When Zhu Jingyuan was ready to go to the construction site of his new palace, his staff member Niu Jian sent the news conveyed by the West Factory:

"Your Highness, the British have officially passed the Regency Act, and the Prince of Wales has become the British Regent, which is actually the Crown Prince's Prison.

Under the manipulation of British Prime Minister Pitt, the contradictions between Britain and the American colonies have become white-hot.

"Pitt is ready to take this opportunity to push for a direct merger of the United States with the British mainland......

"At the same time, the information staff of the West Factory said that it cannot be ruled out that this is a deliberate choice made by Pitt in order to keep the post of prime minister."

Zhu Jingyuan took the telegram and newspaper, carefully read its contents, and had a general understanding of the situation in Britain.

Then he asked rhetorically something that seemed completely unrelated:

"Is Florida and Texas acceptance done?"

Niu Jian was obviously stunned, but the relevant news was in his mind:

"It has been completed, the original Xiyi settlement has been emptied, and our troops have been stationed in the main military positions and residential areas.

"Now the garrison is pulling nets to search the original settlements, looking for possible missing and hidden Tessians, or Mo slaves.

"The first batch of armed migrants from Xintianfu in South Yinzhou has arrived and are cooperating with the troops to clear the original residential areas.

"The first batch of local immigrants from Daming is expected to arrive in the next few days and will be able to celebrate the Chinese New Year there."

Zhu Jingyuan smiled and said:

In other words, there is no need to worry about the Americans refusing to remove Florida or delaying the handover.

"In that case, we can't let the British integrate the United States in peace, and we have to add fire to both the British and the United States.

"The newspaper staff and writers on the Tessie side that we were able to contact were able to split up to write some analysis and commentary.

"On the one hand, the promotion of the United States of America joining the United Kingdom will certainly be a drag on the United Kingdom.

"On the other hand, propaganda that America would become a big Ireland and a direct target of exploitation by England.

"But you don't have to push too hard, just fan the wind a little, don't be too obvious.

"You don't need to use any special powers, don't be discovered."

Niu Jian smiled and nodded in agreement, and went back to send a telegram to the West Factory to convey Zhu Jingyuan's meaning.

At the same time, Zhu Jingyuan took more than a dozen guards, as well as his two maidservants, and officially went out to the construction site of the new palace.

Guan Tianpei, with his subordinates, has carefully screened all immigrants and natives in the past month.

At the same time, he stared at the palace personnel and let them establish a strict household registration system in accordance with the local standards of the Ming Dynasty.

All subsequent immigrants will be screened when they get off the ship, and after passing the household registration information, they can enter Quicksand City.

In the process, Guan Tianpei discovered dozens of immigrants whose origins were not particularly clear, and the family was transferred to Oman.

These migrants are not necessarily at risk per se, but there is some uncertain information on their resumes and they are sent away in order to avoid possible risks.

Oman's climate is actually better than that of Quicksand City, and it is not a punishment to send them to settle there.

Then Zhu Jingyuan was finally able to walk around the outside of the existing old palace accompanied by the guards.

Now the whole quicksand city is a big construction site, not only the new palace is being built, but there are also several construction sites around the palace.

This includes a collective housing building for more immigrants, as well as a future residence for the Imperial Court of the New Great Food Country.

There are also more oil tanks being built by the sea, as well as more important seawater chemical plants and water towers and cisterns.

At the same time, the exterior wall structure of the palace is now basically completed.

In the planning of the Ming Dynasty's local palace, this outer wall is usually just a "Xiao Wall".

It's just an ordinary single-story wall, not a city wall that can run horses on it.

However, most of the capitals of the newly built feudal kingdoms overseas have been turned into walls.

In particular, if the capital is not a castle, this wall will become a de facto wall, and this is the case with the Great Food Country.

Moreover, the structure of the city wall has also changed, and it is no longer a traditional city wall with rammed earth inside and brick on the outside, but a concrete blockhouse that surrounds the palace.

The interior of the wall is hollow to allow for the passage of vehicles and people, and there are machine gun holes in the wall.

At the four corners of the wall, there are four heightened watchtowers.

There is also a moat dug out of the wall, which is designed to be dug wide enough to bring in the sea directly into the bay.

There are no rivers to use in the mainland, so we can only use seawater.

On the whole, this is a composite modern fortification.

According to Zhu Jingyuan's understanding, this kind of defensive fortress can still play some role in the First World War and the previous era.

In the era of World War II, in the war between the great powers, it was of little significance in the face of heavy weapons.

However, the palace had to build a wall anyway, and this fortification would reassure the officials of the palace and the immigrants around the palace.

They all instinctively felt that in case of any sudden danger, they could take refuge in this seemingly very strong fortress.

When Zhu Jingyuan came to the gate of the city wall, he looked at the busy workers inside and outside the wall and under the wall, smiled and arched his hand to them.

Then he passed through the open gate of the fence and came to the large courtyard of the proverbial himself.

The inner courtyard wall of the palace is being laid, and the wall structure should be similar to the outer wall.

