Chapter 257: The Method Spreads in Three Vehicles, A Dream Bears a Bear Cub (Rank 36

Qi Xinxiao saw that everyone was taking it seriously, and only then did he begin to convey the Emperor's guiding thought.

"The first principle His Majesty wishes to expound is that of attaining the proper method."

"In the matter of attaining the proper method, the value lies in new methods, in good methods."

"And in this, from ancient times to the present, the methods of today have always surpassed those of the past."

"Take agriculture as an example."

"In the Qin and Han, they planted millet and wheat, one harvest a year at most. One mu yielded no more than a single dan."

"By the Tang, Jiangnan widely planted rice, and one mu could yield as much as two dan."

"Then, after our own dynasty was founded, the north gradually adopted wheat-bean rotation, yielding three harvests in two years. Reckoned up, the yield per mu came to two dan."

"And in Jiangnan, they adopted rice and spring-flower rotation, two harvests a year. Reckoned per mu, the yield could even reach four dan."

"All of this is because new methods surpass old ones."

Though Qi Xinxiao merely stated this plainly, it was filled with the crisp, efficient beauty unique to the New Policies.

The officials below mostly listened in silence.

All of them had risen from County Magistrate posts, so while they were not experts in these matters of farming and sericulture, they were by no means unfamiliar with them.

It was simply that, ordinarily, very few people had ever linked these changes across a thousand years together so bluntly.

"Beyond yield per mu, the same holds true for hard iron replacing bronze, and cotton spinning replacing hemp spinning."

"Even within Confucian learning itself, from Confucius to Dong Zhongshu, and then to the Cheng-Zhu and Lu-Wang schools — how is it any different?"

"To accomplish works of surpassing excellence, this principle that the present must surpass the past is the most fundamental of fundamentals, absolutely beyond dispute!"

Qi Xinxiao swept his gaze across their faces, confirmed that no one was foolish enough to court death by objecting, and only then continued.

"However, methods are numerous and varied, too many to enumerate exhaustively."

"His Majesty has merged the various disciplines of agriculture, crafts, mathematics, metallurgy, and others under the overall planning of the Academy of Sciences, which will specialize in the study of all implements, tools, and agricultural production, led by Director Xiong Mingyu."

"And all methods of statecraft and governance shall be under the overall planning of the Secretariat's policy group, led by Grand Secretary Li Banghua."

At this point, Qi Xinxiao paused briefly.

His gaze settled on one person in the crowd, and he smiled faintly.

"Where is Lu Zhenfei!"

Lu Zhenfei, who had habitually shrunk back into the crowd, was suddenly called out by name and jumped in fright, wondering why he had suddenly been singled out. But as the others shifted aside, he was naturally exposed.

Qi Xinxiao looked at him and spoke:

"You previously suggested that, in local counties, if government students of the county school actively cooperated, they could be rewarded with a quota for Imperial Academy student status. Do you know why, in the end, only 0.3 red was issued for it?"

Lu Zhenfei was astonished; he had not expected it to be about this. "This humble official truly does not know. I beg Secretary Qi to enlighten me."

Qi Xinxiao nodded and spoke.

"Your method, as His Majesty put it, is indeed a good method. Yet in the end, it was only an idea, untested in practice, unverified. Though novel, it was still only empty talk."

"If, once you take up your post, you can truly implement it, and then explain its merits and drawbacks, and it can truly be established as a good method and extended to all counties — then why speak of a mere 0.3 red…" Qi Xinxiao's voice rose slightly, and his gaze swept the entire hall:

"Even three full red would be no great matter!"

This sentence was like a spark, instantly igniting the previously somewhat dull atmosphere.

The eyes of the officials who, moments ago, had been stern-faced and wearing expressions of "reverently receiving the sacred instructions" changed in an instant.

Qi Xinxiao, however, acted as if he did not see their reaction and continued:

"In the matter of attaining the proper method, there are methods of ingenious craftsmanship and methods of increasing agricultural yield, which can well up from among the common people and be collected by the Academy of Sciences."

"And there are also methods of statecraft and New Policy, which can originate from you, the various officials, and then be submitted to the policy group."

"In these two categories of affairs, among the County Magistrates everywhere, the first to report a new method — depending on its novelty, importance, and feasibility — will have it received and evaluated by the command headquarters, with red awards ranging from 0.1 red to 5 red."

He paused, as if giving everyone time to digest this, before slowly adding:

"Remember, only the first will receive this red award."

At these words, some faces showed embarrassment, but even more showed regret and eagerness.

It seemed that in those last few days of interviews, everyone had tacitly agreed to hide their best ideas — and His Majesty had indeed seen through it all with perfect clarity.

