Chen Xiaomu smiled and said, "I wonder why Prime Minister Wei said this?"
Wei Wen said: "The people of Zheng State have so far used copper coins, supplemented by a small amount of silver to circulate in the market. These two coins are heavy in the hand and feel at ease in the heart. Now you want to use one with numbers printed on it. Instead of paper money, let me ask Captain Chen to give you the choice, which one would you choose?"
Chen Xiaomu waved the banknote in his hand and said with a smile: "Prime Minister Wei, isn't this banknote also a piece of paper? And the amount on it is much larger than my Zheng Wenke!"
"Can this be the same?" Wei Wen's eyes widened and he lost his voice: "As soon as you get this banknote in your hand, you can go to the box office and exchange it for an equal amount of cash. Besides, the people who can use this banknote are not officials. Even those wealthy people and ordinary people may have never seen what this banknote looks like in their entire lives!"
"Isn't it settled?" Chen Xiaomu shrugged and said: "As soon as Zheng Wen is listed on the market, we can also set up exchange points across the country to facilitate some people who are not used to using banknotes to exchange the same amount according to Zheng Wen's denomination at any time. In the long run, when people have formed a habit of using Zheng Wen, who would still want to put away Zheng Wen, which is convenient for checkout, light and easy to carry around, and will not wear out clothes. Instead, he has to carry a heavy string of copper coins on his body. It’s heavy and unsafe to go out on the street, and when I’m shopping, I have to count them one by one for a long time before I can settle the bill!”
Wei Wen was still unconvinced and said: "I wonder if Captain Chen has ever thought about how many more manpower would be needed to set up so many exchange points throughout the country of Zheng. This would be a heavy burden for the imperial court!"
Chen Xiaomu felt funny and said: "Prime Minister Wei, our Zheng State has eleven prefectures and thirty eight counties. From each prefecture and county, two people can serve as money exchangers. Additional people need to be sent there!"
Wei Wen thought about it, this was also a way, but he suddenly remembered that Chen Xiaomu had just said that he would promote Zheng Wen abroad. He didn't know what method he would use. When he was interested, he jokingly said: "Chen Duwei, You just said you wanted to promote Zheng Wen abroad, wouldn't you also use the government's promotion method?"
Unexpectedly, Chen Xiaomu nodded and said seriously: "Well, not only do I want their government to come forward to promote the Zheng Wen of the Zheng State, but I also want their emperor to personally come out and exchange real gold and silver for the Zheng Wen of the Zheng State.
Wei Wen was shocked and said: "Oh, Captain Chen, you really dare to say anything!"
At this time, even Su Xingran couldn't help teasing him: "Husband, if you can talk about such crazy things now, waiting until tomorrow morning will be the crime of deceiving you!"
Chen Xiaomu raised his face to Su Xingran and said with a smile: "Wife, I will never admit the crime of deceiving the emperor you mentioned. If others lie to you, it is the crime of deceiving the emperor. If I lie to you, the most I can do is to cheat on my wife. It’s a good crime!”
Su Xingran glared at him and said with a straight face, "Okay, according to what you said, the crime of cheating on my wife will be punished by at least fifty hard punishments!"
Chen Xiaomu subconsciously covered his butt with his hands and shouted: "Wife, what you are doing is punishing me, it is simply murdering your husband. Look at my weak body, I estimate that I can die with only twenty boards at most! Besides, I lied to you. Now? You're going to hit me!"
Wei Wen lowered his head and closed his eyes silently, thinking to himself: "How come these two of you talk about state affairs like they are flirting!"
Su Xingran still had a pretty face and said angrily: "You just lied to me, how dare you say you didn't lie to me?"
Chen Xiaomu argued: "Everything I said is true, so did I lie to you?"
Su Xingran looked at Chen Xiaomu with a half-smile but said, "Okay, then tell me how to get the emperors of other countries to use real money and silver to buy your Zheng Wen notes!"
"Of course I'm selling them explosives, and I only accept Zheng Wen. Are you still worried that they won't use real money in exchange for us Zheng Wen?"
