Chapter 1417: Buying In

With such thoughts in mind, how could Xuzhou and the surrounding regions not surge with excitement? However, Zhao Jin and Wang Zhaojing had issued near-ironclad orders on this matter. With Lord Jin and Third Lord having given the word, no one dared disobey.

Xu Zhenzhen and Mu Shulan took the children to Cloud Dragon Mountain. The sour, pedantic scholars of the Great Ming called that place the Xuzhou "Meiwu." Centered around the original Cloud Mountain Temple, Cloud Dragon Mountain had been built into an extremely tight system of fortress fortifications.

At this stage, there was really no way to hide it from anyone. Everyone could guess that something very important to the Zhao Family Army was there. Guessing further, they could also figure that the gold and silver the Zhao Family Army had accumulated since its founding through various battles and commercial dealings might be stored there, along with perhaps supplies prepared for a resurgence in hard times.

Back then, Dong Zhuo built this Meiwu, proclaiming it impregnable. He stored vast quantities of grain and treasure inside, along with beauties plundered from the Eastern Han court, intending it as his pleasure den for the remaining decades of his life. Of course, everyone knows how that turned out. Using this as a metaphor for Cloud Dragon Mountain's location was certainly not well-intentioned.

There were also various storyteller tales and opera scripts about loyal heroes of the Great Ming sneaking into Cloud Dragon Mountain to steal treasure, frightening Zhao Jin so much he dared not harbor rebellious thoughts. They spoke of countless hidden mechanisms at Cloud Dragon Mountain and Cloud Mountain Temple, and of martial arts masters of peerless skill guarding it, making infiltration truly difficult beyond measure.

By all rights, such storyteller tales should have been quite exciting once written, but after a few installments, few paid them any attention. They were only somewhat popular in Sichuan and Guangdong, because wherever the Zhao Family Army's influence could reach, who didn't know its might? Such outrageous fabrications were simply too dull.

However, Xu Zhenzhen and Mu Shulan taking the children there was not to seek refuge, because Zhao Jin's third wife, Meng Ziqi, was already in charge over at the He Family Village. The reason they went was that the old couple, Zhao Zhentang and He Cuihua, wanted to pray before the Buddha for Zhao Jin.

"Your son has laid hands on quite a few Buddhist temples over the years. He's already offended the Buddha terribly. If the Buddha could still bless him, that would take an awfully forgiving heart." Zhao Zhentang's remark was quite caustic, and as a result, He Cuihua scolded him thoroughly.

"You know full well what Xiaolan believes in. Having her come along to a Buddhist temple, isn't that just adding trouble for our family?" This remark from Zhao Zhentang actually made He Cuihua a bit worried, afraid her daughter-in-law might overthink things.

Mu Shulan, however, didn't mind much. She even had Zhao Qi accompany his grandmother to worship the Buddha and pray for Zhao Jin's northern campaign.

Mu Shulan still managed the Smelling Incense Sect. While the Smelling Incense Sect's scale had indeed shrunk compared to Xu Hongru's time, in terms of organizational tightness and operational capability, it far surpassed its former self, and its doctrine had also grown increasingly complete.

The children of Zheng Quan and You Zhenrong, after graduating from the five academies of Xuzhou, did not join the Zhao Family Army or Cloud Mountain Firm as their fathers had hoped. Instead, they continued working for the Smelling Incense Sect. This made Zheng Quan and You Zhenrong beat their chests and stamp their feet, so furious they wanted to strike and curse them. In the end, it was only settled when Zhao Jin gave his word.

Before this batch of young people joined, the Smelling Incense Sect's turf had been encroached upon, intentionally or not, by the Internal Guard, the Intelligence Bureau, and even Cloud Mountain Firm. Both inside and outside tacitly approved of this trend; even if some had objections, they were helpless to do anything about it.