Before, afraid of revealing their methods and having them copied by colleagues, each had hoarded and concealed the goods in their bellies, offering only commonplace fare to get by. But now it seemed…

As expected, one really should hide one's best ideas!

Without hiding them, how could this new avenue for red awards have emerged!

Everyone's minds began racing, already calculating which of the many methods they had concealed were suitable to reveal, and which were not — and most crucially…

Be the first to report?!

They were to leave for their posts tomorrow! But there was still this one night. If they rushed back, perhaps they could still submit a few more official documents before departing! For a moment, though no one in the barracks spoke, that urgent, restless agitation seemed almost to overflow.

Qi Xinxiao took all of this in.

In his heart, he finally breathed a sigh of relief.

This method was a solution that the Northern Zhili Command had urgently devised after discovering the problem.

The core was still "driving them with profit," only with a slight addition of what His Majesty called "game theory" concepts mixed in.

If it had failed to work, given the new sovereign's benevolence, a reprimand or punishment would have been unlikely, but it would still have been somewhat of a loss of face.

Now it seemed that the word "profit," when applied, was indeed invincible wherever it went.

His small inner worry set aside, Qi Xinxiao continued speaking, his voice overriding the restlessness in the hall: "To people today, wheat-bean rotation and three harvests in two years is indeed a good method."

"But changing and adopting this good method is not such a simple matter…"

"The Hanlin Academy and the Secretariat jointly collated and inventoried the local conditions surveys you all submitted."

"For example, in Daming Prefecture, six out of ten plant wheat, while in places like Shuntian and Yongping, it is barely four out of ten."

"What do you all think are the reasons for this?"

This question was rather interesting — it was asking about the factors that constrain the adoption of good methods.

In the duties of a county magistrate, agriculture comes first; criminal cases and moral instruction come after. Even those among you who merely sit high in the yamen must read several agricultural treatises. The group pondered for a moment, then one after another began to speak.

"In the districts near the capital, taxes are mostly levied in kind. Once payment in kind is required, the common people will still give priority to growing sorghum, millet, and panicled millet to meet the autumn tax. This is due to the tax system."

"It also has to do with the lay of the land — Daming Prefecture is indeed suited to wheat."

"The common people have scant property and fear natural disasters. Although crops like unhusked millet and panicled millet yield a thin harvest, compared to wheat and beans, they are ultimately more drought-resistant."

"In many low-lying, flood-prone areas, if you plant beans after the wheat and the summer and autumn bring heavy rain, you reap nothing at all — a sheer waste of labor and capital. Better to plant a single crop per season."

"North China is vast in land and sparse in people; it cannot match the south's intensive, meticulous cultivation. To practice this two-year, three-harvest rotation — though it raises per-mu yield — there may not be enough hands to work it." "Irrigation is also a factor. Winter wheat truly demands more water than millet."

Among them was a county magistrate of southern origin — how he had wormed his way into this cohort was a mystery — who actually opened his mouth and fired off a regional slur: "Northerners are indolent, shunning work and chasing ease. Wheat-bean rotation, after all, costs more in labor and capital and demands more toil — hence it never caught on."

At these words, the dozen-odd officials of Northern Metropolitan native registry were naturally incensed, and men from Shandong, Henan, Shanxi, and elsewhere all turned furious glares upon him.

The man saw he had roused public wrath, mumbled a few words, dared not speak further, and retreated into the crowd, covering his face.

Qi Xinxiao, seeing the discussion had veered off track, hastily coughed and raised his voice.

"Gentlemen!"

"This brings us to the second principle His Majesty wishes to convey: once a sound method is obtained, it must be propagated."

"The transmission of method — if it does not proceed from top to bottom, grasping the key link and driving implementation with force — is in truth exceedingly slow."

"There are naturally many reasons for this: irrigation, taxation, superior seed strains, labor, payment in kind versus commuted silver — all play a part."

Qi Xinxiao shifted his tone, his voice growing firm and forceful:

"But all these problems can be solved."

"If payment in kind versus commuted silver has an impact, we change the method of tax collection. If the common people fear flood and drought, we undertake irrigation works. If land is vast and people few, we resettle refugees from overpopulated regions and apply intensive, meticulous cultivation."

"In everything, the first step is to obtain the method; the next lies in propagating it."

"Any sound method that can raise per-mu yield and resolve the conflict between man and land — we must propagate it."

"And this task of propagation falls precisely upon your shoulders."

