Chapter 161 Disaster Relief

"Dad, you keep saying that it's not the time to start a rebellion. So when should we start a rebellion?"

"Let me ask you, if this flood dragon turns into a real dragon, and the officials in Shanxi see the real dragon, and then see the various weapons and equipment that are beyond this era that you have brought out, will they still have the desire to betray you?"

Luo Mingyue couldn't help but fall into silence.

In this era, if a real dragon appeared before the world.

Either they are scared to death, or they bow down and worship.

"How long will it take?"

"It should be soon."

During the years that Rosen has been in the pirate world, he has been transforming the soul of the Lord of the Sky.

A large number of sea king souls were also used to strengthen the soul of the Lord of the Sky, and the flesh and blood were used to feed the Lord of the Sky.

And he has been using the Gray Stone to make the Lord of the Sky stronger.

Thanks to the psychic contract between Rosen and Lord of the Sky, Lord of the Sky and Rosen are able to communicate in a more complex manner.

So under Rosen's teachings, the Lord of the Sky has mastered natural energy and is able to release attacks similar to the Fireball Technique.

The current Lord of the Sky is much more powerful than most sea kings.

Now there is only one last step left, which is to formally distort and transform the soul of the Lord of the Sky.

Soul twisting can be said to be a very cruel magic.

This is similar to the inaction transformation in the world of spells.

However, the transformation by inaction is a rough transformation, without considering whether the recipient can survive.

Soul twisting essentially requires the survival of the subject.

After half a year of preparation, Rosen is finally going to take action against the Lord of the Sky.

Rosen used the souls and limbs of various animals to fuse into the body of the Lord of the Sky, including the antlers of a stag, the claws of an eagle, the mane of a lion, and the tail of a fish.

And when fusing the soul fragments of these animals into the Lord of the Sky, Rosen also made some fine-tuning.

Rosen was very careful with every step, making sure that everything was within the range that the Lord of the Sky could bear.

After all, even in the entire world, there is no other Lord of the Sky for him to conduct experiments on.

This process was somewhat mentally stressful for Rosen. He had to stay focused at all times to ensure that the magic would not go wrong. The whole process lasted for three months.

Rosen finally succeeded in transforming the Lord of the Sky's soul into the form of a dragon.

However, as a real dragon, riding on clouds and mist is a common operation.

But the Lord of the Sky does not have the ability to fly and hide like a real dragon.

Rosen thought for a long time, and finally decided to give Lord Sora a devil fruit, the natural type. Yunyun fruit.

After nightfall, a huge figure rose into the air from the Luo family's old house.

Rosen stepped on the Lord of Sky's head and held the dragon's horn.

"Rain cloud."

"Ang..." The Lord of the Sky roared like a dragon, and then a rain cloud spewed out of his mouth.

After a while, it started to rain heavily within a radius of dozens of miles.

"Thunder clouds."

The Lord of the Sky roared like a dragon again, and the original rain clouds began to flash lightning and thunder again.

Rosen was already quite satisfied with such ability. After all, the main purpose of Rosen's transformation of the Lord of the Sky was to make it exist as a spiritual totem.

As for strength, Rosen doesn't care, and there is no need for the Lord of the Sky to fight with others.

Of course, the Lord of the Sky's body shape is right here.

With the power of the devil fruit, its strength is bound to be strong.

……

The current governor of Shanxi is Qian Wenxin, who is from the north. In the current general direction, the imperial power has been suppressing the Jiangnan clans, so he is also highly valued.

Qian Wenxin was a relatively honest official.

Of course, it is almost impossible for a governor to be absolutely honest.

However, under Qian Wenxin's rule, the administration was clean and honest. We cannot say that the people were prosperous, but at least there were no major mistakes during his term.

Occasionally, he would accept some benefits, mostly through exchanges between officials and granting some conveniences.

It’s just that vision determines ability. If it were in modern society, any junior high school student who went to govern a region would be no worse than the officials of this era.

The people of Shanxi can only say that they will not starve to death in most cases, but last year a tributary of the Yellow River overflowed and most of Shanxi was flooded.

As a result, there are many disturbances in Shanxi today, and the people are blocked outside the city of Taiyuan.

Qian Wenxin was so busy with this that he urged the Taiyuan prefect to provide disaster relief every day.

But now there is a shortage of food and clothing in Taiyuan City, so where can we get money and food to give to the victims outside the city?

No one dared to let them in, so they could only be blocked outside the city.

Qian Wenxin also went to find local wealthy families, but the money and grain they donated was just a drop in the bucket compared to the millions of disaster victims.

"Master, master..."

"What's the matter?"

"Master, the Princess of Kaiyuan County wants to see you."

"No, no, sir. I'm busy." Qian Wenxin waved his hand impatiently. He had no time to meet a little noble whom he had never heard of.

"Master, this county lady said she is willing to donate 10,000 shi of grain and grass."

"How much?" Qian Wenxin suddenly jumped up from the desk and looked at the housekeeper excitedly.

"Ten thousand koku."

"Please come to the living room and I'll serve you some good tea. I'll be right there."

Qian Wenxin straightened his appearance and clothes, took a deep breath, and walked towards the front hall.

