Chapter 249: Business
Translator: Translation Nation Editor: Translation Nation
Sea, near the Golden Island
Pei Zi Yun had rushed all the way to Golden Island from the capital city. The blue expanse joined together with the clear waters over the horizons, as several clouds lined the skies. Several seagulls glided just over the waters. Some distance away, a small island could be seen in the middle of the sea.
Pei Zi Yun sighed, as the official beside him laughed, "Dao Master, we’re almost there. Look, there are even people who’re receiving us."
This official was the same person who had been sent by the Crown Prince to assist Pei Zi Yun. HIs name was Qiao Du, and had been in service to the Crown Prince for a long time. If there was anything which Pei Zi Yun needed done, he could act through this official. Now that the Crown Prince seemed to be the favourite to take over the throne, the authority of this official was naturally much greater than ever.
Pei Zi Yun and the official had been sailing for several days and had occasional drinking sessions together while they looked out at sea. Qiao Du realized that Pei Zi Yun never discussed politics, and thus he didn’t ask.
Pei Zi Yun turned around and smiled, "I see it too….."
When they got nearer, Official Qiao Du looked at the island and saw several girls and women picking up shells and crabs from the beach. Old women were laughing as they made fishnets out of coconut husks.
A farmer was using several cows to plough his field. A distance away, some wheat was already growing on fertile soil. Further up was a stronghold, where all the mountainous people had made camp and lived. At this point, some of them gazed far ahead at sea, watching the boat approach.
Pei Zi Yun embraced the wind as he noticed that flowers were blooming within the island. He then spoke, "These past few days have been extremely cold. In the blink of an eye, it’s already spring and the flowers are blooming."
Hearing theese words, a boat crew laughed out, "Young master, it seldom snows on Golden Island. While we travel around the seas, it would take at least three months before the weather starts warming up. But here, on Golden Islands, the cold only lasts for a month before spring comes. In the past, I used to roam the islands and never settled down. Now I wish I did, for I would have fields to work and income to earn."
"Haha, you’re right!" Pei Zi Yun pointed at a forest and spoke, "We can let the cattle roam over there, and we can even fish out here in the waters."
"Approaching shore!" Another boat crew shouted out as everyone started getting busy. They lowered the anchor and took out the drawbridge. He Qing Qing led several Daoists as they welcomed him, "Dao Master!"
Pei Zi Yun brushed them off, "How’s things been of late?"
He Qing Qing then spoke, "We have mountains behind the island for us to live in, and the fields are fertile, even more so than back where we came from. The days are comfortable and stress free. The only problem is that most of us grew up in the mountains, and we don’t know anything about water. This is a small problem."
"You should learn in the ways of the sea now, including how to swim. You live on an island now, and it wouldn't be good if you didn’t know how to live with your environment." Pei Zi Yun pointed at the the group of people ahead and asked, "What are they doing there?"
He Qing Qing looked in the same direction and replied, "Young master, those people are repairing the dam. Since we don’t have many people, we had to call for six carpenters from the mainland to help us. They charged us three times more than the usual price."
"We are surrounded by two high peaks with the flow of the sea in the middle. The dam is essential. In the past, we’ve done this before up in the mountains. We transformed all the flat land into arable lands. Even the lands up in the hills could be terraced and used to grow. There’s at least 500 mu of lands in those."
Hearing these words, Pei Zi Yun nodded his head.
"How’s the building of the mansion coming along?" Pei Zi Yun then asked.
"We’ve also invited carpenters to assist, and it’s already been build. Please take a look."
The few of them then walked towards it.
Along the way, they witnessed the plants and flowers in full bloom, as the sun shone down upon them warmly. Several fishermen were casting out their nets, trying to catch some fishes.
A distance away, several goats were pacing within a huge flat piece of land. They were grazing grass while bleating occasionally. There were also a group of hens nearby the goats, The hens would peck the ground from time to time, in search for worms. Since there weren’t any predators on the islands, everyone was at ease.
The mountain ranges hid the stronghold of the mountainous people but could be seen from where Pei Zi Yun stood. There was even a sentry outpost built. Since this island used to belong to the bandits, most of the existing infrastructure were fortified in case of future need.
Below the mountainous stronghold was a little town with a very simple and tidy layout. From time to time, a mountain villager could approach and pay his respects to Pei Zi Yun.
"Dao Master look, in order to maintain our safety, we’ve repair the entire stronghold used by the pirates." He Qing Qing said.
Pei Zi Yun followed He Qing Qing into the stronghold and saw that some parts of it were still under construction.
The walls were dyed red. Although it didn’t look spectacularly majestic, it was still rather grand. As they walked in, Pei Zi Yun saw the discussion room, the guest rooms, the backyard and even the strategy room. There was a pond outside, where several fishes swam within.
Once they walked out again, they returned to the small town below the stronghold, and saw a small monastery. There was only one main hall for now, while the rest of it was still being built. Several Daoists were guiding the workers, instructing them on the desired layout.
Next to it was an ancestral hall. When Pei Zi Yun looked at the entire place from afar, he felt a sense of pride. He then turned to the official and asked, "What do you think of this?"
"It looks good. Since you have the lands, more people can live here." Qiao Du didn’t think much of it, since it looked like a small village and was very remote from the capital city. Besides, the amount of arable was also limited, since this was after all an islands. He could understand why Pei Zi Yun decided to rebuild this place, but didn’t have much opinions about it.
"It’s good that you think this way." Golden Island wasn’t so small that it could remain hidden from view, and Pei Zi Yun didn’t want to hide it from view as well. If the island was a little bigger, the imperial courts might relocate people to the island and live. However, since it was so small, and was barely the size of a big village, and it was also very far from everything, it was unlikely that it would happen.
