The old man could never have imagined that what happened to him that day would bring such a big variable to this Anham County and even Dahua Kingdom.

First of all, the villagers reported that they had encountered the saltwater karst cave to the town, and it happened that the three of them heard it by He Guanggen, who was sent to explore the mine; the three political secretaries walked to find the old man to guide the way, and confirmed that the karst cave was indeed a high-grade salt mine, and rushed back to the Yamen of the Fuzhou Salt Transport Administration in the starry night to report the good news; after hearing this, Lu Binxian, the salt transport inspector of the Yamen of the Fuzhou Salt Transport Administration, hurriedly called the official who was full-time salt smelting, and after confirming the quality of the mineral sand, he was overjoyed, and the busy people called back the scattered walks to all places and transferred them to the blind mountain.

After seven or eight days of deep exploration by hundreds of people, it was known that this vein was more than ten miles long, a few miles wide, and more than ten zhang deep, which was a huge mine that had never been seen before, and it was enough for the whole people of Dahua to eat for 100 years. Within a few days, Lu Binxian issued an order to seal off the blind mountain, and don't let the neighboring people come to steal mining. After a while, he prepared an urgent official letter of 300 miles and submitted it to Xu Yongnian, the official of the county salt transportation administration.

Xu Yongnian has been the secretary of the salt transportation department of Anxian County for more than three years, and he has made no achievements during his tenure. After reading Lu Binxian's submission, it was like grasping a life-saving straw, and he was overjoyed, so he hurriedly asked his staff to write a book of thousands of words to report the good news, and urgently submitted it to the capital for 500 miles. The staff was also a man of hard work, quite talented, and not only discovered this rare huge mine in the county, but also reported to the construction of the salt government post road, set up a mining and refining team for mineral salt, and estimated the quality of the output of sand salt and powder salt for the period of year, and asked for many proposals such as liberalizing the sale of private salt and formulating a salt tax.

The emperor was really overjoyed when he saw the recital, and praised several "wonderful" words in a row. Although I don't agree with many of Xu Yongnian's proposals, I deeply think that he is enthusiastic for the people, and I am both grateful and gratified. The next day, a holy decree was issued, which simply said: Jiaqi's great merit, showing his great benevolence, specially promoted to the second level, to the second grade of the minister, giving the official field a hundred hectares, and the three generations of children and grandchildren are all in the official position.

But that Xu Yongnian seemed to be destined to be blessed with grace and not be generous, and after receiving the holy decree, he was so happy and sad that he laughed so much that he didn't breathe, and he died in front of the eunuch who announced the decree.

Dahua was founded by Xia Ruren, a general of the previous dynasty, and it was more than 300 years old, and he served as 22 emperors, and the current dynasty was the 23rd emperor, with the year name Yonghua. This Emperor Yonghua is actually not sincere about imperial power, and is obsessed with the art of immortality. It was only because the old emperor and several princes fought fiercely with each other, dead and dead, crippled, and gone, and could not find a suitable crown prince for a while, and saw that his limit was approaching, so he forced Emperor Yonghua to take the throne. After Emperor Yonghua ascended the throne, he was also diligent and hardworking, and there was no delay in important state affairs. It's just that I really don't like this power in my heart, and I am very good at heart, and it is not easy to kill, and the situation of this great Chinese country is not very good, and the party is not fighting, although there is no war, the people's lives are not as rich as in previous dynasties.

Emperor Yonghua had nine sons, of which the third, sixth and seventh princes were all dragons among men, and they were proficient in all aspects of civil and military affairs. This Emperor Yonghua has been an emperor for more than 20 years, and he has long been tired of it, and he has always wanted to choose one of the three princes to pass on this great position, but the three princes are all first-class and excellent, each with its own good, and it is really difficult to choose in a short time. Since Xu Yongnian's death, the three princes have successively recommended their confidants to take over the post of the salt transportation official of Anxian County, and Emperor Yonghua was hesitant and irritable for a while.

Since the founding of the People's Republic of China, nine out of ten of the imperial court's silver coins have come from all over the world: coinage, salt transportation, official fields, and taxes.

The coinage is one of the ten departments, the main job is to mint gold ingots, silver ingots, and copper inscriptions, and there are minting divisions in each county, which are in charge of silver money exchange, broken silver, broken gold, and broken copper smelting, which is the throat of people's livelihood. Since the previous dynasties, the coinage department was in the hands of the emperor himself, and there was no head minister, but six years ago, Emperor Yonghua had handed it over to the chief of his confidants, Ni Juzheng;

Guantian and Juntian are commonly known as "Guantian", which are scattered in various counties and prefectures, and are in charge of the county administration, state administration, and local general's offices, and the annual income is reported to the Ministry of Officials and the Treasury of the Military Department;

There are agricultural taxes and commercial taxes, and the tax system in various places is not ordinary, and Dahua has promulgated tax laws: the agricultural tax and commercial tax in the capital are 15 taxes and 1 tax, which is the lowest; in the county capitals, the agricultural tax is 14 taxes and 1 tax in 13 taxes; and in the state capitals, the agricultural tax and commercial tax are 13 taxes and 1. Taxes in various localities shall be collected by the county, prefecture, and county assistant divisions, and shall be uniformly submitted to the treasury of the Ministry of Civil Affairs.

