Chapter 425 Solving the Mystery
Xiao Lin nodded. “The well salt of Bashu, the pond salt of Hedong County, and the sea salt of Bohai County are all controlled by the Guanlong nobles. Your Highness should have a deep understanding of why the Guanlong nobles seized Jiangdu five years ago, but Your Highness certainly can’t imagine what they really want to grab.”

“Huai salt!”

Xiao Xia suddenly realized that he had been confused all these years, thinking that the Guanlong nobles were coming to seize the land and trade in the south of the Yangtze River. Now he realized that they were coming to steal the Huai salt. He now understood why Yuan Min was the governor of Jiangdu County.

He finally understood the answer to the riddle his father gave him: “salt”.

“It seems that I am still just floating on the surface!” Xiao Xia said with a wry smile.

Xiao Lin said slowly: “There are many hidden dangers here. In the past, the southern salt industry was controlled by the southern noble families. Later, when the Southern Chen Dynasty was destroyed, the northern nobles intervened. However, in order to ease the hatred of the southern noble families, the late emperor also restrained the Guanlong nobles for many years.

But in fact, they could not restrain it. The Guanlong nobles still came in through various means to support local tyrants. These big salt merchants lurking underwater were the local tyrants supported by the Guanlong nobles.

The Guanlong nobles also arranged officials to protect them. Wei Lihu, the governor of Jiangdu County, was from the Yuan family. Because of you and the failed assassination attempt on King Han, Wei Lihu was abandoned by the Guanlong nobles. Yuan Min took over the seal of the governor and continued to protect the powerful salt merchants.

Over the years, the Guanlong nobles took the lion’s share, while the powerful salt merchants took the smaller share, and gradually they took away the salt business from the Jiangnan families. How could the Jiangnan families not hate them?

This time, Your Highness forced Wei Yue to leave, which may also cause a shock to the salt business.”

“Is Wei Yue also protecting these salt merchants?”

“Your Highness, there must be a connection. As far as I know, when Wei Xiaokuan was commanding the Battle of Yubi, he seized the Hedong County Salt Pond. Later, in order to commend him, the Northern Zhou court allowed the Wei family to obtain brine salt from the salt pond. The Wei family has always been in the salt business. Later, the Guanlong nobles seized the Hedong County Salt Pond. Once, Wei Yue let it slip when he was entertaining guests. He said that the Wei family had always obtained salt from the northwest. I don’t know the details.”

“Get salt from the northwest?”

A light flashed in Xiao Xia’s mind, and he seemed to understand something?
Isn’t the salt from the northwest the Qinghai Salt Lake? Could it be that the Wei family has been secretly dealing with the Tuyuhun nobles? If I kill all the Tuyuhun nobles, I will also cut off the Wei family’s financial resources.

No wonder Wei Chong hated himself so much for killing the Tuyuhun nobles.

Xiao Xia pondered for a long time and asked again: “What is the relationship between the Wei family and the Guanlong nobles?”

“Wei Yue took office in Wu County in the fourth year of Renshou. At that time, Crown Prince Yang Yong was in power. It was the Dugu family who recommended him to Wu County. It can be said that the Wei family initially had a cooperative relationship with the Guanlong nobles, but as the emperor ascended the throne and Wei Chong became prime minister, with the help of the relationship with Qi Wang Yang Ling, the Wei family began to split from the Guanlong nobles. Your Highness saw the salt merchant Lin family on the road. It is actually a salt merchant in Wu County, not a salt merchant in Piling County. At first, he was a small salt merchant, but now he is among the top salt merchants in Jiangnan. He was actually supported by the Wei family and has no relationship with the Guanlong nobles.”

“Did King Qi Yang Ling extend his influence into Jiangnan?” Xiao Xia asked again.

“Your Highness, are you talking about going through the Wei family?”

Xiao Xia nodded, and Xiao Lin shook his head and said, “I don’t know about this, but I think even if the King of Qi extended his hand to Jiangnan, he was used by the Wei family.”

“It seems that my decision to drive Wei Yue out of Wujun was a good move by mistake.”

Xiao Lin stroked his beard and smiled, “Your Highness, please think about how to play the next chess game.”

“Does the Jinling Xiao family also do salt business?” Xiao Xia asked again.

After a while, Xiao Lin smiled bitterly and said, “It’s hard for me to answer this question. If Your Highness wants to know, you can ask the Xiao family in Jiangdu when you have a chance!”

After saying goodbye to the Xiao family in Jinling, Xiao Xia had been thinking about the issue of salt monopoly. Salt monopoly has always been a major taxation issue for the imperial court, starting from the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period, and has continued for a thousand years, including the Northern Wei and Northern Zhou dynasties. The rulers of the Sui and Tang dynasties could not have been unaware of the huge profits.

