Boom, boom, boom.

There was a loud noise in the first gold mine near Xinhua City, and the water in the mine was constantly pumped up as the rumbling sound continued.

"Add some more firewood to it."

At the command of a man, a group of people began to add firewood to one of the hearth chambers of the mechanism, and after a short time the firewood was added, the bearings on the mechanism began to run even faster.

This thing is the product of Zhao Weiji's undisciplined operation, the steam engine.

Due to the arrival of the second group of immigrants, Xinhuacheng began to mine the surrounding mineral deposits, especially iron ore and gold mines, and when the open-pit deposits were mined, they inevitably went underground. Underground mining faces a serious problem: what about groundwater?

It is impossible to pump up all the groundwater by manpower alone, so Zhao Weiji took out a steam engine.

In fact, when he first arrived in the Song Dynasty, Zhao Weiji, a science and technology technical house, could directly open and hang these mechanical products of later generations, but it was too shocking to do so, and to be honest, Zhao Weiji didn't want to be cheap Zhao Guangyi. Therefore, the things he took out, except for the Jenny machine, were inventions that were not more than fifty years ahead of this era.

And even if it's a Jenny machine, in fact, its production process is not too complicated, so even if you take it out, it won't have much impact.

But now it's different, Zhao Weiji in Xinhua City basically has no one who can restrain him, plus he needs to quickly establish a super force in this land, so he can't take care of so much, and opening is the king.

When the second batch of immigrants arrived, in addition to a large number of laborers coming to Xinhua City, they were also accompanied by many engineering students from Tsinghua College.

The arrival of these people gave Zhao Weiji great help, and he worked with this group of engineering students for a week to design this steam engine, and it took more than a month to produce him.

When the steam engine came out, the whole Xinhua cheating stream development began. And because of Zhao Weiji's own advantages, the horsepower of the first steam engine that came out here exceeded two hundred horses, which was simply exaggerated.

The arrival of the steam engine greatly saved the use of manpower, and Xinhuacheng, which was still short of labor, was able to carry out the development of multiple industries at the same time in a blink of an eye.

A large ironworks were built, two veins were excavated at the same time, and most importantly, the group of engineering students had already begun research on steam engine engines, and it is estimated that the first steamship would be available in six months at most.

"Lord, can this steam engine really be placed on the ship?" As an old sailor who has been adrift at sea for half his life, Wang Dayuan felt inexplicably excited when he thought of this kind of thing being installed on the ship.

The joy of no longer having to look at the sky to eat is something that ordinary people can't experience.

"Of course, aren't they already renovating the steam engine, I've seen their progress, and I'm sure the results will come soon."

Jia Xian in Zhao Weiji's mouth, surnamed Qian, is called Qian Sen, and the word Jia Xian. There were also four people named Yang Qiang, Zi Zhengdao, Li Guang, Zi Weichang, Ding Wen, Zi Zhenning, Chen Run, and Zi Peiyuan.

These few people are now more valuable than gold in Zhao Weiji's eyes, and if they were born in Europe six or seven hundred years later, they would definitely be incredible people.

"Okay, don't talk about the ship, that thing can't be in a hurry, let's talk to me about the gold coin minting first, the second batch should also come out."

As soon as he heard Zhao Weiji ask about the gold coins, Wang Dayuan immediately became happy, "Of course, thanks to this steam engine, the second batch is even more perfect than the first batch of minting." With this steam engine, both the melting temperature and the strength of die casting have been greatly improved, why don't you go with me to have a look? ”

Hearing Wang Dayuan say this, Zhao Weiji was naturally willing to go and see what kind of second batch of gold coins were.

After the two came to the coinage workshop, Wang Dayuan took a newly minted gold coin and handed it to Zhao Weiji, who put it in his hand and observed it carefully.

Indeed, due to the high temperature of the furnace this time, the impurities are removed relatively cleanly, and the die-casting is also very good, and the patterns on it are very clear.

The gold coins written by Zhao Weiji in Xinhua City are about the size of one-yuan coins in later generations, and the thickness is about the same. It's just that the pattern printed on it is a little different, and the obverse of the one-dollar coin in later generations is one, and the reverse is a chrysanthemum. And the gold coin here, the obverse is still one, but the Chinese numeral one, and the back is printed with the four big characters of the Great Song Tongbao.

Of course, Zhao Weiji also thought about printing the Principality of Zeon on the back, but then he still didn't have the courage to do so.

Today's gold coin is probably worth about a lot of money in the Central Plains, so Zhao Weiji set the unit of this gold coin as one yuan.

Now that there are gold coins, the trading problems in the market have been greatly alleviated, but the question is whether there is a need to continue to implement paper money?

Of course, there is, because there is a big disadvantage of using gold coins, that is, the face value is too large, and money has always been able to do too many things in the Central Plains, let alone in a place like Xinhua City, where there are plenty of materials.

