The World Online

Chapter 1154 – A Huge Gamble

“The Imperial Court will not interfere in regions that guilds are good at like medicine, equipment, inns and the like. It will only enter ones that the guilds do not want to enter like grain, iron ore, and other basic industries to provide services.”

Ouyang Shuo’s announcement totally warmed the heart of everyone present.

Compared to benefits and interests, Ouyang Shuo was more interested in the recognition of players and letting the players feel a sense of belonging. After all, those who could participate in killing the beasts were all elite players.

Furthermore, although the Imperial Court did not snatch food from the guilds, just the rental for the shops and taxes would form a stable source of income, making up for the expenditure for the construction of the camp and even bring in profits.

Since that was the case, why would Ouyang Shuo be so petty?

After settling this matter, discussing specific defense problems was next.

Ouyang Shuo wanted to give each guild a rough battle region with provinces as the boundary such that each province had a stable fighting force.

“No problem!”

Due to the benefits they received right at the start, the guild leaders naturally knew how to pay back the favor.

After settling all these big issues, Ouyang Shuo ended the meeting. As for the specifics, the Privy Court would discuss with them one by one, and it was not something that could be settled so soon.

…

Gaia 6th year, 1st month, 17th day, Shanhai City.

There was just a month till the Chinese New Year. Ouyang Shuo started to meet up officials to disseminate information and debrief them before they went for their holidays.

Within the Imperial Reading Room, Ouyang Shuo was meeting agriculture department director Jia Sixie.

The people treated food as heaven.

The status of agriculture in the dynasty was naturally undeniable. Great Xia’s agriculture technology was at the leading position in the world. However, after the establishment of the dynasty, he had not focused much on it.

Him summoning Jia Sixie showed that the situation had changed.

During the 4th system update, Gaia activated the calamity mode. Even though Great Xia was protected by the gods, with the weather being really smooth, grain production would be unavoidably affected.

Along with a large number of refugees spawning, the population growing, and the few large-sized wars that occurred throughout the year, they had used up a shocking amount of grain.

Even with Great Xia’s grain production, they just barely had enough.

Along with tens of millions of players moving to Great Xia, they welcomed a new round of sudden population explosion. The grain shortage crisis was slowly becoming apparent.

The beast siege was the final nail in the coffin.

Not to mention the large number of farms being destroyed, to compensate the grain lost, the Imperial Court needed to open up the granaries to save the affected. The amount of grain used up daily was in the millions.

If it were not for the fact that the accumulation work of Great Xia was appropriate, they would not be able to hold on.

Jia Sixie was really sharp. When the grain crisis started to sprout, he had spotted it and handed up a memorial that Ouyang Shuo focused on.

The other territories did not have the problem of a sudden increase in population to worry about, so they did not have to face such a crisis.

Jia Sixie said, “During this half a month, the agriculture department sent officials down to the various provinces to check the granary situation. Overall, it is okay, but there are some granaries that did not meet requirements and did not gather up enough grain for a crisis.”

Ouyang Shuo’s face sank, “Preparing grain for crises is the responsibility of the local officials. There are actually people who did not do their job in this area. What are they thinking!”

Jia Sixie did not dare to retort, as he knew that the king was furious.

“The agriculture department shall investigate the situation and let the Internal Affairs Court handle it.” Although Ouyang Shuo had just breezed over the mater, under the Internal Affairs Court, it was going to cause huge waves.

“Yes, my king!”

“Can the grain last till the next grain collecting season?” Ouyang Shuo asked.

Jia Sixie did not want to make false promises and hesitated, “Based on the current situation, there would definitely be some grain shortages. The officials are worried that the merchants will smell the opportunity and gather up grain, while the farmers might not sell their grain, which would further escalate the issue.”

Ouyang Shuo nodded. Jia Sixie’s worries were not unfounded.

Great Xia always focused on an open and relaxed business environment. Hence, they would not do anything even if merchants amassed grain.

Thinking about it, Ouyang Shuo said, “Let the agriculture department discuss with the business department to try to remove this problem.”

Great Xia had many money-making opportunities. With the business department stepping in, there would be very few merchants who would decide to take that route. After all, for them to survive in Great Xia, making the Imperial Court unhappy was not a good matter.

“Understood!”

Jia Sixie nodded. With the king personally giving instructions, the matter would be much easier. If not, the business department would not bother about the agriculture department.

The grain shortage situation was one that internal control could alleviate, but it could not solve the root.

Ouyang Shuo was prepared to inform the Financial Court to use the opportunity that TUP was just formed and not officially running yet to use voyage trading to buy large amounts of grain from Southeast Asia.