"The propagation of gas wells is so; the propagation of wheat-bean rotation is so; and the same holds for every other undertaking that can save labor or raise output." "At the center, we have the Academy of Sciences and the Policy Group to discern and clarify — all scientific methods, whether agronomy, pneumatics, or engineering, and all New Governance methods, whether bureaucratic discipline or winning hearts and minds — none escapes their oversight, none goes untested."

"In the localities, we have you — capable officials of the New Governance — to propagate these sound methods."

"Linked together in this fashion lies the key to resolving the conflict between man and land."

Seeing the assembled men nod one after another, Qi Xinxiao then continued.

"And the final, third principle is the verification of method."

"Though we must obtain methods and propagate them, not every method is a sound one."

"There are cases where a method sound in itself becomes a harmful policy."

"Take Wang Jinggong's Green Sprouts Law — was it not a sound method? Yet once propagated, it turned into an instrument that maimed and harmed the people."

"That was the fault of the localities, the fault of oversight."

"And some methods are not flawed at the local level, but at the center."

"For instance, the Han-dynasty Pit-Field Method, which was claimed to yield a hundred dan per mu…"

At this point Qi Xinxiao gave a contemptuous sneer.

"Yet set against the labor, the superior seed, and the fertilizer it demanded per mu — was that hundred-dan harvest even worth it?"

"The Hanlin Academy has examined every dynasty: whenever any dynasty undertook reforms to propagate the Pit-Field Method, they invariably fizzled out without result."

"And among these, the most brutal case was the Jin state's promotion of it in the north during the two Song periods."

"The method was no sound method to begin with, and the officials were no sound officials either. When the two combined, the common people truly suffered a wretched fate."

"Therefore, the work of verifying methods is also of the utmost importance."

He looked out at these "lords of a hundred li" who were about to take up their posts, and his tone grew exceptionally solemn:

"Whether a method from the center is good or bad, and how it must be adjusted — all of this must be examined where the shoe meets the ground."

"Only a county magistrate who has done the work in practical administration can pronounce a method good or bad."

"Among a hundred counties, if one county calls it a harmful policy, it may not be so; but if ten counties call it harmful, you must be vigilant; if thirty counties call it harmful, something has certainly gone wrong; if fifty counties call it harmful, you must halt propagation and investigate the problem."

"Thus, though you are county magistrates, you are in truth also censors."

These words carried immense weight.

They meant the center was delegating the "power of appraisal."

Even if this "power of appraisal" was delegated only to these New Governance county magistrates.

The officials fell silent one after another, still digesting the information laid out above.

They had originally supposed they were mere executors, oxen and horses to be driven — they had never imagined that within this system, they were also "eyes" and "mouths."

Qi Xinxiao, seeing that all matters had been fully explained, clapped his hands once and declared in a ringing voice:

"Gentlemen, these are the three principles His Majesty wished to convey." "In the Northern Metropolitan region, over the coming year, we shall carry out precisely this work of obtaining methods, propagating methods, and verifying methods."

"From the Academy of Sciences and the Policy Group at the center, to the Command Headquarters that coordinates from the middle, and finally to you, my fellow officials."

"Linked together in this cycle — such is the full picture of the Northern Metropolitan New Governance."

"Those who have understood may disperse first. Those who have not — you may now raise your questions."

Qi Xinxiao was still too young — that final remark was a mistake!

The one thing he absolutely, utterly should not have done was to copy the emperor's closing catchphrase!

Now no one wanted to leave.

In an instant, questions surged toward him like a tide.

"Secretary Qi! What counts as a new method? Must it be utterly unprecedented?"

"What counts as a new method having been tested in practice? Does testing in a previous posting count?"

"How is the priority of new-method submissions determined? By the date the official dispatch is sent, or the date it arrives?!"

"And that red-marking — the 0.1 and the 5 marks — how are novelty, importance, and feasibility assessed? Who makes the judgment?!"

"The Acquisition Method gets a red mark — what about the Promotion Method? Does the Promotion Method count in the performance evaluation? If the Promotion Method is like that, then what about the Verification Method?!"

One after another, the officials scrambled over each other, spittle flying.

Yes — they had all taken in the content of the Acquisition Method, the Promotion Method, and the Verification Method, yet none of it truly mattered that much to them.

The Way of science, or pleading on behalf of the people — such things might hold a place in their hearts, but they could never outweigh career and prospects. What they were so urgently questioning, what they were red-faced and fighting over at this very moment, was entirely that just-announced matter of the red mark for "the first to submit the new method"! Hats, banknotes, face, sticks.

These four things were the true fuel driving the vast machinery of the empire.

The new sovereign was brandishing the stick, giving ample face, yet had slashed the banknotes — so this hat absolutely had to be fought for!

