Volume 1 Princess Taiping Grows Up Chapter 53: Attracting Investment
Although Li Yuechen said that Fulai should take a vacation and rest for two days.
But he seemed a little restless. During the two days of rest, he was busy in Anfu Hall, as if he was afraid that he would be forgotten.
But when he saw that Li Yuechen's attitude towards him was no different from before, he finally felt relieved.
After resting for two days, Li Yuechen handed him a piece of paper and said, "Find a place outside the city to collect these things for me to use as fertilizer."
"May I ask, Your Highness, what is this 'thing'?"
"Forehead……"
Li Yuechen then remembered that there was no such word in this era, so he explained: "It's an object!"
Fu Lai nodded, but seemed a little confused: "Your Highness, why do you use the word 'thing' to refer to an object?"
"This... doesn't Chang'an have two markets, the East and the West? So I think that the word 'East' can refer to objects..."
While I was explaining, I suddenly thought of a question. My mother is a princess. Is it necessary for me to explain it to you so clearly?
So he just waved his hand and said, "Don't ask so many questions, just do it!"
Fulai also knew Li Yuechen's temper, so he was not afraid. Instead, he smiled and and said, "Yes!"
After walking out of Anfu Hall, Fulai opened the paper given by Li Yuechen, and saw various things written on it, including plaster of Paris, fresh cow dung, etc.
So he sighed slightly. These things could not be completed in a day or two. He needed to leave the palace to handle them properly.
…
It is the season when various fruits are on the market, and Li Zhi has also given a lot of fruits to Li Yuechen.
After all, she is his most beloved daughter. Every time new tribute fruits arrive, the first thing he thinks of is to share some with Li Yuechen.
A new batch of grapes was recently presented as tribute, and Li Zhi sent a lot of them at once.
In fact, the Tang Dynasty did not originally produce grapes, but during the reign of Emperor Taizong, grapes were successfully planted near Chang'an, which also led to the development of wine.
It seems that Taizong himself likes to make wine, and he makes it himself.
Xiao He brought over a plate as blue as the deep sea, put the washed grapes on it and placed it on the table.
"Your Highness, these are grapes given by the Saint."
Li Yuechen nodded: "Well, put it down first."
She wasn't worried about whether it was poisonous or not, as everything sent into the palace was tested for poison and taste. But she was thinking about something right now and had no plans to eat it for the time being.
Looking at Shangguan Wan'er who was swallowing her saliva with her eyes wide open, Li Yuechen waved: "Wan'er, come and eat some too."
"Thank you, Your Highness!"
Shangguan Wan'er smiled brightly when she heard this, and trotted over, grabbed two grapes and put them in her mouth.
Then he raised his head and said, "I want to give some to my mother."
"Eat." Li Yuechen nodded while writing and drawing on the paper, and agreed, "Xiao He, if you want to eat, eat some too."
Xiao He also smiled and said, "Thank you, Your Highness."
Then he picked up a bunch of the smallest ones and said, "We servants can only eat these. This is a gift from the Saint. Your Highness, please eat more."
"Yeah." Li Yuechen agreed casually.
Just as she was about to continue writing, she suddenly glanced at the plate and was stunned.
Then he put down the brush in his hand, reached out his hand, and poured all the grapes onto the table, then he looked at the plate carefully.
When Xiao He and the others saw this, they thought she was angry and were about to apologize, but they saw Li Yuechen tap the plate in her hand lightly, looked up in surprise and asked, "Where did this plate come from?"
Hearing her question, Xiao He was slightly stunned, then thought for a moment: "It seems to be... a glass plate presented by a foreign envoy..."
Li Yuechen thought it was porcelain at first and didn't think much about it, but when she took a look at it accidentally just now, she found that it was actually glass!
Although it is not transparent glass and there are many bubbles inside, it shows that glass technology had already appeared in this era.
In the past, she always thought that the colored glaze of this era referred to things like crystal gems, but she didn't expect that even glass would appear.
"Can our Tang Dynasty make this thing?" Li Yuechen looked up and asked.
Xiao He nodded: "Yes, but 90% of the colored glaze produced in the Tang Dynasty is green, and occasionally there are colorless and transparent ones, all of which are rare treasures."
Li Yuechen nodded slightly and began to think secretly.
Green glass, that should be because when it was fired, there was more copper or iron in it. What should be added? I think it should be manganese?
"That is to say, our Tang Dynasty has the method to make this glass...colored glass, right?" Li Yuechen asked.
