Iron Dynasty

PS: Many readers have reported that the update span is too long, and the snail will try to update it twice in the future.

Li Wei's hand holding the wine glass froze in front of him, and the word court made him a little moved.

Chang'an is the foot of the emperor of the Great Yu Kingdom. It is the ideal of many officials for a lifetime to be able to hold one and a half positions in Chang'an.

That's right, it's the imperial court. Xiao Ming's words became more and more explicit, Now this Honglu Temple minister will step down in three years, and now many officials are rushing to take the position, although Honglu Temple is not a lucrative position. , but it is also the fourth grade of official residence.

Li Wei's expression struggled for a while, and suddenly said: But what does this have to do with the subordinate, this life may stop here.

Not necessarily, if the messenger is willing, there is no problem in recommending a person to the emperor to serve as the minister of Honglu Temple with this king's current status, isn't it? If the messenger is willing to do things for the king, after three years, the king promises to let the messenger serve as Honglu. Lord of the Temple.

Xiao Ming understood the words completely. Li Wei was obviously a person who attached great importance to his official position. He was a Biejia under the command of King Wei, and a fourth-rank official of the imperial court.

Moreover, Xiao Ming did not suffer any loss if the solicitation failed. At most, he could not take advantage of the King of Chu.

Li Wei fell into contemplation. His father used to be a ninth-rank official in the imperial court. His dying wish was that he would one day be a top official, but obviously there is no hope for him under the king of Chu.

As King Qi said, now that he is getting older and older, he can only go home and farm if he waits any longer.

And once he obtains the official position of the minister of Honglu Temple, he can enter the court to discuss matters. What an honor, he said: Your Highness is serious.

really.

Xiao Ming smiled. As he once said, the betrayal did not happen because there were not enough benefits. People live with selfishness, and few people can completely abandon the temptation.

Li Wei continued: There is no basis for the empty words, but please make a letter from Your Highness. If Your Highness repents in the future, even if you die, let the people with lofty ideals in the Great Yu Kingdom know that His Highness is a person who does not believe in his words.

Hearing this, Xiao Ming laughed loudly and said, How difficult is this.

After all, he asked Ziwan to prepare a pen, ink, paper and inkstone, and write down his promise. Then he said to Li Wei: Since it is a promise, it needs two people to sign.

Xiao Ming wrote down his name and handed the pen to Li Wei.

Reaching out his hand to take the brush, Li Wei held the pen on the receipt for a long time, because he understood that once he wrote his name, he would have to wait for King Qi's dispatch in the future.

If he does not obey, King Qi can also use this word to ruin his reputation.

But the humiliation of being sent to Qingzhou and the unfulfilled despair over the years finally made him determined to write his name on the slip.

In the future, your Highness will give you an order, and the lower official should do his best. After Li Wei signed the letter, he got up and saluted.

Xiao Ming waved his hand to let Li Wei sit down. This was the first time Xiao Ming had wooed a minister. Fortunately, he did not expect to succeed. Now he finally understands why the ministers in the court turned to different vassal kings.

These vassal kings with different surnames have been operating in the Great Yu Kingdom for such a long time, and they are naturally better at attracting court officials than him.

The messenger doesn't need to be nervous, this king will not let you do dangerous things, it is only necessary that the messenger can always inform this king about the information of Chu, and if the king of Chu has any tricks in this transaction, please inform the messenger.

Having signed the signature, Li Wei was also very conscious, and he said to Xiao Ming: Xiaguan is only serving as a Lin'an Biejia in the Chu Palace. This Biejia may seem like a big name, but in fact it is just a record of daily affairs for the Lin'an Inspector. But because of this low-ranking official, he has some understanding of some secret things.

Xiao Ming raised his glass and drank wine, waiting for Li Wei's next words.

Today, the king of Chu has 15,000 musketeers in his army, and he has more than 3,000 merchant ships. These 3,000 ships are large merchant ships, excluding medium-sized merchant ships and small merchant ships. If these two are added up, the king of Chu has enough Eight thousand merchant ships, this time the King of Chu and His Highness purchased artillery and did not want to give out a large merchant ship to His Highness. They just wanted to exchange medium-sized merchant ships and small merchant ships with His Royal Highness. The King of Chu did not intend to hand over the real core craftsman to His Highness at all, he just handed it over to His Highness as an ordinary craftsman...

Li Wei told Xiao Ming everything he knew.

Before he went to Qingzhou, the king of Chu explained his bottom line for many negotiations, and he naturally knew all the tricks, but the king of Chu would not have thought that Li Wei would tell the truth now.

In the Great Yu Kingdom, the messenger has always been a very tragic role. The messengers of the barbarians are basically risking death, because the barbarians will be killed if they are unhappy.

At the same time, the vassal kings will also send messengers to each other. If the messenger proposes things that make the other party unhappy, even if they are not beheaded, they will be humiliated.

So when the King of Chu chose him as his messenger, he was completely disappointed with the King of Chu.

Xiao Ming nodded frequently. It was true that the King of Chu wanted to buy artillery, but it was also true that he wanted to recharge it with inferior quality. If he did not buy Li Wei today, it is estimated that this time the King of Chu would have to take advantage of the loopholes.

In addition to the tricks in this trade, Li Wei also talked about the affairs of the King of Chu and the Cao family, and the transaction between the Dutch and the King of Chu.

In general, now the Dutch mainly buy porcelain, silk, tea and other items from the Great Yu Kingdom, while the King of Chu only buys arquebuses from the Dutch.

Moreover, the arquebuses were sold at a price of five hundred taels. A few days ago, the Dutch sold the mirrors to the King of Chu at a high price, causing the King of Chu to lose a lot.

The real reason for the Dutch people's dissatisfaction with the King of Chu this time is that the Dutch people feel that they are at a disadvantage in trade, because the purchase of porcelain, silk and tea has hollowed out the Dutch money. Li Wei concluded.

Xiao Ming nodded. In fact, the problem Li Wei was talking about was the trade deficit. Now the Dutch are obviously aware of this. Long-term trade has made Chu more and more rich, but the king of Chu rarely buys their goods.

The huge trade deficit between Britain and the Qing court made the British eventually import opium into the Qing court. It seems that the Dutch are now mad because of this.

Xiao Ming was very satisfied with the information Li Wei said. He will continue to provide information for three years, and at the same time, he will continue to uncover the traps in this trade, so that he will not be fooled by the King of Chu.

At the end of the meal, Xiao Ming sent Li Wei to the Wei family restaurant to rest. He was thinking about how to get the large merchant ships of the King of Chu and high-quality shipbuilders.

While he was thinking, Xiao Ming was startled by a sudden Boom explosion from the direction of Bowen College.

In order to facilitate the teaching at Bowen College, the Bowen College was only a few streets away from the palace. I don't know what happened with such a huge explosion.