Chapter 2182: On Internal Governance and Strategy

The Flash Gold people are as tough and resilient as wild grass; what they lack is nothing but opportunity—the chance to avoid hunger through honest labor and diligent management, the chance to return to being hardworking, law-abiding good people.

What the Great Emperor of the Nine Abysses seeks to do is restore those opportunities once stolen by demons and immortals, by tyrants and corrupt gentry, by war and dispersal.

Before He Yue set off on his return to the homeland, he happened to catch the new batch of regulations issued by Cangyan taking effect; as he bade farewell, he raised his thumb toward his elder brother He Lingchuan: "Well said, elder brother truly harbors lofty aspirations."

If He Lingchuan were not his elder brother, he would have said he was aiming too high and too far.

Not to mention Cangyan, not to mention Shen State—even Bekka would not dare boast so!

Is it really so hard to let people labor and gain enough to eat their fill?

Nonsense—it's as hard as climbing to heaven!

Especially the Flash Gold Plains, which originally were nothing but bare poverty. Others build their nations from scratch; Cangyan must begin from a deficit.

"That's why we say 'ensure stability'." He Lingchuan never dismisses present difficulties: "The people are the foundation of the state; if they are not prosperous, Cangyan will not be strong."

The second major item in Cangyan's promulgated policies is encouraging industry and commerce.

Beyond grain, the surface and subterranean resources of the Flash Gold Plains are actually very abundant—including Huhe fisheries, forests, minerals, livestock and sideline products, and so on. The resource list compiled by the Yangshan Merchant Guild exceeds four thousand seven hundred items and continues to grow. Each time He Lingchuan sees this list, he feels deeply moved; if the former Panlong City had possessed such vast territory and such rich resources,

where would it still need to suffer others' elbowing?

This is also the rich reward he and the Dragon Spirit Army gained by striking down the Flash Gold Plains at the cost of their heads.

He Lingchuan controls the Yangshan Merchant Guild, so he knows well: precisely because the Flash Gold Plains' resources are too abundant, unit prices are low,

volume is large, and preservation is difficult—grain is not the most favored commodity. In the early years of state founding, since everyone still could not eat their fill, and with the Dragon Spirit Army having fought a major battle within Ya State's borders, grain prices fluctuated greatly; but as grain harvests grew year by year, prices would likewise decline year by year, eventually stabilizing.

Merchants seek profit, so they will early on shift their focus from grain to other commodities.

What are those other commodities? Mostly cash crops and various handicrafts and luxury goods—in short, famed, superior, and special products.

Blade Edge Port and the Yangshan Islands rely on this one specialty—palm oil—to earn basin-full profits each year; so what about the resource-rich Flash Gold Plains?

Moreover, the Flash Gold Plains are vast in area and labor is plentiful—if you don't farm, there are plenty who will, so there's no fear of untended fields; thus Cangyan does not worry that developing industry and commerce will harm the foundation of the state, but rather strongly encourages it.

At this time, the historical mission of the Yangshan Merchant Guild has already been fulfilled, and the Yangshan Islands also belong to Chiyan, so retaining the name "Yangshan Merchant Guild" is no longer appropriate—but aside from He Lingchuan, no one can dismantle it.

Thus the Great Emperor of the Nine Abysses personally took up the blade, splitting this vast organization into more than ten institutions, each specializing in supervision and storage-transport for grain, forging, mineral deposits, military provisions, livestock, etc., one for wartime preparedness, two for stabilizing prices.

For example, in the early stages of large-scale land reclamation, farming tools were in high demand—hard to find a hoe; previously, a hoe sold for a hundred cash, but now even fetches the high price of one tael of silver; county and prefectural governments stepped in, the Merchant Guild joined local workshops, and drove the price back down to three hundred cash.

And after the Yangshan Merchant Guild was dismantled, it also slimmed down: seventy percent of its personnel flowed into various levels of military and civil administration, material management, and merchant associations, each taking on other duties.