When I arrived at the front hall, I saw a noble lady in her early thirties sitting in the living room.

Seeing Qian Wenxin coming, Luo Mingyue immediately stood up and clasped his fists and bowed: "Greetings, Governor Qian."

"Meet the Princess of Kaiyuan County."

In terms of social status, Qian Wenxin is naturally much higher than Luo Mingyue, but Luo Mingyue is a county lord, and although she is a minor noble, she is also a noble.

Qian Wenxin was curious about Luo Mingyue's identity. After all, there were not many female titles in the current dynasty.

"May I ask what your name is, young lady?"

"I am Luo Mingyue from Kaiyuan County, Kaifeng. My father once had an old relationship with Emperor Yongle. My brother Luo Ming is the son-in-law of the emperor and the husband of Princess Hanshan. After my father passed away, he passed the title to me."

"So that's how it is. I apologize for my ignorance." Qian Wenxin nodded, thinking that he would investigate further and now he should first confirm the donations of grain.

"May I ask if the county lady wants to donate 10,000 dan of grain?"

"Exactly."

"I wonder if the county lady has any needs that I would like to see done?"

"I plan to open some workshops in Taiyuan City and several surrounding cities, and purchase a large amount of wasteland for reclamation. I need a lot of manpower. These disaster victims are cheap and practical manpower, so I hope that the governor can be convenient for me to purchase wasteland and hire disaster victims. At the same time, I hope to inform the court, so that the court will not think that I am gathering disaster victims to commit rebellion."

Qian Wenxin was in high spirits and immediately asked, "How many disaster victims does the county lord want?"

Luo Mingyue said so much, but he only heard one sentence: Luo Mingyue wanted to hire the victims of the disaster.

"It depends on how much wasteland I can buy. If I can buy 10,000 acres of land, I will hire one person if I can buy one acre. If I can buy 10,000 acres of wasteland, I will hire 10,000 disaster victims. If I can buy more than 1 million acres of wasteland, I can not only help the governor solve all the disaster victims' problems, but also transfer a batch of grain and grass to lower the grain price in Shanxi, or at least help Shanxi's grain price return to its previous level."

"This...what the county lady said is indeed touching, but it is just empty words without any basis."

"I have brought one million taels of silver with me this time, which I have pledged at the Governor's Mansion. I can withdraw as much as I need, and it can be considered as my investment in Shanxi."

Qian Wenxin was shocked. The princess of Kaiyuan County was unknown, but her wealth was extremely rich.

He can easily take out a million taels of silver. Even the wealthy people in Jiangnan may not be so generous.

"Besides this, does the county lady have any other requests?"

"After the disaster is over, the Governor cannot force the victims to go back to farm."

"That won't work. Land is the foundation of the country and the cornerstone of the dynasty. If they don't farm, how will the taxes be collected next year?"

"I wonder how much agricultural taxes Shanxi collected last year?"

"Last year, the agricultural tax in Shanxi was 1200 million shi, and the tax on males was 95 liang."

The agricultural tax that Qian Wenxin mentioned is actually the land tax and the levy. These two taxes are quite heavy and will take away 60% of the farmers' income from their land.

Ding tax is a population tax. In the early Ming Dynasty, the ding tax was about 30 wen per person in each household. Now it has risen to 85 wen. Generally, a family of five will have to pay more than 400 wen of ding tax a year.

If the local government imposes some miscellaneous taxes, the tax will reach 80% of the income from the land.

"Now that the Yellow River has flooded and Shanxi has suffered, the court will certainly reduce taxes next year. If the governor trusts me, I will pay five million taels of commercial tax to Shanxi next year. If it is less than this amount, I will never break my promise. I guarantee that I can pay ten million taels of commercial tax the following year."

Qian Wenxin looked at Luo Mingyue in shock.

"Does the county lady really mean what she said?"

"My fiefdom, Kaiyuan County, has a population of 80. Last year, it paid 400 taels of tax to the court. This year, I have set up some industries in Kaifeng and employed more than people. This year, I paid million taels of tax to Kaifeng Prefecture. If the Governor-General does not believe me, you can send someone to Kaifeng Prefecture or Kaiyuan County to inquire about the situation. If there is any lie, the one million taels of silver I brought this time will be regarded as a gift to the victims."

At this moment, Qian Wenxin really took action, if it was really as Luo Mingyue said.

If you pay 5 million taels of silver a year, then it doesn't matter whether you have land tax or not. With the money, you can buy food directly.

Moreover, the total tax revenue of the Ming Dynasty last year was only 30 million taels. If I pay 5 million taels of silver a year, I'm afraid I can get it directly into the central government.

"If this is true, I really want to thank the county lady on behalf of the victims. Tomorrow I will discuss this with the various government offices in the prefecture."

The most valuable thing these days is farmland, and the least valuable thing is wasteland.

What Luo Mingyue wanted was wasteland, not farmland, so Qian Wenxin could not think of any reason to refuse.

Money is the least valuable thing to Luo Mingyue.

Even without Rosen's support, Kaiyuan County and Kaifeng Prefecture could earn tens of millions of taels of silver every year, which could be said to be richer than the imperial court.