Chapter 1264: Talent

"Dahong, have you two managed to find out to what extent the relationship between those two tribes has reached? Have they formed an alliance?"

Dahong and Changxian both shook their heads: "Tribal Chief, the people of the Jiuli are too tight-lipped; we simply cannot find out anything. However, judging by what they say, it seems they mean that Huaxia and the Jiuli are too far apart, and even if they wanted to trade, it would be a great difficulty. Therefore, those two tribes should have no way to reach any alliance."

"Furthermore, if they want to trade, they can only go through us, conducting trade through our Xuanyuan Tribe; apart from this, they have no other path to take."

"That path of the Suiren clan, they likely cannot pass through. Huaxia and the Suiren clan are currently only maintaining a simple trade, and those two tribes previously experienced such a war; it is estimated they have no way to unify together."

"The Jiuli and the Suiren clan also have wars, competing with each other for territory, so no matter what they do, they cannot bypass us. If they truly want to start trading, they can only pass through us. At that time, no matter what kind of connection they have, it will surely all be revealed here with us."

But they would never imagine that Huaxia and the Jiuli were actually relying on the territory of the Suiren clan to conduct trade with the Jiuli for several years. It was not until the matter of the Suiren clan joining Huaxia was completely exposed that this entire secret became known to the people of the Xuanyuan Tribe.

Meanwhile, Huaxia was openly conducting small-scale trade with the Jiuli through the Xuanyuan Tribe. Every time the Xuanyuan Tribe went to the Jiuli, or the Jiuli came to the Xuanyuan Tribe, they would incidentally bring some of the things Huaxia needed, and Huaxia only needed to pay some compensation to the Xuanyuan Tribe.

Xuanyuan also agreed to this approach to try to avoid too much contact between Huaxia and the Jiuli. Because they were constantly trading openly like this, it caused Xuanyuan to lower his guard, believing that the communication between Huaxia and the Jiuli was only to this extent.

Baifeng knew a famous military strategy called "Openly repair the plank roads, secretly cross to Baoji."

Apart from the contact between Huaxia and the Jiuli, no other major events occurred in the entire Xuanyuan Tribe. Changle getting married originally had almost no impact on the Xuanyuan Tribe, but because the object of Changle's marriage this time was quite special, it was so attention-grabbing.

Furthermore, Dahong and the others provided a detailed report and summary of the events that occurred in the Xuanyuan Tribe this year. Overall, everything was developing in a good direction.

Dahong also asked Xuanyuan: "Tribal Chief, the writing of our Xuanyuan Tribe has now basically taken shape, and Cangjie has also roughly compiled the Dictionary. Should we now, like Huaxia, establish schools to teach everyone to recognize characters?"

But Xuanyuan's thoughts were basically the opposite of Baifeng's. Xuanyuan had his own insights regarding education and talent.

"Talent is innate, not something that can be taught. People who are taught can at most do some odd jobs and cannot play an important role, so schools are not necessary."

"Besides, if we open schools, what are we going to teach them? Just teaching them to recognize characters? A person who doesn't need to know characters—even if they learn them, what can they do?"

"Therefore, you should follow Cangjie to learn characters. Only selected talent can go to learn writing; after learning writing, they can work better."

"The selection of talent must be sought slowly in life and in work. Even someone plowing a field could be a talented person who can assist me."

"Limu was a woodcutter who chopped firewood, and Fenghou was a farmer who plowed the land. They did not know characters, but I discovered them. Could it be that they are not talent?"

"Fenghou provided us with great help in this war. His wisdom is definitely higher than most of the people taught in Huaxia's schools. So why should we waste energy and time on schools? We just need to discover talent."

"This time, I am prepared to let Fenghou also become a 'Prime Minister'. At that time, you inner ministers will assist me with Government Affairs and manage the Xuanyuan Tribe, while Limu, as an outer minister, will be responsible for campaigning with me."

"We do not need an official system as complex as Huaxia's, and we do not need so many people to make the Xuanyuan Tribe run smoothly. Huaxia is completely wasting time and energy."

"As for various Artisans and talent responsible for specific matters, just let them teach students themselves, just like father and son, passing it down generation after generation. Our people will also become more and more numerous. Spending several years in a school to teach them to recognize characters, and then spending several more years to teach a person real knowledge—this is the least wise thing Baifeng has done."

Dahong and Changxian looked at each other, believing that what their Tribal Chief said was very reasonable. Talented people are always found inadvertently; they are not taught. Talent is innate; it just depends on whether you have the ability to find them.

At least half of the officials in the entire Xuanyuan Tribe came from the lowest status. As long as your ability is favored by the Tribal Chief, you can serve the Xuanyuan Tribe.

The other half were those who originally had their own status, such as Qibo. He was originally a tribal chief of a tribe, the Qishan, which of course could also be called the Qi River Tribe. As for whether the mountain there was called Qishan because the Qi River flowed past it, or if the water was called the Qi River because it flowed under Qishan, this cannot be known, but Qibo was the leader of a tribe there.

When Xuanyuan was campaigning, he discovered this incredible talent, Qibo, which is why he was willing to let him stay by his side to assist him. Of course, at the beginning, Qibo also served as Xuanyuan's teacher to instruct him.

The talent of the Xuanyuan Tribe was scraped together just like this. And this was only in this era of Xuanyuan. After Xuanyuan, it is unknown who will inherit the Xuanyuan Tribe, probably Xuanxiao, but they all believe that Xuanxiao can also, like his father, find talent who can assist him.

It is even said that there is no need to actively search for them yourself. As long as you are a virtuous monarch and a virtuous Leader, countless talents will naturally come to join you and assist you.

Once their Tribal Chief's theory was stated, it made Baifeng appear to be a mediocre leader, because he could not use his own character to attract talent to assist him, but instead needed to spend his own time and energy to cultivate talent and officials just like cultivating Artisans. How could officials cultivated in this way be talent, and how could they be virtuous? They are just a group of people the same as Artisans.