Thief Emperor

Chapter 397: Conferring Official Honors
Li Yun simply kept Mr. Huang.

He opened the document that Du Qian had prepared, but he had not had time to read it carefully. After reading it once, his expression became even more strange.

Really from Caozhou.

And my family also sells salt.

Huang Chao, who had failed in the imperial examinations for a long time, had now taken over his family's salt business. That was why he returned to Jiangdong to purchase salt. And because there were salt fields everywhere in Jiangdong, he stayed in Jiangdong and was considered the person in charge of his family in Jiangdong.

However, he did not want to do business. He only wanted to become an official and build a career. When he heard that the Jiangdong Recruiting Envoy had won a great victory over the Pinglu Army in Jiangbei and was still recruiting talents, he gave up his family's business and came to join him.

The reason why Du Qian chose him was mainly because of his background.

Jiangdong is now promoting the salt permit system, and the salt road needs someone knowledgeable about the business. In Du Shijun's opinion, Huang Chao, who came from the salt gang, is just right for this job.

Li Yun looked at his background and asked him a few more questions, his expression becoming increasingly strange.

"Sir, you have a rich family and a lot of property, why did you come to me?"

Huang Chao looked up at Li Yun and said sternly, "My Lord, I am not interested in my family business."

"Now, Guanzhong has fallen, and the Central Plains is also in chaos. If you are short-sighted and only care about protecting your family property, the enemy troops will come in and your family will be destroyed and your clan will be wiped out in a matter of days."

"I have been determined to achieve great things since I was young. Now I am in Jiangdong. I heard that you bravely defeated the Qingzhou troops in Jiangbei. I admire you very much, so I came to serve you."

Li Yun looked at him with complicated eyes, then narrowed his eyes and spoke softly.

"Then you can stay in Jinling for the time being and be my retainer. If there is...if there is a major event in the future, I will naturally give you the opportunity to make achievements and establish your career."

Huang Chao bowed his head and said, "Thank you, sir!"

After saying that, he saluted Li Yun and then walked out.

Li Yun touched his chin and shook his head repeatedly: "Weird, weird..."

"It's so weird."

He thought for a moment and said, "Go call Meng Hai over."

The person guarding the door immediately went to call for help. A moment later, Meng Hai, who was in Li Garden, ran over and bowed his head to Li Yun and said, "Envoy, what do you want me to do?"

Li Yun looked at him, hesitated for a moment, and then said, "As for the new Huang Chao, ask Jiusi to send someone to help me keep an eye on him, record his words and deeds, and send them to me regularly."

As the de facto lord of Jiangdong, Li Yun could crush Huang Chao dozens of times just by thinking about it. Naturally, it is impossible for him to feel any fear towards him just because of a name.

However, because it was such a coincidence, Li Yun still wanted to observe this person.

If he has a violent nature and is not very useful, then he will be kept as a disciple.

If he is useful and succeeds in the future, this person might be really useful.

Now, Li Yun has more than just Meng Hai as his follower. Zhou Liang’s son Zhou Bi and a few smart young men are all running errands for Li Yun.

Meng Hai is now mainly responsible for the communication between Li Yun and the intelligence department set up by Liu Bo, or in other words, he conveys Li Yun's orders to the intelligence department on behalf of Li Yun.

This intelligence agency was named "Jiu Si" by Li Yun.

In other words, it is temporarily named Jiusi.

The reason for this name is not because this intelligence agency now consists of nine "departments", but simply because Liu Bo, who is in charge of this agency, ranks ninth in Cangshan Dazhai. Li Yun has always called him Laojiu.

The establishment of an intelligence agency must have a name, otherwise it would have no way to call it, so Li Yun simply gave it this name.

Now, this intelligence agency is just in its infancy and is still very immature in all aspects. However, if it grows stronger in the future, the Nine Departments may really evolve into a huge organization consisting of nine departments.

Meng Hai bowed his head and said, "I understand, Lord."

Li Yun looked up at him and said with a smile: "Have you thought clearly about what I told you two days ago?"

Meng Hai bowed his head deeply and said, "Sir, I agreed to that matter right away, but you insisted that I go back and ask my father again. After hearing that, my father agreed immediately without even thinking about it."

Li Yun said "hmm", then said: "Then let your father and the people from Hexi Village take charge of this matter. It can be regarded as a task for them. Firstly, this matter must be kept secret, and secondly, it also requires some skills. I will give your family a month."

"Set up the workshop as soon as possible. This workshop..."

Mr. Li touched his chin and said, "It is located near Li Garden."

What Li Yun asked the Meng family to do was, of course, to mint coins.

He had already asked someone to make the coin mold, so the rest of minting the coins was not a difficult task, but he still had to find someone reliable to do it.

