Longzang

Chapter 1091 Signs of Wealth
The Azure Nether army remained entrenched in the Ji Kingdom, sweeping all before them. Boosted by their military might, the leaders at the front—whether Xiao Yu Bao Yun, Feng Ting Yu, or Wang Hu—were all strong enough to withstand Yu Jing.

After several crushing defeats, the morale of Ji's army had been shattered. The mere sight of the Azure Banner was enough to demoralize them even before battle. For the commander-in-chief, such low morale offered little boost. The fact that the army hadn't immediately collapsed was a testament to its elite status.

Past battles have shown that when the two armies clash, the Ji army is often destroyed by artillery fire before they even see the Qingming soldiers.

By now, the Ji army has lost more than 500,000 men, while Qingming has suffered more than 1,000 casualties, most of whom were either acclimatized to the local environment or poisoned by eating local specialties.

Wei Yuan was not greedy. After his several Qingming armies occupied the four counties surrounding Xianghan, he stopped advancing and instead stationed himself there. Then he began to negotiate with the King of Ji.

Wei Yuan did not set up boundary stones in the four prefectures, indicating that he had no intention of occupying them. At this time, the eight prefectures of Jixi were a barren wasteland, sparsely populated, with fewer civilians than the Qingming troops. For many years, no boundary stones had been set up on the land, causing the landscape to deteriorate and gradually revert to the territory of mountain dwellers.

Looking at the map surrounding the State of Ji now is quite interesting. Beyond the traditional southwestern border of Ji, what was originally a mountain-dwelling region is now dotted with boundary stones, mostly becoming human territory. Meanwhile, the eight prefectures within Ji have continued to degenerate, becoming mountain-dwelling lands surrounded by human territory.

Only if it gets closer to the capital of the Tang Dynasty will the boundary stone not degenerate into a world of alien races after it is uprooted; it will only become barren and desolate.

With the war now over, Wei Yuan, who was in Yizhou, began to contemplate the nature of human destiny and the Martial Ancestor's plans.

Wei Yuan had read "The Biography of Emperor Wuzu" countless times. Emperor Wuzu reigned for a hundred years, and Wei Yuan was already familiar with all the major events that had occurred before and after.

However, no connection can be found among these scattered events, nor can any clues be discerned regarding the Martial Ancestor's scheme. One can only speculate that it is mostly related to human destiny. The increasing number of chosen ones is a recent phenomenon, occurring only in the last few hundred years, and this is likely related to the Martial Ancestor's plan.

Wei Yuan recalled the recent situation. First, there was Zhang's life-or-death tribulation, and then the secret realm provided by the Northern Whip, which led him to the Ji Kingdom. Subsequently, in the Ji Kingdom, he encountered the Great Array of Heaven and Earth Refining the World, and for the sake of the millions of innocent people in the Ji Kingdom, Wei Yuan destroyed the enemy's array twice.

On the Zhao side, after years of preparation, Wei Yuan finally pushed King Zhao to the Yujing realm. During King Zhao's advancement, several immortals directly intervened, and the two sides fought a battle from afar. At the most critical moment, King Buddha used his supreme power to dispel the fog and make Wei Yuan make a choice, thus allowing King Zhao to escape a calamity.

Both the State of Ji and the State of Zhao are plotting against the Martial Ancestor, attempting to undermine his established power structure in different ways. Meanwhile, it seems another force is doing everything in its power to stop them. Wei Yuan has unknowingly found himself at the forefront of this power struggle between the two major powers.

However, Wei Yuan was unclear about the Martial Ancestor's true intentions and therefore did not know how to respond. At this point, he could only let things take their course and handle the situation according to his own conscience.

If Qingming is considered a country, then although its population is small at present, its powerful national strength supported by hundreds of thousands of Dao Foundation cultivators and tens of millions of Body Forging cultivators is already rare in the world. Even compared with Zhao and Nanqi, it is only inferior in the number of high-level cultivators above the Dharma Aspect level.

Now that the Golden Elixir Dharma Form plan is in place, Wei Yuan has made increasing the number of Dharma Forms his main task.

Wei Yuan first mobilized all the propaganda tools at his disposal to popularize the knowledge of the Golden Core Dharma Form within Qingming. At the same time, he adjusted the cultivation system, increased subsidies for the middle and late stages of the Dao Foundation stage, and introduced a variety of methods to improve one's foundation. The two main methods were soaking in the hot springs generated by the Desolate Boundary Stone and taking pills.