"Ah!" Wei Wen suddenly opened his eyes when he heard the sound, and said in shock: "Captain Chen, you actually want to sell Zheng Guo's foundation of national defense, explosives!"
Chen Xiaomu smiled slightly, "Why not? As far as I know, the Qin State, Qi State and other countries are now spending their money to develop explosives. Instead of waiting for them to come up with it, it is better for me to sell them ready-made explosives. This will not only help For a large sum of money, it can also slow down the time for them to make explosives themselves!"
"But if they turn around and attack us with explosives, wouldn't it be easy!" Su Xingran's face was as heavy as water at this time.
Chen Xiaomu shook his head, "Absolutely not. As long as we sell explosives to more than two countries at the same time, then they will worry about the other country getting the formula of explosives from us, and they will definitely stare at each other. Every move of the other side is for fear that the balance of power between the two countries will be broken by the other country. Once one side acts rashly, the other side will definitely attack it desperately!"
Wei Wen said: "If they join forces to deal with our Zheng country, it won't be troublesome!"
Chen Xiaomu smiled and said: "Prime Minister Wei, you are overthinking it. Today's Qin and Qi, including Jin and Wu, the smallest of these countries have an area of 300 cities, while our Zheng State only has three hundred cities." More than ten cities are worthless to them, tasteless to eat, and a pity to abandon. If they can really join forces, then we only need to secretly send people to contact one of them and promise to join forces with us. After the war, we will share the formula of explosives with them. I don’t believe they can let go of hundreds or even thousands of cities. Instead, they come to seize Zheng’s land of more than 30 cities, and at the same time eliminate a potential future A powerful opponent!"
Su Xingran raised her eyebrows, stared at Chen Xiaomu and asked, "Then what will we do in the future? Whoever gets this explosive formula will immediately launch a war to unify the world!"
Chen Xiaomu chuckled and said humorously: "My dear wife, do you think you will be invincible if you get this explosive formula? To tell you the truth, just like our current method of using explosives, except for ambushes, under normal circumstances, even the north Neither the Mongolian nor the Jin cavalry can defeat them, and at most they will only kill a few more enemies!"
"Oh!" Su Xingran said in surprise after hearing this: "Didn't you use explosives to defeat the Chu army, which included tens of thousands of Chu's most elite black-armored cavalry? Could it be that the Chu's black-armored cavalry were not as powerful as Ordinary cavalry from Mongolia and Jin?”
Chen Xiaomu smiled and said: "Honey, you can ask Zhang Jian and Li Gui. I led them in almost all raids and ambush battles. I didn't dare to fight head-on with the Chu army's cavalry and chariots. You know Why? That’s because the explosive packets I sent out with the trebuchet can only hit fifty or sixty feet, which is far lower than the distance of a cavalry charge. In addition, the cavalry charge is too fast, and it is too fast. The skirmishers are linear and cannot be hit at all. They are not as dense as the infantry charge, and the speed is slow. It is easy to hit! Maybe before you can throw out the explosive pack, your own soldiers will be consumed by the opponent's cavalry. It’s all gone!”
After hearing that the explosive packs could not deal with cavalry and chariot soldiers, Su Xingran and Wei Wen were disappointed, with a look of despair on their faces. Chen Xiaomu saw this and said with a smile: "Honey, you don't have to worry too much. As the saying goes, where there is a spear, there is a shield. Recently, I designed a weapon called a machine gun. Using it to deal with cavalry is as clean as using a sickle to cut wheat. After finishing it in the past few days, I will immediately bring it over to demonstrate to you. In addition, I also mentioned that I did it last night The grenade used in Sanqingguan can shoot the explosive two to three hundred feet away at once, but it can blow up the cavalry before they launch a charge. I will improve the explosive formula next. Work hard to improve its explosive power, and then use the old formula of explosives to obtain real money for Zheng Guo!"
I had seen Chen Xiaomu use a grenade in Sanqing last night. A small and short iron barrel looked inconspicuous, but the sound it made was earth-shattering. A person could lift it with only one hand. Even if he could hold it in his hand and run around without difficulty, Su Xingran immediately felt relaxed after hearing this. His face could not hide the joy in his heart, and he said with a smile: "Husband, how much money do you need to set up the weapons department as soon as possible? You make a budget, and the court will give you the money even if it means selling iron!"
