The World Online

The scale of the storyline quest was huge and it also took up a lot of time, so Ouyang Shuo didn’t know where to start. He could only take it step by step. The only thing he could do now was to order the Construction Division to open a patio in Xinan University to be the place for the philosopher debate.

What Ouyang Shuo cared most about was to upgrade the territory. He opened the interface for the territory and applied for the upgrade. A notification resounded in his ear, which was checking for the basic requirements.

”System notification: Checking if Shanhai City meets upgrade requirements...”

”Requirement 1: Population reached the 100 thousand upper limit, requirement met!”

”Requirement 2: All basic structures are built, requirements met!”

”Requirement 3: Lord rank is at least a 3rd class Marquis, requirement met!”

”Requirement 4: Politics, economy, culture and military all not less than 65, requirements met!”

”Requirement 5: Core affiliate territories have at least reached grade 1 city, requirement met!”

Compared to the city grade, the upgrade requirements to a prefecture had requirements regarding the three affiliate territories. It was as if it was reminding the lords that at the prefecture grade, one shouldn’t neglect the building of affiliate territories.

”System notification: Congratulations player Qiyue Wuyi for meeting all requirements, will you apply to upgrade?”

”Apply!”

”System notification: Congratulations player Qiyue Wuyi for successfully applying, assigning upgrade quests.”

”Quest 1 [Recruitment]: Need at least one historical person who is willing to work for your territory.”

”Quest 2 [Organization moves in]: At least one NPC Chamber of Commerce is willing to move into the territory and help the economy.”

”Quest 3 [Culture Festival]: Hold a culture festival with a certain influence.

”Quest 4 [Army Group Trial]: An army group needs to go through a trial to prove its strength.”

”System notification: Out of the 4 quests, one needed to complete 2 to upgrade; the more quests completed, the bigger the rewards.”

Out of the 4 upgrade quests, they all made considerations out of all 4 aspects of the territory.

This was enough to show the difference between a city and a prefecture.

As the system mentioned, each lord when upgrading would face a different set of quests. Overall, their difficulties would be around the same level.

The upgrade quests didn’t have a time limit or a punishment for failure. If one couldn’t complete it, then they territory would be unable to upgrade, and one couldn’t reapply.

This. This was the greatest punishment.

The next day, Ouyang Shuo gathered Fan Zhongyan, Cui Yingyu and Baiqi to divide up the upgrade quests. Fan Zhongyan was in charge of leading the Administration Department to prepare for the culture festival; Yingyu would be in charge of contacting the Cui Chamber of Commerce and discuss about them creating a branch; Baiqi would be the overall commander and would be in charge of the army group’s trial.

What was the most uncertain was the [recruitment] quest. Ouyang Shuo could only inform the various offices in the system imperial cities and ask them to search and recruit.

After that discussion, everyone stood up and left.

Before Yingyu left, she looked at Ouyang Shuo with a weird expression. ”Big brother, why do I feel that your entire temperament changed?”

”Really?”

”Ya, you have more prestige. When I first saw you, I was shocked.”

Ouyang Shuo nodded, knowing that the Dragon and Phoenix pendant was working. The two specialties of the pendant were starting to show themselves.

Last night, when he was cultivating, he could feel that under the stimulation of the pendant, the Chi in his body had improved. In just a few days he could break through to the 5th layer. Based on what was recorded, if one broke through to the 6th, he would have good fortune.

After Yingyu left, Ouyang Shuo started to deal with the administrative matters that were piling up.

Bai Nanpu had already arranged the letters based on priority and placed them on his table.

The first letter he picked up was from Gushan County Magistrate, Lei Fan. In the letter, he mentioned that things went well contacting the central mountain tribes. When the new year came, more of them would come down.

Apart from that, Lei Fan mentioned that the mountain barbarians in the north were different. It was going to be winter but some tribes went deeper into the mountains for unknown reasons.

Lei Fan guessed that there was a huge change deep in the mountains. He arranged spies to go in to investigate. As this was a huge matter, he reported it to Ouyang Shuo for him to settle.

Ouyang Shuo frowned. The mountain barbarian tribes were important soldiers, and there wasn’t any room for mistakes. He ordered the Military Intelligence Division to investigate and for Tian Wenjing to help out.

Putting down the worry of the mountain barbarians, Ouyang Shuo continued.