Even to say that he would order chambers of commerce to proceed to Java to purchase grain. With profits to speak of, there would naturally be merchants who would dare to take the risk and smuggle grain.

As long as they did it decently, this grain crisis might turn into a great opportunity.

Thinking of which, Ouyang Shuo said, “Men!”

“Present!”

“Summon Financial Minister Fan Li over.”

“Yes, my king.”

Very quickly, Fan Li rushed over.

“Sixie, tell Mister Fan about the rough situation,” Ouyang Shuo said.

“Yes, my king!”

Jia Sixie had not expected the king to act so quickly, directly calling the Financial Minister over to discuss. He did not dare to take the matter lightly and introduced the grain crisis problem.

Fan Li was really smart and understood what the king was planning, “The king wants to use the business department to have a large-scale purchase of grain?”

“Smart!”

Ouyang Shuo smiled, “A crisis is also an opportunity. We have no way to predict how the beast siege next year will be and how the catastrophes in the wilderness will be like. However, since we smell a chance, I do not mind taking a gamble.”

“How much funds can the Imperial Court use to purchase grain?” Ouyang Shuo asked.

Fan Li’s eyes froze, as he realized that the king was going in big. Thinking about it, he replied, “It’s already close to the end of the year, and all the expenditures have mostly been tabulated. Excluding the emergency funds for next year, we can use around eight to ten million gold.”

Great Xia was expectedly rich.

The successive huge wars at the end of the year along with the military organizations used up millions or even tens of millions of gold each time. Even so, the Imperial Court could still take out 10 million gold in funds.

Based on the current grain prices, 10 million gold could purchase enough grain for Great Xia to last five months. If they grain was gathered up, it would be as big as Shanhai City.

When Jia Sixie heard that, his eyes were filled with excitement.

This time, Jia Sixie could finally swallow all his worries. The Imperial Court purchasing this batch of grain would solve the crisis, and the merchants would naturally have no reason to amass grain.

All problems ceased to exist.

Who would have known that Ouyang Shuo would shake his head and say, “Not enough!”

“King, please instruct me!” Fan Li did not understand.

Ouyang Shuo said, “If it is just to solve our current problem, such an amount is naturally enough. However, if in the first half of the New Year, the two huge calamities happen, what would happen?”

“….”

Fan Li and Jia Sixie exchanged glances and saw the seriousness in the eyes of one another.

The current amount of grain was not enough, and the sole reason why others did not feel it was because they had a stable prediction of the grain production for the first half of the year.

If their predictions failed, the wilderness would be in chaos.

Even to say that the entire dynasty would be in trouble.

Fan Li thought about in and said, “Forgive me for being direct, but both calamities have a large amount of uncertainty. Is it not unwise to put all our eggs in that basket?”

Choosing a stable solution was the way to rule a dynasty.

Fan Li’s words made a lot of sense.

Ouyang Shuo smiled happily, “Fan Li cares about the country. I am pleased.”

“But.” Ouyang Shuo kept his smile. His eyes pretty much looked through the air at that unknown presence, “According to my intuition and judgment, this is not a gamble. If I’m right, there’s a 50% chance of the worse happening.”

Ouyang Shuo had a great understanding of how Gaia thought.

In the past five years, Gaia had not gone all out and was not vicious in its test of players. As long as the Lords did decently, they could survive well in the wilderness.

The 6th year would definitely be a separation point.

The tests that were about to come would only be more and more cruel.

Be it Silver Hand, Azure Badge, or Great Xia, they could not say that they could easily manage their own territories and continue to expand.

What was the point?

Gaia wanted strong people who could survive in the bad environment of Planet Hope and not people who relied on their current strength to bully the weak.

Due to that, Ouyang Shuo made such a judgement.

The 6th year of Gaia would definitely have a crisis that would cause problems for territories.

When Fan Li heard that, he sucked in a deep breath and nodded, “If you have 50% confidence, it’s worth a gamble.”

In front of such huge interests, not to mention with 50%, but even if it were just 30%, Fan Li would be willing to gamble with the king.

Fan Li firmly believed in the king’s judgment. A king always had foresight that normal people did not. Great Xia’s development proved that the king was someone who looked into the future.

After successfully persuading Fan Li, Ouyang Shuo smiled, “Since that’s the case, borrow 10 million from the Four Seas Bank to purchase large amounts of grain.”

With the size of the Four Seas Bank, loaning gold did not have much risk.

“Yes, my king!”

Fan Li was feeling really excited deep down, as this was a really sizeable amount.