Without money, what is the point of being a traitor?

Chapter 496 Illusion of Life
There was nothing wrong with the letter, but what annoyed Pei Yuan was that the envelope had been opened, and it was obvious that Captain Han had already read it.

Well, that's not good.

Pei Yuan glanced towards Han Qianhu and saw Han Qianhu looking at him sideways.

Pei Yuan should have been the one who was justified, but because this action was really not something that could be told to outsiders, he felt inexplicably embarrassed.

Han Qianhu saw Pei Yuan looking at her, and said openly, "I didn't think it was your personal matter, so I just looked through it casually. I didn't expect that you get along so well with your subordinates."

Pei Yuan felt more and more embarrassed.

It's very harmonious.

They can all help Song Chunniang get married.

However, Pei Yuan still had some ulterior motives towards Han Qianhu, so of course he couldn't let her misunderstand anything.

He quickly recalled what he had just read, making sure there was nothing overly ambiguous.

He immediately explained to Han Qianhu, "Actually, this is just what I want to do to help General Song and Zhang Yunjun."

"The captain may not know that General Song and Zhang Lian's daughter are old friends. Zhang Yunjun is in an awkward situation now, and her future is uncertain. She and General Song have some romantic ties, so I intend to help them conceal this matter from Zhang Yunjun's parents."

"I am just here to help."

Han Qianhu listened, thought for a moment and said, "Zhang Yunjun's case back then was committed by Song Chunniang, right?"

Pei Yuan didn't expect Han Qianhu to react so quickly. Of course, he couldn't sell out his friend, so he could only stammer, "I don't know about that."

Han Qianhu sneered, "Why hide it from me? I personally selected someone, wouldn't he know the background?"

Pei Yuan was caught off guard.

Just as he was thinking quickly about how to smooth things over, he heard Han Qianhu say slowly, "Keep watching yours."

Pei Yuan didn’t know what Han Qianhu was up to, he just felt that the letters he was holding were a little heavy.

Seeing Pei Yuan was distracted, Han Qianhu casually said, "I remember telling you before that I can accept bad people, but I can't accept stupid people."

Pei Yuan was slightly startled and began to think.

In order to convince Han Qianhu to agree to his plan of roasting nuts in Huai'an, he lied to Han Qianhu and said that he had obtained information from Song Chunniang.

As a result, Han Qianhu saw through the lie in an instant.

However, Han Qianhu did not pursue the matter afterwards. Instead, he seriously studied the feasibility of Huai'an roasted nuts with Pei Yuan.

Han Qianhu saw Pei Yuan's expression change slightly and said calmly, "Do you remember?"

"It may not be that your bad intentions won't help me, but if you are stupid, you will only bring me trouble."

Although Pei Yuan knew clearly that Han Qianhu's words were referring to the incident in which she was deceived into using the tax money to speculate in commodities.

But listening to it again at this moment, I suddenly have a different feeling.

If his previous wishful thinking was also regarded as such by Han Qianhu.

Then, is her indulgence towards me, which I have always believed, also her way of controlling people?

Could it be that I have fallen into some kind of illusion about life?

Although he was sure that Han Qianhu didn't care about the little lie he just told, Pei Yuan felt more and more confused.

Pei Yuan thought about it and put the letter in his arms.

Of course you have to reply to the letter.

There are just some details that still need to be considered and there is no need to resolve them here.

Pei Yuan was thinking about it, and when he looked down, he saw another opened letter.

Pei Yuan was speechless and could only continue to pick it up and read it.

This time, the document was sent by a very special person, namely, Wang Qiong, the Right Vice Minister of the Ministry of Revenue, who is currently working in Shandong.

Wang Qiong accepted the important task of providing relief and appeasing the people, and following Pei Yuan's advice, he focused on Shandong.

Therefore, after arriving in Shandong, he conducted inspections in various prefectures and enriched the policy theory of the Single Whip System with real conditions.

Pei Yuan had asked Wang Chang about Wang Qiong's whereabouts, but unfortunately, due to bad luck, he never had the chance to meet Wang Qiong.

Pei Yuan's own whereabouts were also erratic, so the only place left for Wang Qiong to contact was naturally the local stronghold, Liansheng Temple.

Pei Yuan unfolded the letter and saw that it contained some detailed records of Wang Qiong's inspection of various places in Shandong. Along the way, he was also deeply touched by the suffering of the people.

The lower class people, who obviously have nothing, bear the greatest social burden. The powerful people who own land and assets can use various means to shift their obligations to the lower classes.

