Chapter 248: Accounting Office and Food
Su Ruojin returned Li Xiuzhu's indenture contract to her and said, "You are free to go wherever you want. I will not wish you a safe journey, nor will I curse you to die on the way. Whether you can reach Liaoxia and whether you can find your mother is all your own business."
Li Xiuzhu fell to the ground and cried, "Little Master..."
Su Ruojin stood up and left the meeting room.
"Young Master..." Li Xiuzhu muttered to herself as she looked at Young Master's back.
Mao Ya waited until she had cried enough before bringing over two bundles. "Here are the clothes you wore at the Su family, and the money the young master gave you."
Li Xiuzhu looked up in surprise and looked at her in disbelief, "Travel money?"
"Jinniang said that your current body is not suitable for long-distance travel. Wait until you recover in the spring of next year before setting off."
"I..." She betrayed the young master, but she didn't expect the young master to...
Mao Ya put the bag at her feet, "But the Su family is not suitable for you to stay. Manager Hua has found a safe and affordable inn for you. You can stay there until the beginning of next spring. The board and lodging expenses have been paid. You don't need to worry about it. Just take care of your health and go find your mother."
Li Xiuzhu solemnly kowtowed three times again in the direction where Su Ruojin left. After that, he picked up his two bags and left the Su family and went to the inn that Hua Ping had booked for him.
Sitting in the inn, holding her bag, she knew very well that once she left Bian Jing in the spring of next year, she would never see the people of the Su family again in this life.
After seeing Li Xiuzhu off, Hua Ping asked Su Erniang, "If next spring..."
As if she knew what he was going to ask, Su Ruojin turned around and replied directly: "No, the King of Yan will definitely return to the court and ascend the throne before the New Year."
"Are you so sure that the Liaoxia people..."
"Yes."
"Why?"
Hua Ping was puzzled. He followed the young lady all day and didn't have any contact with anyone special. How did he know that the war would end after the New Year?
Su Ruojin frowned, "Do you think that only the Dayin Dynasty was affected by the disaster?"
Huaping:......
Su Ruojin originally wanted to return to her parents in Wei County, but unexpectedly Su Yanzu found her and asked her for help.
"Be your accountant?" Su Ruojin was quite surprised to hear this. "Under such circumstances, your uncle's shop is still doing business?"
Su Yanzu shook his head, "No."
What is that? Su Ruojin looked at him in confusion. Why would he be an accountant if he had no business?
Su Yanzu asked Hua Ping and others to go out.
Hua Ping looked at Su Ruojin.
But dear uncle, Su Ruojin indicated that it was okay and asked everyone in the living room to leave, leaving only the two of them.
"What does uncle want to say?"
Su Yanzu said, "The new emperor and General Ning are still on their way to pursue the Liaoxia people, but you know that when two armies fight, food and fodder go first before the troops move. Now the battle has reached a fever pitch, and a large amount of food and fodder, war horses and winter clothes are needed. The new emperor asked the King of Jin to organize grain merchants to raise grain. I am not only one of the grain merchants, but also the princess's chief historian. The King of Jin has entrusted me with the task of coordinating the amount of grain, and I would like to ask you to help me."
"Uncle, you are not kidding."
"I have seen the account book you made. It is clear and easy to check."
Su Ruojin: ...She uses the modern double-entry accounting method, which is of course convenient, practical and easy to check.
"Didn't you say that every citizen has a share of responsibility for the rise and fall of a country? I'm doing my part for the court."
Su Ruojin: ...
Seeing the young lady hesitate, Su Yanzu said again, "Your Majesty's main support is Prince Zhao."
As expected, the person who understood her was his uncle. He grabbed her with one sentence and glared at him, "You are awesome!"
Su Yanzu laughed when his niece stared at him, "Even if you agree."
Su Ruojin rolled her eyes again, "I'll teach you how to keep accounts."
"Alright."
So straightforward? Why does it feel like he's waiting for her here? "Uncle, are you cheating me?"
"No, no." Su Yanzu quickly denied, "I sincerely ask for your help, but if you teach others, it will be an extra pair of hands."
Su Ruojin...
I don't want to talk about it, I'm tired. I was actually forced to do labor.
As the new emperor has not yet returned to ascend the throne, the capital is leaderless and although it appears calm, there are actually undercurrents.
Prince Jin was the spokesperson for the Zhao clan. In order to support Prince Yan who was fighting outside, he united all the people he could. Su Ruojin knew that these included Princess Yuehua, Prince Wei and his family, and Minister Fan.
Every day, many cash flow bills are remitted to the Princess's Mansion. Su Yanzu's official office has become the accounting center. Detailed accounts are remitted to form a general ledger, and then the budget is issued from the general ledger. One link after another, the new emperor's logistics work is carried out in an orderly manner.
Princess Yuehua did not expect that Su Yanzu would ask his little niece to come over for help. At first she thought that he wanted to take care of her little niece who was bored in the capital. Unexpectedly, her chief steward came to reply and found out that the young lady was actually an expert in accounting.
"Is it really that amazing?"
The chief steward said, "Yes, Your Highness, the young lady doesn't need to use abacus or beads to calculate the account quickly and accurately, and it is 100% correct."
The ancients started calculating with small wooden sticks, called counting sticks. Later, with the development of production, the use of small wooden sticks for calculations became limited, so people invented a more advanced calculating tool - the abacus.