As the Life-Growing Boundary Stone gradually expands, the output of the Azure Netherworld Herb Garden increases dramatically. The production of Dao Foundation-level medicinal herbs explodes, and the annual output of hundred-year-old medicinal herbs is hundreds of thousands of kilograms. The pills refined from them are enough to support the needs of 500,000 Dao Foundation cultivators.

With the allure of the Golden Core Dharma Image and numerous methods to improve their foundation, the enthusiasm for cultivation among Qingming's group of template Dao Foundations finally increased slightly, but the increase was far from meeting Wei Yuan's expectations.

How to enhance the will to cultivate became the core issue facing Wei Yuan. Adhering to the principle of making the best use of everyone's talents, Wei Yuan immediately assigned this task to the Prosperous Realms, allowing all cultivators to work together.

With the collective wisdom and efforts of many cultivators, the prosperity of all realms quickly found the root cause of the obstacle preventing the template's foundation from advancing further: the cultivators were too poor and had no money.

In Qingming, most template Dao Foundations work in various factories or mines, and their incomes are roughly the same. Based on the average income level in Qingming, the pills needed to cultivate to the Golden Core Dharma Form and the cost of using hot springs are roughly equivalent to the income of a template Dao Foundation for fifty years, plus one day off per month.

The Qingming region had only been prosperous for a few years, and the surge in template-based Dao Foundations was a phenomenon of the last decade. Therefore, the vast majority of template-based Dao Foundation income was used to improve the lives of their families and enhance their physical abilities, leaving little savings. The chances of achieving the Golden Core Dharma Form were not high enough to warrant such a desperate gamble.

Therefore, many people choose to save money to build up their family's assets and ensure their family's livelihood before considering their own path to enlightenment. Their daily savings are limited, leaving very little for purchasing body-strengthening hot springs and elixirs. Thus, although Qingming can produce a large quantity of foundation-building elixirs, less than a tenth of them are actually sold.

Having identified the core problem, Feng Chutang submitted a solution: the Golden Elixir Dharma Image Subsidy Loan Program, or Dharma Image Loan for short.

The Faxiang Loan is available in several varieties with terms of 30 years, 50 years, and up to 200 years.

After obtaining a loan from Qingming Money House, it can only be used for designated cultivation-related expenses. The interest rate is not high, only 10%, and repayment can be made collectively based on family blood ties: the son pays for the father's debts, and the grandson pays for the grandfather's loans.

Wei Yuan immediately recognized the potential of the Faxiang Loan, but there was another important impact that Feng Chutang hadn't noticed. Therefore, Wei Yuan personally revised the approval, lowering the interest rate of the Faxiang Loan to 0.5% per annum. At the same time, based on the principles of the Faxiang Loan, he also launched the Daoji Loan.

Once a Dao Foundation cultivator takes out a Dharma Aspect Loan, he will become very stable, work hard, and cultivate diligently until he pays it off. He will become the mainstay supporting Qingming Industry and will have no time to oppose the Creator Immortal Venerable, no, the Realm Lord.

The same principle applies to Daoji Loan. After Wei Yuan's approval and the refinement of details by various realms, Qingming Money House officially launched Daoji Loan and Faxiang Loan.

The two benefits caused an instant sensation throughout Qingming, with long queues forming outside money shops everywhere, all filled with people looking for loans.

Based on the actual situation, Zhujie Fanhua urgently adjusted the loan details, giving priority to cultivators with families and jobs. In addition, cultivators working in certain dangerous or arduous industries, as well as those serving in the Qingming Army, will also receive priority in obtaining loans.

In just one month, over 50,000 people were approved for Dharma Aspect Loans, while over three million received Dao Foundation Loans, nearly emptying the Qingming Bank. In the blink of an eye, the prices of various cultivation pills skyrocketed, with supply falling short of demand.

Fortunately, Xu Henshui's alchemy skills have greatly improved at this time, and he can now continuously refine six-foot square pills. Although he is still not as good as the one-foot giant pill of the Hermit of Knowing Pills, the value of his accumulated pills has been close to that of the Ancestor of Pills, second only to the Hermit of Knowing Pills. He has become the only candidate to become the next abbot of the Creation Temple, with no competitors at all.

The launch of the two loans also brought Wei Yuan a huge wave of cultivator luck, which was an unexpected bonus.