Minister Wang was very moved by this. He thought that if the Single Whip System could really be implemented to tie land and taxes together, it might really be a great thing.

At the end of the letter, Wang Qiong also hinted that it was time for him to return to Beijing to work.

After reading it, Pei Yuan subconsciously wanted to take another peek at Han Qianhu.

When I looked over, I was suddenly startled.

It turned out that Captain Han had come to the desk at some point and was watching Pei Yuan read the letter idly.

Pei Yuan instinctively wanted to cover it up, but then he remembered that the letter had already been opened, so he pretended to be frank and unfolded the letter and handed it to Han Qianhu.

Han Qianhu was not polite. He took the letter with his bare hands and glanced at it. Then he asked Pei Yuan curiously, "When I read the letter, I was a little confused. Why had I never heard of the One Whip Method mentioned by Wang Qiong before?"

Pei Yuan saw that Han Qianhu was concerned about this matter, so he explained, "This one-whip method is a method that the prince and I have worked out together, in order to reform the system and reduce the burden on the people."

Although Captain Han had read the letter, the Single Whip Method involved the core secrets that Wang Qiong wanted to change, so of course he couldn't go into too much detail in the letter.

There are a lot of vague contents and hints that only Pei Yuan can understand.

Han Qianhu didn't quite understand what he said, so he simply asked, "Are you going to reduce taxes?"

Pei Yuan shook his head. "It's not about reducing taxes, but about tying all the taxes and corvée that the people have to bear to the land. Let those who have land bear the responsibilities they should bear. Those who don't have land don't have to bear those responsibilities."

"Oh, so that's it." Han Qianhu was not interested after understanding it. His eyelids drooped. He was about to hand the paper back to Pei Yuan, but suddenly he thought of something and asked curiously, "This method doesn't seem to be perfect. Many people who have wealth may not get their income from land. Aren't these people the fish that slipped through the net?"

Pei Yuan knew that industry and commerce were very developed in the south, so it was not surprising that Han Qianhu would ask this question, so he asked, "Han Qianhu, you mean the merchants, right?"

"There are indeed many problems with the collection of commercial taxes. If the commercial taxes are collected by local governments, they are arbitrary and may not be submitted to the court truthfully. In the end, merchants pay the same amount of taxes, but the court gets almost nothing." "But if the court collects commercial taxes directly, will the local taxes on merchants be less? Not necessarily. They may even have to pay more."

“So not only do local officials dislike the imperial tax collectors, but merchants also don’t like them.”

"If we cannot gradually sort out the responsibilities and powers between the imperial court and the localities, it will be very difficult to impose taxes on businesses."

"Because commerce is mobile, merchants travel north and south, and transactions take place anytime and anywhere. Compared with unrestrained commerce, land is more likely to be a target."

"To solve the court's problems now, we can only start with the easy ones and then move on to the difficult ones, starting with land."

"And as long as the one-whip law is implemented, it may not necessarily restrict business."

Han Qianhu was now interested. "What do you mean?"

Pei Yuan hesitated for a moment, but finally did not hide it.

"Because in the plan that Wang Qiong and I have, the Single Whip Law will no longer collect the original amount, but will collect the discounted amount."

Han Qianhu was a little surprised when he heard this. "No longer collecting taxes? But how can the people have so much money to pay taxes?"

Then he frowned and looked at Pei Yuan, "If this is forcibly implemented, it will inevitably become an evil law that benefits the court and harms the people."

As if she was afraid that Pei Yuan didn't understand what she meant, she explained, "The people grow crops. If they want to pay taxes, they can only sell the crops and exchange them for money to buy the color."

"The imperial court levies taxes during the summer and autumn harvests. At that time, grain prices are low and money is expensive. If the people were to sell their grain at a low price, they would be forced to sell their grain at a low price."

In history, the Single Whip System did enrich merchants and harm farmers.

Pei Yuan didn't expect Han Qianhu to have such insight. He quickly explained, "What Qianhu is worried about is not a problem, because the currency we plan to use for the discount is the Ming Dynasty treasure note."

"Ming Dynasty Treasure Notes?" Han Qianhu's face showed a strange expression, "Does anyone still use that thing now?"

Pei Yuan didn't want to explain too many things to Han Qianhu, because some ideas were just Pei Yuan's concepts and might not be able to be explained clearly to people of this era.

He simply asked directly, "The thousand households must have a lot of Ming Dynasty treasure notes in their hands?"

Han Qianhu was a little speechless, "Why do I need that? It's not worth much and I can't spend it."

Pei Yuan then asked, "How many Ming Dynasty treasure notes do the people around the thousand households have?"

