Chapter 15 The Inner Treasury Crisis

Ye Tao finally understood why the Crown Prince had come to Yicheng to urge Tan Weixin to return to the capital. It turned out that Tan Weixin, who controlled the internal treasury, had used economic means to vent her dissatisfaction.

Indeed, Tan Weixin was powerless to stop an extremely annoying fellow from marrying her father and becoming a queen; after all, it was a major event between the two countries, representing the close relationship between them. Although the choice of person wasn't great, they had to make do. But she could express her opinion on the matter.

The Chun Nan Kingdom was wealthy, even extravagant. When the envoys of the Chun Nan Kingdom confidently listed a large dowry, the Eastern Ping Kingdom's ruler needed to make a corresponding statement to show his importance to the matter. Accompanying Princess Bailian were various items and specialties, as well as hundreds of palace maids, female officials, and even opera troupes and dancers. The accompanying guard would stay in Dongping for a year before returning home. There were also scholars representing Chun Nan's flourishing civilization who would stay in Dongping for a year or several years. Although Dongping's artisans were the best in the world, Chun Nan sent some top artisans to show off, and to show that they weren't after Dongping's artisans, whether or not that was really the case was another matter.

To make this happen, the Eastern Ping Kingdom had to spend money to build palaces and guesthouses worthy of housing the people from Chun Nan. Moreover, this was a matter of face, and it had to fully display the style of the Eastern Ping Kingdom, so spending money was inevitable.

Although the Eastern Ping Kingdom's treasury was full, the financial surplus was still not enough to do so much construction. After discussion, it was finally decided that the national treasury and the internal treasury would each bear half the cost. Upon receiving this decision, Tan Weixin called in the officials of the Ministry of Revenue and the Ministry of Works to set a rough budget, and in the blink of an eye, she allocated all the funds in one go, so readily. It was as if she had no qualms about her previous suggestion to live within one's means and not be too extravagant being rejected. Just when the ruler felt that he was a little sorry for his daughter's hard work, Tan Weixin left everything behind and came to Yicheng. She handed over all the matters in her hands to the chief eunuch of the inner palace, Li Sishu. Originally, Eunuch Li thought that the large amount of silver left on the books was enough for the princess to rest for a while before coming back to deal with it. But various expenses followed one after another. Early summer was the time when the royal palace carried out its annual fire prevention measures and preparations for summer rainstorms, and it happened that some palace repairs and renovations were originally scheduled for this year.

One of the reasons Tan Weixin suggested not being too extravagant was that she really didn't have the money to be extravagant. As a result, the incoming requests for funds almost formed a run on the treasury. If Tan Weixin was there, even if she didn't have enough money, she would find ways to juggle things. She would handle the necessary expenses, cut unnecessary spending, or postpone some payments, knowing the priorities. But Eunuch Li was a very simple person. He paid each of the first few requests for funds one by one, and then when he realized something was wrong, he simply didn't pay anything and returned the whole mess to the ruler.

This caused a great outcry. Tan Wenpei excelled in military strategy and law, but knew almost nothing about economics, and the affairs of the internal treasury could not be entrusted to ministers. Handing the matter over to Queen Zhuo Xiu didn't seem to have much effect. Zhuo Xiu had only managed the internal treasury in the past by being cautious and minimizing expenses. Moreover, she was facing requests for detailed projects that had been heavily scrutinized twice by Tan Weixin in order to increase transparency and reduce the possibility of corruption. For a time, she couldn't tell what was what. So, the ruler and queen, and later the crown prince and the other two princes, began to balance the accounts after dinner every day, paying off the items that everyone felt were more important and couldn't be delayed. A few days of this were fine, but when Tan Weixin arrived in Yicheng after a leisurely journey of nearly ten days, they completely collapsed.

