Chapter Forty-Nine Enough Despair

  Brother Ren is indeed, a true man does not show his appearance! Since Brother Ren has extraordinary talent, Han Mouren has a couplet, can Brother Ren come up with the next couplet for Han Mouren? The unyielding Han Mouren makes another plan and struggles to the end.

  Before Zhou Yu could answer, Han Mouren burst out singing loudly;

  The upper hook is old, the lower hook is a test, the old test gives birth to youth, and the youth tests until old.

  Zhou Yu smiled slightly, these topics are almost omnipresent on the internet in later generations, every netizen knows them, it's simply too easy.

  One person is great, two people are heaven, heavenly feelings and human feelings surpass heaven.

  Han didn't expect Zhou Yu to be so difficult to deal with. After some careful thought, he suddenly had an idea and exclaimed:

  The zither is tuned with new strings, and the sound is wonderful.

  Zhou Yu immediately replied:

  Planting flowers and plants is good, planting all kinds of flowers and plants makes a fragrant garden.

  At this time, Mr. Han was already sweating profusely and in a hurry, but no matter how hard he tried, he couldn't think of any good couplets.

  Look at Zhou Yu, hey Jiang Lang's talent is exhausted! Then I'll make a quick battle, I'll shoot to see you off!

  Then Zhou Yu smiled and said: Coming but not going is also impolite! I have a couplet, I hope Brother Han will instruct me.

  One two three four five six seven (meaning to scold someone as being without eight 'turtle egg')

  Han Mouren pondered for half a day but couldn't get the gist, he had never seen anything like it before, all were numerical couplets, so he could only cup his hands in respect. Brother Zhou was highly talented, Han Mouren admired him, wondering if sir had a next verse to come down.

  Zhou Yu smiled and said:

  Filial piety, brotherly love, loyalty, sincerity, propriety, righteousness and integrity (implying that a certain Mr. Han is shameless)

  After realizing the truth, Han Mou was laughed at by two beauties and fled in a hurry. He hated Zhou Yu to the bone and vowed to get revenge for today's humiliation.

  Scolded away the annoying fly, Han Mouren. Zhou Yu smiled at the two beauties and said: "Alright, now we can finally do what we like to do. It's already winter now, it's quite cold outside, you should head back earlier!"

  Big Brother Zhou, Mei'er has troubled you. The man just now is the nephew of the Shanghai Dao Tai, narrow-minded, big brother be careful! Hu Mei bowed to Zhou Yufu with a worried expression and said to Zhou Yu.

  No big deal, just a clown jumping around, but it can bring us some fun! As he spoke, Zhou Yu seemed to have thought of something and a faintly evil smile hung on the corner of his mouth.

  Haha! That young man, when Mr. Zhou wasn't around, was incredibly arrogant, boasting that he was a French-educated genius, and even claiming to be a jinshi in the Qing dynasty, as if he were some kind of unparalleled talent in China. But once Mr. Zhou arrived, his true nature was revealed.

  Look at him, he's got a look of excessive drinking and womanizing, what a talent! Stupid talent is just about right! Zhuer was excitedly discussing loudly, as if she had won a big victory.

  Zhu'er, don't talk nonsense in front of Big Brother Zhou. Hu Mei saw Zhu'er's joyful expression and was afraid she would say something inappropriate, so she hastily stopped her.

  Oh! Zhu'er pouted and responded with a nod. However, when she turned her head around, she still made a face at Zhou Yu.

  Zhou Yu smiled secretly, in the days at the Hu manor, Zhu'er was indeed his delight. She made Zhou Yu have a relaxed mood during his leisure time, no longer like an old man who thinks too much all day.

  Then they talked about the interesting things that had just happened, and Zhou Yu ordered Mei'er and the others to return to their rooms. Although she had been recuperating for these days, Hu Mei's body still hadn't fully recovered. Zhou Yu was afraid that if they stayed too long, Mei'er wouldn't be able to handle it, so despite the faint warmth between them, he sent Mei'er and the others away from the garden.

  On the way back, Hu Xueyan, who had been quiet for a long time, hurriedly caught up and said, "Principal, please wait a minute."

  Zhou Yu stopped by the side of the road and waited until Hu Xueyan ran up to him, panting, before curiously asking him:

  Mr. Hu, why are you in such a hurry? Is anything wrong?

  Hu Xueyan adjusted his breath slightly, stretched out his hand and handed over a newspaper, "Hey! Take a look at the 'Extra' yourself!"

  Zhou Yu took a look and found that it was the "Shen Bao" newspaper sending reporters to Vietnam and France for interviews, and continuously publishing a series of reports on the loyal and brave army's battles against the French military.

  Reports say that due to the defeat of the French expeditionary army, the Jules Ferry cabinet in France collapsed. After the new cabinet took office in France, it claimed to have sent out the imperial anger and has now completed the deployment of troops and generals, dispatching young Admiral Courbet to lead the second French expeditionary force to gather at Haiphong, Vietnam.

  The spokesperson of Zhongyong Army, Liu Chengliang also claimed that the Zhongyong Army is ready to give a head-on blow to the French invading army.

  Zhou Yu smiled slightly; I already know about this situation, it's nothing to worry about. According to what I know, the French army has dispatched a total of over 200,000 troops, thirty or so advanced hybrid warships, and more than ten troop ships. Their ultimate goal is not Vietnam, but Taiwan and the coastal areas of Fujian.

