The large area in front of the lobby of Kunshan County Government Office was packed with people, perhaps as many as one or two thousand.

After sending away Governor Lin who came to cause trouble, oh no, to inspect and guide, Mr. Zhao gathered all the county's officials, gentry, village heads, outstanding representatives of village heads, and advanced individuals in flood control the next day to hold the "First Leaders' Meeting of Kunshan County."

Representatives from Jiangnan Company also attended the meeting.

At the beginning of the meeting, County Magistrate Zhao gave an enthusiastic summary speech on flood control.

"In the past few months, our 300,000 people in Kunshan County have united as one to fight a thrilling battle against the floods, showing a selfless spirit of sacrifice, great fighting spirit and selfless dedication!"

After six months of training, Mr. Zhao has become more and more comfortable. He was standing on the steps in front of the lobby, holding the long table with one hand and waving the other hand vigorously. He said passionately:

"Now the flood has receded. I can now proudly announce that this battle has achieved a stage of victory!"

There was thunderous applause and cheers on the big square.

Many people were so excited that they kept wiping away tears. They had been at the mercy of floods since they were old enough to understand things, and they never thought that they would be able to defeat floods one day.

After everyone calmed down, Master Zhao began to commend the advanced collectives and exemplary figures that emerged in this year's flood fighting campaign.

Jiangnan Company, Kunkai Company, Jiangnan Hospital, Kunshan Inspection Company, as well as thirty-six A-level units and two hundred and ninety-seven villages were awarded plaques as advanced collectives in flood fighting.

Then the awarding ceremony for model flood fighters was held...

~~

Needless to say, these are all weird ideas that Master Zhao came up with.

He knows very well that in addition to material rewards, people also need spiritual rewards.

Especially after a glorious victory.

Material rewards can only make people happy for a while, but they will be gone after they are spent.

Spiritual rewards, however, can last forever, allowing people to be inspired by a sense of honor and pride. Rather than fading with time, they become more precious over time and eventually become part of people's souls.

Therefore, Zhao Hao attached great importance to this matter and took the rare opportunity to do it himself... Well, mainly because it was quite interesting.

Plaques are easy to talk about, as the Ming Dynasty has a long history of plaque culture.

From the time one passed the imperial examination to become a scholar, people could hang plaques such as "Xiu Shi Liu Fang" and "Bi Pan Lian Fang" in their homes to show off that they had escaped from commoner status and joined the ranks of scholars.

When one passes the imperial examination, becomes a Jinshi, or becomes an official, there are naturally higher-grade plaques. Even those who honor their parents, get along well with their brothers, or donate to support education can hang plaques, so Zhao Hao asked Xu Wei to write a few words, and it was custom-made in the county.

But the medal was something that had never appeared in history, so it had to be designed by Master Zhao himself, with Secretary Ma drafting the perfect blueprint. It was then handed over to more than a dozen silver shops in Suzhou City, and it took a month to make it.

The medal consists of a pentagonal ribbon badge made of blue and white ribbons and a round metal main badge.

The edge of the main chapter is an abstract levee, which protects the outline of Kunshan County. In the center of the picture is the silhouette of Mr. Zhao's head... No, it's the four words "United as one" written by Mr. Zhao himself.

On the back of the medal are ten regular script characters written by Xu Wei: "Model of flood fighting in the second year of Longqing in the Ming Dynasty".

Twenty district heads and section heads including He Wenwei, Xiong Xiasheng, Bai Shouli, Gu Dadong, and Zheng Ruozeng received gold medals.

Another thirty section chiefs, seventy-three village chiefs, three hundred and thirty headmen, and one hundred and thirty civilians who made outstanding contributions received silver medals...including Mi Wa and Goudan.

The rest of the captains and more than 4,400 civilians who performed outstandingly were awarded bronze medals.

Zhao Shouzheng personally awarded the gold medal to the winners, and then awarded the silver medal together with the gold medal winners.

As for the bronze medals, because there are so many winners, the village heads can only lead them back and distribute them to the winners.

At first, Zhao Hao wanted to leave a souvenir for everyone.

Unexpectedly, the effect was surprisingly good. The sense of honor of the officials and common people of the Ming Dynasty far exceeded his imagination. They touched the medals on their chests and were so excited that tears welled up in their eyes. Gu Dadong and others were all in tears.

Seeing the flood fighting role models who were extremely proud of a small medal, Xu Wenchang, who was sitting on the wall with him and watching the excitement, praised Zhao Hao for a rare moment.

"You are a devil who manipulates people's hearts."

"You're still carrying the devil's stuff?" Zhao Hao glanced at the shiny gold medal on Xu Wei's chest.

Although he and Wu Cheng'en were unable to go on stage to receive the award due to their status as parolees, they still deservedly won the gold medal.

"Take it off."

"That won't do." Xu Wei quickly covered his chest and gently stroked the medal, saying with great importance: "This represents my achievements, and no one can erase it."

As he said this, he sighed and said, "Why doesn't Hu Ruzhen have these ideas like yours? If he had given me one like this when we won the war against the Japanese pirates, it would have been perfect..."

Seeing that someone as crazy as Xu Wei actually attached so much importance to honor, Zhao Hao finally understood something.

Although the Ming Dynasty was founded 200 years ago, the morals of the society have been declining, and officials and common people are more and more concerned with profit, but people still put honor and reputation above money. This is something that he, a pragmatist, had not thought of before.

Mr. Zhao was touched and overjoyed. He had found another way to save money.

Although the medals are not cheap, even if they are all awarded the title of Comrade Brezhnev, it is much more cost-effective than rewards with real money.

Xu Yuanchun and Xu Weizi, who were sitting nearby, were very regretful that they could only use pencils to record such an exciting scene.

It would be great if I could have the kind of camera that the teacher described.

But the teacher said that they had to learn optics and chemistry before they could be taught how to make a camera, but before that they had to learn mathematics first.

Oh my god, when can we make a movie?

~~

In front of the lobby, after the awarding ceremony, Zhao Shouzheng convened a mobilization meeting.

He shouted to the high-spirited leaders of Kunshan County:

"Although we have achieved a phased victory in flood control, more arduous tasks are still waiting for us. Northern Kunming needs to harvest in autumn, and southern Kunming needs to rebuild. The huge third phase of the project is about to begin, and we also need to lay a solid foundation for the great development of the entire county next year."

"So everyone, we must not put our weapons into storage or let our horses go to the mountains. We must continue to display the spirit of flood fighting, guard against arrogance and impetuosity, set a good example, lead the people of the whole county to unite and meet new challenges!"

"Yes!" Everyone responded in unison. People who had been somewhat lax due to the victory in flood control were encouraged to roll up their sleeves and get people to work.

"I declare that in the next battle, the flood control organization of the District Lijia will remain unchanged. We will complete the autumn harvest in northern Kunming in ten days. After ten days, we will all move to southern Kunming and work together to complete the third phase of the project and the post-disaster reconstruction of southern Kunming!"

"Yes!" Master Zhao is light and electricity, and he is the only miracle for the people of Kunshan. Everyone will do whatever he says.

ps. This is the first of three consecutive updates. Please give me your monthly votes!!