Chapter 56: The Pitiful Teacher (Part 1)

  Zhao Kuangyi was half joking and half serious. The Song Dynasty had many problems, mainly two: one was to end the frequent wars of the Five Dynasties, and the other was to unify the Central Plains, including Hedong, Sichuan, Jiangzhe, Fujian, Jiangxi, and Lingnan. Song Ji once said a sentence that made the Zhao brothers appreciate very much: after a long period of chaos, people yearn for peace, and the trend of unification is inevitable, but when it comes to details, it's really troublesome. For example, the barbarians in Hunan were not easy to deal with.

  Song Jiuxu wrote several strategies in a letter to Pan Meishi, including teaching farming and weaving, opening roads, promoting education, advocating for imperial culture, emphasizing commerce, and clearing wasteland. However, advocating for imperial culture is empty talk, and clearing wasteland is not clearly explained by Song Jiuxu. He also didn't mention the inherent human fear of this thing. Promoting education is also difficult to implement, as teaching familiar questions is not a big problem, but those uncivilized households are beyond the control of the court. Which teacher would be willing to go to those areas to teach? Moreover, Lv Yucei was from Hunan and had some understanding of local conditions, so he did a good job. After reading the several strategies, he only chose one: teaching farming and weaving. As for opening roads, it's still very difficult, even with gunpowder. Those mountains are too big, and the court's treasury doesn't have enough money to make all villages and towns accessible by major roads.

  It's actually a great progress to have farming and weaving, but how do people farm in the west of Xiang River? They use knives to clear the land and set fires to burn the mountains, then scatter seeds without any management, relying on heaven for harvest. People are at ease, but what kind of harvest can they get from that? Even going south, many places have men not working, staying at home taking care of children, cooking, chatting, while all farming and weaving work is done by women. Don't even mention how hard it is for women, in such primitive farming conditions, what strength do women have?

  Lü Yuqing wrote a letter, combined with Song Jiuer's letter, and sent it to the south. In southern Hunan, there were three tiger generals. The first was Ding Deyu, not because Ding Deyu's ability surpassed Pan Mei's, but because he had served as Murong Yan's deputy commander during the campaign against Jingnan and Hunan, where he had made military achievements, and unlike Li Chuyu, he was not brutal.

  Three people in the south are doing quite well at the moment.

  The imperial court formally combined the two memorials, one was Song's immature idea, and also a pleasant surprise. After all, he was just a commoner who had never been out of his hometown before, so it was already quite good that he could come up with such an idea, and he was a talented person! Also, there were some suggestions from Lü Yuqing, but Lü Yuqing wasn't very clear about the southern barbarian tribes either. The main thing was to let the three generals refer to them.

  It's easy to say but hard to do. Just a change in daily routine can create conflicts, which is a direct change in lifestyle, how easy it is!

  This is the point, secondly, the general trend must be that the people of China hope for national unity and no more war, but in the process of unification, fighting is inevitable, and when there is a fight, people will die. The people who have not lost their loved ones are thinking about it, and what do the people who have lost their loved ones think? The ones with the most deaths are the people of Northern Han!

  An old woman brought two orphans from Bei Han to the capital of Song Dynasty, and put them in the Song family. Maybe this can let Zhao Kuangyi see more things, it's also an experiment. Zhao Kuangyi won't make trouble for no reason.

  Time flies.

  The common people were in an uproar, but as Zhao Kuangyi used various methods to persuade them, most of the tombs were moved. A small number of families saw that the situation was already hopeless and gradually stopped making a fuss. After all, it was just a river island, with over 1,000 tombs, and no more than 1,000 tombs had owners. The difficulty of relocating them could not be compared to that of Chai Rong's tomb relocation in the past. The officials also made their selection: six technical officials, nine minor officials, and five artisans. The number of artisans was small because there were few literate people, and they were afraid that they would not be able to grasp it. In total, there were twenty people, not ten as Song Jiuxi had said.

  Zhao Kuangyi sent a yeshi to inform Song Jiu, who said that it didn't matter whether there were twenty or ten people, but the number couldn't be less than ten, as that would be too few, nor could it exceed forty or fifty, as that would be too many. Upon hearing this, he immediately agreed and was ready to transmit at any time. He only mentioned that the transmission location had to be in that new house, first for secrecy, and second because there were some tools inside that could be used for demonstration.

