Faced with his wife's insistence, Li Jinglong had no choice but to agree.

Over the years, Ding had never interfered in anything Li Jinglong did, except this matter.

In fact, Li Jinglong was not unwilling to take his brother-in-law to the West, but he had just been appointed and was at the center of the storm, so he wanted to set an example first.

There are simply too many people watching, and almost every noble family has conveyed their intentions, either overtly or covertly. Everyone can imagine how great the benefits will be from such a large scale.

If it were someone else, it would be fine, but now the Crown Prince is in power, and I have never seen him doing business at a loss.

All the famous chambers of commerce in the Ming Dynasty have offices in the capital.

When the big event of sailing to the West came out, those who were qualified immediately gathered together.

Nanjing Restaurant.

It’s more than a restaurant, but it’s more than just a place to eat and sleep.

It was newly built a year ago and opened at the beginning of the 29th year of Hongwu. It is the largest in the entire capital and is located at the junction of the inner and outer cities.

When this restaurant was built, the residences of many officials and nobles were involved and they were directly demolished. Even if no one tells the background behind this, everyone can guess it.

The high consumption is simply not within the reach of ordinary people.

The cost of a meal may be as much as people’s income for several months or even the previous year.

There are only consumption in the front yard, and there are 108 rooms of various types in the back yard. The cheapest one costs 20 strings of treasure notes per night, and only members can reserve it.

If you want to become a member, the first thing you need to do is to top up Wanguanbaochao.

This threshold is enough to stop most people.

After spending this much money, the ceremony is naturally grand.

In this backyard, there is a separate public security department to maintain order and security, and the patrols are all done by yamen runners.

There is service around the clock, and even if you get up in the middle of the night and want to eat some pastries, there will be someone waiting to make them right away.

There was no gong or drum celebration at the opening, but on the opening day, the 108 backyard rooms were already snapped up.

You should know that the ten most expensive rooms here cost 888 strings of treasure notes per night.

That's it, the starting price is a monthly package, there is no daily calculation at all.

In other words, these ten rooms alone can bring in more than three million strings of treasure notes every year.

When Zhu Yuanzhang first heard his eldest grandson mention this number, he was speechless for a long time.

"Let's say, your grandson runs such a big restaurant, and the annual income can be 20 to 30 million strings of treasure notes?" Zhu Yuanzhang was somewhat unbelieving.

Even though I was numb before, I still feel shocked now.

Even if this is just housing, it's no different from robbing money.

The eldest grandson could have just robbed the place and given it to the owner to stay for a night.

Are there really so many suckers in our Ming Dynasty?

Zhu Yuanzhang felt that he was beginning to doubt his life.

In order to collect annual tax revenue and the national treasury, he racked his brains to increase revenue and reduce expenditure. He worked for more than 20 years, but in the end, the annual revenue was only as high as that of a restaurant.

This made Zhu Yuanzhang feel very bad. It seemed that all his previous efforts had been in vain?

Zhu Ying explained: "You can't look at it that way. The economy is different now. After the development of maritime trade, the merchants involved in maritime trade have made a lot of wealth in a short period of time."

"Our Daming products are absolutely popular overseas. As long as they can be shipped on board, there is no need to worry about not being able to sell them. And because many goods are now produced on a large scale in factories, costs are gradually decreasing, which makes the profits even greater."

"Moreover, after these merchants sell our Ming Dynasty goods overseas, they can resell them at a high profit. After all, they can sell as much as they want. It is not easy to control it. It all depends on their own ability."

"Our Ming navy protects the safety of the waterway, and now all the Japanese pirates have disappeared. The safe waterway has brought greater prosperity to maritime trade. Anyone who participates in maritime trade has a very stable income."

"According to the reports from below, ordinary chambers of commerce can earn thousands or even tens of thousands of taels of silver per month. The big chambers of commerce that have their own merchant ships are even more outrageous. It is said that the largest merchant ship can earn 100,000 taels of silver in one trip."

"Not only in Southeast Asia, but also in Japan, there is even more silver. Several uncles in Japan have at least three or four medium-sized silver mines. The silver they process every day is already more than what we can print in banknotes."

Mineral deposits such as silver and gold are real hard currencies in the world. After smelting and processing, they can be used directly.

