Chapter 77: Professional schools train professional talents,...

Shen Zhiwei, from the perspective of later generations, used history books to correct Prince An's behavior.

King An knew nothing and could only vaguely explore the way to be a king, following the experiences of others and imitating others to deal with difficult problems that he had never encountered before.

If it weren't for Shen Zhiwei, King An and King Bei would have both become overlords. They possessed the common qualities of overlords - the ability to learn and explore.

Unfortunately, there is no if. If Shen Zhiwei existed in this world, history would be destined to have another glorious ending.

The death of the King of the North was a little more hasty than when he was alive. When he was alive, everyone was worried that he would become more powerful, and everyone was watching the King of the North's every move. But after his death, this kind of attention disappeared, and was replaced by disdain for the loser.

There is also resentment towards Jingchang.

The fundamental reason why they joined forces to attack the Northern Kingdom this time was the prophecy that came from Jingchang. Jingchang did nothing, but in the end he reaped the benefits and took over the largest territory of the Northern Kingdom. How could they not hate him?

If you want to hate someone, you must take action and make some arrangements against Jingchang.

So someone proposed to give a new interpretation to the previous prophecy.

King Yue of the North died. Obviously, the prophecy of "everything will return to the north" did not refer to the northern country, but perhaps to the people who owned the northern land, or to the princes of the entire north.

Some people speculated so, but the princes in the south disagreed. Why did they want to drive them out of the arena of competing for the world with just a few words?

So some people began to doubt whether the prophecy was true or false.

At the beginning, Shen Zhiwei ordered Gui Yang to offer sacrifices to heaven and earth and predict the future. As a former fortune teller, Gui Yang had a very high level of professional skills. There were no mistakes or omissions in the whole process. He was also very capable of falsification and came up with a prophecy that perfectly matched Shen Zhiwei's ideas.

Now it is so difficult to expose this as a lie and tell the world that the prophecy is a conspiracy of Shen Zhiwei.

Are you trying to say that the former Grand Diviner was disrespectful to the gods, or are you trying to say that Shen Zhiwei, who was called the Son of Heaven, took advantage of the gods' will?

These two pots of dirty water can be thrown casually, but it is hard to say whether anyone will believe it, because in recent years, there have been bumper harvests near Jingchang, and the people live and work in peace and contentment. Even if there are some natural disasters, they are all within the control of the court. Shen Zhiwei ordered people to provide disaster relief in time, and no public grievances have been accumulated from beginning to end.

The common people did not know about any conspiracies or secrets, nor did they understand the truth or falsity of prophecies. They only knew that the rule of the Zhou emperor was the only pure land in this war-torn land. For thousands of years, they had been the subjects of the Zhou Dynasty and would continue to be the subjects of the Great Zhou in the future.

And it is even less likely that the nobles would follow the princes in distorting the prophecy, or accuse Shen Zhiwei of fabricating the prophecy.

They are not stupid. Shen Zhiwei is the most powerful person now, and he is also the one who wins the hearts of the people. What is the benefit of going against Shen Zhiwei? The nobles in Bian and Beidi who were loyal to the princes were all killed by Hu Youan's troops because they wanted to rebel. From top to bottom, they were all killed.

It's not like they are tired of living that they have to go against the ruler of the world.

Thus, the dirty water of the princes was thrown out, and Shen Zhiwei passed the test unscathed.

Not only did the prophecy not weaken the emperor's value, but because it was speculated that the north in the prophecy was the king who owned the most northern land, the position of the common ruler of the world in the prophecy was returned to the Zhou emperor.

After all the twists and turns, the emperor is still the emperor.

All kinds of disturbances in the outside world could not break through the emperor's defenses. Shen Zhiwei didn't even realize that anything was happening, and everything was over. All that was left for her were a bunch of princes who seemed to be very honest and bowed their heads to seek development.

The princes are now more honest than when they were cheated in Bian, even though they were cheated even worse this time.

Shen Zhiwei suspected that these princes had all taken ninja courses, which was really tolerant.

