Chapter 1 An Interesting New Year

The New Year this year was especially interesting. Ye Tao, Ye Lao Geng, and even several of Ye Tao's senior brothers were invited to the royal palace as guests, to have dinner with the Dongping royal family. Usually, even though Ye Tao was already a駙馬 (Fu Ma, imperial son-in-law), there was no such rule. But Tan Xiaopei decided to treat the Ye family in this ordinary way, on the one hand, to fully show his emphasis on Ye Tao, and on the other hand, to show Tan Xiaopei's characteristics as a humble, generous, and informal monarch.

As for the Grand Canal Governor-General's office, Ye Tao was not worried about what happened in Sufeng Town. Although Tan Weixin was still immersed in the mood that her currency reform plan had been rejected and was unwilling to deal with too many messy things, it did not prevent her from wanting to help Ye Tao do his job well. Under Tan Weixin's instructions, Zeng Man sent his most capable group of subordinates to Sufeng Town to investigate the situation. After obtaining Tan Xiaopei's consent, Zeng Man also retrieved a large amount of data that had been stored in the Inner Court archives, which he could no longer fully access, and selected a considerable part of it for Ye Tao's reference.

The situation was not complicated. Although the Grand Canal construction plan might bring a lot of benefits, the cost for the local and intricate local forces was also obvious. Sufeng Town was not originally a large town, and the expansion plan alone would occupy a large area of the surrounding land.

The land involved in the construction of the Grand Canal was even more. Unlike the situation of relocating residents when building a new urban area in Danyang, in Danyang, since the new urban area had already been approved by the monarch, even if some people suffered some losses in the entire plan, they would not dare to act strangely. But in the local area, even if this place was not very far from Danyang, the situation was completely different. Some local families relied on the land in their hands to survive and develop, and they also hoped to maintain this situation with these lands. Although enlightened people in various families could see the future benefits of the Grand Canal, not everyone could understand how much capital and material flow the Grand Canal could drive, and how many business opportunities it could integrate. Faced with change, some people will always selectively ignore some opportunities and benefits to avoid entering a field they have never been familiar with, just like in any era.

And some people, although they saw such opportunities, still felt unsatisfied and were trying to gain more bargaining chips for themselves to gain more benefits. A large part of the total budget for the construction of the Grand Canal was allocated to the purchase of land involved and the relocation of people, which accounted for almost half of the total budget. This was also determined by the special circumstances now. After all, most of the land is now privately owned, and the excavation of the Grand Canal this time is concentrated in the relatively rich plain area. If the Grand Canal is forcibly built without compensating the landowners, there will be a relatively large backlash. The use of manpower and material resources in the excavation of the Grand Canal, on the other hand, does not take up much cost. After all, there is still the national corvée system, which can centrally conscript laborers. All that needs to be borne is the daily consumption of food, drinking water, accommodation, and medicines, as well as the compensation to be given if a laborer dies on the construction site.

In this case, a person named Shan Zeyi emerged out of nowhere. Shan Zeyi was the head of the Shan family, the third largest landlord in Sufeng Town. From the beginning when he received the news that the Grand Canal was going to be built, he began to collect land in relevant areas by various means. When Shi Xiu led a large number of Ministry of Works officials and a group of Xue Qilin (Blood Qilin) Army officers who were proficient in map surveying to conduct a detailed survey, some of Shan Zeyi's subordinates took the opportunity to ask the more detailed route of the Grand Canal from the mouths of those simple-minded technicians, and then compared it with the land they had already mastered, and greatly gathered a batch of land in key locations. Of course, Ye Tao was also responsible for this. Due to being entangled in various affairs, he was dragged to Danyang for too long, giving Shan Zeyi enough time to operate. When Shan Zeyi believed that the land he had in his hands had enough influence on the Grand Canal project, he captured the mentality of some local landlords who would rather hold land than try greater business opportunities, gathered them together, and incited everyone to passively resist under various names. In this way, according to the existing Grand Canal excavation plan, almost half the length of the Grand Canal was related to the land in Shan Zeyi's hands or the local forces he represented. Whether Shan Zeyi was willing to let go currently seemed to be the key to whether the Grand Canal could be started quickly.

Learning of this situation, Ye Tao was also a little annoyed. If he had taken office and started work immediately after receiving the appointment of Grand Canal Governor-General, he might not have given so many people the opportunity to brew opposition emotions, let alone allow Shan Zeyi to master so many key locations of land for blackmail.

"Father wants me to tell you that he has already given you enough face to let you know what's going on. He will no longer help within the scope of the Grand Canal Governor-General's authority. You have to rely on yourself." When Ye Tao was frowning and thinking about how to break the situation, Tan Weixin sent another bad news.

