The World Online

The next day, Ouyang Shuo didn’t get online until 10 AM in game time.

Bing’er’s winter vacation had started yesterday, and his little sister was wrapped around him all day. They strolled around, ate and drank, totally relaxing themselves.

In the front of the square was a sea of people. The Material Reserves Division was distributing the basic benefits and was extremely busy. Some of the determined villagers received their tickets and headed directly to the bank to get a house loan.

With the exception of the wine workshop and pottery workshop, the other shops and houses would have prices ranging around 60 silver coins. With everyone getting 20 silver coins issued, they would meet most of the conditions to get a loan to buy a house.

Ouyang Shuo expected that today, most of the listed properties would be sold out. Fortunately, the construction department had built hundreds of homes in anticipation of this day for people to live in, otherwise he wouldn’t have known how to salvage the situation.

He had calculated roughly, with the issuance of the various kinds of tickets, the total costs of privatization would cost over 600 gold coins. At this stage, he doubted any lord would be courageous enough to implement such generosity.

But it was all worth it. Ouyang Shuo looked at the economic index of the territory, and it had long passed 30 points, and was still rising. In this way, except for the population index requirements and mulberry farms, the conditions to upgrade to a town had all been met.

By 3 PM, the basic benefits had all been paid out. Following today, new immigrants would be collecting their benefits directly from the Material Reserves Division.

Waiting until everything had settled down a bit, Ouyang Shuo convened a meeting in the main room of the manor, to listen to the trophies arising from the extermination of the raider camp.

In the chamber, Zhao Youfang began the report. “This time, we collected a total of 11,450 units of food, 1200 units of wood, and 500 units of stone. We also seized 105 gold coins, 45 silver, and 72 copper coins, five building plans, and one special item: Summoning Talisman.

The wood, stone, and building plans basically came from the destruction of the camp. Since he didn’t personally lead the attack, as long as the enemy was broken, the camp would be automatically destroyed.

Except for the arsenal building blueprints which he had use for, the other four could only be sold off to the Market.

As for all the weapons and equipment, they were not within the scope of the findings. Ouyang Shuo had long ordered Lin Yi to take those back to the barracks and dispose of those themselves.

The, Gu Xiuwen began to report on personnel. “This time we recovered 125 noncombatants for the territory from the raider’s camp. Among these people are both a chef and breeder, as well as tailors and blacksmiths. They were all intermediate skill talents, except the breeder was an advanced talent.”

Ouyang Shuo nodded and said, “After privatization, the village dining hall will be disbanded. The chef will be sent to the barracks and will be specifically responsible for the food supply of the army. Arrange for the tailors to be sent to Little Mu’s tailor shop, she will put them to work. Assign the smiths to the weapons workshop, Wang Gao can take them as apprentices. As for the advanced breeder, he can be responsible for the pigs and cattle pens, we have a lack of people there.”

In Shanhai Village, skilled personnel were no longer a rarity. Therefore, Ouyang Shuo was also not like before, and didn’t examine each individual one by one to determine the situation in detail, instead lining them up and sending them off.

125 new people would save 8 days on their march to a township upgrade. Coupled with the surge following the Siege of Beasts, they were now 20 days ahead of schedule.

Today was February 10th. In five days, Shanhai Village could be upgraded again. Upgrading from a grade 3 village to a grade 1 town in only 13 days time was an amazing accomplishment. So far, no one in China could compare, even Di Chen with his limitless checkbook hadn’t caught up.

Out of the rewards of war, Ouyang Shuo took 100 gold coins, the building blueprints and the special item, a Summoning Talisman. The rest of the money naturally went to the Financial Division, with the food and other materials naturally sent to the Material Reserve Division’s storage area.

Before giving the building plans over to the Construction Division, Ouyang Shuo took a look at them.

Arsenal: Warehouse for storing weapons

Requirements: Arsenal building blueprints, 600 wood, 400 stone

Building time: 3 Days

Ouyang Shuo told the Construction Division to start putting up the arsenal within the next two days. The location would specifically be right next to the barracks and weapons workshop, of course.

Then, Ouyang Shuo took out the summoning token to examine its properties.

Summoning Talisman (king rank): Randomly summon a king rank historical figure for your use.

Although it was the lowest level of summoning talisman, it was still priceless. Ouyang Shuo did not expect that he would get so lucky, casually exterminating an intermediate raiders’ camp could get him such a treasure! He did not hesitate to tear the summoning talisman, a white light flashed, and a middle-aged scribe appeared.

“System Notification: Congratulations to the player Qiyue Wuyi for successfully summoning the historical figure Tian Wenjing, special reward of 50 reputation points.”

Seeing Ouyang Shuo, the scholar bowed deeply, saying respectfully, “I greet the lord!”

Ouyang Shuo was not neglectful and hurriedly stepped forward, his hands lifting the other, sincerely saying, “Please rise, sir! It is my pleasure to have you by my side, there is no need to bow!”

After the greeting, Ouyang Shuo quickly looked at Tian Wejing’s stats.