This is what the steward calls abacus, but it is not popular at all. Only a very small number of people master this technique. It is rare to find such a master in the Ministry of Revenue of the imperial court.
Gathering grain from thousands of merchants and transporting large quantities of grain to the battlefield required not only countless vehicles, ships, and manpower, but also, at the management level, an accountant was needed to count the quantity.
The carriages, horses, labor and food were in place, but because of poor management, they were eventually embezzled due to miscalculation and never reached the new emperor. Not to mention the missed opportunity for war, if one was not careful, the throne of the Prince of Yan might be given to the descendants of the previous crown prince or the previous new emperor by the Empress Dowager.
This is why Prince Jin and Princess Yuehua attach great importance to the food account.
Princess Yuehua went to Su Yanzu's official office. It wasn't that she didn't trust Su Ruojin, but she was curious about why a young lady could be more capable than all the male accountants.
At this moment, Su Ruojin was not in the accounting office, but was taken to the warehouse where grain was stored by Su Yanzu.
"Ajin, help me check if there are any shortages in these stacks of food."
The two or three men following Su Yanzu looked at the twelve or thirteen-year-old girl, and then looked at the pile of grain that was as big as a mountain. How to check it? Carry it down one sack at a time and weigh it?
Su Ruojin looked at the piles of grain that were piled up like a hill and asked, "How are they stacked? Are they stacked evenly?"
Su Yanzu signaled the man guarding the warehouse to come over and answer.
When Morikura saw the princess's confidant, his tongue got tied with nervousness. "Just...just like that, just...just neatly arranged."
Su Ruojin: ...It’s the same as not replying.
Seeing that this person could not answer clearly, Su Yanzu asked someone to find the head of the grain storage. He gestured for a while, and Su Ruojin understood. He found paper and pen and drew a simple diagram of what the head of the grain storage said.
"Is that so?"
The head soldier took one look and nodded quickly, "Yes, that's right, it's piled like that."
Su Ruojin asked him to look carefully. "I marked the number of floors and the quantity of each floor. Take another look. Is it correct?"
"Yes, that's right."
Su Ruojin nodded, and after using two or three formulas, he calculated the grain in this granary in a short while. "By bag, there should be 711 bags. If the weight of each bag is correct, there should be 6,230 kilograms of grain here."
Su Yanli took out the detailed list of this warehouse, as well as the summary list, which showed 809 packages, with a total weight of 7,090 kilograms.
The chief of the soldiers shouted: "Impossible... Impossible..."
Su Ruojin said: "Unless you don't arrange it like the drawing, it won't be wrong."
"Of course...it's arranged like this." The leader's eyes flickered.
The Shoucang man screamed, "She didn't count, how could she be accurate with just a glance?"
The two or three men who followed Su Yanzu also disagreed with a young lady standing here and talking nonsense.
Su Ruojin spread her shoulders and said, "Uncle, using my method, there are seven piles here. As long as they are arranged neatly, there will be at most one bag difference. Unless they tamper with it, there will be this much."
Su Yanzu saw his niece's relaxed yet confident look, turned around and called out, "Someone, go through all seven stacks."
The man guarding the warehouse and the head soldier looked at each other and stood there without moving.
Su Yanzu asked his manager to find a laborer to come and stack the bags one by one. When the stack was completed, he found that the number was exactly the same as the number reported by Su Ruojin.
The man who was guarding the warehouse turned pale in an instant, "How is it possible... How is it possible..."
The head soldier knelt down and said, "Sir, this is none of my fault. It was them...they made me do this."
The two or three men who had been following Su Yanzu just now all had bad looks on their faces, but they did not kneel.
These three people were a grain merchant, the warehouse manager of the Ministry of Revenue, and the chief clerk in charge of grain in the Privy Council.
Su Yanzu snorted coldly, "One warehouse is short of nearly a hundred bags of grain. Very good, I will report to Prince Jin and His Royal Highness the Princess right away." After that, he motioned for his niece to go first, and he would follow.
The war is going on, and the emperor is personally fighting in the battlefield, yet corruption is happening in the rear. Su Ruojin sighed secretly, wondering if these people will stop until the country is destroyed?
But she wasn't naive. This kind of thing could happen anytime. Shouldn't she have calculated so accurately just now? Could it be...
"Won't."
Su Yanzu seemed to know that his niece had regretted her mistake, so he reassured her, "The new emperor will remember Ah Jin's contribution."
"No, don't do that." Su Ruojin was so scared that she quickly stopped him. "Uncle, I did this today to tell them not to do anything that would harm the country and the people. Someone can see that they are greedy."
"Ajin did the right thing. I will..."
Su Yanzu was about to report the credit to her again, but she quickly stopped him, "Uncle, you understand so well, you know why I don't want to take the credit, right?"
Of course he knew, but it was she who found out that the accounts didn't match the actuals, so she should...
Su Ruojin waved her hand again, "Uncle, you know better than me why this is happening, so don't scare me."
Su Yanzu had no choice but to nod in agreement. Afterwards, he put the matter on hold and asked Her Royal Highness the Princess not to summon Yang.
Princess Yuehua smiled, "I didn't expect that you Su family members all like to do practical things."
Su Yanzu cupped his hands, "Your Highness, thank you for your compliment."
(End of this chapter)
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