When Jiang Yan came to the study, Shang Cheng was writing a letter.

Shang Cheng saw that it was him who came in, and he didn't stop writing, and said to him very casually: "Why did you remember it today?" I'll just have two or three more sentences, and I'm not busy greeting you. You sit down for a while. There was tea on the table, and when you were thirsty, you took a cup. As he spoke, he dipped his pen in ink in the inkstone, skimmed the tip of the pen on the inkstone, groaned for a while, and continued to write the letter horizontally and vertically.

In a few moments, the letter was written. He took a few pages and examined them from beginning to end, picked up his pen and scribbled a few inappropriate words, and then he folded the letterhead and put it in the envelope that he had written long ago, and put it in a pile of letters on the big case without sealing it.

He took the blindfold and the medicine box, walked over and sat down in the seat next to Jiang Luan, first took a piece of medicine and tilted his head to cover the socket of his right eye, and did not look at Jiang Luan, turned his sore wrist and said: "I have been busy writing letters since I got up early in the morning, and I have been writing until this hour, which is almost finished." Yiyi, why did you think about coming over today? ”

Jiang Tuan poured him a cup of bitter tea, pushed it to his hand, and didn't take his words, saying, "Letter to whom?" ”

"This letter is addressed to Wen Mu. There are also two letters for Zhang Jixian and Ximenke, and Guo Fengyi and Zhongshan also have one each. I originally wanted to write a letter to Lu Bofu and them to ask about the current situation, isn't this your coming? Shang Cheng tilted his head, closed his eyes and said, "Let's write to them when I have time to go back." ”

Jiang Yan smiled, took a sip of tea, looked at the few small pieces of reddish tea leaves floating up and down in the teacup and asked, "This doesn't seem to be the kind of bitter tea you made earlier?" ”

"That's what I did." Shang Cheng said, "Someone else gave Gu Poyang a few loads of autumn tea that came down, and he gave me two loads." I didn't let them all make tea cakes, thinking that I would use them to make some green tea myself. At this point, he grinned and added, "It seems that one process is not right, and it turns out like this." Originally, the color of the tea leaves and the brewed tea should have been green, but it turned red. ”

Jiang Jun only knew that the tea leaves were blue-green on the tea tree, and they were black and brown after being made into tea brick tea cakes, and the tea cakes made by Ouchi Imperial were also wheat yellow, but that kind of tea cake could not be seen on the market at all. He took another sip, took it in his mouth, carefully discerned the taste, and after a while said, "Very good." It's a lot better than the bitter tea you've gotten in the past. ”

"Heh, speaking of which, do you also think the bitter tea in the Admiral's Mansion is unpleasant?" Shang Cheng joked.

"This is the consensus of everyone, and I am not the only one who says this."

"But I remember that you were very fond of bitter tea at that time."

"This is 'what is good at the top, but what is good at the bottom'. You love to drink bitter tea, and I was working in the Admiral's Mansion at that time, do you think, do you dare to say that bitter tea is not delicious? Now that I am receiving a salary in the Ministry of Works, I naturally don't need to say anything against my will. Jiang Yan pretended to be serious and explained to Shang Cheng. As he spoke, he couldn't help but smile.

Shang Cheng was wearing an eye patch, and when he said this, he couldn't help laughing.

"Zhongshan, is he okay in Jiazhou?" Jiang Jun asked with concern. Although he also cared about other people, because he and Sun Zhongshan had been working under Shang Cheng since the beginning of West Malaysia, the relationship between the two was naturally closer than that of the people next to him, so he asked Sun Zhongshan first.

The smile on Shang Cheng's face disappeared in an instant. He slowly put on the blindfold and was silent for a long time before deciding to tell the truth to Jiang Wei. He frowned, and said faintly: "Zhongshan, his situation in Jiazhou is difficult to explain. To put it more ugly, it's 'very bad'. ”

"What?" Jiang Yan's mouth opened wide in surprise; Because he was so stunned, he even brought out the Yanshan accent when he spoke. The answer was completely unexpected! Isn't Sun Zhongshan the deputy head of the Jiazhou camp, how can he say that it is "very bad"? He immediately asked, "Did he make a mistake or make a mistake?" In his hurry, there were only two reasons he could think of. Although Sun Zhongshan is a cautious person, who can be without fault if he is not a sage?

