Early in the morning, Li Mu was having breakfast, and the porter came to report that someone from the palace was waiting in the lobby. Li Mu hurriedly pulled a bowl of porridge, wiped his mouth, and came to the lobby of the front yard.

"Father-in-law Gao?" Seeing the comer, Li Mu was stunned for a moment and said, "Why did Grandpa Gao come so early, is there anything urgent?" ”

Father-in-law Gao smiled all over his face and said, "Don't panic, there is no urgency." Our family came today to bring clothes to Master Hou. Saying that, Gonggong Gao clapped his hands, and the little eunuch behind him hurriedly came to him with a tray, Gonggong Gao sorted out his expression, and said solemnly: "Zhulu Hou listens to the holy oracle." ”

Li Mu hurriedly bowed down, and Gonggong Gao learned Li Shimin's demeanor, and said in a thick voice as much as possible: "Your Majesty said: Li Mu, you kid, you have never been to the court once since you were promoted. Although there is a reason for the incident, it will inevitably cause criticism, so I made a court dress for you, and I must wear it tomorrow to participate in the court meeting! ”

After finishing speaking, Gonggong Gao immediately put on a smile again and said, "What our family said is His Majesty's original words, and not a word is bad." Do you know what Your Majesty means? ”

"Uh......" Li Mu didn't react a little, but he knew what to do, with a flick of his wrist, he handed over a piece of silver without leaving a trace.

Grandpa Gao put it in his sleeve with a smile on his face, and nodded: "Master Hou, someone has sued you." Do you remember what kind of notebook you took two days ago? ”

"Transcript?" Li Mu thought about it for a while, he has taken a total of two recitals these days, one is to recommend the officials of the Ministry of Industry, and the other is to recommend Tang Guanren's 'Imperial Walking', the former has already passed the anger with Li Shimin, there should be no problem, then the problem must be Tang Guan's recital. It seems that someone is jealous of Tang Guan and doesn't dare to provoke his father Tang Jian, so he pointed the finger at himself.

Li Mu understood, bowed his hand to Gonggong Gao, and said, "Thank you Gonggong Gao for your advice, Ben Hou knows it in his heart." ”

Father-in-law Gao still looked smiling, he knew in his heart that this kind of impeachment was insignificant to Li Mu, and he didn't take it seriously at all.

"Master Hou, it is not often that there is a matter of giving service, which shows that Your Majesty has grace to you. There is one more thing, if our family doesn't say it, I'm afraid that the Hou Ye won't know. Does Master Hou know who this court dress came from? ”

"This ...... How can I know. ”

Gao Gong said: "This set of court clothes was sewn by the queen herself. ”

"Huh?!" Li Mu was surprised: "It was actually sewn by the queen herself?" Li Mu hurriedly bowed in the direction of Taiji Palace, and shouted in his mouth: "How can Li Mu be so loved, he can be so loved by His Majesty and the Queen, there is no way to repay him, only by bowing and dying, and completing everything His Majesty has explained, can he repay Long En's case!" ”

In fact, he had already guessed just now that this paragraph was just to cooperate with Gao Gonggong's performance. He knew that after Gonggong Gao went back, he would reply to Li Shimin and Empress Changsun, and he said this to make it easier for him to explain, and to make Li Shimin and Empress Changsun feel comfortable.

How could Gonggong Gao not see Li Mu's careful thoughts, pretending to be confused, pretending not to know.

"The heart of the Hou of Zhulu, our family will pass it on to Your Majesty. Okay, our family's affairs are done, and we have to go back to the palace to reply to the decree, so I won't bother much, and let's go. ”

Li Mu sent it to the door and gave the concierge a look, and the concierge hurriedly ran to the warehouse and asked someone to move two jars of champion yuanhong. Father-in-law Gao was helped into the carriage by the little eunuch, Li Mu handed over the two jars of wine, and said: "Today, a new wine has been made, and there are still two jars left, and I ask my father-in-law to help transfer it to His Majesty and the Emperor Taishang for tasting." ”

"Our family will live up to the trust."

Gonggong Gao put the wine next to him, held it with his hand, said goodbye to Li Mu, and returned to the palace.

Li Mu returned to the lobby, picked up the court dress that was said to have been sewn by Empress Changsun herself, and looked at it carefully. I have to say that this stitch is indeed excellent, and the queen of Guiwei has such attainments in female redness, which is really impressive.

After the founding of the Tang Dynasty, Li Yuan once issued an edict to stipulate the color of the uniform of a hundred officials, and the prince to the third grade was made of purple Dake Ayaluo, and the belt was made of jade belt hook. The fifth rank and above are made of crimson Koko Ayara, and the belt is made of grass gold hooks. The six pins are made of yellow double silk and the belt is made of rhino hooks. The seventh rank is made of green tortoise shell, double giant, and ten-flower silk, and the belt is silver, and the ninth product is made of cyan silk cloth mixed silk, and the belt is made of yoga stone belt hook.

In terms of official position, Li Mu, as a waiter in the Ministry of Works, is a fourth-grade official, and can only wear a crimson official uniform, but because he is still the founding county marquis of the third grade, he just happened to wear a purple edge. Therefore, the court dress sewn for him by Empress Changsun is purple, and gold thread is specially used. Although it is not obvious if you don't look closely, it is a kind of low-key show-off, and it is just that others have not found the gold thread, as long as the gold thread is found, they will know that the dress is from the palace.