The four feudal lords who have now established themselves in Japan have become symbols of the rich and powerful.

Naturally, these large amounts of silver eventually flowed into the Ming Dynasty's market economy.

According to the laws of the Ming Dynasty, Baochao was the current official currency, and private transactions of silver were illegal, so a large amount of silver was deposited in the royal bank and exchanged for Baochao.

The Baochao Tizhusi is now recruiting a large number of people. As the amount of silver exchanged is very large, the Baochao Tizhusi is now a little overwhelmed and can only continue to expand its scale.

The economy developed so fast that Zhu Yuanzhang felt that he could not keep up with the times. Overall, he was naturally very surprised.

"We think we can open more restaurants like this."

"Not only in the capital, but also in every prefecture along the coast, you can open a restaurant similar to this one. It will cost you a lot of money."

Zhu Yuanzhang said seriously that he felt that being in Daming was just like picking up money, and he would be able to get a lot of money no matter what he did.

After finishing his speech, Zhu Yuanzhang added: "Now our Ming Dynasty has more and more money and more people, but the number of farmers is constantly decreasing."

"High-yield crops can bring a lot of food, but there is an upper limit to the population that these foods can support. If there is a natural disaster, it will be a disaster for the people of Ming Dynasty."

"A few years ago, I issued an edict ordering many regions to switch from farming to mulberry. Now that silk and cotton fields are selling well, more and more people are unwilling to grow grain. This is not a good phenomenon. In this regard, my grandson must think of a good way to deal with it."

"Otherwise, these prosperous scenes before us will be like a mirage that will be shattered at the slightest touch."

Zhu Yuanzhang instructed, saying that he was well aware of how exaggerated the population growth was in the Ming Dynasty. He took a walk around the capital some time ago and found that every household had children, and most of them had more than one or two.

The appearance of these newborns in the Ming Dynasty means that the population will experience a huge explosion in the near future.

The weather now is getting colder year by year.

Under the cover of high-yield crops, the yields of rice and wheat have actually been decreasing, but because high-yield crops are planted and harvested in large quantities, this phenomenon is not obvious.

Zhu Yuanzhang has always paid great attention to this area. He knows very well that grain is the foundation of the Ming Dynasty and the basis of the country.

Now, in order to cater to the development of commerce, the prices of silk and cotton are constantly rising. Planting one acre of mulberry fields is worse than planting ten acres of land. Naturally, people would rather plant mulberry fields rather than rice fields.

Zhu Yuanzhang realized that if this continued for a long time, big problems would definitely arise.

Zhu Ying said: "In fact, my grandson has already noticed this problem. More and more farmers are trying their best to leave the village and no longer work in the soil to make a living."

"With the current development of the Ming Dynasty, it is difficult to effectively change this problem, so my grandson can only find food and population from the outside world to solve it."

Zhu Yuanzhang was silent for a moment, then asked, "How many people are there now?"

Zhu Ying hesitated for a moment: "According to statistics, there are about two million people registered now."

After listening to this, Zhu Yuanzhang paused for a moment without saying anything. After a long while, he sighed and said, "This is only a temporary solution. If it continues for a long time, it will definitely be a hidden danger. This is the only way to do it now."

Zhu Yuanzhang was well aware that there was still an illegal industry in the Ming Dynasty that was not currently strictly restricted by the government, and was even being secretly carried out by his eldest grandson.

The contradiction of the Ming Dynasty lies in the land economy, and grain is the foundation of the country. No matter how much money you have, it cannot be eaten. If you encounter natural disasters and famine, big problems will arise.

High-yield crops are good, but during severe droughts and floods, there is still no way to preserve them.

Natural disasters are natural disasters. No crops can grow.

Therefore, the country must have sufficient food reserves to deal with various crises.

The rapid growth of population means huge consumption.

It went against the laws of history and stimulated population growth in an environment like the Little Ice Age in order to seize the world market first.

For Zhu Ying, or for the Ming Dynasty, it is both an opportunity and a challenge.

If it is not handled properly, the current prosperity of the Ming Dynasty may very well be a flash in the pan during Zhu Ying's reign, and it may not take too long before it returns to its previous track.

This is certainly not the result Zhu Ying wanted.

Therefore, human trafficking began to prevail.

The overseas population was constantly being sold to the Ming Dynasty, and even gave rise to a large number of landowners.

