Deposed? I couldn't be happier! I wouldn't even be a dog to the crown prince.

When the first truly invincible ocean fleet of the Tang Dynasty stirred up a storm in the Pacific Ocean.

The city of Chang'an, thousands of miles away.

Li Chengqian was lying on a specially made, temperature-controlled rocking chair in the Eastern Palace.

Wu Zetian was flipping through the diplomatic bulletins from the Court of State Ceremonial that had just been delivered.

Those envoys from small countries who were once high and mighty, and even secretly plotted to steal the technology of the Tang Dynasty.

Now they all stood obediently in front of the Royal Bank of the Tang Dynasty, like wilted eggplants, holding their own gold and silver to exchange for "Tang Dynasty Silver Notes" bearing the image of Li Chengqian.

Because the Tang Dynasty's ocean-going merchant fleets have already begun to engage in low-level dumping on a global scale.

Deep in the jungles of Southeast Asia, on the banks of the Ganges River in India.

Those indigenous kings, who originally lacked even iron tools, looked at the soft cotton cloth unloaded from the Tang Dynasty merchant ships, woven day and night by steam looms.

There are also those glass mirrors that are made at a low cost, yet are so bright that they can reflect a person's pores.

They've all gone mad.

"My God! This is a creation of the gods!"

A Southeast Asian tyrant, wrapped in tree bark, held a small glass mirror and trembled with excitement.

He immediately ordered that a whole chest of gold nuggets from the national treasury be exchanged for the mirror, and that it be enshrined in the tribe's highest temple.

This kind of trade, exchanging cheap industrial goods for precious raw resources, happens every day in every corner of the ocean.

The Tang Dynasty merchant ships carried with them industrial defective products that were already in overproduction domestically and were gathering dust in warehouses.

But in return, they received ship after ship of gold dust, precious ivory, and various rare medicinal herbs that the Tang Dynasty desperately needed.

This is a terrifying economic scissors gap.

The merchants of the Tang Dynasty were like a group of sharks smelling blood. Led by the Eastern Palace Merchant Guild, they brandished credit certificates issued by the Tang Royal Bank and went on a buying spree in ports around the world.

Behind the scenes, Li Chengqian cunningly delivered the most fatal blow.

"Pass down the order."

During a casual morning meeting, Li Chengqian issued an order to Dai Zhou.

"When the Tang Dynasty caravan conducts any transactions overseas, it refuses to accept any currency or precious metals not issued by the Tang Dynasty."

"Want to buy glass and silk from the Tang Dynasty? Sure."

"Take your gold and silver to the nearest Tang Protectorate and exchange them for Tang silver notes at the exchange rate we've set!"

"These are the rules. Anyone who dares to break the rules, I will send Zheng He's treasure ships to their doorstep to reason with them."

This was a forcibly established "Tang Yuan" settlement system.

On an economic level, it directly shackled the world with the power of the Tang Dynasty.

No matter how many mines you have in your country, without Tang Dynasty silver notes, you can't even buy a Tang Dynasty iron pot.

In order to maintain their rule and enjoy their lives, the royal families and nobles of those countries had no choice but to humiliatingly hand over the financial lifeline of their nations to the Tang Dynasty's Royal Bank for manipulation.

It's not just economic plunder.

The advanced lifestyle of the Tang Dynasty was also spreading outwards at an alarming rate.

The Persian royal family.

This once mighty empire, which was invincible in the West, is now struggling to survive. However, the Persian royal family wants to demonstrate its noble status of "aligning with the Tang Dynasty."

They spared no expense, hiring several junior craftsmen from the Ministry of Works of the Tang Dynasty at high salaries.

In their palace, built of mud and stone.

They painstakingly installed a rudimentary flush toilet system that had long been obsolete in the Tang Dynasty.

"Praise be to God! Praise be to the Tang Dynasty!"

The old Persian king sat on that white porcelain toilet, listening to the rushing water, and was moved to tears.

"This elegant way of excreting without having to endure the stench—that's the life true nobility should have!"

To maintain this expensive and frequently clogged toilet system.

The Persian royal family had no choice but to painfully mortgage the country's largest copper mine to the Tang Dynasty's Protectorate General in the Western Regions.

And there are countless examples like this.

The Tang Dynasty had flush toilets, steam bicycles, and even rudimentary phonographs.

In the eyes of these foreign nobles, they became important luxuries that measured status and position.

For these things, they willingly emptied the nation's treasury, becoming the most loyal leeks in the Tang Dynasty's economic colonies.

Chang'an City, Ministry of Revenue.

Dai Zhou stood before the enormous gate of the national treasury.

This notoriously stingy Minister of Revenue of the Tang Dynasty felt no joy at the prospect of making a fortune.

He looked at the box after box of gold bricks, which were almost blocking the passageway.

That old face was etched with profound despair.

He turned his head shakily and looked at the clerk next to him who was in charge of keeping accounts.

"This...this was just brought back from the beach today?"

"Your Excellency, this is only the first batch delivered from Dengzhou Port. I heard there are dozens more merchant ships laden with gold, but they were delayed by the storm and will arrive tomorrow."

The clerk excitedly reported, completely oblivious to Dai Zhou's expression, which was on the verge of collapse.

"What a tragedy..."

Dai Zhou fell to the ground with a thud.

He clutched a heavy gold brick with a pitiful expression, his voice filled with the fear of a poor man suddenly becoming rich.

"Your Highness!"

"Keep pulling the gold back like that."

Dai Zhou was so anxious that tears streamed down his face.

"This gold... will soon be worth the same as those worthless stones outside Chang'an!"

Dai Zhou's concerns were not unfounded.

The wealth of the Tang Dynasty is expanding rapidly. If new ways to consume or invest cannot be found quickly, this severe inflation will sooner or later destroy the economic system that the Tang Dynasty has worked so hard to build.

however.

Just when the civil officials of the Tang Dynasty were racking their brains over how to spend money...

In a vast primeval jungle in Southeast Asia, which was regarded as an important spice-producing region by the Tang Dynasty caravans.

Several self-proclaimed clever indigenous tribal leaders.

However, this act of self-destruction provided the Tang Dynasty, a war machine already struggling to deplete its excess military power, with a perfect excuse.

"Bang!"

A rough parchment scroll was slammed onto a makeshift wooden table.

A tribal chieftain with strangely painted face arrogantly brandished a rusty iron spear.

"The paper scraps of paper from the Tang Dynasty were nothing but waste paper!"

"From today onwards, our dozen or so tribes have formed an alliance!"

"Refuse to accept Tang Dynasty silver notes! Loot all their merchant ships! Arrest all those Tang Dynasty merchants and enslave them!"

This arrogant indigenous chief believed that they were invincible in this complex rainforest.

The treasure ships of the Tang Dynasty could not reach the shore, and the cavalry of the Tang Dynasty could not run in the swamp.

He naively thought...

I can challenge the economic rules set by that terrifying empire.

The news reached Chang'an.

Li Chengqian lay in a rocking chair, looking at the ridiculous joint statement.

Instead of getting angry, he laughed with satisfaction.

"Finally, someone who's blind to reason has stepped forward."

Li Chengqian casually tossed the statement into the nearby wastepaper basket.

He turned his head and looked at Xu Xiao, who was standing to the side, so bored he was practically rusting.

"Old Xu."

"Go tell the Ministry of War."

"It's time for those idle old geezers to go out and 'reason' with these savages."