Now, Qingming has taken another step ahead. It's no longer surprising that everyone has meat to eat; everyone has loans, which has become the new symbol of wealth. Even Wei Yuan didn't expect that it would be these two major loans, especially the Dao Foundation Loan, that would become the key step in propelling Qingming towards a future where everyone has access to immortal cultivation.

Within months, the two major lending platforms flourished in Qingming. When people met acquaintances, they no longer greeted each other with "Have you eaten?" but with "Have you taken out a loan?"

Daoji Loan and Faxiang Loan were collectively known as Cultivation Loan, which nearly drained the Qingming Bank's stock of Qingyuan coins. After Feng Chutang took over the Qingming Bank, he strictly controlled the printing of Qingyuan coins and stabilized their value. As a result, more than ten years later, the Qingyuan coins not only did not depreciate, but also appreciated slightly.

The Western Jin Dynasty and the State of Zhao had long favored the use of lightweight and tamper-proof coins. King Zhao, however, was still unwilling to give up and issued currency several more times. But in the end, all of these efforts resulted in chaos and squandered much of the good fortune he had painstakingly accumulated.

The cultivation loan program within Qingming is booming like never before, which means that every now and then, the number of cultivators will surge.

Wei Yuan then changed his strategy and began to take the initiative to negotiate with King Ji of Cangwu, but his attitude in the negotiations was unprecedentedly tough, and he put forward many extremely harsh conditions.

In the Ji Kingdom's court, Sun Chaoen deviated from his usual stance and advocated a hardline approach. As a result, he was sent as an envoy to Qingming again and negotiated for several months, finally managing to persuade Wei Yuan to relent.

Although the terms negotiated this time were still harsh, they were much more favorable than the initial terms. Just as Prince Ji and Cangwu were about to agree, Sun Chaoen overruled the objections and continued to advocate a hardline stance against Qingming.

Trusting Sun Chaoen, Prince Ji sent him to Qingming again. After several months of negotiations, Prince Ji managed to secure many favorable terms for Sun Chaoen.

King Ji was overjoyed and adopted Sun Chaoen's advice, still refusing to sign the contract and continuing to slowly wear down Wei Yuan. In any case, Wei Yuan had only occupied uninhabited lands and hadn't placed boundary stones, so even if he occupied them for another ten years, he wouldn't achieve anything significant.

Wei Yuan was happy to prolong the process. Last five years, Wei Yuan gave Cangwu a huge surprise. This time, every year, Wei Yuan could give his enemy a small surprise.

While Wei Yuan personally oversaw the confrontation with Cangwu in Yizhou, Zhang Sheng returned to Qingming to take charge of the rear.

On this day, spring was in full bloom on earth, while in the azure sky, it was summer all year round.

A flying boat flew at a low altitude of a hundred feet, slowly heading towards the Azure Nether Immortal City. The flying boat was equipped with an identification array, which had already verified its identity, allowing it to fly freely within the Azure Nether. Otherwise, under the surveillance of the Zhou Tian Star Array, any flying boat of unknown identity approaching the Azure Nether would be detected, and if it trespassed without identifying itself, it would immediately face an attack from missiles, artillery fire, flying swords, and cultivators.

This small flying boat was only allowed to fly freely after its identity had been verified.

On the deck of the flying boat, Li Zhi stood with his hands behind his back, looking down at the land below. The land was a sea of ​​green, with endless fields of emerald green, divided into neat plots.

Rivers and streams crisscross the land, with lakes of all sizes scattered like pearls on a green velvet carpet. Villages dot the landscape, connected by roads and bustling with traffic. These villages may appear ordinary, but their main structures are several towering buildings, dozens of stories high, majestic and imposing. Scattered around them are some low-rise buildings, also exquisitely crafted, making the overall style completely different from the ordinary villages of Datang.

Looking at the towering buildings that resembled sheer peaks, Li Zhi was filled with countless emotions. His Zhenshan Territory currently covered four thousand li, with over ten million people and a million elite soldiers.

Li Zhi was able to develop Zhenshan Territory to such an extent in less than thirty years, which, by any standard of the Nine Kingdoms, makes him a great ruler.

However, there was a Wei Yuan and a Qing Ming in the world.

　P.S.: My physical condition wasn't good in October, so I made a firm decision to rebuild my body. At first, I was extremely tired and constantly feeling groggy, but now, two weeks later, my energy has improved significantly, and my condition is starting to recover. I'll take a short break tomorrow, and return to normal on Monday.

　　
　
(End of this chapter)