At the beginning of Dahua, the salt transportation was originally subordinate to the Ministry of Commerce, but more than 100 years ago, many salt mines were discovered in various counties and prefectures, and the salt transportation office accounted for 60% of the Ministry of Commerce, and gradually sat down, and then finally separated. Although it is not listed separately, it is no longer under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Commerce, and the quality of the Yanyun County Magistrate has also been raised from the original third grade to the second grade, which is one grade lower than the radicals of each ministry and only half a level lower than the county magistrates. In that dynasty, there were three Yanyun County Governors, who were stationed in Anxian County, Xiangyang County and Shilong County, among which Anxian produced mineral salt, also called "sand salt" and "powder salt", and Xiangyang and Shilong produced sea salt. The best sand salt has a salty taste, but it is not astringent and bitter, but sea salt, no matter how it is refined, always has some astringency and bitterness, so although the price is less than half of the sand salt, the eater is still less than three-thirds of the sand salt. This Anham County is also the first of the three salt-producing counties.

In particular, the newly discovered veins are of high quality, and the reserves are also huge, and there is even a mine for the use of the world, and its importance is self-evident.

Dahua Capital City, inside Ruiyun Building.

"Siyuan, the day before yesterday, I recommended you to my father and the emperor to serve as the administrative secretary of salt transportation in Naanxian County. What do you think?" asked a man in Chinese costumes in his thirties, sipping wine while smiling at the man in purple on the lower left.

The purple-clothed man was stunned for a moment, obviously quite surprised, and hugged his fist behind him for a while, "Although Siyuan is not talented, if he goes to work, he will do his best to live up to the expectations of the prince." ”

The man in the gorgeous costume is the sixth son of the current Yonghua Emperor, the prince of the jaw Xia Mu Dynasty. This Xia Mu Dynasty has been favored by heaven, and he is already a great luck among people when he was born as a prince, but he is also smart and studious, and his talent is strange. Not only did he learn geography and astronomy, but he also dabbled deeply in governing the country, and he was a rare all-rounder, and he was called "the wise prince" in the court.

At this moment, Xia Muchao got up from his seat, paced to the man named Mei Siyuan with a wine glass, took the wine jug from the table, and went to take Mei Siyuan's wine glass.

Mei Siyuan was also busy getting up and standing up the moment Xia Muchao left his seat, and now he saw that he was about to pour wine for himself, and he was frightened for a while, and he was about to leave.

Xia Muchao let him quit the wine, put down his cup, pressed his hand on Mei Siyuan's shoulder, took his wine glass, and filled it with wine. looked directly into his eyes and said in a straight voice, "Siyuan, the lack of salt and the imperial court, endangering the people, is a great urgency for the imperial court, and it is urgent to solve the shortage of salt!"

Mei Siyuan's eyes swayed, he was speechless for a long time, raised his glass with both hands over the top, and responded in a deep voice, "Siyuan, as a courtier, is favored by the emperor in the world, and he should bow and serve;

"Haha", Xia Muchao was very happy, the glass of wine was also exhausted, patted Mei Siyuan's right shoulder with his left hand, and laughed loudly, "Okay, good, if you go to Anxian, the Dahua salt crisis should be solved within five years" After speaking, he returned to his seat.

Xia Muchao had already taken his seat, so he asked Mei Siyuan to sit down as well. I heard him ask again, "I urgently ordered you to come back this time, can your wife and son come with you?"

"No, it's still in Qingxi County. Siyuan didn't expect what the prince thought, and he didn't dare to act rashly. Mei Siyuan replied.

In the summer of that year, Ruren had an incident, and four friends in the army led troops to accompany him. During the war, the five people formed a rebellion, with Xia Ruren as the eldest brother, and the remaining four were renamed Zhi, Li, Yi, and Xin, and their full names were Zhu Zhi, Huang Li, Yang Yi, and Bai Xin. The five generals led the army like a bamboo, and it was unstoppable, and finally established the Great China Kingdom. After the founding of the country, Dahua was divided into a city and 26 counties, Xia Ruren thanked the four righteous brothers, and gave the four people the surnames Zhuge , Huangfu, Ram, Baili, and the fiefs of Limin County, Baoguo County, Cangsheng County and Youmin County, and gave an order to the emperor of later generations: the four clans of Shiyin Huang'en, the hereditary replacement of the fief of the four counties, and never withdraw the feud.

When Emperor Yonghua did not love power, seven years ago, he let the three princes of his choice govern two counties, and Qingxi County, which was presided over by Mei Siyuan, was one of the counties under the jurisdiction of King Zhi. According to Dahua's practice, local officials are not allowed to act without a will. This time he received the edict of King Zhi to enter the capital, Mei Siyuan thought that he was just performing his duties normally, and he did not dare to bring his family with him. Xia Muchao also knew that he was not surprised, at this time he took a glass of wine, walked from the seat to the window, and said after a while, "Someone went to invite your family to come, live in the palace first, I think you will leave for Anxian County within the year, stay in Anxian County and settle down, and then send someone to pick you up." An Xianyan Transportation Administration, this king is already 100% sure!" looked out the window and drank a cup, looked back at Mei Siyuan, and said confidently.