"Yes." Xiao He nodded and replied, "The Glass Workshop under the Shaofu Supervisor is responsible for this."
Li Yuechen nodded. Now it was good. It seemed that there was no need for her to try it herself. This matter could be handed over to the craftsmen.
Thinking of this, Li Yuechen, who was in a very good mood, put down the plate in his hand, smiled and waved his hand: "Come, eat grapes! Xiaohe, go call my two sisters, come together!"
“Yes!”
Originally, Li Yuechen was still worried about how to do this thing. After all, although she knew the method, she knew nothing about the technical stuff.
Now, the Tang Dynasty actually had glass technology, so making transparent glass might save a lot of time.
However, people of this era probably don’t know about manganese, so they can only look for natural manganese ore.
I seem to have heard that Li Yuechen used to travel all over the world.
It seems that there are manganese mines in Hunan and Sichuan? However, these two places are so large that it is difficult to find them.
As a princess of a country, it is impossible for her to go to the mountains every day, so she can only offer a reward and send people to look for him.
This matter should indeed be put on the agenda, but it is not easy to ask Li Zhi for the reward now.
After all, there is still no clue about it. When we really make a magnifying glass, we can tell Li Zhi to expand the scale and start looking for it.
Not to mention that it is now time to harvest fruits for canning, and the start-up capital still has to be paid by Li Zhi first.
…
Two days later, Fu Lai returned to the palace and reported to Li Yuechen that everything had been secured and was in a village outside Luoyang City.
Li Yuechen nodded and planned to go and see it in person in a couple of days.
After practicing in the morning, he ran to Renshou Hall to find Li Zhi and his wife.
"Oh, Chen'er came early today." Li Zhi said with a smile.
Li Yuechen chuckled and said, "How about I have lunch with you two adults today?"
"Okay." Li Zhi agreed without hesitation. He was of course very happy to have dinner with his daughter.
Wu Zetian glanced over here and asked: "Why do you want to have lunch together today?"
"I haven't had a meal with my parents for a long time, so I came here today." Li Yuechen looked a little embarrassed when he said this. "By the way... I want to discuss a small matter with my parents..."
"snort!"
Wu Zetian had an expression that showed she had seen through everything. She sneered and continued to review the memorials with her head down.
Li Yuechen also smiled awkwardly. There was nothing she could do. As expected, all her mothers were like this.
After lunch, Li Yuechen personally poured a cup of tea for the couple before telling them his purpose.
"It's the season for fruits to be put on the market now. I want to start making canned fruits. I want Grandpa to invest and give me shares ..."
"Wait." Li Zhi interrupted her, holding a health ball in his hand and asked, "What does this investment and shares mean?"
Li Yuechen explained patiently: "Grandpa will pay me some money to make canned food now. After the shop is opened and the food is sold, I will give you dividends every year. The profit will be divided into 30% and 70% between me and grandpa!"
"Why only 70%?" Li Zhi asked puzzledly.
"Seventy percent of it belongs to the child!"
Li Yuechen reminded him, and almost couldn't help but add, "You still have to look at my face to get 30%!" But in the end, he didn't say it...
"Grandpa, please don't underestimate this 30%. This means that as long as this shop is still there, Grandpa will get 30% every year. In this way, if Grandpa needs anything in the future, he will have money to use, such as disaster relief..."
After listening to her explanation, Li Zhi finally understood what was going on.
After thinking for a while, he asked, "Doesn't that mean that if this shop becomes big in the future, no matter how much profit it makes, I can get 30% every year?"
"Yes!" Li Yuechen nodded, "That's exactly what I meant."
Li Zhi smiled and said, "Okay, I'll pay for it!"
"Grandpa is so awesome!" Li Yuechen raised his hands and shouted, then gave him a big hug.
Before Wu Zetian could say anything, Li Yuechen rushed over and gave her a hug.
"Get out of here!"
She pretended to be disgusted and pushed Li Yuechen away, "All you do is think about these things that don't belong to your job. Look at you, don't you look like a princess at all!"
Li Yuechen smiled and hugged her again: "Hehe, I am a princess, why should I care about what others think? As long as my parents are happy, I am happy!"
"All you do is flatter me all day long!" Wu Zetian said as she pushed her away again.
However, judging from the smile on her face that she could barely hold back, it was clear that she did not object to her daughter's intimate behavior with her.
After playing around for a while, Li Yuechen announced his departure.