Workers for the main works of the exterior wall are gradually moving to the interior wall.

The courtyard between the inner and outer walls is now mainly used as a site for stacking building materials, and there are a small number of simple houses for workers to live temporarily.

However, the number of workers on the inner and outer walls is actually not too large, and most of the workers are in the area within the inner walls, and they are all building palaces in the palace.

At present, the three main halls and the main body of the king's bedroom have been basically formed, and the decoration should begin after the Chinese New Year.

The surrounding ancillary buildings are also being built rapidly.

All the buildings in the inner courtyard of the palace are expected to be basically completed by the middle of next year, and the British will be able to move in next autumn.

Although the current Daming architecture is still in the same vein as the traditional building in appearance, it has basically abandoned the traditional wooden frame.

Before the large-scale development of overseas land, the large wood of the local area itself was difficult to find, and the traditional palaces built became smaller and smaller.

The key is that Emperor Shizu personally invented concrete, and foresightly introduced the technology of reinforced concrete frame structure.

After the completion of industrialization, steel production soared rapidly, and reinforced concrete buildings began to be popular.

Of course, this surge is relatively classical, and even now, reinforced concrete is not available to all families.

The small-scale houses built by ordinary families are basically brick and tile structures, and where there is timber in the local area, wooden beams may be used for local materials.

There is no timber available in the surrounding area, and most of the roofs are filled with prefabricated floor slabs or concrete.

However, the clan, the nobles, the qualified elite, and the official buildings of the imperial court are basically reinforced concrete frame structures.

The timber frame structure of ancient Chinese buildings has a good inspiration for modern frame structure.

Coupled with the special mention of Emperor Shizu, the development of related architectural design technology has been accelerated for more than 120 years.

The reinforced concrete frame structure, which was only widely used in the early 20th century, was popularized in the late 18th century in the Ming Dynasty. By this time, it was very mature, and there were already special construction machinery.

The reinforced concrete frame structure has no large walls, making it ideal for the construction of traditional Chinese buildings and palaces.

The walls and interiors of the houses continue to be decorated with wooden materials, and the final look and feel is not noticeable from that of traditional palaces.

However, the actual rooms and units are much more spacious, and the whole building is built much faster. Otherwise, with a total of tens of thousands of workers in Quicksand City, such a large palace, and so many other buildings, it is impossible to build it so quickly.

The latest high-rise buildings and halls even have elevators inside, and the final comfort of use has of course been greatly improved.

Zhu Jingyuan walked around the construction site, saw the busy workers around him, and smiled at them from time to time, shouting hard work.

Zhu Jingyuan also went over to chat with workers who were resting, surveyors and designers, and workers who were dealing with some special crafts.

Many boys are naturally curious about buildings, machinery, and weapons, and they have little resistance when they see these things, and Zhu Jingyuan is this kind of person.

In this era of complete combination of oriental classical and modern technology, Zhu Jingyuan is quite excited about this large-scale construction site that is close to the world's most advanced.

As a matter of course, I watched the craftsmen work with curiosity, and asked all kinds of questions of interest.

But this behavior is very exciting for the ordinary workers of this era.

The workers all felt that the Prince of Da Shi was particularly amiable, and he did not have the frame of being the king and the Prince of Daming at all.

Workers, who are usually very enthusiastic about their work because of their high wages, have once again raised their emotions to a higher stage

Niu Jian and Guan Tianpei, who were following Zhu Jingyuan, were also very surprised by Zhu Jingyuan's behavior.

Both of them could see that Zhu Jingyuan didn't deliberately pretend to be a corporal of courtesy, but really didn't dislike the mess of those workers.

Even the maidservants who followed Zhu Jingyuan, An Xiaona and Erin were very surprised.

When Zhu Jingyuan was usually with them, when he faced the servants of the palace, he also behaved quite amiably.

However, An Xiaona instinctively thought that this was because everyone was Zhu Jingyuan's family and close subordinates, so they had that attitude.

Now it seems that His Royal Highness the Prince of Great Food, even if he is an ordinary worker outside, has the same attitude.

From the staff and guards, from the maidservants to the workers, they all had a new understanding of the young king of their own family.

Zhu Jingyuan walked around the construction site for more than an hour, and only at noon did he call the workers to rest and return to the palace.

In the afternoon, Zhu Jingyuan received news that Zheng Fuguang, who had been busy in the Baku area for almost two months, had returned.

Zhu Jingyuan immediately went to meet this theoretical subordinate of the company, and after greeting him, he asked about the situation in Baku by the way.

When Zheng Fuguang came to Dashiguo from Daming, he still had a bit of a scholarly temperament, and now he has completely become a resident engineer.

His cheeks were slightly dark, but he was also quite ruddy, and his hands were a little rough, and he had obviously done a lot of work by himself.

Although he is in a dusty state now, he is quite energetic and looks very healthy.

When Zheng Fuguang heard Zhu Jingyuan's question, he reported like a few treasures:

"His Royal Highness is really accurate in choosing a place, and Baku is also a piece of land soaked in the oil sea.