The people in Hexi Village are the best choice. As long as they learn a little bit of the skills, they should be able to do this job in no time.

"Envoy." Meng Hai took a deep breath and lowered his head and said, "The reason why I didn't come to tell you about this in the past two days is because my father has already found a workshop to learn mold casting. He said that he would accept the task assigned by the Envoy after he learned it, so as not to delay the Envoy's work."

Li Yun was startled, then burst out laughing: "I guess this thing should not be difficult to learn, there is no need to be so serious, I will leave the task to your family."

"Figure it out within a month and show me something."

At this point, Li Yun thought for a moment and added, "It can't be too rough either. It has to be decent."

In fact, minting coins is not a simple matter.

If the copper coins on the market were all made of pure copper, then of course it would not be difficult. However, the coins cast by the imperial court were mostly alloys, and would be mixed with lead and other things to reduce costs. Only experienced coin casting masters could grasp this ratio.

So, Li Yun gave the Meng family a month to try it slowly.

Meng Hai knelt on the ground, bowed his head and kowtowed, saying: "On behalf of the entire Hexi Village, I would like to thank you, Your Excellency!"

Li Yun frowned.

"Get up. If you don't get up, I'm going to be angry with you."

Meng Hai had been following Li Yun, so he naturally knew that Li Yun was not used to people kneeling to him, so he quickly got up and bowed, with tear marks on his face.

"Don't worry, my father is a very good person. He will definitely take care of this matter for you!"

Li Yun stood up, stretched his body, and said with a smile: "Don't make it too good. If it is too good, it will not look like the coins minted by the court."

"All right."

Li Yun raised his head and looked outside, then said slowly, "Let the next person in. I will see three more people today."

Meng Hai responded, wiped the tears from his face, and went downstairs to tell someone.

…………

Autumn of the first year of Zhaoding.

Except for Yangzhou, all the prefectures and counties in Huainan Road in Jiangbei were captured one after another by the Pinglu Army, and the territory of the Pinglu Army also expanded rapidly.

The imperial court turned a blind eye to this and even sent an envoy to appoint Zhou Chang, the son of Zhou Xu, the governor of Pinglu, as the defense commissioner of Yangzhou.

The Defense Envoy was mainly responsible for the military affairs of a state, and his duties were similar to those of the Sima, but his status was obviously higher than that of the Sima of a state, and not much different from that of the Inspector.

Anyone with a discerning eye could tell that the court's actions were intended to sow discord.

After all, the major general of the Pinglu Army would not dare to go to Yangzhou City to take up his post no matter what.

Therefore, this appointment was simply an excuse for the Pinglu Army to attack Yangzhou.

At this time in Jiangdong, Li Zheng under Li's command was sent to the southern part of Jiangnan East Road, where he conquered various states and counties while expanding his own military strength.

Su Sheng was stationed in Qiantang, where he began to recruit soldiers on a large scale.

Zhou Liang began to recruit soldiers in the north of Jiangnan East Road, near Nanjing.

However, the first place Zhou Liang started recruiting soldiers was not Jinling Prefecture, nor nearby Changzhou, but he went directly back to his hometown of Xuanzhou and began to increase troops in Xuanzhou.

The number of Jiangdong soldiers has entered a stage of rapid expansion, and they are continuously expanding their territory outward with Jiangdong as the center.

The trend of separatism has become unstoppable and is becoming increasingly obvious.

The imperial court naturally noticed the situation in Jiangdong, but it still turned a blind eye. On this day, two imperial angels in blue entered Jinling City with the imperial edict in their hands and soon arrived at Li Garden.

Because the two imperial envoys were holding the imperial edict, Li Yun, who was nominally still working for the Wu Zhou Dynasty, naturally came out to greet them quickly. After seeing Li Yun, the two angels smiled at Li Yun, and without waiting for Li Yun to kneel down, they unfolded the imperial edict and read it aloud.

After a long parallel prose, the two eunuchs finally read the main text, and then the eunuch was heard singing loudly.

"Li Yun, the Recruiting Envoy, guarded Jiangnan and Huainan, suppressed the rebellion and quelled the evil, and made outstanding contributions. He is hereby awarded the title of Silver and Green Guanglu Dafu."

"Seal the guards."

After reading this, the two eunuchs looked at the young Li Yun with envy in their eyes.

"I order you to guard Jiangnan on behalf of the imperial court and prevent any chaos."

"Appreciate this."

Li Yun stepped forward, took the imperial edict with both hands, raised his head and looked at the two eunuchs. There was no excitement on his face, he just said something very calmly.

"Thank you, Your Majesty... for your grace."

(End of this chapter)