If you don't fight, and I don't fight, when will this great enterprise surpassing all past dynasties ever come true!

In the barracks of the Tengxiang Four Guards, the place instantly erupted into a boiling uproar!

Yet however clamorous it grew on this side, not a trace of the din could possibly reach the Forbidden City.

For Zhu Youjian, standing atop the city wall and watching it all, this was nothing but a silent pantomime.

A pantomime hastily staged, somewhat out of control, its effect uncertain…

The three matters of the Acquisition Method, the Promotion Method, and the Verification Method were the basic framework of the new policies that Zhu Youjian had hammered out through many rounds of discussion with the Secretariat and the Committee.

In Zhu Youjian's original plan, the framework should actually have been discussed on the basis of deeper principles.

For instance, the relationship between productive forces and the relations of production, the concept of labor efficiency, matters such as land rent and the peasants' surplus resources.

Only once these concepts had been explained clearly would it have been proper to then set the basic framework of the new policies.

But time was ultimately too tight, too rushed. Merely collecting and formatting the various historical materials had taken the Hanlin Academy the better part of a month. Pushed forward under duress, all they could produce first was this compromised, misshapen, Ming-dynasty version of a new-policy promotion system.

Even this framework system had only been finalized yesterday, after a group of them talked all the way to the you hour.

Only then was this observation-and-lecture session hurriedly inserted in the afternoon of the grand court assembly, before the new-policy county magistrates left the capital.

And precisely because of this hasty insertion,

the new-policy coordination meeting that was routinely held after the grand court assembly had also been postponed.

And today, uncharacteristically, Zhu Youjian had actually been in a state of restless, agitated excitement ever since waking that morning.

He tried to settle his mind but never succeeded, so in the afternoon he simply cleared his schedule.

He merely took Zhou Yu along, riding aimlessly here and there on horseback within this tiny Forbidden City.

Yet as they wandered and wandered, his mind was ultimately still preoccupied with this matter, which was why he climbed the North An Gate tower and used the telescope to conduct this act of spying. Tomorrow, these county magistrates would leave the capital.

This whole set of methods that Zhu Youjian had devised was about to spread out across the prefectures, subprefectures, and counties of Northern Zhili.

He asked himself — he had racked his brains, employing every policy, every insight into human nature, every scheme, every means, every reward, every piece of technology he could think of.

He had even committed the great management taboo of handing out rewards in advance and erecting monuments ahead of time…

This wasn't even cracking open the champagne at halftime — it was cracking it open the moment the match began.

Zhu Youjian of course knew this was a colossal gamble. If the new policies failed, the backlash would come crashing in like a tide.

But the crux of it was…

Zhu Youjian had no idea at all how difficult next year would be, whether the moment the first year of his reign arrived, the whole situation would simply collapse across the board.

And so, all he could do was haphazardly take whatever strength he could muster, as much as there was, and blast it all out in one go.

So — having done all this… could he win?

Zhu Youjian, who when facing his ministers and officials was forever impassioned and brimming with confidence, could not answer this question.

He knew that Zhending Prefecture had the custom of digging wells; he knew that Baodi County had vast tracts of land swallowed up by the ennobled aristocracy.

He knew that Lu Xiangsheng's patron-examiner was Huang Liji, and that since the new policies began, the two had been in increasingly frequent contact.

He knew that the Duke of Ding seemed inclined to arrange a marriage alliance with Zhang Tongchang, the Duke of Xing, but Zhang Tongchang had declined, saying a wife who shared his hardships could not be cast aside.

He even knew that cultivating one mu of wheat required only three days of full-time labor, while cultivating one mu of rice required fifteen full days of labor… Yet all this information was told to him by others.

Some came from the Depot and the Guard, some from ministers, some from local gentry and commoners summoned into the palace for interviews.

How much truth and how much falsehood lay in these words? He was not certain either.

After all, since transmigrating, he had mostly lived in deep seclusion within the princely estate. Only once, right after ascending the throne, when he went to the Tengxiang Four Guards to take control of the Valiant Guard Camp, had he left the palace. On that single outing, tens of thousands of guards and encircling troops had surged into action, yellow earth was spread to purify the streets, roads were sealed and cleared — who knew how many stalls were overturned, how many livelihoods shattered. Since then, he had never gone out again.

The only thing he could confirm as true, come to think of it, was perhaps one single matter.

That was the two flagstone roads he watched every day through his telescope, inching forward in their construction, now on the verge of completion… So, having done all this — could he truly… win?

Zhu Youjian lowered the telescope in his hands and gazed at those distant, indistinct, clamoring figures. For a moment, he felt unexpectedly despondent.