Seeing how patient they were, Shen Zhiwei knew that her main mission was completely ruined. She didn't have to think about it anymore and could only do the special missions honestly.

The shipyard on the shores of the East China Sea is working at full speed. After improvements and construction, the number of ships going out to sea this year has increased to five. All of them are very large merchant ships. Not only their cargo capacity, but also their manpower capacity has been greatly improved. This time, they went out to sea and took away more than two-thirds of the navy near the shipyard.

Shen Zhiwei realized that she had to expand the army. Hu Youan and others were taking care of the army, and she never paid attention to it. She had to take care of the navy herself, and she had not found a suitable navy general yet.

Chiwei is good at sailing, but after joining the army, she was in the army. All her experience in commanding troops came from the army, and she was unfamiliar with the navy.

Shen Zhiwei was worried that letting Chiwei take charge of the navy would result in an amateur managing an expert. Instead of letting his left and right brains fight each other, it would be better to patiently look for a suitable naval commander. Since there is no one at the moment, he would let them manage their own for now.

Naval warfare relies more on the quality of ships and weapons, and another factor is the transmission of information.

Shen Zhiwei could only rely on the Hundred Workshops for ships and weapons, and asked An Jin and Huang Yu to think carefully and innovate. In terms of information transmission, she used flag signals.

In fact, it is not uncommon to use fixed gestures to convey information, and this is also done by troops marching in the mountains.

Some people have very good eyesight and can see very far away, places that are so far away that sound cannot reach.

Moreover, using body movements to convey messages is more covert and safer on the battlefield than shouting.

There are many advantages to flag language, but there are also disadvantages, one of which is that you have to remember it.

Flag signals are not just a few simple movements. Sometimes they can convey very complex information, which requires memorizing a lot of things. Because the battlefield changes rapidly and the situations are different, it is best for everyone to be able to memorize them.

But people's talents are really incomparable. Some are good at fighting, some are good at memory, and most people can only do one of them and not all. The flag signals are complicated, and it is really difficult to remember them all. The people who finally remember them all can be said to be one in a hundred.

Others could only remember a rough outline, and only a few could remember everything. Seeing that others really couldn't remember everything, Shen Zhiwei didn't force them. She asked those who remembered everything to disperse, with only two or three people on each boat.

There are substitutes, so if something goes wrong, there will be someone to take over.

You can find suitable talents by rote memorization, but it is really difficult to find naval commanders. There are so few suitable ones among so many people. The sergeants, squadrons, and centurions who are promoted all have limited talents.

Shen Zhiwei searched around and had to admit that it was really hard to draw a gold card. She couldn't find it no matter how lucky she was.

The water army has only been around for too short a time, and there was no breeding ground before, so it is difficult to find the corresponding talent.

Speaking of the soil for cultivating talents, Shen Zhiwei felt that she should make some changes to the academy.

The current academy mainly trains officials, and there are also people from all walks of life, but all students are aiming to become officials. For Shen Zhiwei, the space for talent selection is too narrow.

She has to set up some schools with stronger targeting. If there is a shortage of generals, she can train generals; if there is a shortage of doctors, she can train doctors; and the same goes for talents in other fields.

Learning flag language also reminded Shen Zhiwei that everyone has different talents. If she only focuses on selecting talents for the official profession, she will never find suitable talents who can support all walks of life in society until her death.

So Shen Zhiwei called Wen Tao into the palace, bringing Gui Yang along with her.

With Gui Yang as the assistant and Wen Tao as the main one, Shen Zhiwei asked the two to jointly prepare for the establishment of a professional school.

Wen Tao had heard of the concept of school before. In Shen Zhiwei's commercial street planning, she had mentioned the establishment of a school, but now that it has been implemented, they are all uniformly called schools.

It was obvious that a vocational school was not the same as a school, so Shen Zhiwei did not use the word "school" to refer to the new school she was going to open.

Gui Yang didn't quite understand, so Wen Tao explained it to him in a few words, and he understood it. After understanding it, he became worried.