After watching his daughter go out, Li Zhi suddenly laughed, and the health ball in his hand spun rapidly: "Originally I thought Chen'er was suitable to be a general, but now it seems that even if he is sent to the Ministry of Revenue, he can accomplish great things... He is a versatile person!"
"Your Majesty, please don't joke." Wu Zetian reminded him, "As a girl of the first rank, how can she enter the court and serve as an official?"
Li Zhi smiled and replied: "In our Tang Dynasty, since women can lead troops to fight, why can't they serve as officials?"
"this……"
Wu Zetian was a little speechless for a moment, "But after all, this is the ancestral rule..."
"Yes... this is the ancestral rule. It has been like this for thousands of years!" Li Zhi nodded, as if he was asking his wife, but also as if he was asking himself, "But does the fact that this has been the ancestral rule for thousands of years prove that this is right?"
Wu Zetian put down the brush in her hand and looked at Li Zhi beside her, a little dazed for a moment.
She knew her husband very well and was well aware that he was an emperor who was very good at breaking the rules.
And what he said at this moment was probably not just talk, he really had this idea! He was really thinking about the feasibility of this matter!
…
Li Yuechen, who has already left, did not know how advanced the thinking mode of an emperor who dared to propose "abdication to the queen" in history was compared to this era, and how daring he was to think and do.
She was currently humming a song and riding her tricycle towards Anfu Temple because she had just secured the start-up capital.
After a small drift, the tricycle stopped at the gate of Anfu Hall. Li Yuechen jumped off the tricycle, trotted back to the hall, and sat down in front of his desk.
When she has nothing to do and is practicing calligraphy, she would think about some things that might be useful in this era and write them down.
She was not worried about being seen. For one thing, if she did not explain what she wrote, it would be difficult for people of this era to understand it, especially some chemical symbols that are still remembered today.
Secondly, no one dares to touch her things without her consent.
That evening, the funds promised by Li Zhi had all arrived. Fu Lai was about to report, but Li Yuechen waved his hand and said, "Tomorrow we will go outside the city to see how the composting is going. Also, go collect some fruit peels for me."
"Fruit peel?" Fulai was a little confused.
"Yes." Li Yuechen nodded. "This is the season when fruits are on the market. Most people cut the fruit before eating it. Go and buy them back for me at the price of one dollar for five kilograms. Even the rotten ones are accepted!"
A five-jin fruit peel of Kaiyuan Tongbao is actually a bit expensive. But considering the quick collection, I can only spend money on it.
Li Yuechen remembered that she had seen people using fruit peels as fertilizer when she lived in the countryside, so she planned to give it a try to maximize the success rate.
Although Fulai didn't know what the point of doing this was, since the princess had given the order, he had no choice but to do it.
Anyway, Li Zhi's funds have all arrived, so he can just release the news and pay with cash.
Li's Spice Shop in the South Market of Luoyang City has reopened, but the plaque has been removed and it no longer sells spices.
There is a notice posted at the door, saying that fruit peels are sold for one dollar per five pounds. If they are rotten, they are sold for one dollar per seven pounds.
Fu Lai did this not with the intention of embezzling money, but to save some money for the princess.
Such news spread quickly in the downtown area, and soon it had spread to almost every corner near Nanshi, and was still spreading forward.
These days, families that could live in the capital were almost all well off, especially servants in some wealthy families. After seeing this notice, they immediately became interested.
After all, wealthy families eat a lot of fruit. If they could collect some fruit peels to sell, that would be some pocket money, right?
No one can resist money, so after this news came out, many servants in charge of purchasing for wealthy families decided to go back and secretly collect the fruit peels.
Inside the shop, Fulai was giving instructions to his nephew.
"Listen carefully, every account in this shop must be kept clear. If we find out that you have embezzled money, we will never forgive you!"
"Uncle, don't worry. I understand!" Wang Xiang answered respectfully, but then asked curiously, "I heard that your uncle is working for Her Royal Highness the Princess. Why does Her Royal Highness want to open a shop?"
Fu Lai glared at him and said, "You little bastard! Don't ask questions that you shouldn't ask! You might lose your life!"
"Yes, yes, yes... nephew, I spoke too much!" Wang Xiang apologized quickly.
Fu Lai looked outside the door and whispered, "You kid, do your job well. His Highness is very favored by the Emperor now. If you can make His Highness happy, it is not impossible for him to reward you with an official position in the future!"
"Oh, then I have to rely on my uncle!" Wang Xiang smiled.