The reason why he was called a manor owner instead of a landlord was because all these lands were controlled by Zhu Ying and leased to the wealthy families.

The economic sources of these aristocratic families, in addition to maritime trade, also involve the introduction of large numbers of people.

Very early on, or when the Ming Dynasty's official gazettes began to become popular, Zhu Ying had already been laying the groundwork.

He used the capital's gazettes and word-of-mouth propaganda from sea merchants to continuously spread the wealth of the Ming Dynasty, thereby attracting a large number of overseas Chinese to migrate to the Ming Dynasty.

At the same time, a large amount of gold and silver was secretly allocated for transactions among people in some chambers of commerce.

These purchased overseas citizens were generally in good health. After they arrived in the Ming Dynasty, someone would bring them to the manor to grow various crops.

However, they were not included in the Ming Dynasty’s household registration, and most of them would never have the possibility of being included in the Ming Dynasty’s household registration in their lifetime.

Only those with technical talents or who have made great contributions can obtain household registration in the Ming Dynasty.

The more than two million people Zhu Ying mentioned are these people.

In historical terms, they can also be called Kunlun slaves.

…

At this time in a Nanjing restaurant, a large number of Chamber of Commerce bosses gathered together to discuss joining the Ming Dynasty's voyage to the West.

It doesn't mean that they were incorporated into the government fleet, but that they followed the government fleet.

Even if you want to follow, you need to compete for qualifications. Not just anyone can do it.

"This voyage to the West must be the largest in scale since ancient times. With the current navy of our Ming Dynasty, I dare say that there will be at least this number of treasure ships sailing."

The chief manager of Sihai Chamber of Commerce stretched out his open palm and said.

Suddenly someone exclaimed: "Five hundred treasure ships, this is too exaggerated. How many small countries can be destroyed with this number? I'm afraid there must be tens of thousands of soldiers accompanying them."

Apart from the Ming government, the maritime merchants were the ones who knew the situation overseas best.

Let alone five hundred treasure ships, even if there were fifty of them, they would be absolutely top-notch in the South and West Oceans.

The five hundred treasure ships are like using a butcher knife to kill a chicken. It is like using an anti-aircraft gun to kill a mosquito.

The Sihai Chamber of Commerce dares to use the name Sihai, so naturally it must have sufficient background and support. Apart from anything else, just being able to meet Zhang Bo alone is already a symbol of status.

When everyone heard the Sihai Chamber of Commerce say such a definite number, their eyes turned red.

"Five hundred treasure ships, how much cargo must they carry? If they want to sell all of it to Southeast Asia and the West, I'm afraid the treasure banknotes will cost more than 100 million."

"If we can get a little bit of it, then... then..."

The shopkeeper of the Chamber of Commerce couldn't help but speak out.

But he was immediately suppressed again: "This time we are heading directly to the Western Ocean. Such a long distance requires a large ship."

"That is to say, this trip overseas will last for several years. Even if there is no additional requirement for food, then in Kunlun Slave..."

"How dare you talk nonsense!!!" Before the man in front could finish his words, the owner of a large chamber of commerce immediately stood up and scolded him.

The shopkeeper in front of him immediately realized that he had spoken out of turn, and slapped his mouth repeatedly: "I was talking nonsense, I was talking nonsense."

The trade of Kunlun slaves involved the slave trade, which was strictly prohibited in the Ming Dynasty.

However, according to the unspoken rules of maritime trade, if one wants to be qualified to follow the Ming Dynasty navy's route, there are additional requirements for the introduction of food and population.

If the requirements are not met, various fines will be imposed by the Customs and Taxation Bureau.

But this matter cannot be said openly. Although everyone knows who is manipulating it behind the scenes, if you say it out loud, you will be guilty, a serious crime.

In this area, as long as there is any rumor or gossip, it will be strictly investigated by the Public Security Bureau and the Embroidered Uniform Guard, and they will often investigate it to the end.

Even if they were nobles, they would not get any benefit at all, because many of them were demoted from their posts or even sentenced to hard labor because of this matter.

The lessons from the past are there, who dares to discuss this matter?

Besides, where is this place? This is the Nanjing Grand Restaurant in the capital, and there are patrolling yamen runners everywhere. A single wrong word could lead to a disaster.