"... This... why? I should be considered family, right? Is your father still angry with me?" Ye Tao said dejectedly. He had never really experienced this kind of situation. After all, he used to be just a technical white-collar worker.

In the not-cold weather of Danyang, Tan Weixin was still a little overwhelmed. Her heart pulse was really too weak. Probably in winter, more energy had to be used to maintain body temperature, and she seemed particularly weak. However, no matter how weak she was, she could not stop Tan Weixin's mind from working. She chuckled and said, "Because Father has studied it and thinks that although it is tricky, the key to handling this matter well is still in your own hands. He doesn't think it's necessary to say anything or do anything before you completely screw it up."

Ye Tao thought for a while and asked, "Are you sure it's all within my authority?"

Tan Weixin said, "This... I don't know. I haven't studied your Governor-General's authority too much. But since Father said so, and it seems that Lord Huang doesn't think it's too much of a problem, it should be like this." Tan Weixin comforted him, "This is probably to conduct an important performance appraisal on you."

"Performance appraisal?" Ye Tao was stunned. If becoming the Governor-General was just his performance appraisal, what would it be in the future? Did they really expect someone like him to become the宰辅 (Zai Fu, prime minister) of a country? Judging from the level of this Grand Canal Governor-General, there was not much room for promotion.

Ye Tao's vigilance and rejection were within Tan Weixin's expectations: "駙馬 (Fu Ma, imperial son-in-law), our country has never had regulations restricting in-laws from becoming officials. Even if there are, they are just to comply with the worries of some censors and historiographers. On the contrary, family members are more trustworthy, at least, judging from Father's character and his evaluation of you, that's the case."

"But..." Ye Tao couldn't think of anything to refute. He knew that Tan Xiaopei still had some subtle rejection of him in his heart, but this rejection had nothing to do with official affairs or his ability. It was just a simple emotion of a father who was jealous that his dearest daughter was taken away by another man. From this point of view, Tan Xiaopei was quite cute. "Dear 駙馬 (Fu Ma, imperial son-in-law)'s future wife, working for your father is not very exciting."

Tan Weixin chuckled, a little indifferent. She turned the topic back to the tricky things in Sufeng Town and said, "To solve this problem, it shouldn't be difficult. You just don't understand what being an official is all about, or rather, you don't understand how interesting power is. You're not a white-collar worker anymore. Among those people, apart from Shan Zeyi and a few others who are more congenial to him, most people are not thinking about gaining anything from the excavation of the Grand Canal, but are worried about losing something. Although it is generally more difficult to deal with local tycoons than with business groups because they are simpler and more stubborn, they are not monolithic after all. How can you forget the fine traditions of our party and our army in united front work?"

Ye Tao immediately understood that what Tan Weixin said should be something like "unite... strive for... strike..." and nodded. The specific operation would have to wait until he arrived in Sufeng Town and officially started working.

Without delaying much in Danyang, as soon as the New Year was over, Ye Tao led all the officials who had returned to Danyang for the New Year, officially transferred to the three thousand Imperial Guards under the jurisdiction of the Grand Canal Governor-General's office, five thousand city defense troops drawn from various places, accompanied by two thousand Xue Qilin (Blood Qilin) Army new recruits of this year who were temporarily under his command for the first batch of internships, and came to Sufeng Town in a mighty manner.

In Sufeng Town, the Governor-General's office was already quite large. Adhering to Ye Tao's principle of combining large offices and cubicles, the most important departments already had relatively qualified office space, and the original Xiaoling River Waterways Office was more lively than ever before. Although the Governor-General's residence, according to Ye Tao's intention, chose a small and low-key residence very close to the Governor-General's office, the dense courtyard and the very reasonably matched flowers, plants, and trees in the garden still made Ye Tao very satisfied.

After Ye Tao settled down, Vice Governor Shi Xiu came to visit. The honest official's face was a little unsightly, and he said apologetically, "I originally thought that excavating the Grand Canal was a great thing that would benefit the country and the people, and everyone would definitely support it wholeheartedly. I didn't expect, I didn't expect..."

Ye Tao did not blame Shi Xiu for being naive. Before encountering such a thing, he himself didn't think that this Grand Canal Governor was just commanding laborers and craftsmen to build the Grand Canal and supporting cities? He was probably more naive.

Although he had not yet decided how to deal with it, Ye Tao still calmly comforted Shi Xiu and said, "It doesn't matter. Let's carefully understand the situation. There is always a way to solve it."

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I got up early in the morning and started writing. I saw that I was sixth, I was moved. It turns out that there are still so many people supporting me. I won't say much to thank you. Today, I will definitely update four chapters!