The land size of Golden Island and Sentry Island combined together had more than several thousands of mu in arable land. He didn’t have any intention of raising an independent state to rebel against the dynasty. He just wanted to start a business for his Pei household.
"With people around building and repairing the dam, while others were ploughing the fields and fishing. This was starting to become what Pei Zi Yun had in mind for them.
The winds blew strongly as the official, He Qing Qing and several DAoists watched Pei Zi Yun stand atop an elevated ground while he stared into the distance, unmoving. Nobody around dared to disturb him.
After a long time Pei Zi Yun turned around, "Your excellency Qiao, we should rest and have a meal before returning to Ying Prefecture."
Qiao Du wasn’t very interested in this island and thus nodded his head in agreement, "What Dao Master says goes!"
Pei Zi Yun then watched him walk away, towards the dining hall. The layout of the entire area was very simple, with the basic necessities and tea for him to enjoy. He then called He Qing Qing over, "You’ve done extremely well. I need you to begin another phase of work."
He Qing Qing fell to her knees, as she changed the way she addressed him, "Young leader, speak, and see it done."
"Although the lands within Golden Island and Sentry Island are small, divide the arable land into ten parts. Twenty households to one part of land. When the carpenters and workers are done, don’t let them leave yet. Instead, start to work on building the boundaries for each part of arable land."
"I wish for roads to be built, and five pavilions scattered across the island. There should also be relay points, with five men attached to each relay point. Every year, we have to train the young people in the village to fight and defend themselves."
"Only after receiving training would they be able to become guards at the relay station or they can become boat crews."
"If they don’t receive formal training, they would forever be confined to the fields or to fish forever."
"I wish to have twenty guards personally under my charge. Train the best men."
"A mayor’s quarter should be build in the town as well. The mayor would be you, and you should have several other people under your charge. They should be in charge of census, tax, discipline, patrol, the barn and health."
"The census leader’s job is very simple. He would need to have records of each household along with the amount of land owned. New children and new acquisition of land after buying and selling within each other should also be recorded by him."
"Tax leader would be in charge of taxes within the islands."
"Disciple leader would be in charge of the prison."
"There should be two patrol leaders. Don’t we have two remaining pirate boats which haven’t been sold? They should use these boats to patrol the islands."
"Once everything has been built, we should revamp and continue building ports around the islands. The ports should be able to accomodate more boats."
"Harbour leader would be in charge of collecting tax from external boats. It might not be good to them them we are charging tax. We should call it a fee for laying over."
"Barn leader would be in charge of storage and warehouses."
"The health leader has to be a doctor."
"When it comes to our boats, half of the people on board should be merchants and the other half soldiers. Appropriate ranks should be given, and everyone should be distinguished from each other as well."
"Young leader, in order to establish ranks for everyone, that would amount to several hundred people with ranks!" He Qing Qing was the leader of the mountain strongholds and thus understood this. However, she was still rather suspicious, "We only have several thousand people. Wouldn’t this be too many?"
"If we’re only going to plough fields and look after cattle, of course the ranks would be too many."
"But we’re going to have two sources of income."
"First would be to open and encourage sea trade. The more boats dock on our island and conduct trade, the better off we will be. Although our island isn’t very big, it’s an important location for porting. The tax which we will impose is going to be a small amount, which won’t help much. Our main sources of income would be from trading and business."
"Trading and business?" He Qing QIng didn’t know much about it.
Pei Zi Yun pointed at the town, "The town isn’t far from the pier. It’s only a short walk away. We can build hotels, restaurants, clinics and other shops."
"Once a ship docks here, he would have to restock his food supplies, medication, alcohol and other necessities. This is business."
"Although we’re not involved in piracy, there will be some people selling stolen wares. We can buy it off them for much cheaper, and sell it to other boats."
"Additionally, we still have our own trade. We might need a hundred, or even two to three hundred people for this. All these can be part of the plan."
"The starting up of all these would require money. You can use the gold which I’ve given you earlier."
He Qing Qing thought to himself and nodded her head, "I understand, and will get to it soon."
"There’s no hurry/ Take your time. At the end of the day, this is just a small island. To get everything settled wouldn’t take too long, a year or too at most."
Pei Zi Yun stood up and took several paces before he turned around and smiled before whispering, "We have no intention of rebelling, but this might seem slightly suspicious. If this is illegal, you will see that this island will become nothing more than mere sand within a decade."
"You have to remember, riches would never last more than three generations, but laws would be passed down for the next fifty!"
Pei Zi Yun understood his. If he didn’t do things this way, he would solely be relying on his existing fortunes. This might last for a generation or two. But in three generations, it would be gone, and someone else would replace the Pei family.
Now that he was starting a whole new regime with its rules and order, as well as people to enforce, it would last for a very long time.
At this point, he entered his Yin Master stage and looked down the mountain. He could see thick white energy gathering at the base of the mountain. There was a tinge of reddishness as well. Thinking about something, he realized that the white energy was becoming thicker.
Pei Zi Yun laughed out as he though to himself, "When I became a High Scholar, it was white and red. As a High Scholar, I could have 300 households under my charge. According to the laws of the dynasty, a landlord could have 100 households under him. A lord would have 600 households over him, and a count would have 2,000 households under him. Looks like based on this logic, I should be a count as well."
Just as he was thinking about this, a white plum flower appeared into view as it became bigger and transformed quicker into a system interface. It bore with it faint light perception as words and numbers appeared before his eyes.
"Yin Master : Level 3 (11.5% Completed)"