Chapter 539: Sage Zhang's America Plan

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That night, the old brothers drank themselves staggering as usual, and Zhang Zhao had the palace attendants help them back home, but he himself found it hard to sleep.

In expanding westward, he did not actually lack the money of these old brothers under his command — at least not for now — but Zhang Zhao still wanted to bind them onto the wagon.

Because armed colonization was actually quite risky. Although Zhang Zhao had bound the Hexi Buddhist establishment to him and reshaped Hexi Buddhism into an alternative Tianfang teaching centered on Confucian ideas such as repaying grievance with justice,

and Zhang Zhao's Supreme Great Compassion Dharma King had become something akin to Allah or Jehovah, he would still face considerable backlash.

After all, no one is willing to give up their own power and wealth. In the foreseeable future, the nobles of Transoxiana, India, Khorasan, and other places would not put up too small a wave of resistance.

If it were left solely to Zhang Zhao's own descendants to rule the barbarians as sovereigns, relying entirely on the court or even solely on the will of the Emperor to push it forward, Zhang Zhao could hardly predict how things would turn out later.

It might well be that after a few failures, even he, the founding ruler, might no longer be able to keep it moving — let alone the descendants who succeeded him.

In this world, things with benefits are what people do; undertakings that lose money outright certainly cannot last long.

After all, back when the Zhou Son of Heaven ruled the barbarians as sovereign, the distance was not far, and the Yellow River could serve as a "highway" for communication.

But Transoxiana and India, cut off by the Tianshan Mountains and the great desert, with myriad mountains and rivers between, differ in culture and race — they are not so easy to manage.

Therefore, the old brothers all had to be brought in. With everyone investing money, they could pool their wisdom and efforts to first produce a few model cases.

Only with bridgeheads and demonstration zones could others be attracted to join in, and perhaps in the end it could become a wave of nationwide action.

Only when there are more investors would the whole policy not be shaken by two or three failures, or even just one or two.

Moreover, for the Longtao Academy, Zhang Zhao had other ideas. In his mind, it was not only the cradle of westward expansion, but could also be the cradle of eastward expansion a dozen or so years later.

This "east" was not Korea, that Great Eastern Kingdom, nor Japan's self-aggrandizing Eastern Son of Heaven, but the Americas, still farther east.

Given the productive forces of this era, colonizing the Americas was sheer fantasy, and Zhang Zhao would not be so wildly imaginative as to entertain such an idea.

But if pushed by the imperial house, through ten or twenty failures, or through ten or twenty years of attempts, it was still possible to reach the Americas.

Zhang Zhao thought for a moment about the special products of the Americas — corn, sweet potatoes, potatoes, upland cotton, chili peppers, peanuts, tomatoes, common beans, pumpkins.

Any one of them would be a heaven-sent treasure, especially the first three, which were good things capable of changing the course of human civilization.

Even if it cost five hundred thousand strings of cash, one million strings, or even two or three million strings, it would be worth it.

This money — he, Zhang Zhao, would pay it!

If corn and potatoes could arrive on the soil of China a few hundred years earlier, even if they could not be as high-yielding as the corn and potatoes of later ages, an increase of even one hundred jin per mu would be an extraordinary advance.

Then, with abundant food, by the eleventh century China could have a population of over one hundred million or even two hundred million — need one even mention the significance of that?

Because historically, the entire world population in the eleventh century was only a little over three hundred million, and subtracting the early Northern Song's twenty million, it was not even three hundred million.

Then China's population would account for half or even two-thirds of the whole world — what could you use to compete with me? By fertility alone, any foreign race could be assimilated.

And once the Americas had been reached, the news that the Americas abounded in gold and silver would surely spread like wildfire.

At that point, the fleet and sea routes that Zhang Zhao had spent millions of strings building in the early stage would immediately be taken up by countless capitals from all quarters, and the conservative climate would surely be swept away completely!

The drive of gold prospecting alone could send Zhang Zhou onto the throne of maritime hegemon!

Although the dynasty he established certainly could not last forever, and might even fall behind at the time of the Age of Discovery and then be overthrown by someone, this nation would have gained new life!

The more Zhang Zhao thought, the more exhilarated he became. The sage's sense of superiority and the pioneer's sense of devotion were almost sending him up to heaven.

The seventeen-year-old little loli number two, Pantaiya, stared at Zhang Zhao in astonishment, then glanced at her sister Saifeiye, who was continuously eating sour plum preserves beside Zhang Zhao. Pantaiya suddenly felt complete confidence in her own skills.

She had served the Sage until his face was flushed, his eyes dazed, and he was on the verge of ecstasy — who else in the harem could claim such ability?

This... at the very least she should earn the title of consort, right?

In her excitement, this Samanid Persian princess — whose milk-white skin, slender waist, and full hips utterly belied the title of loli — twisted her snow-white serpentine waist and once more dipped her crimson little mouth gently downward, then suddenly sucked hard, nearly sucking the soul right out of Great Sage Zhang (the rest is omitted...).

In the early morning, the Sage, having toiled all night, had no choice but to climb out of bed with an aching back. Cao Yanmian glanced at Zhang Zhao with heartache, then with jealousy that nearly drove her to strangle those two Persian vixens.

"My lord, the wedding day for Da Jie'er and Mei Ge'er is approaching. Should you not bestow a title? We agreed to marry Da Jie'er off with the rites of a princess."

Da Jie'er was Zhang Qiwu, and Mei Ge'er referred to Zhao Kuangzan.