"Your Majesty, listen to the Grand Tutor. Opening a specialized school requires the same care and effort as running a school: finding good teachers, recruiting students, establishing a suitable location, and compiling textbooks. These days, good teachers are hard to find, and students are focused on the imperial examinations. Suitable schools have already been established in the city, but without good teachers, and even less textbooks, it's likely that a specialized school would be unsustainable."

Gui Yang's attitude is to wait until he has more people under his command and Jingchang City is expanded again before setting up a professional school.

We haven’t even figured out the imperial examination yet, and the educational business of schools has only just started, so why set up a professional school?

Guiyang tends to develop conservatively, finishing one field before moving on to the next, rather than setting up a large stall right from the start and being unable to take care of it all.

Wen Tao thought it was worth a try. She had worked at a high intensity before and was used to facing all kinds of difficulties. The problems that Gui Yang mentioned were no big deal to her.

"Dazai, the King is now establishing a professional school. This is necessary. Good teachers are hard to find, but they are not unavailable. There are countless people in the world who are eager to learn. As long as the school is built, there will be no need to worry about where to find students. The rest of the difficulties can be solved bit by bit. It's not difficult at all."

Upon hearing this, Gui Yang rolled his eyes in his heart. He felt that Wen Tao was talking without any concern.

Ever since he regained the position of Dazai and Wen Tao stepped down, he felt uncomfortable because Wen Tao had done a good job before and many people compared him with Wen Tao.

The conclusion is that Dazai O has his own strengths, while Dazai Momo is a qualified Dazai.

Just by listening to these words, you will know who is the better Dazai in people's hearts.

It would be strange if Gui Yang could feel comfortable.

Moreover, he was still thinking about his previous position as prime minister. He was finally transferred back to Jingchang from Yongming, but the position was still not his. Gui Yang sometimes wanted to ask the king how he wanted to arrange for him.

The great king Shen Zhiwei, who was sitting on the throne, actually didn't think about anything.

She felt that what Gui Yang said made sense, and what Wen Tao said also made sense.

She was hesitant to begin with, which was why she had sent someone to the palace to discuss the matter. If she had already made up her mind, why would she have consulted with someone? She could have just issued a royal decree and told her subordinates to get to work.

"You two, my dear ministers, both have valid points. However, you may not yet understand what a professional school is for. Professional schools will train the kind of people Jingchang needs most right now. There's no need to look for good teachers. A professional school that trains generals will have Hu Youan as its lecturer, and a school that trains doctors will naturally have highly skilled doctors as its lecturers."

"Your Majesty, if the General of the Central Army returns to the court, Jingchang will lose a great general in the future!"

Gui Yang disagreed. She said that Hu Youan should be fighting on the battlefield. Asking her to come back to be a lecturer would be a waste of talent.

He thought that Hu Youan would not be able to go to the battlefield after becoming a lecturer.

Shen Zhiwei certainly knew how great the loss would be if Hu Youan was recalled, but you can't have your cake and eat it too. Moreover, when there is a serious shortage of manpower, don't even think about expanding outward. If there is really a lack of successors in the future, there will be endless troubles.

So she gritted her teeth, made up her mind, and said, "The generals' professional school will only be open for one year. During this year, I am willing to suspend everything and focus on training talents!"

Not only Hu Youan, but also the generals who needed further training came back to attend classes, and the capable generals came back to give lectures. Shen Zhiwei didn't believe that after a period of intensive training, she would still lack professional talents.

Wen Tao understood that the professional schools the king mentioned were of two types. One was similar to the "training courses" that officials attended, but it was longer and the teachings were more specific.

The other type is specialized in training a certain type of talent, similar to a palace academy, except that a palace academy trains officials, while professional schools train doctors, craftsmen, clerks, etc.

The king's move is to further enlighten the people, and is more concrete than the previous enlightenment from the city gate platform.

Wen Tao swallowed her saliva, a longing light in her eyes. She couldn't imagine what the Great Zhou would become if the king's vision came true.