However, the salt industry in the Sui and Tang dynasties abandoned its monopoly in the third year of Kaihuang and did not resume it until the middle of the Tang Dynasty, with a period of more than a hundred years of silence.

To put it nicely, it means not competing with the people for profit. Who are these people? They are definitely not Zhang San in the east of the village or Li Si in the west of the village. They can only be the powerful and wealthy.

The most powerful people in the Sui and Tang dynasties were the Guanlong nobles. The more than 100 years of salt monopoly gap coincided with the period of rise and fall of the Guanlong nobles.

Xiao Xia gradually understood his father’s plan. He asked the second son Yang Ling to go to Hebei and himself to go to the south of the Yangtze River. In fact, he controlled the sea salt producing areas in the south and the north. In addition, the army controlled the salt producing areas in the West Sea and did not allow private development. This laid the foundation for the future salt market in Guanlong.

Xiao Xia already had a direction in mind. After the canal dredging was completed, the next step was to firmly grasp the salt industry in his own hands.

At this time, Fang Xuanling walked into the cabin and placed a cup of tea on Xiao Xia’s table. Xiao Xia smiled and said, “General Fang, let me find something for you to do!”

Fang Xuanling quickly clasped his fists and bowed, “Please give your orders, Your Highness!”

Xiao Xia pondered for a moment and said, “Take a dozen of your men and secretly investigate the salt market in Jiangnan, including the origin, salt merchants, prices, etc. You don’t need to investigate too many areas, just Jiangdu County, Danyang County, Piling County, and Wu County. You can find the Xiao family in Jiangdu and Piling. They are more familiar with the situation, so you will know where to start. I will give you three months to conduct the investigation.”

“I humbly obey my orders!”

Fang Xuanling bowed and left. Xiao Xia spread out a piece of letter paper and began to write a long letter to his father, explaining his reasons for driving Wei Yue away. He also mentioned that Wei Yue was secretly protecting the salt merchants of Wujun and controlling the salt market of Wujun.

Xiao Xia suggested using the power of the Jiangnan families to drive the Guanlong nobles out of Jiangnan. He suggested appointing Xiao Lin as the governor of Jiangdu County, Gu Changqing as the governor of Wu County, transferring Yuan Min from Jiangdu County, and Dou Shan from Piling County, and recommended Zhou Mo, the chief historian of Former Liang County, as the governor of Piling County.

Xiao Xia wrote at the end: “All my arrangements are preparations for the Jiangnan Road General Administration Office to control the Jiangnan Road salt and iron monopoly. Once the Jiangnan Road salt and iron monopoly is successful, it can be extended to the court to monopolize the salt and iron monopoly of the whole world.”

At nightfall, several carriages stopped in front of the mansion of Chief Secretary Gu Changqing. Four people were sitting in the VIP hall. In addition to the host Gu Changqing, there were several of his good friends, Lu Heming, Zhu Lie and Zhang Zhaoguang. The four of them were known as the Four Young Masters of Wumen. Behind them were the four major families of Wujun, Lu, Gu, Zhu and Zhang. They were all thousand-year-old families. Lu Xun, Gu Yong, Zhu Huan and Zhang Wen of the Three Kingdoms period were all their ancestors.

The Four Young Masters of Wu were all the legitimate sons and pillars of their respective families, and they all served as officials in Wu County. Lu Heming was the magistrate of Kunshan County, Zhu Lie was the county magistrate of Wu County, and Zhang Zhaoguang was the warehouse officer of Wu County.

The gathering of the four of them was not only an official gathering, but also represented their respective families.

Xiao Xia’s expulsion of Wei Yue shocked the Wujun officialdom and the people. It had been a hot topic on the streets of Wujun for several days, and the various aristocratic families in Wujun were of course very concerned about it.

Lu Heming shook his head and said, “The King of Jin is really cruel. I heard that he killed tens of thousands of nobles from Tuyuhun and Dangxiang. This time he even publicly admitted that Liangzhou Sima Liu Huan was killed by a trap. It may not be a good thing for such a cruel prince to come to Jiangnan!”

Zhu Lie sneered and said, “He is not a civil servant. Brother Lu, don’t use the morality of a civil servant to measure him. He is a prince. Those royal family members are all ruthless. Yang Liang, the King of Han, also killed people like crazy. The key is that he drove Wei Yue away, which is good for us!”

Gu Changqing said in a deep voice: “I feel that he had planned to drive Wei Yue away for a long time. Prime Minister Wei Chong targeted him everywhere in the court. He must have been dissatisfied for a long time, so he took this opportunity to drive Wei Yue away.”

“Brother Gu, do you think Prince Jin will kill Wei Yue halfway?” asked Zhang Zhaoguang, who had been silent all the time.

(End of this chapter)