After these young people joined, however, everything began to change. The knowledge they had learned came from two sources: one was the Zhao Jin ideology instilled by the academy instructors, and the other was the Western church organizational systems taught by foreign missionaries. They then sifted through, discarding the dross and selecting the essence from the usable parts of the Smelling Incense Sect and Buddhism. Naturally, it was different from before.

Faced with such changes, the Internal Guard and the Intelligence Bureau even proposed eradication. Fortunately, these young people's ideals differed from the Smelling Incense Sect's. Many of them had witnessed the suffering and chaos in Shandong and across the realm, and had also seen the prosperity and stability of Xuzhou. In their private conversations, a notion gradually took shape: Zhao Jin was, in the truest sense, the Son of Heaven and the Son of God, sent by Heaven to save all living beings under heaven.

The doctrine they constructed aimed to make everyone under heaven realize this, to make them accept Xuzhou's salvation, accept the Son of Heaven, Zhao Jin, and to submit and be devout for this goal. Those who did not submit were evil demons and monsters.

Once this tenet emerged, whether it was Zhao Jin and his core circle, or the crafty old schemers of the Internal Guard and Intelligence Bureau, or even learned Confucian scholars on the Zhao Family Army's side like Wang Youshan, all expressed approval of this new Smelling Incense Sect. Even the most cautious among them felt that, at the very least for the next few decades, such a Smelling Incense Sect would be greatly beneficial to Zhao Jin.

It could be used to soothe the people's hearts, to destroy those Buddhist temples and Daoist abbeys that opposed the Zhao Family Army or had conflicting interests, to sweep away those cults hidden among the populace that had sought to rebel in dynasty after dynasty, and even to reinforce the mandate of Zhao Jin's destiny. Though he who has strong soldiers and sturdy horses is the Son of Heaven, having this layer of divine mandate and deification was, in the end, greatly advantageous.

Nevertheless, the Internal Guard, the Intelligence Bureau, and even other related departments had successively planted numerous informants within, on one hand strengthening control, but on the other hand also strengthening the Smelling Incense Sect's operational capability.

"... Lord Jin need not worry too much. This new Smelling Incense Sect appears full of vitality, but internally there are too many checks and balances; it will be very difficult for it to coalesce into a single centripetal force..."

Ruhui had his own view on this matter, because the participants in the new Smelling Incense Sect included not only the children of former Smelling Incense Sect followers, but also the children of Cloud Mountain Temple. These people came from different backgrounds, so naturally their mindsets differed. Currently, their thoughts and actions shared the same goal, but in the long run, it would be different.

A truly united, emerging sectarian force was something to guard against, but a sect destined to split could be divided and ruled, then held in hand to exert even greater power.

In fact, many core disciples of Cloud Mountain Temple had only begun to show enthusiasm in the last half year. The true core disciples, even those of Ruhui's lineage, could not be said to feel genuine closeness to Zhao Jin and the Zhao Family Army from the bottom of their hearts. Although their prospects were limitless under Zhao Jin, they also understood in their hearts that without Zhao Jin, they might very well have gained even more glory and wealth. Moreover, Cloud Mountain Temple was relatively isolated and knew little of the outside world, which further deepened their notions.

It was only in this past half year that they realized they had stumbled upon the immense fortune of following a dragon, a blessing that could not be earned over several lifetimes. Catching this wave was not something a local power like Cloud Mountain Temple, confined to a single prefecture or province, could compare to; it concerned the vast realm under heaven.

But by the time they realized this, it was already too late. They had worked for the Zhao Family Army, but without dedication or diligence. Though they would have wealth and status in the future, they could not compare to those companions who had truly thrown themselves in. Some, unwilling to accept this, could only seek out new opportunities. This new Smelling Incense Sect was that opportunity. Yet, when doing these things, they could not help but sigh inwardly: had they known it would come to this, they would have acted differently from the start.