"Quicksand City still drills wells down, and only after drilling to a depth of more than 1,000 meters can the oil be produced happily underground.

"On the Baku side, it only takes at least 50 meters to start producing oil, and at most 5 or 600 meters.

"It's so easy to extract oil over there, we don't have to drill a well in 10 days.

"My subordinates feel that the oil reserves on the Baku side may not be less than those on the Quicksand City side.

"The only drawback is that it is located inland, which is very inconvenient to transport to the mainland of Daming.

"It can only be handed over to the royal consortium, let them run it, and sell it to the surrounding Lucia, Khiva, Kazakh, and Xianbei countries."

Zhu Jingyuan knew that Baku's original reserves were lower than those of the Persian Gulf.

Baku is only the most convenient large oil field to exploit, although at one time it produced half of the world's production, and at one time it reached 70% of the Soviet Union's.

But in just a decade after World War II, production quickly fell to 15 percent of the Soviet Union's, and finally to 2 percent.

As for the oil in the Persian Gulf region, Zhu Jingyuan doesn't know how long it can be exploited.

Zhu Jingyuan nodded with a smile and said:

"It's really hard to ship out, so it's handed over to the royal consortium to export to Lucia and nearby countries.

"Our big food country picks its own oil and sells it, and it is more reasonable to take advantage of loopholes.

"In other feudal countries, it's a bit too flamboyant to do this.

"To the royal consortium, it's just right to gag their mouths.

"They're going to have to give me dividends anyway."

Zheng Fuguang smiled and sighed and said:

"What Your Highness said makes sense, if the Baku oil field is operated by the royal consortium, we can extract oil on a larger scale in the Great Food Country.

"Now that the drilling process has been basically stabilized, the next step is to continue to drill steadily in the existing field.

"So my subordinates want to go home and have a look, after all, the New Year is coming soon, and I ask His Highness for permission.

"If there is a need here, the subordinates can come over again after the New Year."

Zhu Jingyuan suddenly reacted:

"If you go back to Jingshi, is it too late now?"

Zheng Fuguang immediately said:

"It's time, the fastest passenger ship now can arrive in Beijing in as little as fifteen days, and it can be rushed back before the year."

Zhu Jingyuan sighed:

"If you can catch up, then Zheng Gong will go back."

Zhu Jingyuan took out his check, signed a 30,000 silver note, and handed it to Zheng Fuguang opposite:

"Time is pressing, and I don't have time to prepare any New Year's benefits, so I'll send Zheng Gong a New Year's red envelope in advance."

During the Chinese New Year, the owner gives red envelopes to important employees, which is also a traditional practice of Daming manufacturers.

So Zheng Fuguang was not too surprised, subconsciously reached out to take it, and thanked him with a smile:

"Your Highness is really too polite......"

Then subconsciously glanced at the numbers above, Zheng Fuguang was directly startled:

"Ah, 30,000 silver bills...... That's too much! Your Highness...... This...... I don't dare ask for this......"

Zhu Jingyuan smiled and waved his hand and said:

"Not much, compared to Zheng Gong's rush and busyness in the past few months, compared to the oil field income in Quicksand City and Baku, this money is really not much.

"Zheng Gong rest assured, don't have any pressure and bad thoughts, continue to work hard in our Daming Airlines in the coming year, and strive to get another 30,000 next year."

30,000 silver banknotes, converted according to purchasing power, are equivalent to 3 million yuan in Zhu Jingyuan's previous life.

Zheng Fuguang personally led a team of workers to help Zhu Jingyuan drive out the quicksandtown oilfield and the Baku oilfield.

He is the chief engineer of oilfield development and the actual person in charge of the project, and he has worked out billions of industries in half a year.

Although it was mainly Zhu Jingyuan's advance planning and direction, the year-end bonus of three million was not particularly much for him.

But in this era, unless the average engineer owns a stake, the income of the average engineer is far from this level.

If Zheng Fuguang's craftsman rank is not promoted, he may not be able to save 30,000 silver bills until retirement based on labor remuneration alone.

In Zheng Fuguang's opinion, His Royal Highness the Prince of Great Food is really a bit generous and scary.

But thinking about the past experience, this highness has always been very generous, and the craftsmen of the local company are also paid the highest in the industry.

Zhu Jingyuan persuaded and encouraged Zheng Fuguang carefully to accept the check and leave officially.

After sending Zheng Fuguang away, Zhu Jingyuan called Liu Zhixin, who was busy with the long history:

"You can start preparing for the Chinese New Year, and prepare a welfare and red envelope standard for all officials and workers, and send them out before the year.

"Now there are more than 20,000 people in our quicksand city, and no matter how many men, women and children are given a red envelope.

"Of course, if the position is important, and if you perform well, you should give a little more, and vice versa.

"Specially hired workers whose families are not here and want to go back for reunion during the Chinese New Year can go with Zheng Gong now.

"There are also a few other hired ships that go around to purchase all kinds of New Year's goods and sell them in the city at cost price.

"Let the immigrants who have just settled here have a lively and comfortable New Year......