"Your Majesty…"

A gentle voice came from beside him.

Zhu Youjian came back to himself and turned to look.

At his side, Zhou Yu was watching him with concern, the strong wind chafing her small face bright red.

"What is it — is the wind too strong, do you want to go back?" Zhu Youjian smiled warmly and reached out to smooth the wind-tousled hair at her temples.

Zhou Yu tilted her head up, hesitated a moment, then said:

"No… it's just that, just now, Your Majesty seemed… seemed somewhat sorrowful."

Zhu Youjian's heart jolted.

He had not expected that the weakness he revealed in that one fleeting moment had actually been caught.

He opened his mouth, about to find some excuse to brush it off.

But then he saw Zhou Yu give a sly smile. "It must have been this consort seeing things wrongly… urp—" Before her words had even faded, her expression abruptly changed, and she gave a light retch. Instantly, she was so mortified that her cheeks flew into twin blushes of crimson. She hurriedly turned her back and clutched her chest, saying:

"Perhaps… perhaps I ate too many of those dumplings at noon… This consort said she couldn't eat any more, yet you kept piling them into my bowl…"

Yet Zhu Youjian, seeing all this, had already gone completely blank.

All the worries, all the anxieties, all the great affairs of state — in this one instant, they all left him.

His heart pounded violently, so fiercely it seemed about to burst through his chest. He stood frozen in place, barely able to move.

Time itself seemed to freeze.

He turned his head inch by inch, staring in disbelief at Gao Shiming, who stood a few paces away.

But Gao Shiming was also overcome with emotion; seeing him look over, he merely nodded emphatically.

Zhu Youjian stood there, feeling heaven and earth spin around him.

He stood for a moment, braced himself against the battlement, and drew a deep, forceful breath, barely steadying his nerves.

What do I do what do I do what do I do what do I do what do I do!

Countless thoughts burst forth and intertwined in his mind, like a fireworks gala set off at once.

He fought to calm himself, yet when he spoke again, it came out as nothing but orders.

"Do not summon the imperial physicians… First send for someone from outside, bring them in secretly under another name, let no one know…"

"Seal off all news — anyone who spreads it dies… No, no bloodshed, the omen would be bad. Confine everyone to quarters for now."

"Dispatch your most trusted men, under a private pretext, to Jiangnan, to bring the finest doctors into the palace."

"And also… what else, what else is the…"

Zhu Youjian was incoherent, his fingers trembling faintly, utterly without the composure with which he usually surveyed the realm. Nor did he possess that ever-sunlike confidence he displayed before his ministers.

Zhou Yu had turned away and felt shy for a moment before she sensed something was wrong.

She turned back around, looking at the emperor, whose expression had utterly changed, and the agitated eunuch, still somewhat bewildered for a moment.

Gao Shiming hurried over to support him and said in a low voice:

"Your Majesty, this old servant will go through the personnel in the bedchamber once more with a fine-toothed comb. Anyone even the slightest bit unreliable will be transferred out first."

Zhu Youjian nodded forcefully, and his hand shot back to grip Gao Shiming's hand tight — so hard that Gao Shiming felt real pain:

"Companion, Companion, you can never be too careful, you must be thorough…"

"You must be thorough!"

He repeated it again, and in his eyes there was actually a trace of fear.

It was the fear of loss.

Before he crossed over, he had never believed the rumor that someone was so easily soluble in water, nor that there existed a powerful civil-official bloc or a merit-nobility bloc so united and so mighty that they could go as far as assassinating an emperor.

Even less did he believe that, after he had purged the palace four or five times and compressed the key personnel around him to fifty people, anyone could still infiltrate his side. But…

Now he was afraid.

You can never be too careful.

He could not afford to gamble, and he did not want to gamble!

Gao Shiming's eyes had gone red; he only nodded forcefully: "This slave understands, Your Majesty, understands! This old slave will see to it at once, see to it personally!" Only after doing all this did Zhu Youjian let out a long breath.

He turned around and looked at Zhou Yu, who was still standing there in a daze, not understanding what was happening.

Zhu Youjian stepped forward, wanting to pull her fiercely into his arms.

But when it came to it, his outstretched hands stopped in midair.

In the end, he only enclosed her gently.

Zhou Yu leaned somewhat at a loss against his chest.

Zhu Youjian rested his chin on her forehead, his voice hoarse, carrying a catch:

"Changqiu, you may be about to become a mother."

At these words, Zhu Youjian could hold back no longer and shed tears on the spot.

On that cold winter afternoon, atop that ancient city wall, this young emperor —

all at once, had gained a true vulnerability.