  It doesn't matter where the imperial court is located, set a date, hurry up, don't bother with auspicious days like Huang Dao Jiri, let Song Jiuxu prepare, and conduct the transmission three days later.

  Song Jiubing didn't care, if it was the yellow gunpowder that could be carefully considered, or the cannon technology could also be taken seriously. Such technologies that benefit people's livelihoods, as long as they are given time, manpower, and funding, can't produce too much. But the monarch and his ministers wouldn't think this way.

  Those who didn't know would feel a sense of crisis, thinking that these city walls aren't very useful, can't they just stay inside and not worry? Those who knew couldn't underestimate it either, like mining, once it's fully promoted, without one million jin of iron, various mines could increase production by several hundred million jin per year. Excluding gold, including copper, iron, tin, lead, etc., all could be massively increased.

  The Song Dynasty lacked everything: talent, soldiers, people themselves, wealth, and minerals. Minerals were equally important.

  Zhao brothers, Zhao Pu, Lü Yuqing, Xue Juzheng, Wang Renxiang, Li Chongju and others came to the Hezhou River again, arriving at that strange house. Originally, if they saw this house, one by one would feel amused, now not thinking it's amusing, but rather arranged like this.

  Twenty-one students stood at the gate, preparing to welcome the officials and artisans sent by the imperial court to study. Seeing this array, one by one they did not know what to do.

  "Don't be alarmed," Zhao Kuangyin comforted them. "I have brought all of you here just to take a look."

  "Ah." Twenty-one students led the crowd in, but didn't see Song Jiu. Zhao Kuangyin wasn't surprised, thinking that Song Jiu was inside preparing. The preparation classroom was right in front of the main hall of the house, with twenty desks and chairs. These big shots came, and the real learners were not dare to sit, while those who sat were not learning. Of course, no one dared to point this out.

  Zhao Kuangyin sat down with some of his senior officials, but not all of them; many officials wearing purple and red robes could only stand.

  The students were ready to teach, but looking at these big shots wearing yellow, purple and red robes, the twenty-one students were scared pale. Wang Renzi said impatiently: "Teach quickly."

  "Yes," Li Zhu carefully and tremblingly walked up to the podium with shaking legs.

  "What brings you here, Song Jiu?"

  "Mr. Jiu said that the principle is complex, and it's impossible to make all listeners understand it completely. He can only teach some general principles, guaranteeing that they can manufacture and use it, which isn't too difficult after all," Li Zhu stammered and stuttered as he barely finished repeating Song Jiu's original words.

  "It's incredible..." Zhao Pu exclaimed excitedly as he stood up.

  Zhao Kuangyin pulled Zhao Pu down, and was also annoyed. This little rascal just thought about the impression of Song De in his mind, and this father-son pair looked very similar. Song De was also bold and reckless. In the Battle of Gaoping, after the battle, Chai Rong was not happy, but angry, resentful of Fan Ai's weakness, and others. Otherwise, he would have let him take risks. To maintain military discipline, he beheaded more than 70 generals, including Fan and He, as a warning to all. Later, when it came to rewarding the soldiers for their achievements, it was not like what is now being spread by the court, that his own merits were first. The real number one contributor was Chai Rong himself, but he was the emperor, so there was no need to reward him. He awarded Zhang Yong as the first, and Liu Ci, who arrived in time, as the second. Zhao Kuangyin was only ranked fifth or sixth. Song De, this little rascal, was not convinced. Wasn't it just a matter of saying one sentence? He had beheaded more than 30 people, how could he not surpass this kid? And yet, when it came to evaluating merits, Zhao Kuangyin was ranked lower. This battle may have been won, but the fifty imperial guards fought hard, and only twenty or so guards survived, all of them wounded, like a bloody man. Zhao Kuangyin would not argue with him about this. But let this old fellow be stimulated a bit, when attacking Taiyuan City, he was hit by an arrow and still fought desperately, but Chai Rong stopped him and praised him, placing some capable generals in his Imperial Guard, such as Luo Yanhuan, Guo Yanbin, Tian Zhongjin, Pan Mei, Mi Xin, Zhang Qiong, Wang Yansheng, etc. It is not known whether this old fellow almost harmed him or helped him.

  Like father, like son.

  He whispered a few words in Zhao Pu's ear.