It was more than fifty miles from the post house to Chengdu. Yu Desheng traveled all night and finally returned to Chengdu at dawn.
After crossing the Fu River, we can already see the newly built city wall. In the fields on the outskirts of the city, farmers are already turning over the frozen soil with hoes.
Thanks to Li Bing's construction of Dujiangyan, Chengdu's water conservancy can be called "excellent".
Two rivers pass through Chengdu, and the river water can be used for boating, while the rest is used for irrigation. It not only provides convenient transportation, but also allows the people to enjoy its water conservancy.
The rivers are fertile, the land is fertile, millet, millet, and japonica rice are harvested three to four times a year. There are also mountains and forests, bamboos, vegetables, and fruits...
As Yu Desheng walked, he glanced at the vital scene in the desolation, but his heart became even more desolate.
"The land of Tianfu will fall into the hands of rebels."
He muttered to himself, thinking that if Li Xia regained Chengdu back then, it would not be for the sake of the Song Dynasty.
After passing the North City Gate, he walked towards Guanzipu.
Most of the houses along the way are newly built. Although simple, they are neatly arranged. From time to time, you can still see the marks of knives and axes on certain stone walls and beams.
This city is like a person who has been chopped to pieces, healing bit by bit and slowly regaining its vitality.
Yu Desheng sighed again, walked into Guanzipu, and walked to the backyard.
"Ge Er, go prepare the carriage and evacuate Chengdu immediately and go to Chongqing Mansion."
"yes."
"Secretary Xu, could you please take the people out of Guanzipu, find a place to stay and hide, and wait for the opportunity."
"Mr. Yu, is this? Could it be that Ma Jing lost?"
"Is there anything to eat?" Yu Desheng sat down slowly on the armchair and murmured tiredly: "It's not that I'm defeated, but that I'm dead. After only one round of fighting, I was completely defeated by Li Xia and Zhang Jue.
It’s terrible.”
"Li Xia?"
"Let me eat something first and then tell you in detail..."
Having said this, Yu Desheng moved quickly. After being satisfied with his hunger, he had already explained everything that needed to be explained and dispersed his men as quickly as possible.
He changed his clothes, and there was a dry smell.
The soles of my feet were covered in blisters.
After all, I am a scholar. This is the first time in my life that I have to suffer such hardship. I can only say that it is better than being beheaded like Ma Jing.
Just when I was about to leave this Guanzipu, someone else came from the front.
"Sir, shopkeeper Yu is here."
Although Yu Desheng was impatient, he still met with shopkeeper Yu again.
When they met, Shopkeeper Yu was talking about gold and silver matters.
Although this guanzi shop was only opened before the Chinese New Year, gold and silver guanzi had been circulated among merchants for a long time, and were widely used in Chongqing Prefecture.
In Chengdu, Zhang Jue also believed that gold and silver transactions were indeed better than Huizi, and he only allowed merchants to set up shops and issue shops if they could get money...
"Oh, don't I know what Zhang Jue's idea is? Every day he asks us to pay for building bridges and paving roads, but what he wants in his heart is to follow Xue Tian and Wang Changyi's example, raid Guanzi Pu, and steal our gold and silver.
.”
Yu Desheng smiled and said: "What are you afraid of? He doesn't know who is standing behind you. This store belongs to the imperial court. How can he check it?"
He stood up, patted Shopkeeper Yu on the shoulder, and said: "Even if it is confiscated in the end, it doesn't matter. How many gold and silver ingots are there in your warehouse? The one layer on the outside is not as good as yours in total.
The proprietor, a bowl is worth a lot of money. I have to go to Chongqing for some business, so I'm leaving now."
…
Yu Desheng got on the donkey cart, leaned there and closed his eyes tiredly, thinking about what happened this time.
The gold and silver pass will be an important means to check and balance Li Xia.
Prime Minister Zuo made it very clear that if gold and silver were allowed to circulate in Sichuan and Shu, there would be no need to worry about whether Li Xia would take possession of the gold and silver.
How many pieces of gold and silver are there?
The gold and silver pass itself is a piece of paper, and its essence is the reputation of a businessman.