In any case, local administrations are desperately short-staffed.

During He Lingchuan's early travels across the Flash Gold Plains and during the Dragon Spirit War, the Yangshan Merchant Guild gradually monopolized many businesses, forcing local big and small merchants into dead ends; after Cangyan's founding encouraged private commerce, it could no longer allow the Yangshan Merchant Guild to monopolize mountain and sea profits—it must gradually share benefits with the people, so that wealth and goods may slowly circulate among the populace.

As for the Flash Gold Plains' original aristocratic clans and gentry landlords, though they were preserved during the Dragon Spirit War, after Cangyan's founding they caused He Lingchuan anxiety. The war is over, the Flash Gold Plains are peaceful, the army is strong and domineering—should the Great Emperor now turn his hand against himself?

Who doesn't know that Cangyan began in utter poverty, the treasury empty—shouldn't they take the knife to these fattened sheep they've been raising?

Yet the Great Emperor of the Nine Abysses soon summoned many major and wealthy merchants to the capital Ducheng, held friendly talks, and used concrete actions to send an important signal to all realms:

Cangyan does not intend to kill the rich and seize their wealth.

Some may feel disappointed, but this is one of Cangyan's key decisions in encouraging commerce and trade.

First, the Dragon Spirit War nearly eradicated the tyrants and corrupt gentry of the Flash Gold Plains; local evil has been eliminated, quite thoroughly, which favors the healthy, orderly development of civilian commerce.

Second, the aristocratic clans who surrendered and submitted during the Dragon Spirit War had already been forcibly relocated by the Dragon Spirit Army from their ancestral lands, far from their original tangled rural ties, making official-merchant collusion difficult. Living in foreign lands, aside from money, they have few resources at their disposal and will also face local exclusionary tendencies.

Third, He Lingchuan, having engaged in commerce for many years, deeply understands that "money," though not a living thing, possesses strong will—unless you lock it away in storage or bury it underground, once it enters the sphere of circulation, its destination is no longer yours to decide.

It is not that you can press it wherever you wish and expect it to stay put obediently.

Even if you spread it out as evenly and thinly as possible, it will ultimately still flow on its own toward the most efficient places.

What is called efficiency?

When production, division of labor, cooperation, and circulation all proceed smoothly, that is efficiency.

With experienced, established merchant guild merchants and established commercial organizational models, why would Cangyan not use them, instead striking them down with a single blow?

Commerce is the blood vessels of the economy.

The Great Emperor of the Nine Abysses' philosophy is to seize each morning and evening; he will certainly not engage in such foolish self-mutilation of the meridians.

These regulations, once promulgated, met with no objection.

The Flash Gold people's current goal is singular:

To eat food, to eat their fill.

Everything else must step aside.

All of Cangyan, from top to bottom, is also striving in this direction.

Finally, there is military policy adjustment.

The Great Emperor of the Nine Abysses, leveraging his supreme prestige, personally oversaw military reform. Within half a year after the Ya State's Battle of Baiqiu Yuan ended,

and also after the truce between Mou and Ya States, the main force of the Dragon Spirit Army was reduced by half, with most reserves stationed in central and western Cangyan; while eastern Cangyan is an endless expanse of sea, requiring only scattered combat units.

Cangyan outwardly claims military reduction is to cut military expenditures—after all, soldiers' pay, horses, armor, weapon maintenance, for a nascent state, is indeed an extremely heavy burden.

However, the Dragon Spirit Army elites released to the counties and prefectures will become seed instructors, assisting in training local defense militias and patrol forces.

In recent years, imperial elixir overflows frequently; heaven and earth's countless beings receive elixir enlightenment and transform into mountain spirits and wild monsters; these newborn demonic creatures know no etiquette or rules, often causing harm to people, and also threatening urban and rural safety.

Some small states are utterly unable to cope, even having their foundations shaken.