  We've been ready for this a long time ago, and this time will give our loyal and brave army a big surprise hehe!

  As for the battle against the French army, the Ministry of War's Liu Yongfu and others will take care of it. Since you're here, Mr. Hu, let's go to my residence and discuss the revision of Shen Bao.

  We have been receiving Shun Pao for some time now. I have an immature idea, and I want to change the style and operation method of Shun Pao.

  Hu Xueyan listened and estimated that Zhou Yu had another good idea, so he went there gladly.

  Two people came to Zhou Yu's residence, and Zhou Yu took out the specific operational plan for "Shenbao" that he had just planned out in the past two days.

  Zhou Yu explained his plan one by one to Hu Xueyan.

  In the past, Shen Bao was mainly written in traditional Chinese characters, with a serious tone and fewer pages, lacking entertainment and interactivity.

  Now I've changed it to a positive and negative printing method, with both positive and negative versions available. The main version is in traditional Chinese characters with images, while the supplementary version is in simplified Chinese characters with images.

  I also plan to add some interesting interactive features and set aside a separate section for current events and news.

  On the basis of the original, increase reader contributions and interactions, encourage everyone to participate, or provide topics, implement a reward system, for readers who provide topics or questions, once verified and published, immediately send out bonuses.

  The former Shun Pao was 7 cents a copy, now the price remains unchanged, and measures such as giving away annual newspapers and gifts will be implemented.

  The layout also adopted color printing and opened a special advertising column, implementing paid reporting.

  Zhou Yu then explained the operation method and approach of the newspaper from later generations, using a way suitable for the current era, to Hu Xueyan in detail.

  These advanced methods made Hu Xueyan feel refreshed, but at the same time he was also worried about sales and cost accounting.

  Hu Xueyan said with some concern: Your plan is good, but I'm afraid it's too radical. At that time, even the cost recovery may be a problem!

  Hehe, don't worry too much about this. I didn't start the newspaper to make money in the first place. If it were for making money, I could easily come up with a project that would be a goldmine.

  The ultimate purpose of running a newspaper is to enable the ordinary people of China to dare to speak out and take action, to effectively supervise and promote government work, rather than for profit.

  Then I can rest assured, otherwise, you handed over the Shun Pao to me, and I let it lose money every day, and my heart won't be at peace! Hu Xueyan breathed a sigh of relief and began to seriously study Zhou Yu's feasibility plan.

  If there are things you don't understand or can't comprehend, ask Zhou Yu immediately, and read them very carefully.

  By the time he understood everything, it was already getting dark. Hu Xueyan wanted to say something to Zhou Yu, but found it hard to start talking, and in the end, he didn't say anything.

  He was originally going to discuss the Hu Mei matter with Zhou Yu, but he couldn't bring himself to mention it. In today's society, which woman would take the initiative to propose to a man? That would be too humiliating!

  So, Hu Xueyan was really in a dilemma! Saying it wasn't right, but not saying it was even more wrong!

  Zhou Yu also discovered that Hu Xueyan was showing such a situation, but Zhou Yu was too deeply influenced by later generations. For a 13-year-old girl, he really didn't have and didn't dare to have any pushing thoughts. Moreover, the knot in his heart had not been untied yet!

  So Zhou Yu changed the subject to avoid awkwardness between the two of them.

  Mr. Hu, the specific operation of the newspaper, please follow the way we discussed earlier. The employees in the newspaper office should also adopt a salary and performance, sales, popularity linkage, to let everyone go out to gather news, don't stay in the office all day.

  Once they personally get in touch with the grassroots, know what ordinary people need and want to express, they will start from their hearts to cheer for ordinary people and speak out for social injustice.

  This is the newspaper I want, these are the staff I want. Once we overthrow the Qing government and establish our own regime, when the territory is larger and there are more people, all sorts of problems can arise.

  Only when there are some brave and outspoken Chinese people among the folk, can those social ugliness be suppressed as much as possible, and the government's behavior can become more standardized and reasonable, playing a supervisory and promoting role.

  When journalists mobilize people's power, they are powerful and we have another pair of eyes and ears.

  Now our Shun Pao is in the Shanghai concession, what the newspaper says about social ills, those officials of the Qing government have no way with us. Once everyone gets used to telling the truth and makes it an unwritten rule for our Chinese journalism, then my goal will be achieved.

  News reports are a sacred place in people's hearts, they can attract the vast number of Chinese cultural people to speak the truth, and at the same time, they also bring along the ordinary people to speak the truth, so the government must say the truth and do practical things. These are far more powerful than the supervision organs' inspections, because the ordinary people are sharp-eyed and omnipresent, who is truly good to them, they have a clear number in their hearts.

  Hu Xueyan did not expect that Zhou Yu would see so many things from the reform of newspapers, thinking more deeply and for a longer time. Public opinion supervision is simply a sword of Damocles hanging over the heads of government officials!

  Sometimes Hu Xueyan really wanted to crack open Zhou Yu's brain and take a look at what it was made of, how he knew so many extraordinary things.

  No matter whether it's economy, military affairs, science or politics, Zhou Yu has insights and actions that far exceed Hu Xueyan's expectations.

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