Chapter 362: Flowers Bloom Again This Year

February 2nd.

On the highway outside Xingcheng, more than a dozen luxury cars were parked on the side of the road.

Dozens of officials in official uniforms were also standing on the side of the road waiting.

Li Lei was among them.

Xingcheng General Lan Changqun stood next to Li Lei, smiling and talking to Li Lei.

After the former General Gu Zhenhui left office, this new General had once wanted to suppress the Xingcheng forces led by Li Lei.

After all, as General, he couldn't sit by and watch Xingcheng possess such a force that even surpassed him.

The two sides fought for nearly a year, and Lan Changqun was never able to gain the upper hand.

Until the news of Li Fei being enfeoffed as a Marquis returned, this ambitious General completely lost his fighting spirit.

What's the point of fighting anymore?

Now Lan Changqun's mentality had completely leveled out, changing his past attitude and taking the initiative to befriend Li Lei.

At this moment, the two were standing on the side of the road talking and laughing, looking harmonious.

The crowd of officials around them saw this scene and knew clearly that the future General of Xingcheng would definitely be Li Lei!

"They're here."

Someone suddenly shouted.

Everyone turned their heads to look; a motorcade appeared on the highway in the distance, which made everyone's spirits lift.

They were waiting on the highway today specifically to wait for the Marquis of Jing'an, Li Fei, to return to his hometown.

Li Fei and the others first set off from Datong Prefecture by train, arrived in Master Ming Qi City, then changed to cars, and arrived in Xingcheng this afternoon.

The motorcade got closer and closer, its speed gradually slowing down, and finally stopped.

A group of people got off the cars one after another.

"Brother Li, please."

Lan Changqun turned to the side, gesturing for Li Lei to go first with great demeanor.

Li Lei had a smile on his face, walking up somewhat excitedly.

Through the crowd, he saw that dark golden figure at a glance.

"Xiao..."

Almost subconsciously, Li Lei opened his mouth to shout 'Xiao Fei', but he immediately held it back.

After all, this was a public occasion, and his Xiao Fei was already a Marquis.

"Li Shu!"

But Li Fei didn't care about these things, walking quickly toward this side, followed by Li Tianyu.

"Li Shu, why did you come to pick me up yourself?"

Li Fei arrived in front of Li Lei and said with a smile.

"Hahahaha, it's only right, it's only right."

Li Lei laughed from ear to ear.

He grabbed Li Fei's arm and looked him up and down:

"You've grown taller, your body is sturdier, this outfit is good, it has temperament."

"Dad!"

Li Tianyu on the side was somewhat unhappy.

She had been standing on the side for a long time, and her own father hadn't noticed her.

Li Lei looked at her, his smile undiminished:

"Tianyu has also grown taller, not bad, not bad."

The family chatted for a while, and the crowd of officials watched with smiles on their faces on the side, no one daring to disturb.

Finally, it was Li Lei who stopped the reminiscing first, turning to the side to yield the crowd of Xingcheng officials behind him.

On the highway, the crowd led by Lan Changqun bowed to Li Fei one after another:

"Greetings, Marquis of Jing'an!"

Li Lei, on the side, watched this scene, his lips unable to be pressed down at all, and at this moment there was only one thought in his heart:

To have a son like this!

Soon, the motorcade set off again, driving back to Xingcheng.

Li Fei sat in Li Lei's official car; he and Li Lei sat in the back row, and Li Tianyu sat in the passenger seat.

"The Qingyuan City Management Company has now become the company with the best reputation in Xingcheng, almost everyone is praising it!"

Li Lei told Li Fei about the changes in Xingcheng over the past year in the car.

The biggest change among them was brought about by the Qingyuan City Management Company.

The rules that Li Fei formulated back then, after more than a year of 'fermentation', had brought huge changes to the appearance of the lower levels of Xingcheng:

No endless protection fees; merchants didn't have to worry about paying protection fees to one family today and another tomorrow.

No forced buying or selling. Any profitable business would immediately be swallowed by local big families; such things rarely happened anymore.

Streets were cleaned and repaired regularly; the cleanliness of the roads in the 'slums' was comparable to the main urban area.

Whether it was large shops or small vendors, they no longer had to worry about people causing trouble, fighting, customer disputes, etc.; the Qingyuan City Management Company would handle it.

Besides that, there were also businesses like fire and theft prevention, handling water accumulation on rainy days, etc.

The Qingyuan City Management Company would also cooperate with the Inspectorate to manage public security and help solve cases, which was also an important reason why Xingcheng's case-solving rate had risen in a straight line.

In just over a year, the situation in Xingcheng had spread, and now it had attracted many new merchants.

Many well-known companies and firms in Datong Prefecture had chosen to come to Xingcheng to open branches.

"Now many commoners in Xingcheng want to send their children to work at the Qingyuan City Management Company."

Li Lei said with a smile.

Before the Qingyuan City Management Company appeared, joining a gang wasn't something that could make people look up to you; on the contrary, it was disgusting!

Because the thing gangs did most was bullying the common people.

But now it was different.

As the reputation of the Qingyuan City Management Company got better and better, the commoners of Xingcheng sincerely hoped that this largest local 'gang' could grow bigger and stronger, and it would be best if it were always the leader of the Xingcheng martial arts world!

Hearing this, Li Fei nodded with satisfaction.

When the local commoners spontaneously wanted to send their children to the Qingyuan City Management Company, it meant that the goal he had envisioned back then had been initially achieved.

Back then, when he formulated those nearly harsh rules for the Qingyuan City Management Company, including Shangguan Xiao, everyone didn't understand.