Shang Cheng sighed again and shook his head. He opened his mouth to say something, but he stopped for a long time and said nothing, just shook his head again and sighed again. Although Jiang Tuan is a very close person to him, he is not in the army after all, so there are some unpleasant words involving the generals in the army, and he really can't say anything to Jiang Tuan. At the beginning of this year, soon after Sun Zhongshan followed Xiao Jian to Jiazhou, he was sent by Xiao Jian to inspect various prefectures and counties on the grounds that "when he first arrived in Jiajing, he must be familiar with the local area", and when he spent more than two months turning around and coming back, the things that should have been in charge of him were delegated to others, not to mention asking about specific military affairs, and even the logistics baggage was not his turn to intervene, and the deputy head of the Jiazhou camp completely became an ornament, and he could only sit in the barracks in a daze every day. Sun Zhongshan didn't dare to tell Shang Cheng what happened to him, and the letters in front of him all said that he was very good in Jiazhou, Xiao Laoshuai treated him very well, and the departments under the jurisdiction of the camp also respected him, a famous general of Yanshan; In short, everything is fine with him, and Shang Cheng doesn't have to worry about it at all. At the beginning, Shang Cheng believed it. But for most of the year, three or four letters in succession were only happy but not bad, so he became suspicious and asked Gao Qiang to go to the Yamen of the Ministry of War to stop two officers from Jiazhou who had entered Beijing to do business, and the truth was revealed......

Jiang Tuan was familiar with Shang Cheng's habits, and when he saw that he wanted to speak and stopped, he understood that it was inconvenient for him to know about the affairs of Jiazhou. He was silent for a moment, and then asked, "Then, can the matter of Zhongshan still turn around?" He didn't know what happened to Sun Zhongshan, so he could only use this kind of ambiguous language to knock on the side.

"It's too late!" Shang Cheng exhaled and said with a heavy heart. If Zhongshan can tell him the matter in time, then he can still negotiate with Xiao Jian, and if he can't do it, he can still let the military department come forward to coordinate, and even if it is not good, he can transfer Zhongshan out of Jiazhou, so as not to suffer there. But it was too late for him to know the truth, and the Jiazhou direction had already started a fight with the Nanzhao people, so he couldn't think about it. No matter what, it was impossible for him to interfere in the military operations commanded by Xiao Jian. Nakayama can't even do anything to escape before the battle!

Hearing the news, Jiang Yan lowered his head sadly. After a while, he asked again, "Guo Biao, where is he in Xilong?" ”

"He's in Xilong, which is better than Zhongshan's situation in Jiazhou." Shang Cheng said succinctly, "No matter how you say it, he is the Admiral of Xilong, and he has great power, and others dare not come in front of him if they have ideas." After a pause, he added, "Last month, he had already transferred Zheng Qi from Jiazhou to Xilong, and now he wants to transfer Wen Mu as well." This time, he wrote to me to say hello to Wen Mu first. ”

"Could it be that Wen Zhaoyuan would be reluctant to go to Xilong?" Jiang Jun said. He didn't understand a little, since Guo Biao asked Wen Mu to go to Xilongwei by name, it was obvious that he would reuse it as soon as he passed, how could Wen Mu not agree to such an opportunity? What's more, Wen Mu's hometown is in Suping, Xilong, and returning to his hometown is a great thing for the glorious lintel, can Wen Zhaoyuan agree?

Shang Cheng knew very well in his heart what the reason Guo Biao asked him to greet Wen Mu first. It seems that Guo Biao also received the news and knew that Zhang Shao would soon be the governor of Yanshan. It's hard to say whether Wen Mu is willing to go to Xilong or not, but Wen Mu is Zhang Shao's right-hand man, which is an indisputable fact. If Zhang Shao didn't agree, of course Wen Mu wouldn't be able to go.

He pressed his fingers lightly against the blindfold and said no more. There are some things that he is not convenient to say to Jiang Tong now.

Jiang Jun willingly stopped continuing the topic.

