“Have you lost your mind? Expanding expenses this drastically—how can you possibly sustain it?”
Seeing the lead craftsman leave, Zhao Ting’er couldn’t help but reach out to feel Han Qian’s forehead, checking if he had a fever and was talking nonsense.
Zhao Ting’er could be considered the head accountant of the Left Bureau. She had the clearest understanding of the income and expenditure of the workshops and warehouses, as well as the expenses of the Scout Office and Military Office.
Currently, the Tunying Military Prefecture allocated 1,200 dan of polished rice to the workshops each month. While this could cover the wages of the hired laborers, the military prefecture took away 40,000 city bricks, 160,000 small blue bricks, 2,000 dan of lime, and 600 carts of coal each month—nearly 80% of the workshops’ monthly output. What the workshops could additionally transport out for external sale was only 1,600 dan of lime and 400 carts of coal, yielding a surplus of approximately 150,000 coins.
The trade route between Xuzhou and Jinling had also been opened. As long as they didn’t suffer major losses, they should be able to generate a considerable monthly surplus.
Beyond this, the largest source of income was the 3 million coins annually allocated by the military prefecture for public use.
However, these might not necessarily cover the Left Bureau’s ever-increasing expenses.
Apart from maintaining the Left Bureau’s current scout network, maintaining the boat gang and rebuilding the Yangtan Water Fortress required funds and grain, as did secretly supporting Feng Xuan and ransoming members of the Xi clan.
In fact, Zhao Ting’er not only opposed expanding the workshop workforce but had hoped to reduce it upon her return.
The workshop employed such a large workforce mainly because it had been in continuous construction and expansion for over a year.
Not to mention the lime kilns, brick kilns, and warehouses—even within the manor itself, houses and roads were constantly being built. They had even excavated sewage ditches and seepage wells to accommodate the increasing number of residents.
The excavation of coal tunnels and the construction of pathways along the stream to the coal yards and quarries all consumed large amounts of manpower.
Currently, whether the manor, workshops, or warehouses, all had reached their completed scale. Moving forward would be more about maintaining normal operations, so the extra workers hired for large-scale construction should naturally be reduced.
Zhao Ting’er calculated that if they could reduce the workshop workforce to around 600 people, the workshop’s surplus would be quite considerable, and the Left Bureau could operate very well.
Now, reducing in one area while increasing in another was equivalent to recruiting nearly 300 more people. Additionally, all craftsmen would receive an extra midday meal, and they would have to bear the costs of housing and feeding over 300 Left Bureau descendants.
How much difference did this make in total?
Han Qian grasped Zhao Ting’er’s small hand and said, “This isn’t the time to worry about funds and grain. I can’t wait for them to completely dismantle the Left Bureau’s framework before showing them what I’m capable of!” He then turned to Zhao Wuji, “You’ve been by my side the longest—it’s time I assigned you a task.”
“…” Zhao Wuji, as always, silently nodded in agreement.
“Select five or six people with agile skills who are reliable, and you will lead them to specifically train in the methods of hidden endurance!” Han Qian said. “And these five or six people’s so-called reliability means they can only be used by me and must have no attachments whatsoever in Tunying!”
“Yes!” Zhao Wuji said without hesitation. Having spoken, he stood and withdrew to begin carrying out Han Qian’s assignment.
The shock in Xi Ren’s heart did not subside. She didn’t know whether Han Qian was having Zhao Wuji lead a group of assassins or a group of death-sworn warriors, or perhaps both.
Xi Ren was simultaneously curious about what exactly Han Qian meant by “methods of hidden endurance.”
Han Qian seemed able to discern Xi Ren’s confusion. From a stack of manuscripts on the desk, he pulled out a dozen or so pages and handed them to her, saying, “Are you curious about what the arts of hidden endurance are? You can look at this—perhaps you’ll find use for it very soon.”
Xi Ren accepted the dozen pages with puzzlement, but upon reading closely, she wanted to throw them away, as if these pages were a ball of flames scorching her hands. She stared at Han Qian and said sternly, “The descendants of my Xi clan will not become bloody blades in your hands.”
“You will accept it,” Han Qian said. “The reason anyone can exist is that they must have value—even if you gather the Xi clan descendants, men and women, old and young combined, there might not even be 2,000 people. On the surface, it was Feng Changyu who directly dismembered the Xi clan, but if the Xi clan truly regrouped as a clan, could the Xi, Yang, and three other surnames rest easy? Your Xi clan has so few people, all exhausted and drained old, weak, sick, and disabled. In the mountains and waters of Wu, how can you establish yourselves as a clan? I’m teaching your Xi clan the fundamental means to establish yourselves as a clan. In this process, I’m asking the Xi clan for a small compensation—why are you so nervous? Don’t tell me you think such great fortune can be achieved without blood and flesh as sacrifice?”
After completing the “Commentary on the Chapter on Espionage,” Han Qian didn’t feel that was sufficient.
Several centuries later, in an island nation across the sea that also fell into chaotic times of warlord divisions, due to the need for intelligence gathering, they developed ninjutsu based on combat techniques combined with the tactical and strategic thinking contained in Sun Tzu’s Art of War.
Han Qian naturally didn’t know the specific contents of ninjutsu, but he had the foundation of writing the “Commentary on the Chapter on Espionage.” He also summarized the contemporary methods of infiltration, scouting, reconnaissance, and assassination, as well as the training methods for household guard descendants. Over these past months, he had written this dozen-page document beyond the “Commentary on the Chapter on Espionage.”