Chen Xiaomu waved his hand and said with a smile: "Haha, that's not necessary. I have made dozens of samples of down jackets in the past two days. I can make hundreds of thousands of taels of silver just by selling them!" "
"What is a down jacket? It's worth so much money!" Su Xingran wondered. Wei Wen, Su Xingchen and Su Xingyu in the room, not even the young eunuch, had ever heard of this new term, so they all looked at Chen Xiaomu with curious eyes, waiting for his answer.
Chen Xiaomu looked around at the people in the room and said: "Down jackets are a kind of warm clothing, just like the fur coats you are wearing today. However, down jackets are only about 10% as heavy as fur clothes, but they are much warmer than clothes made of fur! "
Su Xingran asked curiously: "Husband, can you really make this kind of clothes? What is it made of? How much silver does one piece cost?"
Chen Xiaomu said: "I plan to use high-quality silk as the outer fabric of the down jacket, use linen as the lining on the inside, and fill it with down in the middle. The initial selling price will be more expensive than high-quality fur clothes. When the production increases in the future, the price will increase." It came down naturally!”
"Okay." Su Xingran smiled sweetly and said: "Husband, after you finish it, do you know who should give the first down jacket to you?"
Chen Xiaomu cupped his hands in front of Su Xingran and said respectfully: "Of course I will give this humble post to His Majesty the Emperor first!"
Su Xingran said with satisfaction: "Well, that's pretty much it!"
Before Su Xingran was overjoyed, Chen Xiaomu unexpectedly proposed something shocking, which was tax exemption and tax reduction. He actually wanted to tax all the farmers in Zheng State, such as poll tax, land tax, and field rent. , all were cancelled, and even commercial taxes were halved except for the salt tax. He also gave two reasons for this. The first reason was that due to the continuous wars for years, the people needed to recuperate. The second reason It is Su Xingran who will ascend the throne as the new emperor of Zheng State tomorrow morning. He must win over the people of Zheng State and let the people feel that they have a bright future with this new emperor, so that they can unite to fight against foreign enemies!
As soon as Chen Xiaomu said these words, if he hadn't helped Zheng Guo recover, Su Xingran, Wei Wen and others would have thought that he was an undercover agent sent by a foreign country to Zheng Guo, and wanted to find an opportunity for Zheng Guo to destroy the country! In fact, Zheng, a small country, was already extremely poor. Coupled with the years of war, it was almost to the point of eating the soil. Now it relies on this tax to support it! It's good for him, but he will cut off someone's lifeline as soon as he comes up. Who can bear this?
So Su Xingran's eyes when he looked at Chen Xiaomu suddenly became cold, and he said in a cold voice: "Chen Duwei, your hands are stretched too far, right? You are in charge of national taxation. Don't you know that taxation belongs to a country?" Lifeline, now you want to cut off the lifeline of our Zheng country, I really don’t know what your intentions are?”
Chen Xiaomu was stunned when he heard this. He didn't expect that Su Xingran would turn his face faster than flipping through a book. He couldn't help but smiled bitterly and said: "What could I have done for you! I just want to transform Zheng State from an agricultural country into an industrial powerhouse, so that today's countries cannot compare with it." !”
Wei Wen sighed from the side at this time: "Chen Duwei, you are really tired of not knowing the master. Do you know that just by what you said just now, you can wipe out the annual income of the imperial court in one fell swoop?"
Chen Xiaomu said disapprovingly: "Can it be five million taels?"
"What?" Wei Wen's eyes widened for a moment, he looked at him blankly, and said in surprise: "Chen Duwei, you are so loud! It's easy to get five million taels or ten million taels of silver. Do you think all your money is worth it?" Did it come from the flood?"
Chen Xiaomu turned to Wei Wen and said stably: "Prime Minister Wei, tell me, according to what I just said, how much money will Zheng Guo's income be reduced in a year? This part of the short income will be made up to the court every year. The new emperor will ascend the throne tomorrow! How about I bring 10 million taels of cash as a gift first?"