He took a sip of tea and said something else with a smile: "I heard that the village is full of people during this time. ”

"You ran this trip for a long time, just to come to see my jokes?" Shang Cheng muttered a vulgar sentence, and then said, "A few days ago, I was very lively here, and there were two university scholars. By the way, who are you listening to about this? ”

"Who else could it be? Of course, it's Lord Wenshi. I happened to meet him in the morning, and when I heard him talk about you, I slipped away and ran over. ”

Shang Cheng smacked his lips, feeling a little uncomfortable. Jiang Tuan was talking about what happened in the Yellow Lantern Temple on the day of mid-autumn. At that time, a few scholars humiliated Li Mu and Tian Xiu in person, but he was angry, and found a reason to send those scholars to the Xiyue Temple Military Department Prison and imprisoned them. How do you know that none of those scholars is a fuel-efficient lamp; In the next ten days, the people who interceded with him were one after another, and each one had more origins than the other. Gu Shi lived close and came the earliest; Then there is Yang Heng, who has been away from people's attention for more than ten years, and has finally been valued by others again, and entrusted him with such a difficult task; Next is the old county king of Qinghe, and the king of Ruyang; He was followed by two fellows; Even the two sisters, Nanyang and Chen Pu, were also asked by others to come and ask him to raise his hand and let those people go; Finally, Chang Xiu and Li Mu came with Zhu Xuan's handwritten letter...... It is undeniable that Shang Cheng has opinions on some of Zhu Xuan's practices, but those are all differences in government affairs; Putting aside his inconsistent political opinions, he actually respects Zhu Xuan, an old man who is both naïve and persistent, and does bad things with good intentions; He couldn't help but give the old master this affection. Not to mention that there are so many people helping to intercede. Although he had the heart to clean up those scholars ruthlessly, he couldn't go against all these people, right?

"You let those scholars go?" Jiang asked.

"Let it go. It's all put. Shang Cheng said helplessly. What if you don't let it go? He had read the confessions sent by the military prison, these damn scholars, they didn't scold people with a single dirty word, obviously comparing Tian Xiu with those advocates they brought, but one of them spoke more elegantly than the other, and they couldn't cure those people's sins at all with a few copies of the paper! He now understands why Zhang Pu only went to those officials to trouble his political enemies when he took the opportunity of successful glass firing some time ago, and these scholars can't do it one by one, these guys are really too capable, even slandering and slandering others can make other people only stare dryly but can't speak...... What could he do? What can't he do, he can't do anything! Could he be more capable than Zhang Pu? Therefore, he had no choice but to release them. However, although it is easy to let these guys go, it is enough to make people feel cowardly; What made him feel even more upset was that those who pleaded with him for those bastards were actually the ones who shouldn't stand up to help Guan Shuo, one by one, Zhu Xuan, Chang Xiu, Li Mu, Chen Pu, and Nanyang...... Every time he thinks of this, he grits his teeth in anger! You fools, you fools, you are so stupid that you have been used as a gun and you don't know it! They humiliated Tian Xiu, she is your friend, your colleague, you actually helped those guys who humiliated your relatives to intercede, have you ever thought about her feelings? Have you ever thought that it was because of your plea that he had to let these people go? However, at the moment, these people who have done bad things have nothing to do, and he, the person who came out to fight unevenly, was humiliated by those guys! He had already heard that as soon as these guys walked out of the Xiyue Temple, they said everywhere that no matter how arrogant he was in Yanshan, he could only obediently give them away......

Forget it, he didn't want to think about this sad thing anymore. He didn't bother to think about his stupid friends anymore. Alas, even if these people have even a little bit of political acumen, they should know what they should do. When others engage in politics, they strive to unite all those who can be united. But what about this group of people? They actually did the opposite, first making Tian Xiu, the core backbone, sad, and then chilling him, a person who drew a knife to help him when he saw injustice. is such a group of people, they even dare to do such a great thing as checking the hidden fields and inhibiting land annexation, he ...... He really didn't have anything to say.

He didn't want to dwell on this matter anymore, so he found a new topic. He asked Jiang Tuan, "What I asked you just now, you haven't said it yet." What are you doing today? ”

"That's right, I recently found in the market that the price of grain is only 60% of what it was in the spring......" Jiang Yan said seriously about his true intentions. He told Shang Cheng about some of the phenomena and data he observed, including the increase and decrease of ships on the Luohe wharf, the continuous decline in the price of manpower at the wharf, the continuous decline in grain prices, and the sluggish trading of various goods...... In the end, he concluded, "I think that money is expensive and cheap nowadays, and these phenomena are early manifestations of deflation. At present, the scope of deflation is still small, and it is limited to some places in the Gyeonggi region and, but the decline in grain prices in Changzhou and the lack of grain trade are likely to be affected by the arrival of Beijing. This means that the effects of deflation are spreading rapidly to other regions. I predict that perhaps in a little while, it will likely affect the entire Central Plains and beyond. ”

Shang Cheng opened his mouth and listened to him finish his words.