To put it simply, the essence of Huizi is the monetary reputation of the court. Now that the court's credibility is about to collapse, it is temporarily transferred to the merchants in disguise until the court rebuilds its credibility.
The flow of gold and silver into Sichuan and Shu is essentially to make Sichuan and Shu believe in the credibility of foreign merchants.
In the beginning, a small amount of gold and silver had to be transported to Sichuan.
But it won’t be much, and merchants are not stupid. There are many ways for merchants to build a reputation of a hundred or two thousand taels with only one tael of silver.
Even this small amount of gold and silver is dead in itself. Even if Li Xia robs it, he still has to use it as money to buy things needed for rebellion and people's livelihood all over the world.
Food, clothing, ironware, medicinal materials.
Circulation and trading are beneficial to Sichuan, Shu and other parts of the world.
That would be equivalent to letting Sichuan and Sichuan share the blame for the current soaring prices in various places, like pouring a basin of cold water into a boiling pot.
And the blazing fire under the pot is the powerful and powerful people of the Song Dynasty. This is the cause of the disaster. It is the leftist prime minister who is going to use the public land law to solve the problem. Let’s not think about it for the moment...
Even if Li Xia wants to scrape out real money, he will face the cunning shopkeepers under the hands of giant businessmen.
He couldn't even find where those giant businessmen were. It was impossible to find them, because behind the giant businessmen were countless entangled interests, and they were all the scholar-bureaucrats in the world.
With money, buy land, hire farmers, provide for your children to study and become officials, and support higher dignitaries...
In this entire structure of intertwined interests, the biggest beneficiaries all stand above the temple of the Lin'an court, and they stand higher than the temple!
How could Li Xia find them? He could only fight with those extremely cunning little shopkeepers in a battle of wits and courage, and the battle made all the businessmen in the world hate Li Xia.
Even if all the Guanzipu establishments in Sichuan and Sichuan were closed down, what would it mean to get a few million dollars?
The nobles in the south of the Yangtze River showered their concubines with basins made of pure gold, and sent boxes of gifts that were authentic calligraphy and paintings by sages.
As long as the gold and silver gates are allowed to flow into Shu, Shu and the imperial court will blend together like cold water and boiling water. Who can separate them?
And if Li Xia does not allow the Jinyin Pass to enter Shu, Sichuan and Shu, the poorest place, will be trapped if trade is blocked. The people will not have enough material and material resources, and there is no way they can even hope to compete with the imperial court...
Yu Desheng carefully sorted out this idea in his mind and felt relieved.
Ma Qian and his son, tiger father and dog son, Ma Jing was incompetent and failed to kill Li Xia with force.
Fortunately, the left prime minister is far-sighted and can plan to kill people with money...
~~
Sudden.
A loud shout came from the west side of the long street.
Yu Desheng opened the curtain and looked around, only to see a group of soldiers rushing towards Guanzipu.
"I was ordered by the government to track down the rebels! Seal this situation for me!"
"What is the purpose of this? Our shopkeeper just donated money to build the city wall a few years ago..."
"Covering the rebels, the evidence is conclusive, seal it! Starting today, gold and silver passes will be banned in Sichuan and Shu!"
"..."
Yu Desheng shook his hand and quickly lowered the car curtain.
Counting the time, Li Xia and Zhang Jue were still clearing the battlefield at the post house last night, but they were able to send people to seal Guanzipu only at noon today. How much insight does this have?
There was cold sweat on his forehead. Yu Desheng raised his hand to wipe it off and anxiously urged the coachman to move quickly.
After finally getting out of the city gate, he looked back at Chengdu City again, secretly thinking that he would never dare to come here in person next time...
~~
The twelfth day of the first lunar month.
"Zhang Jue, you are a bitch! Grandpa fucked you! When you asked for money, you said we were brothers, but you turned against each other and refused to recognize each other. You are so shameless! You damn... ugh... don't kill me... please don't
kill me……"
There was a loud shouting and cursing in the Chengdu government office, and then it turned into crying and begging for mercy.
In the end, Zhang Jue did not kill shopkeeper Yu of Guanzipu, but sent him to a prisoner camp to reclaim wasteland.
Of course, even if the captives grew food, all of it would be transferred to Changpingcang for use in military rations and relief for refugees.