Due to the arrival of potatoes and sweet potatoes, the grain in Xinhua City has suddenly become abundant, and the current grain price can be said to be outrageously low.

Today, Xinhua City has only 10,000 residents, but it produces enough food for at least 30,000 people, not including vegetables and meat. That is, there is too much leftover.

In this way, there is a problem, that is, things are too cheap, and the face value of the currency is too big, and you can't find anything to buy, so what to do?

At this time, the exchange launched a savings business according to Zhao Weiji's plan, you will deposit gold coins in the exchange, and the exchange will provide you with savings notes, and the savings notes can be opened with a face value of a penny.

This is Zhao Weiji's insidiousness, there are no copper coins, and if you want to trade with a small face value, you can exchange gold coins for paper money.

Of course, it's not that no one sees the loopholes in this, Feng Yun clearly pointed out, what if the denomination of the bill in his hand is not enough to take out a gold coin?

He thought that this kind of question could be Zhao Weiji, but he couldn't imagine how many shameless tricks Zhao Weiji from later generations had learned from the bank.

The banknotes are not enough to exchange for a gold coin, it doesn't matter, you can save some more money to make up the amount of a gold coin, isn't it over? It doesn't matter if you don't have a little money, you can use the physical object instead, the exchange will buy the people's physical goods, and then pay with bills, so that you can get together enough bills to take out the gold coins.

In fact, the purpose of this is to forcibly promote the popularization of paper money in Xinhua City, a gold coin is always a large amount of money, in order to avoid the trouble of payment, most people will choose paper money. And even if the banknote is less than the amount of a gold coin, it is still enough for daily life, so there will not be so many banknotes that must be exchanged back for gold coins, so even if the banknotes have been popularized in three months.

……

On this day, Zhao Weiji was discussing with Jiang Yu and others in the city hall about the establishment of basic education, because now more and more laws have begun to be proposed, but many people are illiterate, so there will be certain obstacles to the voting of the law, so Zhao Weiji wants to build a school that can allow everyone to attend, although it will not teach a lot of advanced knowledge, but at least it can eliminate illiteracy.

At this time, Feng Yun suddenly hurriedly ran in: "It's not good, the prince is not good." ”

As soon as he saw Feng Yun's angry appearance, Zhao Weiji knew that something bad must have happened, so he immediately stopped discussing with everyone, "What's wrong?" ”

"Lord Wang, it's not good, there is a counterfeit banknote." As Feng Yun spoke, he handed a banknote with a face value of one hundred yuan to Zhao Weiji.

This banknote knows that it is a counterfeit currency at a glance, because the quality of the banknote issued by Zhao Weiji is quite good, although it is not as durable as the banknotes of later generations, but the quality is almost the same as the printing paper of later generations.

Now the banknote in hand feels obviously wrong when you touch it, and it feels lighter in weight. In addition, it seems that there is an obvious error in the pattern on the banknote, and it is obvious that it is a fake banknote that can no longer be fake.

Although this is very fake, it is a bad sign, that is, some people in Xinhua City have begun to use crooked ways to make profits for themselves, that is to say, the signs of crime have begun to appear.

"Where did you get this counterfeit?"

"At the exchange, there was a man who wanted to exchange ten of these counterfeit coins for a gold coin with a face value of 100 yuan, but our teller felt that something was wrong when he touched it, and immediately asked the guards to detain the person, and then handed the counterfeit money to me. I touched it and found that something was wrong, so I'm coming to you. ”

"Well, that's a problem. But don't worry, the new banknotes have been made, you can take them and see them. After speaking, Zhao Weiji took out a new hundred-dollar note from the drawer next to him and handed it to Feng Yun.

Feng Yun touched and touched, looked and looked, but didn't find any difference from the original, so he had to look at Zhao Weiji blankly.

"You put the money and look at the sun."

According to Zhao Weiji's prompt, Feng Yun walked to the window, held up the money and looked at the sun carefully, this time he found a magical thing, that is, two words appeared in the blank space of the banknote: Da Song.

Feng Yun, who discovered this change, was a little surprised and said, "Lord Wang, this is?" ”

"This is the new banknote, which will better prevent counterfeit money." As early as when the banknotes were ready to be issued, Zhao Weiji had already thought that there would be counterfeit money. It's just that at that time, I didn't have a good banknote with a watermark, so I had to temporarily use a good quality first.

However, no matter how good the quality is, it is still paper after all, in Zhao Weiji's expectation, once the counterfeit money appears, it will not take long to make up for the quality of the paper. So in the end, he still came up with the watermark method, and he believes that at least at this stage, there is no way for ordinary counterfeiters to get watermarks.

However, although the problem of counterfeit money can be solved, Zhao Weiji is very worried about such signs, so Zhao Weiji decided to take this opportunity to make a fuss in the law.