After spending more than 100 years in Huaiyang, most of the Shanxi salt merchants lost their pioneering spirit in the border villages, and after they had amazing wealth, they began to indulge in exquisite personal life enjoyment.

From the thin horses in Yangzhou to the construction of gardens, all entertainment or art that can satisfy the enjoyment of the senses, with the huge investment of Huaiyang salt merchants, began to lead the extravagance of the entire Ming Dynasty.

But in addition to these personal pleasures, the salt merchants were most eager to change their political status.

From buying official positions with silver, to training the children of their families to study, or sponsoring poor literati, the salt merchants hoped to elevate their status in this way.

In fact, these salt merchants are still doing quite well, for example, Huizhou salt merchants have built a strong official and business network by subsidizing students in their hometowns, so that Huizhou salt merchants in Yangzhou gradually have a tendency to catch up.

As soon as the new emperor ascended the throne last year, he issued an edict to recruit businessmen from all provinces in the world to send representatives to Beijing to discuss tax matters, and Yangzhou Mansion set up five representative places.

Although the Huaiyang salt merchants were very eager to improve their status, they even did not hesitate to spend large sums of money on the literati and bureaucrats. But they were reluctant to pay taxes to the emperor.

In their view, spending money on the literati or bureaucrats always pays off. But handing over the money to the emperor, they don't think that there will be anything in return, maybe they will be taken by the eunuchs in the palace to see their net worth, and in the end it is the best ending to get a fortune and avoid disasters.

Therefore, when the Yangzhou government asked the Yangzhou salt merchants to elect three representatives to Beijing, the eight major salt merchants selected Zhang Jinquan and three others, who were not popular, as the representatives of the Yangzhou salt merchants.

Zhang Jinquan and others arrived in the capital in early February, but the merchant representatives from Yunnan, Guizhou, Sichuan and other places had not yet arrived, so they traveled around the capital.

Compared with Yangzhou, there are not many new things in the capital, and the Goolan Hutong in the capital has been rectified by Chongzhen, and most of the courtyards are closed.

The last Shanxi villager, who ran a pawn shop in the capital, said that he would bring a few people to meet the place where the princes lived and see the difference between the northern gardens and the Yangzhou gardens.

So Zhang Jinquan and others discovered the stock exchange, a new thing. In fact, his fellow townsman is just because the stock exchange is full of dignitaries, and he may be able to get acquainted with a few powerful people when he enters here.

And he can also be pretending to be a tiger, showing off his vast contacts in the capital in front of his fellow villagers from other places. Let these fellow villagers think highly of themselves, and by the way, raise the status of the pawn shop he opened.

However, Zhang Jinquan, who came with him, is obviously not the kind of country bun who is dull and timid. It had only been half a day since he entered the stock exchange, and he understood that if he wanted to enter here, he only had to deposit a certain amount of silver taels.

This certain silver tael is determined by one share at the lowest price on the exchange. What can be solved with money is obviously not a problem for Zhang Jinquan.

Although the Huaiyang salt merchants regarded them as substitutes for the dead ghosts and let them serve as the merchants' representatives, they also subsidized 10,000 taels per person as the cost of paying the emperor's taxes after entering Beijing.

Of course, Zhang Jinquan thought that 10,000 taels might not solve the problem, so he brought another 20,000 taels himself. It is obviously not very convenient to take 30,000 taels and put them in the Shanshan Guild Hall.

Zhang Jinquan originally planned to deposit into the pawnshop of this fellow villager, but after entering the stock exchange, he immediately changed his mind.

Wang Xianwen and Wang Xiansheng, two brothers, brought more than 30,000 taels to the capital, they have always followed Zhang Jinquan, and when they saw Zhang Jinquan acting like this, they also followed the cat.

In the next few days, Zhang Jinquan came to the exchange every day to play, and when he felt that he almost knew what this stock was, he simply bought the shares of Xishan Glass Factory and persuaded the Wang brothers to act together.

So in just three days, they collected 290 shares and spent 32,000 taels. But the stock price was also pulled to 170 taels.

Under the persuasion of the Wang brothers, Zhang Jinquan was finally ready to get up and leave. He wanted to buy the Xishan Glass Factory, mainly because of the glass products sold in the Four Seas Commercial Bank.

In the past, glass products were Western products from overseas. There is often a price in the market but not a stock. However, the glass products sold in the Sihai Commercial Bank are not only more transparent, but also more in line with the aesthetic concept of the Ming people, and the price is extremely low.

Zhang Jinquan thought that if he could buy this glass factory and move back to Yangzhou, he would be able to make more exquisite glassware, and he would definitely be able to make a lot of money with the nature of the wealthy businessmen in the south of the Yangtze River.

But as the acquisition of glass factory shares continued to deepen, Zhang Jinquan found that he liked this kind of game of making rules with money.