After dealing with this matter, Zhang Juefang turned to look at Li Xia who was sitting at the top and said: "The 'asking for money' he said was because I asked him to donate three thousand to repair the city."
"I know."
Li Xia has walked around the city today. Zhang Jue has governed Chengdu for two years, and the results have actually exceeded his expectations. There are indeed many places to spend money.
"The man named Yu just now has been building a shipping company in central Sichuan since last year. He owns one out of every four merchant ships on the Minjiang River." Zhang Jue sighed and said, "You want me to seal him up. This year, I will pay the business tax."
Where to conquer?"
"You think of a way."
"Chengdu is barren. Without these foreign business travelers, what else can I think of?" Zhang Jue rubbed his forehead and said: "Leave aside the lack of supplies. If foreign refugees want to enter Shu, the best way is to come with the business travelers.
, merchant ships on the Yangtze River are almost the only way from Jinghu to Sichuan."
"It's not that I won't let you develop business travel." Li Xia said: "Business travel must be revitalized, but you can't use Chu coins from the Song Dynasty."
He stood up, walked over to the pile of confiscated items, looked at them, picked up a ten-guan denomination gold and silver pass, took a look at it, and then threw it aside.
"Sooner or later, this thing will turn into waste paper again."
"Why?"
"I am more and more certain that this was caused by Jia Sidao. Jia Sidao represents the imperial court. Unless the problem of the imperial court's inability to make ends meet is solved, its Chu coins will always be used to plunder the common people."
Zhang Jue said: "It is said that merchants use it for circulation..."
"Fake, a deception to calm people's minds."
Li Xia shook his head and said: "Let's put it this way, the total denomination of the Guanzi here is about one million guan, but after you count the gold, silver and copper coins that shopkeeper Yu brought, if there are 100,000 guan
, consider me losing.”
"So far, there has never been a time when he couldn't exchange it. Moreover, he can also go to Chongqing to transport gold and silver to exchange it."
"Maybe for the time being, this is the capital he paid." Li Xia said: "When we go to Chongqing and do the counting again, will he want to go to Ezhou again? This is a liar, bringing one hundred thousand yuan to defraud you of one hundred thousand yuan.
Thousands of supplies."
"His boss is really rich..."
"The richer you are, the more you can cheat. The richer you are, the more you can cheat."
Zhang Jue still doesn’t quite understand.
Li Xia glanced at him and really didn't know how to explain these monetary theories to this general.
"As long as Brother Jun Yu knows that this thing is just like Huizi, it is a great disaster and one of the reasons why the Song Dynasty will surely perish."
"Definitely destroyed?"
"There is a serious imbalance between the revenue and expenditure of the national treasury, but it cannot collect taxes from the rich and powerful, so it has to desperately issue Chu coins to plunder the common people. The monetary system is extremely disordered, and the economy collapses... Coupled with the fact that the rapists are eyeing it, they will surely perish."
In the past, Li Xia only knew that the Song Dynasty was about to fall, but he knew the consequences but could not explain the reasons.
But after experiencing countless turmoils, he was no longer as ignorant as when he first came, and could already point out the reasons for the demise of the Song Dynasty in one sentence.
The Song Dynasty's suspicion of the generals was the reason why he wanted to rebel. And the gold and silver gate in front of him was the reason why the Song Dynasty itself was about to perish.
Speaking of this, Li Xia really admires people like Jia Sidao.
It has reached this point. Other smart people who can see the situation clearly want to slow down the situation, surrender to Mongolia, survive until the Song Dynasty is overthrown, or rebel.
Jia Sidao still wanted to rescue Song Ting at once.
mad.
conceited.
…
Zhang Jue heard this theory of "must die", but this time he just nodded and asked: "Then what should we do?"
"Originally, what I thought was 'accumulate grain widely and slowly become king', but Sichuan and Shu are too barren and their development is too slow. They need trade. If traders use Chu coins from the Song Dynasty, they will be plundered by the Song Dynasty. Then
The original strategy of "slowly proclaiming the king" will no longer work. We must have our own Chu coins. I need the right to mint coins. This is the power of the princes. Therefore, I need to build a palace and be crowned the king...or be crowned the king.