Steel Dynasty - Chapter 582

[Chapter 582 The power of capital]

“It’s not that the secret guards are powerful, but that King Wei is too stupid. He only knows how to protect the interests of the wealthy families, but forgets that there are more ordinary people than wealthy families in the world.”

Sitting in the government office, Li San took a sip of tea.

He was really exhausted these days. According to Xiao Ming’s request, they organized a grievance meeting in the village, allowing the people who were oppressed by the wealthy families to come to the stage to complain, and then ended by scolding the King of Wei and the wealthy families.

In addition to the grievance meetings, there are also propaganda slogans in each village. The content of these slogans is naturally to support the King of Qi and eliminate the King of Wei.

At the same time, they are also cooperating with the government to establish local militia organizations to unite people’s hearts.

Of course, no matter how much you talk, it is not as useful as actual actions. Distributing land into the hands of the people is the key to making people let down their guard.

The combination of all these methods finally won the support of the people in the four states, and many young and middle-aged people enthusiastically joined the army.

Ye Qingyun smiled. The Secret Guards had always been very mysterious, and he was afraid of Li San because he felt that he must also be stared at by Li San.

After hesitating, he asked: “Where are you going next?”

“Jinling City!” Li San did not hesitate, he said: “To capture the thief, capture the king first. If you can assassinate the King of Wei, it will be easier to capture the city, right? “Assassination!

“

Ye Qingyun was startled, “Aren’t you afraid that this matter will be leaked to me?”

“If the governor leaks it, I will know it immediately.” Li San smiled slightly.

Ye Qingyun trembled all over, and this confirmed his suspicion. At this time, he was more and more in awe of Xiao Ming, because in his opinion, King Qi was really elusive.

How did he establish an organization like the Secret Guard?

But this was not a question he should think about. After chatting with Li San for a while, he left the government office and went to work on recruiting new soldiers.

Yangzhou City is a large city with a population of 600,000. Because they arrived in time, after the massacre, there were still more than 400,000 people remaining in the city. Adding the population of nearby prefectures and counties, the population of Yangzhou City is very considerable. Basically, Around 700,000.

Recruiting soldiers with such a surplus population is naturally not a problem, and now Qingzhou has given orders to recruit 30,000 new soldiers from Yangzhou and Tongzhou. In half a year, he needs to lead the army to cooperate with the Southern Expedition to completely capture Wei.

…

Qingzhou.

Amid the heated propaganda in the four states, war bonds began to be issued by the Qingzhou Chamber of Commerce. In conjunction with the issuance of war bonds, Qingzhou Daily comprehensively explained what war bonds were.

When the people and merchants learned that the war bonds were issued by Xiao Ming, the Qingzhou Chamber of Commerce was blocked by the people for a while.

With grain and money, the people exchanged it for war bonds in the chamber of commerce to support the war effort.

Merchants were more interested in war bonds than the common people, and they spent money to buy them. At the same time, the dignitaries who came to Qingzhou from Chang’an did not miss this opportunity.

Taking their property, they exchanged their gold and silver for a few chapters of thin paper, which were bonds issued by the Chamber of Commerce.

Xiao Ming did not expect such a hot scene, but the people and merchants were so active, which is enough to show his current status in the hearts of the people. As for the merchants, who had tasted the benefits of the Northern Expedition, they naturally did not want to miss the opportunity.

The only thing that made them regretful was that this time Xiao Ming set a limit and they could not purchase more than 10,000 taels of war bonds.

The Chamber of Commerce was blocked, and Xiao Ming’s palace was bustling with traffic. After the war bonds were issued, Cao Zhengyang and other wealthy businessmen came to the palace to discuss the war bonds.

“Your Highness, Your Highness did not set a limit on the Northern Expedition last time, why should we set a limit this time? And these ten thousand taels are really a little less.” Cao Zhengyang said.

Ding Wu also echoed: “Your Highness, please believe in our loyalty to the feudal country. We hope that Your Highness can win consecutive battles and expand our territory.”

“Yes, Your Highness, we are all Qingzhou people now, and we have no different intentions.”

” …”

The merchants were all talking, and the main hall was noisy.

Xiao Ming sat in the main seat and remained calm, but drank tea and listened to the complaints of these merchants. After everyone finished speaking, he said: “Everyone, setting restrictions is not because I don’t trust you, but because this time The amount of war bonds issued is limited, so we can’t let all of you go.”

After a pause, Xiao Ming said: “And I don’t want too much silver and silver notes for this war bond, which will not be of much use to me. , Do you understand now?”

Cao Zhengyang, Ding Wu and others looked at each other, and they immediately understood that this time the people were exchanging food, cloth and other materials for bonds. After all, the people did not like money and liked to use money. Replace it with supplies.

But these merchants had a lot of silver in their hands, and the 50,000 taels of bonds were purchased in the form of silver and silver notes.

“Does His Highness mean that as long as we exchange supplies, we don’t have to worry about this restriction?” Cao Zhengyang asked tentatively.

“Of course not. I can consider raising the upper limit to 300,000 taels.” Xiao Ming said with a smile. This restriction is actually a trap to allow merchants to find ways to obtain various materials from outside the feudal country.

His power alone is limited, but the combined energy of so many merchants in Qingzhou is great. After all, they have connections in other places. If they take action, they will save him a lot of trouble.

“Three hundred thousand taels.” Ding Wu repeated. This limit was acceptable. He asked, “What supplies does Your Highness need?”

“Iron ore, saltpeter, sulfur, cloth, horses.” Xiao Ming said, these He is in short supply of everything. After expanding his army, he needs more steel, gunpowder, military uniforms, and war horses.

Cao Zhengyang frowned when he heard this, “Your Highness, these supplies are in short supply now and are difficult to find.”

“If it was easy to do, why would I tell you about this matter? However, I, the Iron Mine King, can remind you that there are many iron ore mines in King Yong’s seal. You can go there to buy mines and mine them.” Xiao Ming Said that he must now mobilize the power of capital to reserve supplies for the war.

A group of businessmen looked at me and I looked at you, but when they thought of the huge returns, they couldn’t resist the temptation and agreed to it one after another.

“Your Highness, in that case, we will prepare these supplies for Your Highness. There are 20,000 war horses on the Cao Min’s horse farm, and a batch of fifteen taels of war horses is exactly 300,000 taels.” Cao Zhengyang glanced at the others with pride.

“Twenty thousand war horses!” Xiao Ming was also shocked. Cao Zhengyang had only taken over this pasture for a year.

However, after thinking for a moment, he understood that Cao Zhengyang must be involved in some smuggling business from the grassland, otherwise there would not be so many horses.

But now he is too lazy to care about this matter. Sometimes capital and politics are contradictory. While they are wary of each other, they also need each other.

(End of chapter)