyone, he opened the box, revealing a half-white and half-green glass bracelet.

"Oh! This bracelet is great! Half mountain and half water!"

"Father, do you want to help? I'll give you 200 taels!"

"I'll give you 500 taels! Sell it to me, father-in-law!"

The old man excitedly put the box into his arms, thanked Lumei and hurried away.

He had to quickly pick up his grandson and go to Doctor Lu's residence, hoping to use this bracelet to knock on the door of the Lu family.

After the old man left, everyone's eyes fell back on Wantong.

Wantong selected the rest and unpacked them one by one. They were basically mixed colors, with no pure colors. But he was still very happy because the birthday gift for his father-in-law had been completed.

After opening the blind box, he did not leave, but stayed where he was, waiting to see what his arch-rival would open.

The West Market was bustling with activity until the two large truckloads of blind boxes were sold out.

Honglian and her group got on the carriage and left. Those who had opened the blind boxes had basically become familiar with each other. They gathered in groups of three or four in restaurants or teahouses to appreciate the glass skewers in their hands.

After the people left, the two inconspicuous vendors looked at each other, picked up their goods and quickly left the West Market.

These two were secret guards sent by Xiao Shen to gather information.

With so many big things happening in the capital recently, he naturally had to send people out to investigate, and the result of the investigation was the discovery of "Qin's Glass".

Hearing that the colored glaze skewers came from the northwest, Xiao Shen thought that it was his good niece who came to the capital. After some investigation by the secret guards, he found out that it was a merchant named Qin from Anping County who took over the goods of a caravan from the northwest on the way.

He felt relieved, but when he heard the amount of money earned from the glass beads, Xiao Shen started to think about the merchant named Qin Zhi.

He has earned so much, so lending him some to fill the treasury shouldn't be a problem, right? He doesn't want it all.

The two secret guards who were following came back and reported the Qin family's blind box income today, and Xiao Shen's hands couldn't help but tremble.

so much?
It’s almost as much as a county’s tax revenue!

No, we have to act quickly now that many households in Beijing have suffered thefts. If something is stolen again, the loss will be huge!

Having made up his mind, Xiao Shen sent someone to call the commander of the secret guards and gave him instructions, completely unaware of the stiffness on the commander's face.

Who in the family understands? What emperor would send secret guards to pretend to be bandits to rob merchants of their money?

But life is in the hands of the emperor, who can say "no"?

The only thing to blame is that the Qin family was too high-profile and good at making money, which caught the eye of Your Majesty.

His Majesty has specifically instructed that if the Qin family is not to be alarmed, then it should be not to be alarmed. Once it is alarmed, then the roots must be eradicated.

Bless yourself.