Chapter 67: A Melon on a Single Vine

  "Second Master, are our tenant farmers' houses going to be rebuilt slowly?" After finishing speaking, Zheng Lu hesitated and didn't leave, humming for a long time before saying.

  "Why wasn't this settled long ago?" Zhao asked in puzzlement.

  "Second Master, it's a settled matter, but this time you've built a wine workshop and expanded the craftsman's workshop again, and brought in so many people. The expenses are huge, and we can only divert some of the money from the house construction funds. Moreover, the craftsman's workshop still needs to buy materials and add tools, all of which require a lot of money!" Zheng Lu said in a low voice.

  "Oh, I see," said Zhao Che, "how much money is left in our household account?"

  "Last year, the prefecture had a surplus of over 190,000 yuan. Just the labor costs for building dikes and roads, plus bonuses, food expenses, and land compensation, added up to nearly 80,000 yuan, which is less than half of the surplus. Purchasing tools and stone materials cost another 50,000 yuan; the wine workshop invested over 20,000 yuan in two installments. Rebuilding the craft workshop required relocating and building new houses, which used up over 20,000 yuan. After summer harvesting and planting, we need to prepare for road construction, repairing two bridges, which will also incur significant expenses, estimated at around 50,000 yuan. The current funds are not enough to cover these items, not to mention the prefecture's other expenditures!" Zheng Lu counted on his fingers as he calculated the accounts for Prince Wang.

  "Hmm!" Zhao Yan nodded in agreement. The New Year's welfare and bonuses were decided by himself, without consulting them, but the expenses were still accounted for in the government's books. Now that the new wine had just been launched, the workshop was still under construction, although it would definitely make money, but it would have to wait until the end of the year, and the workshop might take even longer. The investment in land would also take a longer cycle to recover costs and generate returns, all of which were far from quenching their current thirst.

  "Zheng Lu, calculate it for me, how much more money will be needed if all of them start working!" Zhao Ye asked after a moment's thought.

  "Second Master, I've calculated it. The cost of building one room is three taels of silver, and for a household with three rooms, it would be nine taels of silver. According to your plan, we are going to build four villages, each with five hundred households. Adding the costs of road construction, well-digging, and tree-planting, we will need at least 30,000 taels of silver. The expenses for the prefecture would be at least another 30,000 taels!" Zheng Lu replied.

  "Alright, I've allocated 150,000 guan from the inner treasury for you to hand over to the chief manager. There's one more thing you must do well!" Zhao Zhe let Xian Xi take out a map from a bag and drew a circle on it, saying: "This five-hectare land by the river should not be rented out again, but set aside separately as our workshop site. Also, expand the simple dock along the Bian River to allow for mooring of thousand-stone ships. Is this amount of money enough?"

  "Enough, enough!" Zheng Lu hurriedly said with a smile. The master is afraid of not having money to spend, now the king has given 150,000 yuan at once, and it's easy to handle things.

  "Your Highness, we won't have any money left in the inner court!" Jian Xi said with a sorrowful face, "The prince's money comes quickly, but it also goes just as fast!"

  "You don't understand anything! Money is just a dead object when it's placed somewhere, it needs to be circulated to make more money. How can you be even more greedy than me?!" Zhao Ze kicked him and said.

  "Heh heh, Second Master, there are too many things going on in your household now. I really can't take care of the workshop side of things, should we let Zheng Fu temporarily lend a hand?" Zheng Lu asked nervously, still unsure if Wang Ye's anger had dissipated.

  "Hmm, let him go then. Tell him to be meticulous and considerate in his work, or else it won't be just a matter of feeding horses next time!" Zhao Che said after a moment's thought. Zheng Fu had been transferred to the stables to feed horses for over a month since he was punished with a beating board. He had secretly observed him several times and found that Zheng Fu worked diligently without complaint, not becoming indolent just because he was removed from his position as head steward. This made Zhao Che quite impressed.

  "Little ones, Zheng Fu has thanked the second master!" Zheng Lu bowed to the bottom and expressed his gratitude. After all, he had been friends with Zheng Fu for many years, and their feelings were still deep. He didn't expect that Wang Ye not only readily agreed, but also became the new head of the store again.

  Zheng Lu finished speaking, and happily followed Jian Xi to get the money. Zhao Di stared blankly at a patch of white space on the map. He had originally planned to complete the basic construction this year and set up several workshops, but now it seemed that plan was going to fall through. Funding and talent had become the bottlenecks hindering his rapid development. If these two problems couldn't be solved properly, he feared that all his efforts would be in vain. For now, the most pressing problem was still funding - with money, he could attract talent. If he couldn't even provide enough food for people to eat their fill, and yet spoke of saving the country and its people under the guise of a "great situation", others would probably just think him mad, let alone be willing to risk their lives for him.

  Xiao Mei was also re-examining the child in front of her, she had been in the mansion for over a month now. Everyone from top to bottom said that although Wang Ye was young, he was bold and generous, good at treating his subordinates, and all sorts of praise. She thought they were just flattering Wang Ye and didn't quite believe it.