Everyone was extremely fond of Tan Weixin. Her health was poor. She had used her body to block a palm strike for the crown prince, and she had maintained the atmosphere of the palace very well, always keeping this Eastern Ping's first family in a warm and harmonious atmosphere, without letting power struggles seep into the family. She had also educated her younger brothers and sister well, allowing everyone to get along in harmony and understand their own pursuits and lives, basically nipping the situation of brothers fighting each other for the throne in the bud. Her occasional tantrums made everyone think she was even more adorable, not the princess who was perfect in everything except her health, but a real, existing young woman.

The ruler and queen initially persevered, but later, as the money in their hands dwindled, the requests for funds became more urgent, and Tan Weixin made friends and lived extremely comfortably in Yicheng, seemingly not intending to return at all, they couldn't bear it any longer. The Crown Prince had to travel a long way to urge her to return to the palace and resolve the financial crisis in the internal treasury.

"Well, alright. Anyway, my anger has subsided, and I've had a good time these past few days. Besides, there's no point in venting my anger on you when that silly woman isn't here. When that silly woman comes, I'll see how I deal with her," Tan Weixin said when she agreed to return to the capital. Her parents and younger siblings had given her enough face by being so humble, and it would be difficult to continue making trouble. If she stayed in Yicheng for another ten days, the new batch of requests for funds for pest control and repairing farm tools on the royal estates would arrive, and her parents and younger siblings would probably have to consider tightening their belts. Thinking of this, Tan Weixin found it very amusing.

The Crown Prince finally breathed a sigh of relief, but he also learned a good lesson from this incident. There were so many things to deal with in just the internal treasury, what about a city? What about a country? How to allocate and coordinate expenditures was truly a profound knowledge, and it couldn't be calculated simply by the Ministry of Revenue reporting a few numbers.

Naturally, Ye Tao was among those who saw her off. After presenting the princess with a gift, a very funny thing happened.

Tan Weixin opened the exquisite silk wrapping, inside which was a square box made of Phoebe wood. She glared at Ye Tao and said to Sisi, "Go, kick this bastard in the butt."

As expected of the princess, she could even outsource such things? Ye Tao was kicked helplessly and protested, "Xiner, what's wrong?"

The address of "Xiner" made the Crown Prince, Min Yue, and Peng Detian frown, but the person in question seemed to feel nothing.

"Seeing me off, and you actually give me an urn?" she said, pointing at the rather large wooden box, extremely dissatisfied. Cremation wasn't popular in this time and space, and everyone didn't react to what the princess meant for a moment.

"Urn?" Ye Tao said with a frown, "That's the 16-chord music box that I worked so hard to make, okay? 16 chords, 4 timbres, do you think those mechanisms don't take up space?"

"Oh? What tune?" Tan Weixin asked.

Ye Tao shrugged and winked. His meaning was clear: you'll know when you hear it. Only then did the princess happily put the box into the carriage.

It wasn't until the carriage had left Yicheng quite a distance and could no longer see the people seeing her off that the Crown Prince suddenly jumped into the carriage and said, "Where's that thing Ye Tao gave you? Let me see it?"

It was true that calling it an urn made sense. The box was a bit large, and covered with intricate carvings of various flowers, birds, insects, and fish. In the lower right corner of the box, the words "Cang Huai" were outlined in silver thread.

Opening the box, the inside was still the standard layout of a jewelry box, but there was a wind-up key inside. Tan Weixin skillfully wound it up and expectantly released her hand. The box immediately emitted a melodious tune.

As expected, it was 16 chords and 4 timbres, and the sound quality was indeed good. But how the wind and string instrument timbres were made in this box was unknown.

They wouldn't see each other again for a few months, right? Tan Weixin thought to herself.

The princess shook off her reverie, looked at the Crown Prince whose eyes were as wide as copper bells, chuckled, and said, "Fun, right? It's a very nice tune... I've got it, I've thought of lyrics."

The Crown Prince said, "Who do you think you are, writing poetry in seven steps?" He looked like he was waiting for a good show. Then, he heard his sister, who had never been so happy, sing in a soft voice:

*Red dust is so laughable*

*The times are so boring*

*It's good to be disdainful of everything...*

(End of Volume 1)

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...I seem to have posted too fast; one volume is already finished.