What a privilege is this to give the court clothes?

Li Mu returned to the backyard with the tray and showed it to Bai Qiaoqiao, who was also very happy, carefully looked at the stitches of the clothes, and envied the queen's female redness. Zhang Tianai can't see anything, she has never touched a needle and thread in her life, whether it is good or not, she can't see it.

didn't talk for a while, the porter came to look for him again, and Lu Wenfeng arrived in Yu Langzhong. Lu Wenfeng sorted out the information that Li Mu asked for yesterday, and he planned to send someone to send it, but he was worried that Li Mu had a question to ask, so he sent it himself.

Seeing each other in the lobby, Li Mu first took a look at the things that Lu Wenfeng had sorted out. But it's a pity that I didn't understand it. Due to the relationship between ancient and modern place names, even if Lu Wenfeng has written very clearly, where is the iron mine, where is the copper mine, where is the silver mine, but Li Mu does not know where these are. Li Mu had to ask one place after another, with Chang'an as the coordinates, in which direction of Chang'an, how far away, and then in his mind corresponded to the map of China's mineral distribution that he remembered in junior high school geography, and he didn't match a few names for a long time.

This gave Li Mu a little headache.

There was really no way, so I had to put the prospecting thing aside. Li Mu put aside the information in his hand and asked a key question: "Lu Langzhong, are the various minerals of Datang today state-owned or private?" ”

"Minerals are all state-owned, but minerals are all over the place, and mining still requires the cooperation of the people of the local state capital. The specific implementation plan is to have two official camps of salt and iron, and the rest will be mined by the state capitals and taxed by the imperial court. ”

"Alas!" Shepherd Li let out a long sigh, the most troublesome thing still happened. Although he had thought of this for a long time, he still had a chance on it. Now that hope is gone, my head hurts all at once.

If these minerals are state-owned and state-owned, Li Mu, as a squire of the Ministry of Works, can naturally allocate them with full authority. There is no one to do it, it can be regarded as no cost, although it will definitely be difficult at the beginning, but as long as it is on the track, it will be a flat river in the future.

But now it seems that the degree of control of the imperial court over the local area is far lower than Li Mu imagined. Although Lu Wenfeng said it tactfully, his meaning was already clear. Minerals belong to the state, but if the state wants to exploit minerals, local cooperation is indispensable. What is a place? Is it a magistrate? Is it the people of the land? Obviously, it's not, the word "this place" is still a family of gate valves.

Li Mu can now understand a little bit of the reason why Li Shimin is afraid of the gate valve family, just imagine, although the country's surname is Li, but the talent is in the hands of the gate valve family, the land is in the hands of the door valve family, the population is in the hands of the door valve family, even the minerals, nominally the imperial court, in fact, it is still in the hands of the door valve family, if this is not feared, then unless this emperor is a fool.

Fortunately, these gate valve families also contain each other, fighting openly and secretly. Otherwise, if they join forces, the rebellion is estimated to be successful. Thinking of this, Li Mu suddenly smiled bitterly, what else is the estimate, it can be done. At the end of the Sui Dynasty, there was a great chaos, and the heroes rose together, isn't this 'group of heroes' the gate valves in various places? Some are like Li Tang, who rose up by themselves, and some are behind the back, the so-called competition in the world is the war between these gate valves!

Li Mu picked up the information compiled by Lu Wenfeng and looked at it, and suddenly he found a problem, and said: "Lu Langzhong, why don't you have the distribution of coal mines in these things you have organized?" ”

"Ah, if you go back to your lordship, coal and stone are not considered mines, so there is no record."

"Coal doesn't count as mines?" It was the first time Li Mu had heard of this kind of thing, and said, "How can coal not be considered a mine?" ”

"My lord, didn't the lower official explain it to you yesterday? Coal stone is everywhere, more or less, and it is not uncommon. And unless iron is smelted, few people use it, and it has no value, how can it be counted as a mineral? ”

"You ......" Li Mu looked at Lu Wenfeng and wanted to say something, but suddenly sighed and didn't say anything. Lu Wenfeng's deep-rooted concept will make him change for a while and a half, and it is very difficult to change it. Unless he is shown the usefulness of coal, it will certainly not work by talking about it.

"Yesterday you said that there is a place full of coal pits and valleys, what is that place called?"

"Lord Hui, it's Shuozhou, north of Taiyuan."

Li Mu wrote down the name of the place and said to Lu Wenfeng: "You go back and try to look for it, see if there is a place like Shuozhou where you don't need to dig and there is coal directly on the ground, and if you find it, tell me immediately, I have a lot of use." ”

Lu Wenfeng really couldn't help it, and said: "My lord, coal and stone really can't be used for heating, it will kill people, and the lower officials are not alarmist!" Xia Guan has seen it with his own eyes! ”

Li Mu reluctantly explained: "I know that coal and stone heating will kill people, but that is not the fault of coal and stone, but the way of using it is not proper enough." Ben Hou has developed a new method of using coal and stone for heating, using coal and stone in my way to avoid the risk of poisoning, so that coal can come in handy? Therefore, Ben Hou wants to find coal, so that the people can be warm for the winter, isn't it a great thing? ”

When Lu Wenfeng heard Li Mu say this, he was a little stunned, he didn't believe it in his heart but didn't dare to say it, and it took a long time before he said: "If it's really as the adults say, it's indeed a good thing." But coal poison is not child's play, and adults should be more careful when testing. ”