Name: Tian Wejing (king rank)

Title: Model Official of Xinjiang

Dynasty: The Qing Dynasty

Identity: Shanhai Village Villager

Occupation: Civil Servant

Loyalty: 75 points

Commander: 40

Force: 25

Intelligence: 70

Political: 85

Features: Official’s Clarity (enhances administrative efficiency of the territory by 20%); Iron Calm (enhances territorial prestige by 20%); Fair and Honest (enhances the territory’s honesty level by 20%)

Evaluation: One of Qing Dynasty Emperor Yongzheng’s three beloved officials, known for being tricky, clear-minded, and cool of heart all in one. During his governance period, the law was strict, there were almost no thieves in his jurisdiction, and he held to very strict deadlines whenever given the task to expand.

In terms of governmental ability, he was more adept than Fan Zhongyan. He had become an official at the age of 22, starting in Changle County, successfully becoming a magistrate. He knew the state, and also the officials outside his area. He had served as mayor, governor and other prestigious positions during his term, and was given the title of ‘Model Official of Xinjiang’ by the Yongzheng Emperor.

The main reason why Fan Zhongyan was praised by history was, in addition to government affairs, his character and literary achievements. Tian Wenjing was different, he was fundamentally a governing official. Although he was clean and honest, he was still known as a ‘strict official’ in name.

They complemented each other. With Shanhai Village having the two men, the government could carry on without worries. Precisely because of this, Ouyang Shuo issued out a happy sigh of relief.

Because the day was already becoming late, it was inconvenient to talk. Ouyang Shuo called on Gu Xiuwen, let him arrange a living area for Tian Wenjing, while giving him a good introduction to the basic situation of Shanhai Village. Gu Xiuwen had done this job before, and would have no problems with it.

In addition, Ouyang Shuo specifically told him to inform the secretaries of each division that there would be a meeting tomorrow at 9 AM in the chamber.

****************************

2nd month 11th day, the next morning in the chamber.

The director of the Administration Department and the other secretaries were there. Ouyang Shuo took his place in the middle and sat down, officially introducing Tian Wenjing.

After the greetings, Ouyang Shuo said, “After nearly ten days of effort, privatization has achieved initial success. Today, we have come to convene and discuss two things. After privatization, military supplies must be kept independent. In addition, with the cooperation of the carpentry workshop, territorial vehicles need to be included in the unified jurisdiction, so some of the functions of the Material Reserves Division are going to become more and more complicated.

“Therefore, I have decided to officially upgrade the Material Reserves Division to Material Reserves Department. Underneath it will now be the Combat Logistics Division, the Transportation Division, and the Resource Division.

“The Combat Logistics Division will be concerned with our arsenal, rations, and other military supplies, logistical supplies, as well as the well being of our horses.

“The Resource Division is responsible for the distribution of basic materials and the operation of the rice shops, meat shops and cloth factories. It will continue to oversee the logging stations, quarries, mining sites, and pastures, which are directly under the jurisdiction of the Material Reserves Department.

Zhao Youfang did not expect Ouyang Shuo to make such a big move, basically completely revising the remittance of the Material Reserves Department.

Not only was the duty of the Material Reserves divided into three parts, more ingenious was the fact that logging field, quarry, mining and ranching oversight was stripped out and placed directly under the director of the Material Reserves Department.

Not only that, the supply chain and reserve chain were elbowed apart, separated to avoid any dominance issue, which was Ouyang Shuo’s real intention.

Waiting a moment for all of them to adjust to this big move, Ouyang Shuo went on. “I have appointed Tian Wenjing as the Director of Materials Reserve Department, he will be the coordinator of territorial material reserves.”

Tian Wenjing stood up in a perfect salute, respectfully saying, “Thank you, lord! I will be dedicated and honor your trust, you need have no worries!”

There was no argument over this appointment. At this stage, he was the only suitable candidate who could be in charge of Material Reserve. The most promising candidate was Zhao Youfang, who couldn’t even control his division now, let alone this newly expanded Department.

“Mr. Zhao Youfang, deputy secretary of the prior Material Reserves Division, is now the secretary of the Combat Logistics Division. The secretary of the Transportation Division will be the original quarry field manager Zheng Shanpao. Former Material Reserves Division secretary assistant Du Xiaolan will be the new secretary of the Resource Division.” Ouyang Shuo rattled off the new subordinate personnel appointments for the divisions.

Zhao Youfang did not make a fuss. Ouyang Shuo had given him the Combat Logistic Division, so he was not being treated poorly. Zheng Shanpao, although his performance wasn’t eye-catching, before this, he only simply focused on the quarry. He took this chance to shift him to the relatively simple Transportation Division, which could be considered a formal step into an official’s career.

Du Xiaolan was one of Cui Yingyu’s apprentices, and was the key center of influence for Yingyu in the Material Reserves Department. She had done well as Yingyu and Youfang’s assistant, so he carefully put her in charge of the Resource Division, where she was the most appropriate.

*[Long Taos]: side characters in Chinese operas who perform acrobatics and fight scenes

*[12.47 to 13.07]: don’t ask me about the tree sap