Han Qian called it the methods of hidden endurance.
Han Qian naturally didn’t have time to gather a group of potential children for rigorous training, and qualified fourteen- or fifteen-year-old youths were extremely rare. Having Zhao Wuji select five or six people could only be an emergency measure. However, the Xi clan descendants had experienced the catastrophe of clan annihilation and were subsequently sold to southern Hunan and central Guizhou as slaves—their youthful mentalities actually made them most suited to the methods of hidden endurance and capable of rapid training.
Xi Ren’s current personality was much more assertive, but during her maiden years serving Feng Changyu, how deeply hidden was her patience?
Based on the combat and sword-striking techniques she had learned in childhood, she had secretly continued rigorous training over these years, concealing it from the Feng clan members, developing in increasingly strange and uncanny directions, to the point that despite wearing silver ring bells on her feet, she could walk without sound.
Therefore, when she read these dozen pages carefully, she immediately guessed Han Qian’s intentions. Instinctively, these pages felt like flames scorching her hands.
Yet Han Qian wasn’t worried that Xi Ren would refuse his arrangement.
“You are simply a demon,” Xi Ren said. Even though she guessed that Han Qian would most likely have Feng Xuan first select suitable Xi clan youths to train specifically in the methods of hidden endurance for ransom, in the end she still restrained herself from throwing the dozen pages in Han Qian’s face.
“Ting’er, have I ever said I was a good person?” Han Qian asked Zhao Ting’er with a smile.
……
……
The next day, Third Imperial Prince Yang Yuanpu, following his pattern of coming to the city every other day, once again came to the Tunying Military Prefecture.
However, this time Yang Yuanpu rose early. Without lingering long at the military prefecture offices, he proceeded directly to the Qiuhu Mountain Villa under escort of the Guard Battalion to see Han Qian.
Everyone had matters to attend to, so those who could constantly accompany Yang Yuanpu were still Chen De, Chai Jian, and Li Chong—this was also their duty.
Even as Supervising Military Commissioner, Guo Rong didn’t come over lightly to avoid the two sides feeling constrained.
Han Qian had just gotten up and practiced two sets of boxing forms. In the courtyard, he was having breakfast with salted duck eggs when he glanced at Chai Jian and Li Chong, then stood to greet Yang Yuanpu. “Has Your Highness had breakfast? Come taste the manor’s secret-recipe salted duck eggs…”
Zhai Xinping was a food lover. While he had forgotten the vast majority of mathematical formulas completely, he specifically remembered the text from “Diaoding Ji” on pickling duck eggs: “For every hundred eggs, weigh two jin of salt, add a little water, first soak the eggs in well water overnight, add salt to plant ash, use wine lees or meat brine for even more richness, mix evenly and pound thoroughly in a stone mortar, then use wine and brine to adjust to paste consistency for pickling. Eggs should stand upright, large end facing up…”
What seemed like a simple salted duck egg, when produced by the manor, had a blue shell and oily yolk that emitted a faint wine fragrance.
Yang Yuanpu sat down and devoured all eight segments of the perfectly salted duck egg, calling out directly, “Master Han, you really should help me train the cooks in my household!”
“If Your Highness likes them, I’ll have Zhao Ting’er copy the recipe for Your Highness to take back,” Han Qian said with a smile.
“When I came to the manor, I saw many youths also walking this way. What does Master Han intend?” Yang Yuanpu asked.
“Director Zhou transferred 200 people from the workshops, and the manor is now severely short-handed. Moreover, I was thinking that while the Left Bureau’s 200 men serve Your Highness loyally, their descendants are destitute and dependent, lacking food and clothing. My abilities are limited—I cannot help everyone in the military prefecture live without worry. I can only first gather the Left Bureau’s children of appropriate age, have the Left Bureau provide their room and board, then have them learn to work in the workshops,” Han Qian said, glancing at Chai Jian and Li Chong. “I thought Director Chai already knew about this and had explained it to Your Highness.”
Chai Jian was slightly taken aback. He had naturally learned of this matter last night, but everyone firmly believed Han Qian couldn’t maintain such a large operation and decided to wait and observe.
“Excellent!” Regardless of what others thought, Yang Yuanpu naturally supported all of Han Qian’s decisions.
Yang Yuanpu’s support for Han Qian in establishing the Secret Bureau’s Left Bureau was itself born from unwillingness to have all the great and small powers of the Dragon Sparrow Army controlled by those affiliated with the Xinchang Marquis’s household. He had even agreed to the annual 3 million coins additionally allocated for Left Bureau expenses, which Yang Yuanpu provided from the Linjiang Marquis household’s private treasury and from the rewards he received from the palace during festivals and holidays.
Any perceptive person could see that these measures of Han Qian’s were meant to strengthen internal cohesion and control within the Left Bureau. Yang Yuanpu now possessed such discernment—how could he not support it?
Of course, these days whether following Shen Yang’s lectures or absorbing the ideology Han Qian instilled in him, the core focused on the two words “funds and grain.” At this moment, he only worried whether the Left Bureau could sustain increasingly large and numerous expenses.
Yet Han Qian seemed to have no worries at all. Regardless of what the accompanying Chen De, Chai Jian, Li Chong, and others thought, he invited Yang Yuanpu to tour the workshops’ operations…