Now the letter in his hand was from the Four Seas bank treasurer, Meng Zhida. In it, he mentioned his suggestion for Shanhai City to use paper currency.

In olden china, during the South Song era, they used paper currency. Hence, it wasn’t considered an advanced thing. To use that in the game, one needed to fulfil two requirements.

Firstly, one needed a facility to produce and print the money. The territory must at least have a paper workshop and printing workshop. The paper could also be bought from outside, but the printing must be done by the territory. Apart from that, a professional must do it, designing and ensuring anti-forgery.

Secondly, one needed to set up a credit system. If the paper note wasn’t recognized, it was just a useless piece of paper without any value.

And to create this credit system, one needed to create a perfect reserve system. With Shanhai City as an example, if one wanted to use paper notes, the best choice would be the Four Seas bank. So, every 100 gold note would correlate with a 100 gold coins stored in the bank.

During the South Song Period, as the court mass-produced notes but didn’t have enough reserve gold, it made the notes lose value and become useless.

As for notes, it wasn’t that Ouyang Shuo didn’t have any plans. It was just that he wanted to do so in the latter stages of the game and now was just too early.

If it was a suggestion from others, Ouyang Shuo would naturally ignore it. But Meng Zhida was different. He was a professional talent in finance and was very careful. Since he made such a decision, this meant he had his thoughts as to why.

Ouyang Shuo gathered his thoughts and raised his head. ”Men!”

”Yes!” Bai Nanpu walked in.

”Call the Four Seas bank treasurer Meng Zhida.” Ouyang Shuo paused for a while. ”And Cui Yingyu, to discuss something!”

”Yes, my lord!”

Yingyu was right beside Ouyang Shuo so she reached quickly, ”Big brother, you’re looking for me?”

”Do you know about the Four Seas bank and the bank note thing?”

”Yes, Treasurer Meng raised the issue with me.”

”What are your thoughts?”

Yingyu frowned. ”When he reported to me, I thought banknotes and silver tickets were the same thing. He explained that it was a totally different concept. In truth, to such new things, I don’t know much, but it seems fine.”

Ouyang Shuo nodded. Although Yingyu was improving her knowledge about modern finances, if it was related to money and goods, she was still lacking.

No wonder Meng Zhida sent the letter to Ouyang Shuo. It was probably what Yingyu asked him to do.

While the two of them were discussing, Meng Zhida rushed in hurriedly. When he saw the letter in Ouyang Shuo’s hand, he roughly knew what was going on.

”Uncle Meng, in principle, I agree with the banknotes, but as for the time, can we push it back?” When Ouyang Shuo discussed matters, he was always straight to the point.

”I think that to use banknotes, this is the best time.”

”Oh? Please elaborate.” Ouyang Shuo didn’t expect for him to be so certain and that made him very interested.

”There are four reasons. Firstly, as the economy starts to prosper, the trade volume increases; between merchants, one has to bring large amounts of gold, so it’s hard to bring and very inconvenient.”

Ouyang Shuo nodded. NPCs didn’t have storage bags; a gold coin was 20 grams, so 1000 gold was 20 kilograms, needing a professional to carry it.

Hence to solve this problem, people in the olden days decided to use banknotes.

”Secondly, as the affiliate territories upgrade to city level, inter-territory trade would prosper. For example, the seafood and salt from Beihai County would go from Youyi river and Qiushui river to sell in Tianfeng City; the trees from Yongye City would be sold in Beihai City. All this is pushing for the birth of banknotes.

Meng Zhida’s words made Ouyang Shuo silent. The information he revealed was enough to raise his alertness. The trade in the territory was something he as a lord didn’t pay attention to. Seems like the military action recently had taken away a lot of his time and energy. If it were before, such a situation will definitely not occur.

Luckily with the arrival of Baiqi, the general could release Ouyang Shuo from military matters.

”Thirdly, the Four Seas bank has a lot of gold, which is sufficient to print banknotes.”

During the first 10 days of the 10th month, Ouyang Shuo injected 40 thousand gold into the main branch, which was what gave Meng Zhida the confidence to suggest this.

”Fourthly, it takes a long time to prepare. Naturally, it’s better if we start the plan it early.” Meng Zhida listed out the four big reasons.

Ouyang Shuo nodded; he was totally convinced. ”Uncle Meng’s words have opened my eyes. Since that’s so, let’s do it! Describe your specific plans.”