Doing so not only made the Qingyuan City Management Company earn much less money but also required a lot of manpower, material resources, and energy.

Fortunately, the current result made Li Fei very satisfied, and it also proved that his choice back then was correct.

Suppressing a place with martial force was indeed easy, but if one wanted to stand here for a long time, the hearts of the people were the key.

Although the Green-Faced Villa had previously unified the martial arts world of Datong Prefecture, that was only on the surface.

In the absence of a foundation, the Green-Faced Villa couldn't do things like the Qingyuan City Management Company.

Now that Li Fei had returned, after wiping out the Bai family and that General in Master Ming Qi City, he intended to let the Green-Faced Villa truly control the martial arts world of Datong Prefecture, and then do things according to this set of the Qingyuan City Management Company.

As for the problem of lacking manpower, after his Marquis Mansion was built in Xingcheng, there would be no need to worry about not being able to recruit people.

"The situation of the Chen family is also very good now; Lixin is doing very well, including me, everyone underestimated him."

Li Lei continued.

Back then, Li Fei used the Chen Family Village incident to topple the Chen family in one fell swoop.

But he didn't choose to swallow the Chen family then and there, but instead let his childhood friend Chen Lixin manage the Chen family.

After all, the Chen family had been in Xingcheng for so many years and was deep-rooted; if he wanted to swallow it by force, he could only swallow a 'remains' that was torn apart.

And using Chen family members to govern the Chen family, the effect was different.

Although Chen Lixin was from a side branch and not the direct line, in the situation where all the direct lines were in prison, after receiving strong support from Li Lei, he quickly succeeded in taking over the Chen family, and the resistance he encountered was also very small.

Chen Lixin was only one year older than Li Fei; a twenty-year-old Chen family head was indeed unexpected.

But in the past six months, Chen Lixin had indeed governed the Chen family very well, not only sweeping away the decline but also making great progress in business.

This business student from the Martial Arts University had shown his extraordinary business talent!

Before, there was no platform for him to display it, but now holding the entire Chen family, Chen Lixin had the opportunity to display his talents.

Li Fei revealed a look of curiosity.

That night he and Chen Lixin talked in the hotel, and the other party guessed that he intended to move against the Chen family at once; he knew then that his childhood friend wasn't simple.

"What have they done?"

Li Fei asked.

So Li Lei told him what Chen Lixin had done in the Chen family over the past six months:

"Borrowing the remaining prestige of his new position, and with me standing for him, he checked the accounts of the Chen family for the past thirty years within a month, and found dozens of people who were either corrupt or kept fake accounts!

He didn't send all these people to prison; in the end, he only let me arrest half, and the other half handed over all their family property to save themselves.

Next, Chen Lixin used this newly acquired capital to let more than a dozen shops of the Chen family stop business for rectification, re-decorate, and prepare to change trades."

"What did he let these shops change to?"

Li Fei asked curiously.

"Hahaha, you certainly wouldn't guess; this is the new specialty of our Xingcheng now—takeout!"

"Ah, this..."

"What's wrong?"

"It's nothing, Li Shu, you continue."

"Before, we either went to the shop to eat or cooked at home, but now we don't have to; we can have people deliver it.

Chen Lixin first used my relationship to establish cooperation with the government, specifically delivering meals for us; now the three meals a day of the six academies of Xingcheng are all delivered to us by the Chen family's takeout company.

Later, he continued to expand the scale, specifically asking people to take menus to various shops every day to ask what they want to eat? Which shop to eat at? After recording it, the Chen family takeout company would send people to deliver the food to these shops at a fixed point.

Now the entire catering industry in Xingcheng is competing to cooperate with the Chen family; I estimate that the profit of the Chen family takeout company is now enough to make up for the losses caused by the Chen family's previous injuries."

Li Fei listened to the story told by Li Lei, having a sense of déjà vu of watching a time-travel novel.

Actually, the concept of 'takeout' was something he mentioned casually when he talked with Chen Lixin back then.

He hadn't expected the other party to really implement this concept.

When Li Fei first came to this world, he had the arrogance of a time-traveler, always feeling that with the advanced concepts in his mind, he could easily become the richest man.

But soon he found himself too naive.

In such a world, creativity, talent, capital, etc., were not the most important.

The most important thing was to have a background!

If there wasn't a sufficiently powerful background, Li Fei would establish a takeout company in the first month, and the company would be someone else's in the next month.

So Li Fei's way of making money back then could only be choosing to fight underground boxing.

But Chen Lixin was different.

He had Li Lei as a backer, which was equivalent to having the biggest background in Xingcheng!

Added to the foundation and capital of the Chen family, naturally there was no reason for it not to succeed.

Of course, there was no internet or mobile phones in this era, and even telephones weren't popular; wanting to implement the takeout concept Li Fei proposed required doing a lot of work and overcoming many difficulties.

Chen Lixin solved these problems one by one.

"It's indeed not bad."

Li Fei said with a smile.

Whether it was the Qingyuan City Management Company or the Chen family, the seeds planted back then had now begun to sprout.

Li Fei looked out the car window; the wild flowers on the side of the road were blooming brilliantly, the same scene he saw when he left Xingcheng by bus a year ago.

Parting with you in the flowers last year, flowers bloom again this year.

Xingcheng, which was once squeezed by powerful officials and gangs, was now experiencing a rebirth.

The once insignificant teenager was now world-famous!

The 47th year of Hongguang, February 2nd, the Dragon Raises its Head.

The Marquis of Jing'an, Li Fei, had returned to his hometown.

Requesting monthly votes.

(End of chapter) ===== CHAPTER 363 =====