Back when Zhao Kuangzan had resolved to defect, risked sending messages while among the Khitan, and personally captured Hezhong Prefecture, it was because Zhang Zhao had promised to marry Zhang Qiwu to him — and to do so with the rites of a princess.

At this thought, Zhang Zhao stood up and spread his arms for Cao Yanmian to dress him in his robes.

"What do you mean, 'with the rites of a princess'? Da Jie'er is my daughter, and rightly a princess of my Great Zhou.

Hmm! Since the princess title is not yet settled, and Mei Ge'er helped me win the first great victory in Hezhong — among the counties under Hezhong Prefecture there is a Baoding County, so let Baoding be the name: she shall be titled Princess Baoding.

Grant her an estate of two hundred households in Baoding County; by imperial decree build the Princess Baoding's residence; disburse from the inner treasury to prepare her dowry; and further bestow gold, silver, and silk worth three thousand strings for the daily use of the princess and her consort."

Princess titles also had ranks. In particular, Tang dynasty princess titles rarely used counties; they generally used prefectures or commanderies, and were called commandery princesses.

Those named after counties were called county princesses — note that this is not the same thing as a commandery lady or county lady.

But by Zhang Zhao's time, since he wanted to rule the barbarians as sovereign and carry out armed colonization, he did not need to restrict consorts as strictly as the Song and Ming did — especially the Ming, whose obsession went so far that even the emperor's daughters became hard to marry off.

Therefore the starting point for princess titles had to be a bit lower. If you started off as Princess of Wei or Princess of Chu, then later when the consort rendered great service, how could you reward him further?

Having received a definite answer, Cao Yanmian swayed out. Zhang Zhao suddenly realized — ah! The specifications for Zhang Qiwu's marriage had long been settled, so Cao Yanmian's coming to ask was probably a reminder that the harem ladies had not yet been given titles.

Sure enough, when Zhang Zhao summoned Empress Cao Yanxi, the already pregnant empress was pouting unhappily, and the moment she saw Zhang Zhao her mouth did not stop.

"The Sage has it good, carousing with his brothers night after night, while we women have nothing at all. I wanted to hold a banquet and gather with my sisters, to give the two mothers some joy, and I have not even had the chance!"

Zhang Zhao understood one principle very well: never provoke a pregnant woman. As long as she was not too unreasonable, whatever she said went. This was something Sage Zhang had summed up after having more than a dozen children.

At once he took Cao Yanxi's hand and seated her, then, under the barely suppressed laughter of a group of palace maids, made promise after promise.

"The titles will be granted at once, and according to the ancient rites: below the Empress, establish two Noble Consorts; then establish the eight consorts Xian, Shu, Zhuang, Jing, Shun, Hui, Kang, and Ning; below them establish the nine junior consorts De, Duan, Li, An, and so on.

I guarantee that everyone will have a title! The Six Bureaus and Twenty-Four Offices will also be arranged, so that you can hold a splendid harem banquet."

Only then was Cao Yanxi satisfied. She stretched out her slender white fingers and diligently pounded Zhang Zhao's back, with the ingratiating look of one who had just gotten her way, while her mouth still reminded him:

"The Sage must arrange it quickly, or all the sisters will come asking me."

Zhang Zhao nodded and mumbled assent repeatedly, when he suddenly felt the shoulder-pounding behind him stop. Carefully, he turned his head to look.

Sure enough, Cao Yanxi, who had always been prone to drowsiness after becoming pregnant, had already fallen asleep leaning against the brocade quilt behind her. Several palace attendants, long accustomed to this habit of hers, were gently supporting the Empress.

Zhang Zhao gave her a doting glance, then stood up and softly instructed, "Let the Empress sleep here for a while."

In Chongzheng Hall, Zhang Liecheng returned travel-worn and weary, and presented the results of the Ministry of Works survey.

"Sage, we have found a suitable site for brick-firing around Luoyang. Planning for the construction of the Luoyang palace city and the inner and outer walls has also begun, though the estimated time required is at least five years or more."

Zhang Zhao nodded. "Five years is not long. You need not worry about the construction itself, but the Embroidered Uniform Guard must keep a close watch on materials and corruption."

Zhang Zhao was still prepared to make Luoyang the capital. He was carrying the banners of the Zhou and the Tang; it would be impossible to justify not making Luoyang the capital. Besides, Kaifeng was truly unsuited to serve as a capital.

As a city like the later Shanghai, Kaifeng could work at this time, but as a national capital, it had far too many drawbacks.

Damn it—not only does it sit exposed on the plain with no natural defenses, but in the future the Yellow River will become an elevated river above the ground here. One good breach and it could be flooded outright. How could it possibly serve as a capital!

However, Luoyang was now in ruins, and there was no large timber left for building palaces, so Zhang Zhao prepared to reduce the use of wood and build more with fired brick, which would also help promote improvements in brick-firing techniques.

Moreover, he did not intend to establish Luoyang as the only capital. Under the current transportation conditions, that was clearly unworkable.

Father and son talked for a while. Then Fan Shun, the Commander of the Hanshan Capital Guard responsible for protecting the forbidden palace, came to report that Hu Guang was outside the palace requesting an audience, saying he had important matters to report.

Zhang Zhao rose abruptly. Hu Guang was the man he had sent to probe the movements of the Southern Tang. If he had come to report now, it must mean that Du Chongwei in Songzhou had indeed made contact with the Southern Tang.

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