As they secretly regretted this, they never imagined that the people of Xuzhou, Pizhou, and the surrounding prefectures and counties like Huai'an Prefecture, Fengyang Prefecture, Guide Prefecture, and Yanzhou Prefecture lamented even more deeply. They had originally thought this was a great risk of execution and family extermination; who could have imagined it was a great fortune that would bring glory to their ancestors?

In past dynastic changes, first came chaos, then war, then unification. How many years did that take from start to finish? How many people had to die? Even if one followed a master, one might not survive to the end. Who dared risk following? Besides, the Great Ming had lasted over two hundred years and didn't yet seem to be on the verge of collapse. It had weathered crises even greater than the present one several times before. This Zhao Jin uprising had taken ten years to barely seize two provinces' worth of territory; who knew how many more variables the future held?

Who could have imagined that the change of heaven and earth would come so quickly? Even more unexpected was that even the most cautious person, upon analysis, could find no real danger in it.

Zhao Jin's Zhao Family Army held absolute superiority in both military might and financial resources. The risks of the past did not exist for them, and the advantages that past contenders lacked, the Zhao Family Army possessed. This was a completely surefire situation. Outsiders might talk about Second Lord Chen Sheng still facing risks in Liaodong, but who among the insiders didn't know that even if all of Second Lord's troops were lost in Liaodong, the battalions in Lord Jin's hands could still conquer the realm? Who could stop them?

Outsiders thought Second Lord's First Brigade was the elite force, but everyone knew the Second and Third Brigades were no worse, and they knew even better that the most elite was the Personal Guard Brigade.

Having missed out before, people beat their chests and stamped their feet in regret while rushing to catch up. For a time, the Xuzhou academies were flooded with applicants. The martial halls went without saying, but even the Engineering Academy and the Foreign Affairs Academy, the least valued, were packed with people. The Cloud Mountain Trading Firms and Cloud Mountain Inns throughout Shandong and the Jiangbei region of South Zhili were also swarming with people; even a mere shop assistant position was fought over by countless individuals.

Not to mention the agricultural land estates everywhere. Many people brought their wives and children to seek refuge, even willing to offer up their own land, just to secure a qualification before the dynastic change.

The temporary shortages caused by the mass conscription mobilization were instantly alleviated. According to the Internal Guard and the Intelligence Bureau, among the various people coming to seek refuge and willing to serve the Zhao Family Army, there were quite a few scions of Great Ming's powerful and noble families, including those hereditary aristocratic lords who were meant to endure with the dynasty.

Of course, the powerful, wealthy, and influential acted differently from everyone else. Whether it was the great merchants of the capital, Shanxi, and Henan, the great aristocratic clans of South Zhili and Zhejiang, or the maritime merchants of Fujian and Guangdong origin, their method of showing goodwill to the Zhao Family Army was more direct: purchasing properties in Xuzhou, and then, at Cloud Mountain Firm's initiative, investing heavily in the industrial and commercial sectors.

The most conspicuous among them were the maritime merchants of Fujian and Guangdong. According to the managers of Cloud Mountain Firm, they practically sailed into port with ships fully laden with gold and silver, then dumped it onto the docks. They bought shares in every industry that allowed investment, purchased vast tracts of farmland, and then conveniently bought up goods suitable for trade.

Next were the wealthy merchants of Qingjiangpu and Jiangnan. They knew better than the maritime merchants where the key points lay, and they were more adept at currying favor and building connections. Besides buying shares and investing, these great merchant clans also proactively allowed Cloud Mountain Firm to invest in their own industries. The textile guilds of Songjiang Prefecture and Suzhou Prefecture, once impenetrable, began to open up to Cloud Mountain Firm.

This opening was also a matter of necessity, because the cotton production of Suzhou and Songjiang Prefectures simply could not meet the enormous consumption of their weaving workshops. The rest of the cotton output was firmly held in the hands of the Zhao Family Army. Not to mention having to face the fierce competition of Xuzhou cloth; since they could no longer win the fight, they might as well make a fortune together.