Han Qianhu thought about it after hearing this and answered casually, "It shouldn't be much. This thing is not in circulation now."

"In the past, merchants could use it to pay taxes at the banknote exchange, and some of it would be collected. But after the rebellion of the Bazhou Army, several major banknote exchanges changed to accepting cash, and no one used treasure notes anymore."

Pei Yuan then said, "So, now people don't have much Ming Dynasty treasure notes in their hands, and they are basically not circulating in the market."

"Moreover, the value of Ming Dynasty's treasure notes is far lower than the cost of printing them, and the court has not printed treasure notes for a long time."

"The Ming Dynasty treasure notes currently available on the market are not worth mentioning in the face of the massive demand for tax replacement."

Han Qianhu was a little unconvinced, "The imperial court...has already given up on the treasure notes."

"No." Pei Yuan said his gossip, "I heard that in a month or two, several major customs offices will start collecting treasure notes again. By then, the price of treasure notes may go up."

Han Qianhu, who had been indifferent to these things at first, suddenly became interested.

"You mean that the price of Baochao may rise due to the opening of customs."

Pei Yuan was still very confident about this, and immediately said with absolute certainty, "It's not just possible, it will definitely rise."

If it doesn't go up, we will be doing a disservice to the large number of people who are crazy about cheap food.

Upon hearing this, Captain Han's face darkened.

Seeing this, Pei Yuan was wondering if he had said something wrong.

Han Qianhu sighed and muttered to himself, "He has really grown wings. That's right, how can a man who won the first place in the martial arts examination be willing to be inferior to others?"

Pei Yuan was a little confused. No, what’s wrong with me?
He hurriedly said helplessly, "I have done something wrong, I hope Qianhu will tell me clearly."

Han Qianhu frowned and questioned Pei Yuan, "I don't need to ask about your private establishment of a cult. I can also turn a blind eye to your assassination of the eunuch who holds the seal of the Silijian. But why didn't you report this matter earlier?"

"Ah, this, me." Pei Yuan was speechless when asked.

Pei Yuan suddenly remembered that Han Qianhu was quite lawless when it came to making money!
When his plan of Huai'an roasted nuts impressed Han Qianhu, he, an outsider who was seconded here, directly received Han Qianhu's full support.

Pei Yuan thought it was bad and quickly explained, "I am just guessing."

Han Qianhu immediately asked aggressively, "Is it a guess like the Huai'an fried food?"

"Uh, probably."

Han Qianhu asked again, "Didn't you just say that it's not just possible, but it will definitely rise?"

Pei Yuan knew that facing a smart man like Han Qianhu, it would be meaningless to explain anything.

He could only say cautiously, "How about Qianhu try a small amount as well?"

Han Qianhu glared at Pei Yuan fiercely, but did not answer immediately. Instead, he asked, "What is the current market price of Baochao?"

Pei Yuan hadn't paid attention to it for a while. He thought for a moment and said, "It's probably a few dozen strings of banknotes for one penny."

Han Qianhu asked casually, "How much do you think it can increase to?"

Pei Yuan gritted his teeth and spoke out his estimate, "I think the Ming Dynasty's treasure notes have reached their bottom. This wave will at least rebound to the price of one guan and two wen."

After hearing the quick calculation, Han Qianhu couldn't help but asked in amazement, "How much?"

Pei Yuan sighed, "If the Qianhu doesn't participate, he can only exchange two coins for one Guan. If the Qianhu participates, the treasure notes may be completely ruined this time."

Han Qianhu asked Pei Yuan in confusion, "What do you mean?"

Pei Yuan explained with a wry smile, "You may not believe me, but I put money in to prop up the market, because I have no intention of cashing in the Ming Dynasty's treasure notes. But if I went in, I would be seeking to make a profit. With the financial resources at hand, if I sold the goods at the price of two cents, no one would be able to take them."

Han Qianhu was confused by Pei Yuan's words, "Support the market? What are you going to do?"

Pei Yuan said honestly, "Because I have already bought a lot of it at a low price. If I want to sell it off, as long as I sell a part of it, it will destroy the Ming Dynasty Treasure Notes that are on the rise, and I won't make much money in the end. But if the Ming Dynasty Treasure Notes can survive, the Ming Dynasty Treasure Notes in my hands are ready-made money, and I don't need to sell them at all to realize their value."

"This is also the reason why I don't want Qianhu to get involved."

"I have the determination and confidence to revive the Ming Dynasty, and I am willing to risk my life to do this. But, Captain, do you have the same?"

(End of this chapter)