He never imagined that in addition to sitting in the Ministry of Industry, taking care of the partner's warehouse business, worrying about Rendan's business, and instructing others in the trading of gold, silver and copper coins, Jiang Jian would have time to think about such a profound economic problem as deflation. This guy has so many things to do every day, he's too busy to come over, isn't he?

He was silent for a long time before he said, "This ......"

Jiang Jian immediately sat upright in the chair. He is now like a newborn doll, reverently waiting for the teacher to answer his questions.

“…… This shouldn't be deflation, right? Shang Cheng said. He couldn't discourage Jiang Lu's enthusiasm for learning, so he could only talk to him in the most euphemistic tone possible. "I think this is a temporary economic downturn in a certain region caused by some kind of unexpected event, right? This was the case because the amount of loans provided by the clan to the first three was too large, which affected the normal circulation of the total amount of money in the Shangjing area, so the problem of 'expensive money' arose; because the clan wanted to raise a large amount of cash in a short period of time, and they did not have so much cash on hand, they could only sell land and other things such as grain and cloth, which caused the phenomenon of 'cheap goods'. One by one it may or may not be deflationary. But it won't cause much of a problem anyway. Because this phenomenon should be temporary, at least for a short period of time, when the clan pays the loans, or after the imperial court announces the strategy of the Eastern Wa, prices will naturally return to stability, and the market should return to prosperity. Speaking of which, Shang Cheng had to criticize the Prime Minister's public office for making mistakes in this matter. In the planning stage of the Eastern Japanese strategy, secrecy was necessary for military considerations; However, after the strategy entered the implementation stage, especially after the sailors in the direction of Mingzhou went to sea, it was completely unnecessary to continue to keep it secret from the public. It is precisely because the Prime Minister's public office does not agree to make the strategy of the East Wa public that the people do not know what to do, and some people with ulterior motives secretly add fuel to the fire, and finally the current situation has been created. As for who these well-intentioned people are, it is not difficult to judge, it is nothing more than those who are angry with the imperial court to suppress the land annexation policy, or those who want to buy a large amount of land, or those who look at the position of the prime minister of Zuo, or those who want to monopolize a certain industry in the market to eat alone, of course, it is more attractive than everyone to eat a piece of cake together......

Jiang Jian originally thought that the phenomenon of expensive money and cheap goods in the Gyeonggi area today was deflation, which would bring great harm; As a result, Shang Cheng actually said that this phenomenon would not last long, and it could not have much impact, which inevitably made him a little disappointed. He immediately gave another example to prove that his judgment would not be wrong: "I have recently heard many people say that they will not grow grain next year because they will lose money by selling grain. They would rather leave the land unused than grow food that is bound to lose money. Does this mean that people are reluctant to reinvest in the land? This is also a phenomenon in deflation, right? ”

Shang Cheng laughed immediately. He felt that it was probably because he was incompetent as a "teacher" that Jiang had a narrow understanding of the meaning of deflation. Without growing food, what do these people eat? What's more, it doesn't matter if they say that they don't grow food. Although feudal society was generally a self-sufficient natural economy, when it came to the life-and-death question of what to plant in the land and what not to plant, it was a primitive planned economy that was enforced. Besides, everyone doesn't grow grain, so what do you pay for the annual tax per acre? You can't go to the market and buy grain to pay taxes, right? If everyone does not grow grain, grain prices will naturally rise, and it will be difficult to say whether they will be able to afford grain at that time. He smiled and said, "You say, if you don't grow food in the field, what else can you grow?" Are there cash crops for them to choose from? He picked up a pear from the plate with fruit on the small table, pointed to the peach on the other plate, and said with a smile: "Don't grow grain, let's plant pears together, or plant peaches?" ”

Jiang Jun didn't laugh, he asked again: "If this phenomenon is really deflationary, then, what can be done to curb its development momentum?" ”

"There are a lot of ways." Shang Cheng said. He refilled the tea for Jiang and refilled it for himself. "Let me think about it, what is the best way to ......"