Rebirth of the Four Seas Emperor

The Baoan County headquarters of "Mingzun Liulifang" officially opened, marking that Hou Yao's industrial planning is officially on track.

The miraculous scene that happened in Hai County that day was perfectly replicated in Bao'an County, and it was even more sensational than the previous one.

Hou Yao also arranged a light and shadow show on the day of the opening.

I saw a Taoist figure standing in the sky holding a glazed jade purification bottle. With a wave of the willow branch in his hand, he lifted the curtain of the "Mingzun Liulifang".

For a time, the golden "Mingzun Liulifang" appeared in front of the world, like a miracle built by an immortal.

The reason why we have to go to great lengths to arrange such a big show is, on the one hand, to introduce the science of light and shadow to a few core students;

On the other hand, it is also to more thoroughly deter the gangsters in the county.

Nowadays, the people are not enlightened, and using such mysterious and mysterious things can make most ordinary people lose the courage to fight against themselves.

As long as he keeps his secret, no one in Baoan County can encourage people to confront him head-on.

As long as there is no civil unrest, his position will be as stable as Mount Tai.

Following "Mingzun Liulifang", "Mingzun Zuixianjiu" is also officially launched.

Mingzun Zuixianjiu is known as "a bowl of drunken immortal wine for three days". As soon as it was launched, it became the favorite of gentry and nobles.

The minimum is 56 degrees and the maximum is 68 degrees, far exceeding all the good wines of this era.

There are also many varieties. Guangdong is already rich in fruits, especially lychees, which are large and fleshy and are most suitable for wine making.

'Mingzun Lychee Fairy Wine' is the signature wine of 'Mingzun Zuixianjiu'.

The supply exceeds the demand every day, and the major restaurants and brothels in Nantou City can't do business if they put a few bottles of "Mingzun Zuixianjiu" on display.

With the full development of these two industries, Baoan County's reputation spread to surrounding provinces in a short period of time.

In less than a month, an overwhelming number of merchants came to Nantou City.

For this situation, Hou Yao has already had a plan to deal with it.

The opium dens and casinos in the city that were previously cleared have long been transformed into inns of various grades.

The officers of the Yamen have also received special emergency training, and the security maintenance is also in good order.

A high sign was also erected at the city gate, and the conditions required for doing business in Baoan County and the corresponding procedures were clearly written.

Since the industry of "Mingzun Zuixian Liquor" is under the name of the county government, if you want to order this kind of wine, you have to go to the government office for approval.

For this purpose, a government affairs office area has been specially established to facilitate businessmen to come for consultation.

With the income from "Mingzun Zuixianjiu", the Baoan County Yamen suddenly became much richer.

Hou Yao re-set the salary for everyone, and the lowest-status slaves all have an income of one tael of silver per month.

And the highest-status Kuaishou, also known as the catcher,

Depending on the level, the lowest income is [-] taels of silver, and the highest salary can reach astronomical [-] taels per month.

Giving these servants such a high salary naturally raises their requirements. The first point is that eating, taking, getting stuck, and asking for food are prohibited.

You must know that in this era, although the servants in the yamen were all lowly servants, the actual power in their hands was not small at all.

The common people are afraid of the government, and the reason why they are unwilling to report to the government is largely because they are deceived by these petty officials.

Hou Yao achieved the goal of controlling the entire government administration by controlling the money bags of these petty officials.

This is one of the reasons why he is willing to put the high-quality liquor industry under the name of the Yamen.

Another reason is that he can take advantage of the opportunity to collect grain in the name of brewing wine.

If the winery is in his own name, there may be many people paying attention to this industry, and even more people will have wrong ideas.

But in the name of the government, those who want to make this idea have to think carefully.

What's more, since it was in the name of the yamen, it would be fair for him to use the money to bribe his superiors.

No, this is no longer considered bribery, but should be called surrender.

After entering March, Baoan County changed almost every day and developed at an extremely fast speed.

The area within the county seat alone is far from enough room for development, and various simple sheds have been erected around the city walls to conduct various businesses.

Although the development of Bao'an County is already booming, the big bosses from all parties have not made any move for a while due to the distance.

It was fine if others didn't move, but there was one big boss who couldn't sit still.

……

Li Kangsheng saw Nantou City becoming more and more prosperous day by day, and his heart felt like a cat scratching a dog. He also wanted to make money.

Even though he runs the Huangtian Salt Farm, with so many people under his command having to eat, drink, and defecate, he cannot make ends meet with just this income.

At the beginning of the founding of the Xia Dynasty, the imperial court established Pengcheng Ganhusuo City to fight against Japanese pirates invading the coast of Guangdong.

However, since the rise of Wang Zhi, Japanese pirates have mainly wandered around Jiangsu and Zhejiang, and rarely visited Guangdong.

Therefore, for a long time, Pengcheng's main residence was in a state of dilapidation, with only a few veteran guards decorating the facade.

It was not until Li Kangsheng took over as the chief executive of the Pengcheng Household Office more than 30 years ago that this situation changed.

The full number of soldiers in Pengcheng Ganhusuo City is more than 100 people, but the actual military salary issued by the imperial court is only enough for 100 people.

Therefore, if Li Kangsheng wanted to support his full troop quota, he had to find ways to make money on his own.

The population of Baoan County more than 30 years ago was far less than it is today.

Private salt is not as rampant as it is now. This trend of private salt was actually brought about by Li Kangsheng.

