“This Li Chuyuan seems to have finally come to his senses.”
Xiao Ming chuckled after reading Li Chuyuan’s memorial.
At this moment, he was in the Grand Secretariat’s office. All nine Grand Secretaries were present. Seeing Xiao Ming laugh so happily, Pang Yukun asked with a smile, “Your Majesty is so pleased. It seems there’s good news again.”
“That’s for sure. Li Chuyuan wants to purchase more cannons, firearms, and ammunition from us, and the scale is beyond imagination. Because he lifted the State of Chu’s firearms ban, the powerful families in Jiangnan are all craning their necks, eager to acquire firearms to arm their private armies,” Xiao Ming said.
“The firearms ban is lifted!” Pang Yukun was somewhat surprised. “It seems Li Chuyuan has finally seen through the Sima family. He thought the Sima family would help him, but he never expected that the Sima family had malicious intentions all along, did he?”
Fei Ji, who knew the Sima family best, said, “I, your old servant, once said that if the Prince of Chu died, only the Sima family could seize the State of Chu. Now, it seems it’s about to come true.”
Xiao Ming nodded slightly, “If that’s the case, I have even more reason to send troops. But before that, I need to think about how to make another huge profit.”
Everyone laughed upon hearing this. Zhan Xingchang said, “During the northern war, we confiscated many export-model cannons from the feudal lords. We can seize this opportunity to sell them. And when the first batch of cannons was manufactured, there were barrel explosions due to material issues. Since they want better cannons, let’s sell these soon-to-be-obsolete cannons to them.”
“However, the firearms captured from Goryeo have already been sold to them. Now, if they still want more, the military machinery department will have to produce them,” Yang Chengye said thoughtfully.
“That’s fine. The structure of matchlock guns and flintlock guns is simple and easy to produce. We can select a batch of old workers from the military machinery department and have them, along with some new workers, restart the phased-out production lines. This can completely meet their demands,” Xiao Ming said.
“If that’s the case, I will immediately order the mobilization of resources for production. We will make another huge profit before heading south.” Pang Yukun was very excited.
Clearly, the wealthy south would bring them even more war profits. With these profits, northern industrialization and railway construction would accelerate again.
They would have ample military funds to attack Japan and stabilize the north.
Having settled this matter, the entire Grand Secretariat began to operate. The nine Grand Secretaries, led by Pang Yukun, began to coordinate this arms trade in all aspects.
And the military machinery department, having received the order, quickly drew out a portion of old workers. Soon, the flintlock gun production lines were fully restored. Flintlock guns and matchlock guns came off the production lines one by one.
From June to October, for four months, the imperial court was in a frenzy of arms trade.
To their delight, they truly made a huge profit this time.
Besides the Prince of Chu’s regular purchases, the southern powerful families showed their generosity this time. Now, Xiao Ming finally understood the phenomenon of a wealthy populace but a poor nation in the late Ming Dynasty.
These southern gentry and powerful families sold firearms as extravagantly as contemporary Shanxi coal bosses sold houses. Basically, they could produce as much as these powerful families could consume.
To avoid affecting the arms trade, he even postponed his southern expedition by a month. The arms trade only cooled down in November.
At this time, the silver, gold, tea, porcelain, silk, and ore transported from the south already totaled sixty million taels, approximately two hundred million Golden Dragon Coins.
The capital spent on manufacturing weapons in Qingzhou over the years had been fully recovered, and they even earned several times the exorbitant profits.
However, Xiao Ming was still not satisfied with this figure, because he knew very well that even so, it was merely squeezing a small portion of the powerful families’ wealth. The wealthy southern powerful families still had much more to extract.
And this final blow would be dealt by war.
On November 5th, as the weather in Qingzhou Province gradually turned cold, two divisions equipped with Falcon Rifles departed from Qingzhou by train to Dengzhou, and then embarked on ships from Dengzhou to Jinling Province, heading south.
“Although the arms trade is very profitable, attacking the south this time will also be difficult. I hope the Falcon Rifle can truly perform well.”
Niu Ben was somewhat worried on the train.
This time, Xiao Ming, along with his consorts and imperial heirs, also planned to go to Jinling Province. Now that the Grand Secretariat was operating smoothly and government affairs were handled in an orderly fashion, he didn’t need to constantly stay in Qingzhou Province.
So, taking advantage of the trip south, he also planned to tour Jinling City for a while. At the same time, he would inspect Jinling Province. This used to be the Prince of Wei’s feudal state, and there were many former Wei loyalists remaining.
Both Pang Yukun and Fei Ji found this place a headache.
“Why worry, General? The powerful families in Jiangnan are buying weapons and cursing me as foolish. Do you also think so?” Xiao Ming chuckled.
Niu Ben’s face turned pale. “I, your old servant, would never dare.”
Xiao Ming smiled. He said, “Actually, both the powerful families and the merchants’ council know very well that I will march south. That’s why they are scrambling to buy firearms. For them, I know very well that buying weapons means arming the enemy. But what they don’t understand is that without an industrial foundation, the firearms in their hands will quickly become mere sticks.”
“Sticks?” Niu Ben was a bit puzzled.
Xiao Ming continued, “I have already ordered Yue Yun to blockade the Great Yu Empire’s maritime routes. Neither Britain nor France can now resupply them with ammunition by sea. At the same time, I have ordered the Yizhou provincial office to prohibit the sale of saltpeter to the south. This way, once they run out of ammunition, what use are their cannons and firearms?”
Niu Ben suddenly understood. “I, your humble general, see now. Li Chuyuan is deliberately fighting a prolonged war with the merchants’ council. This way, their ammunition will be consumed quickly. By the time we act, they won’t have much left.”
“Precisely. To ensure Li Chuyuan continues to stir up trouble, I even promised him wealth and glory for the rest of his life.” Xiao Ming looked south. After the officials he dispatched arrived in Lin’an, Li Chuyuan secretly made this request.
The reason he told Qingzhou officials about this was that he dared not trust anyone in Lin’an.
Niu Ben’s face relaxed, while Luo Quan was full of confidence. For him, the Great Yu Empire had been divided for too long. Now, they were finally going to complete the great task of unification.
Three days later, Xiao Ming arrived in Jinling Province.
Returning once more, Xiao Ming found that it had not only recovered its prosperity but had even surpassed its former glory. Through the harbor, he could even see plumes of smoke drifting in the sky, a typical sign of steam engine factories.
Seeing this, Xiao Ming couldn’t help but sigh with emotion. This Jinling City indeed possessed too many advantages.
However, there were even more geographically advantageous places in Jiangnan, such as the Songjiang area, which was contemporary Shanghai. And this was also the first target of this southern expedition.
Once this place was captured and a harbor established, supplies from Qingzhou Province could be directly transported to Songjiang, saving the trouble of transshipment from Jinling Province.