Qiao Xin felt so depressed!
Raising a son is really a debt. Qiao Xin chanted "Amitabha" several times before she suppressed the depression in her heart.
She had no choice but to propose a compromise: "Why don't we let Yun Ting come back, and then sit down and ask him carefully? We have been so worried and thinking about him, but if he doesn't want us in the end, then it would be a waste!
This is his life, and if he thinks it is good, then it is really good!"
The Queen was stunned. She had heard that Qiao Xin raised her children differently from others, but she didn't expect it to be so different. By doing this, she didn't care about the prestige of her elders at all?
Emperor Wu coughed lightly and said, "A senior official of a region is not allowed to leave the station without a reason!"
Qiao Xin smiled and said, "Your Majesty, my birthday is coming up soon. Can I see my children and grandchildren? My family hasn't had a reunion dinner in the past few years. I want to take this opportunity to gather all the children together!"
Emperor Wu: This reason is really hard to refute. Qiao Xin has been running around for Dajing's career in the past few years and has not enjoyed a few days of peace and quiet!
While other old ladies were enjoying the happiness of playing with their grandchildren, Qiao Xin was squatting in a mountain valley, studying what to grow to fill her stomach, and what kind of road to build to facilitate everyone to go out. She never reunited with her children and grandchildren during the New Year and other festivals. The Qiao family couldn't be more low-key in Beijing...
The result of this year's busy work was that wherever she went, the lives of the common people improved visibly. Emperor Wu began to open his eyes to the world and became more and more aware of the real situation of the people under his rule.
He no longer has to manage his own kingdom through memorials one by one, but can also understand the sufferings of the people from Qiao Xin's perspective.
Although Qiao Xin was not in the imperial court, she had already become his eyes and ears. What was even more rare was that the old lady did not hide anything from him and said everything in her letters, which made him see a different big picture. He no longer had to sit in the imperial city for his whole life like the emperors of previous dynasties and slowly become a puppet of the aristocratic family!
When only Qiao Xin and Emperor Wu were left in the imperial study, they talked about the Lu'an riot in Southern Liang, Zhu Zhen's killing of civil officials, and the murder of the children of Yizhou noble families who escaped.
Qiao Xin had mentioned this in her letter in advance, but Emperor Wu was still shocked when he heard her admit it in person.
This old lady really can't tolerate any sand in her eyes and is so brave! !
Even when he was facing pressure from the Yizhou family, he had to give in. Now, they were pulling out the root of the problem!
But why did he feel so inexplicably happy?
Emperor Wu collected his thoughts and gave a few mild reprimands. If Eunuch Cao was present, he would have seen that he was not angry.
"Why are you so impulsive? Have you ever thought about what kind of consequences you will suffer when the incident happens?"
Qiao Xin heard this and frankly admitted, "I thought about it, but I really can't bear it anymore. Every time I close my eyes, I see the mountains full of wailing corpses. It would be fine if they left quietly, but they harmed the people along the way. They committed inhumane crimes, why can they get away with it?"
"Let's forget about this now, and don't mention it to anyone! Otherwise, I can't protect you!"
"I understand!"
Qiao Xin knew that this matter had been approved by Emperor Wu. Regarding the Yizhou noble families, his interests were the same as Emperor Wu's. His Majesty had long been fed up with the increasing dominance of the Yizhou noble families and disrespected the holy order!
That’s all for this topic.
Emperor Wu then asked about the tea plantation. The court officials were still skeptical about the idea of ​​using tea to control the border, exchanging tea for horses and bartering with other peoples to make profits from the Yi people.
What everyone is more worried about is that merchants will sell everything to foreigners for profit, and then the craftsmen and skills of Dajing will be lost! Compared with the little profit gained, it is really not worth mentioning!
Besides, opening so many tea plantations is not only time-consuming, labor-intensive and costly, but what if they fail?
Emperor Wu was not without worries, but based on his understanding of Qiao Xin, he knew that he was not a person who spoke without thinking. Once it came to the interests of the people, he had to be extremely cautious. Once the border tea plantation was opened, it would affect the jobs of hundreds of thousands of people and the safety of the border. This responsibility was too great! He did not believe that Qiao Xin would disregard the interests of the country for his own selfish reasons!
In this regard, we have to say that Emperor Wu was really a good leader!
Qiao Xin thought about it, asked Emperor Wu for paper and pen, and quickly drew a simple geomancy map. There were only some simple lines on it, but Emperor Wu understood it as Qiao Xin explained it!
"Our neighbors in the four directions of Dajing, southeast, northwest and northeast are all big consumers of tea. Especially Beirong in the north and Luosha and Xiling in the west. People in these places live in places with long and cold winters. They eat beef and mutton all year round and rarely eat rice, flour, fruits and vegetables. This leads to excess internal heat. They must drink tea every meal to stay healthy.
Tea has been integrated into their daily life. They drink tea just like we drink salt, it is an indispensable consumption.
Moreover, to the west of Xiling there are countries such as Persia and the Uzbek Empire, and to the south there are India, Funan, and Zhenla. In these places, tea is sold at a price comparable to gold.
More importantly, they don’t produce it locally, so they can only buy it from the southwest and northwest of Dajing!"
In previous years, the southwest trade route was controlled by the tea merchants organized by the Xia family, while the northwest was controlled by the aristocratic families headed by the Dou family of Yizhou. The court could not get any benefits!
Emperor Wu looked directly at Qiao Xin with sharp eyes.
"How did you get this information?"
"Of course, I asked the caravans that came to Dajing. When I was in the northwest, I often saw merchants from the Arab world selling various small commodities. When I had nothing to do, I chatted with different merchants and learned a lot of interesting things about foreign countries.
This time in Anhua County, we also encountered many horse caravans from the south selling tea, and even the leaders of merchant ships. We pieced together some information.
I suspect there are other countries further away who also need our tea. Otherwise, why would profit-seeking merchants travel thousands of miles just to buy some tea to bring back? When have these cunning people ever done a business that would lose money? "
Emperor Wu's expression eased a little. What Qiao Xin had deduced was not far from the records in the palace's Sutra Library.
This was news that was only known to the royal families of all dynasties and a very small number of powerful families. I didn't expect that a woman could come to the conclusion based on just some scattered information!
"Will 20,000 acres of tea plantations be enough?"
Qiao Xin was stunned: "Ah!!!!"
The topic changed too quickly, but he reacted quickly!
"That's enough for Anhua County and Yiwu County! Your Majesty, in fact, the best places for tea production are Qimeng Mountain in Western Shu and several counties near Ya'an.
There is also Nanzhao in the southwest, where there are dense mountains, countless ancient tea trees that are hundreds of years old and have a wide variety of species.
What a pity that such a good piece of land does not belong to our Dajing!"
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