Li Kangsheng, who was in his early twenties, made many military exploits in Nanhai Guard and made outstanding achievements. He rose from a small soldier to the commander of Nanhai Guard, Si Zhenfu.

It can be called a legend. Such a person is also Ma Wenwen's nephew, and the emperor cannot ignore his existence.

The key is that Li Kangsheng's father was just a commoner and complied with the royal marriage principles, so he sent people to find Ma Wenwen, hoping to get married.

For the Li family to be able to become a member of the imperial family, that is an extremely high achievement.

Ma Wenwen was naturally very happy, so the two hit it off and planned to transfer him back to the Five Cities Military and Horse Department of the capital.

Unexpectedly, after the transfer order was sent to the South China Sea, Li Kangsheng actually resisted the order.

It turned out that he knew in advance that his uncle and the emperor wanted him to marry the princess.

At that time, he already had a childhood sweetheart, and the two of them were inseparable. They were still young and frivolous, and they didn't care about the consequences.

This angered the emperor, so he changed the order and asked him to serve as a cadre in Pengcheng.

In name, he was promoted to a level, but in reality he was assigned.

Li Kangsheng took a group of his old brothers to take office, and when they arrived at the dry house in Pengcheng, they were forced to start a private salt business.

If this was the only thing, Li Kangsheng might still have a chance to turn around.

But what happened later was beyond everyone's expectation. The princess who was proposed to be married by the emperor had her engagement annulled due to dissatisfaction.

With the help of a prince, he sneaked out of the palace and ran all the way to Pengcheng to curse Li Kangsheng.

Li Kangsheng looked confused. At that time, he had a quarrel with his childhood sweetheart, and their relationship was in crisis.

And the princess, who was like a fairy transformed into a human being, suddenly appeared in front of him, and the curse immediately entered his heart.

Li Kangsheng regretted his mistake, so he tried his best to please the princess in an attempt to redeem the marriage, so he took the princess around to relieve her resentment.

However, when the two of them visited Nanhai Mansion, they met a talented young scholar, and the princess was extremely attracted to the scholar.

She actually asked the three of them to travel together, but Li Kangsheng couldn't resist the princess' wishes and had to agree.

No one expected that this partnership would lead to trouble. The princess insisted on visiting Yazhou, the scholar’s ​​hometown.

As a result, on the night when the three of them arrived in Hai County, Yazhou, a group of pirates attacked the city and took away the scholar and the princess.

Although Li Kangsheng had the skills and fought hard, he lost the princess and his future was ruined with no possibility of recovery.

The princess left the palace secretly and was captured by pirates. It was impossible for such a royal scandal to spread.

Therefore, the outside world spread rumors that he could not be promoted because he had an uncle who was the chief assistant.

In fact, if he didn't have an uncle who was the chief assistant, the emperor would have found countless excuses to kill him.

This shows how ridiculous the rumors in this world are, completely confusing right and wrong.

After Li Kangsheng's future was ruined, he focused exclusively on making money.

But he has no business ability and can only make money in the simplest and crudest way, which is to expand the production capacity of private salt.

Because he was afraid that he would be targeted by the emperor if he did it too hard, he recruited a large number of high-ranking people to do it together.

These include the former crown prince and several princes.

Such large-scale and unrestrained selling of private salt seriously affected the court's salt tax revenue.

The final result was that it directly led to the great purge 16 years ago.

The imperial court directly sent an army to purge all private salt forces in Bao'an County.

There are rumors that the imperial army was defeated by pirates.

In fact, the real situation is that the imperial court used the name of pirates to uproot the influence of the former prince and several princes.

During this turmoil, Li Kangsheng had already stopped working half a year before the purge because he got wind of it in advance.

So in the end he escaped safely.

In the past decade or so, the scale of illegal salt sales in Baoan County has become even greater than before the purge.

However, because the impact on the court's salt tax was small, the court turned a blind eye.

The scale expanded, but the impact on the court's salt tax was smaller. One person must be mentioned here, Liang Yongzhen.

16 years ago, after the Great Purge, all other salt factories were closed, but Li Kangsheng's salt factory resumed production.

Although the salt was produced, it had just been cleaned and the sales channels were destroyed.

Just when he was having a headache about how to sell it, Liang Yongzhen found him.

After buying all his goods, Li Kangsheng didn't know where to sell them.

But since then, Liang Yongzhen has become the only channel for all illegal salt sales in Baoan County.

However, in recent years, the scale of private salt production in Baoan County has become too large.

Liang Yongzhen struggled to sell, causing the price of salt to fall again and again.

Li Kangsheng's income thus shrank significantly.

He couldn't give in, but he couldn't force Liang Yongzhen, so he could only use other ideas to make up for it.

Collecting protection fees was a clever idea that he came up with on the fly, but unfortunately he couldn't collect much money.

Now that he sees Hou Yao's business growing rapidly, Li Kangsheng cannot help but want to get a piece of the pie.

"Zhu Liang'ao, did you send someone to meet Hou Yao when I asked you to do so?"

"Sent, but Hou Yao kept saying that he was unavailable and asked us to wait."

"Damn it, this Hou Yao, if he doesn't see Qian's face, I will chop him to death."

At this moment, a soldier broke in:

"Reporting to Sir Qianhu, Hou Zhixian replied that he will be waiting for you at Sihai Class in two days...".