  Today they talked about the affairs of the mansion, and he didn't shy away from himself. He was really generous, to say the least. The 100,000 yuan he spent without batting an eye was for building houses for the tenants, not for his own enjoyment. Although Night Gate's business is killing people for money, they also claim to be chivalrous on the rivers and lakes, and have done things like robbing the rich to help the poor. However, at most it would only be a hundred or so yuan, and most of the money was still kept for their own food and drink expenses. Even his master brother might not have such great magnanimity, but he is still just a child.

  "Also thinking of your senior brother, tonight you can meet him, don't blame me for hiding him away!" Zhao Che put away the map, suddenly noticing that Xiao Mei was staring at herself in a daze, and smiled.

  "Who cares about him? I'm just worried about his injuries." Xiao Mei said with a glance at him.

  "Hehe, you said it wasn't, but your eyebrows are smiling!" Zhao Yan pointed at Xiao Mei's face and teased.

  "Nonsense! You little devil, you never say a true word!" Xiao Mei felt her face burning and turned away to say.

  "Heh heh, Mei sister, I want to ask you, now that everyone outside has withdrawn and your senior brother's injury has healed, why are you still staying here? Are you really thinking of selling yourself to repay the debt?" Zhao Yan shook her head, no longer joking with her.

  "Alas, you want to drive us away, but with two killers by your side, who would dare?" Xiao Mei sighed and said, her face also darkening.

  "You can stay here as long as you want, one of your night watchmen even stayed with me for half a year to be in charge. What's there to be afraid of? If he didn't try to kill me, he might have become the big boss by now." Zhao Chu picked up his fishing rod, hung the bait, and cast it into the water as he spoke.

  "What?! Our Night Gate people have assassinated you before, how come I don't know what he looks like?" Xiao Mei asked in surprise.

  He is about six feet tall, with a very pale complexion, his eyes are not big, but they have spirit. When he smiles, the left corner of his mouth slants downward. He is skilled at using a short knife.

  "No need to say more, he's one of our Night Gate people. I was wondering why we hadn't seen him for so long, and it turns out he's already died at your hands!" Xiao Mei said with a serious expression.

  "I'm telling you ahead of time, if he doesn't kill me, I won't kill him. Don't put the blame on me and shout for revenge on his behalf." Zhao saw that she had acknowledged it and quickly gave her a vitamin tablet to prevent a cold.

  "Xiao, you little rascal, you're really clever and won't take a loss. If someone is better than you and kills you, then so be it. We all have this awareness in our line of work. I won't bother you for his sake!" Xiao Mei said, rubbing Zhao Che's head twice, her movements seemingly affectionate, as if an older sister was scolding a younger brother who had spoken out of turn.

  "Mei sister, my sister, you're calling me that, but if you don't want to call me Er Ye, that's fine. But please stop calling me 'little ghost head' all the time, it damages the imperial family's image and honor!" Zhao said with a careless flick of his hair tie behind his head, speaking in a serious tone.

  "Ha ha", Xiao Mei burst out laughing in a very unladylike manner, and as she laughed, two lines of clear tears suddenly appeared on her face.

  "Mei sister, what's wrong?" Zhao asked in surprise, he didn't seem to have said anything wrong, how did he make her cry? He wondered if she was having a nervous breakdown. As he spoke, his butt shifted slightly to the side, but every cell in his body went into high alert.

  "You scared me, I just remembered some past events!" Xiao Mei was amused by Zhao Che's tense appearance, stretched out her hand to hold his shoulder, and let him lean on her body. "You don't know, we are all orphans, suffering from a young age. I was adopted by Ye Men at the age of five, every day except eating and sleeping was learning martial arts, practicing various killing skills. At the age of eight, my master took me to dig up a corpse in a new grave, then asked me to take it back alone. I was so scared that I almost died, but I still dragged the corpse back. The next day, however, I found out that several of my fellow disciples were gone, and it wasn't until I grew up that I knew they had been secretly executed for failing to complete their mission that night."

  "Ah! Your nightgown is really big!" Zhao Ye felt that Xiao Mei didn't have any malicious intentions, so she shifted her body to make herself more comfortable.

  "This was just the beginning, from that day on, Master arranged the corpse in various poses, disguising it as different people. I had to stab the corpse every day, and I had to stab at a vital spot, enough to kill someone. This continued until the corpse rotted and became smelly, with no place left to stab, only then would it stop. From that time on, I never smiled happily again!" Xiao Mei said with a bitter smile as she listened to herself speak.

  "When I was ten, I killed my first person, but I didn't feel any fear. Then I started to take on missions frequently, killing people according to the instructions, without anyone telling us whether they were good or bad, and I never asked. Until a few years later, I suddenly realized that among the fifty of us who entered together, only I and my senior brother were left, all the others had died. The cruel training had long turned us into emotionless people, but I still felt sad, maybe it was because of the saying 'when a rabbit dies, a fox grieves'."

  "No, it means you still have feelings, you are different from them!" Zhao Yan said.

  "It's possible, after a few more years, my senior brother achieved great success and the old master passed away, leaving him as the new master. I also became the right protector of the door, responsible for training new assassins. I tried to do it according to my teacher's method back then, but I couldn't. Just at this time, our door received a contract to assassinate Zhang Kangguo, which was a big deal. My senior brother and I took on this task personally, but we were ambushed!"

  "We can say that we're both bitter melons on the same vine. Although I'm a prince, my situation isn't much better than yours. One wrong step and it's eternal damnation!" Zhao Yi forced out a smile and said.