However, when he raised the price to 170 taels per share, no one sold the shares of the glass factory in his hand, which made him feel that there was no benefit in raising the price further, so he decided to follow the persuasion of the Wang brothers and end today's stock acquisition.

But as soon as they got up, a man in eunuch costume hurried into the hall, and after he whispered a few words to a trader, the price of the glass factory's stock began to rise.

Taininghou finally couldn't help but stand up and shouted at the trader: "What the hell are you guys doing, how can the stock price of the glass factory rise all the way to 200 taels?" ”

Xu Yingyuan glanced back at Tai Ninghou, and said slowly: "As long as you have a stock to sell, naturally you don't have to worry about no one accepting it..."

After Zhu Youzhen instructed Wang Chengen to send people to speculate on the stocks of the glass factory, he began to continue to complete the different metallographic patterns of pig iron and wrought iron.

After the sky darkened, Zhu Youzhen gave up continuing to observe the metallographic pattern. When he walked out of the room, he found Lu Qi guarding the door.

Zhu Youzhen looked at him and said with some surprise: "What are you doing standing here, is there something to tell me?" ”

Lu Qi immediately lowered his head and said: "These days, the Donglin Party people have been contacting the Yanguan everywhere, trying to use the case of Yangwuhou to drag Xue Zhen, the secretary of the Criminal Department, off the horse. ”

Zhu Youzhen was silent for a while, and then said calmly: "Look at the people they contact, if they can suppress it, they will suppress it, and if they can't suppress it, let the officials arrange them to go out of Beijing and send them farther..."

In the martial arts school, which was renamed the Army Military Academy, Zhu Youzhen inspected the Army Military Academy for the first time.

Looking at the rather cramped interior of martial arts compared to Guozijian, Zhu Youzhen also felt a little emotional.

Since the emperor personally wrote the questions for today's exam and was present to watch the examination situation, the students of the Army Military Academy were in high spirits.

They originally thought that after the emperor inspected the school, he would go to the small school in the city to take the real exam.

However, what these students didn't expect was that what the emperor ordered to take out was actually stacks of test papers, which made most of the students a little dumbfounded.

Although the martial arts school was changed to the army officer school, it basically carried out cultural education and learning to use some novel instruments.

But for these mostly illiterate middle and lower-ranking officers, it was harder to sit in their rooms and learn about culture than for them to shoot arrows on horses all day.

They didn't understand how learning literacy and mathematics would help them in warfare, but that topographic surveying was barely relevant to operational command.

They have been able to endure until now, mainly because the principal of the Army Military Academy is the highly respected imperial teacher Sun Chengzong, so they dare not oppose this teaching method.

But today, these students finally can't bear it anymore, they think that as a military attaché, it is really unfair to test these useless words and kung fu instead of riding and archery and foot combat.

Zhu Youzhen sat on the throne placed on the steps of the lobby, and the courtyard with little martial arts was full of students, and even the wings on both sides were also full.

Zhu Youzhen whispered a few words to Lu Shanji beside him, only to learn that the cadets of the Army Military Academy had expanded to more than 900 people. Among them, more than half of the military attaches of Jingying and Jinyiwei were followed, followed by Wuju near Gyeonggi, and then some officers recalled from Jizhou and Liaodong.

When Zhu Youzhen was chatting with Sun Chengzong, the students who got the exam papers below finally felt that this was really ridiculous after reading the test papers.

One of the cadets finally couldn't help but stand up and asked to express his opinion to the emperor. Zhu Youzhen nodded at the military academy instructor who was invigilating the exam, expressing his willingness to listen to what the cadet wanted to say.

“… As a martial artist, he relied on strong bows and arrows and skilled martial arts to fight on the battlefield, how could such writing and calculating writing skills be able to defend against the enemy for His Majesty? Please also ask Your Majesty to test our martial arts with bow and horse kung fu, this is the ability to go into battle and kill the enemy. ”

Although this student was a little bold, Zhu Youzhen did not show an angry look on his face, and he asked interestingly, "What's your name?" ”

"The minister is Baoding Wuju Fang Yucheng." The student said respectfully.

A name that he had never heard of, Zhu Youzhen thought in his mind. He continued to ask the cadet, "What do you think is the most important duty as an officer?" ”

Fang Yucheng's mind was not slow, and he immediately replied: "Loyal to Your Majesty, bravely kill the enemy on the battlefield." ”

Zhu Youzhen shook his head and said, "What you said is good, but I want to ask you." If the Houjin army now detours to Xifengkou and attacks Zunhua City. I ordered you to take 3,000 men to relieve the siege, how long will it take you to reach Zunhua? How much rations to carry? Where do you think the enemy will intercept you? ”

Fang Yucheng was dumbfounded for a while before replying, "The minister will order the sergeants to march in a hurry, and strive to arrive within 5 days, carrying 10 days of dry food." The minister thought that from Zunhua to Beijing, the terrain of Jimen was the most dangerous, and the enemy army might intercept our army here..."