Mythical Three Kingdoms

Of course, as a part-time Minister of Finance, Chen Xi also needs to oversee food storage, the national economy, and other areas. In short, Chen Xi’s current situation involves a bit of everything, can do anything, and can also delegate tasks to others as a nominal responsibility. However, the thing Liu Zhang is doing interests Chen Xi very much.

After all, Chen Xi had previously thought about building a Western Han Expressway, followed by a Han-Cheng Expressway to connect Sichuan and Shu with the central government. You have to know that the significance of the previously built Grand Canal was not only for water transportation but essentially to connect the central government with the Northeast, the South, and the Central Plains.

It can be said that after the Grand Canal was completed, the entire Central Plains, except for the Northwest and Southwest Sichuan, areas where the nation’s ruling power is weak, were essentially brought under control.

For the Northwest Front, Chen Xi and Cao Cao have already agreed on the road directly leading to the Western Regions, a twelve-route national highway. Once completed, Liangzhou, and even further to the Western Regions and Onion Ridge, can basically be included within the ruling scope, meaning only Sichuan and Shu remain.

Actually, Sichuan and Shu aren’t far; the biggest issue there is the difficulty of the roads. The difficulty of Shu roads is not just idle talk; the difficulty of the plank roads simply breaks the ceiling for entry difficulty. This is why Chen Xi insists on building a road directly connecting the heart of Sichuan and Shu; without this road, Sichuan and Shu are basically the easiest provinces to fragment.

And now, inexplicably, Chen Xi finds that Liu Zhang’s idea matches his exactly: cut down the mountains, we want to go straight across without turning, build straight through.

To say how long the road from Hanzhong to the CD in Sichuan and Shu is actually not too long, but because it’s entirely a plank road, it’s extremely difficult to traverse, and the cost of time is generally dozens of times more than walking normally. So this road must be built, even for political significance!

Plus, within the Elder Faction, Sun Qian, who specializes in construction, dispatched geomancy experts who’ve already sent back some new observations, which are supposedly natural nurturing processes.

With the constant rise of Heaven and Earth Essence, the strength of the mountains and stones in nature has also experienced certain natural reinforcement. Besides, it doesn’t work as efficiently or quickly as human nurturing with a clear goal, the differences in other aspects aren’t significant, which means roads and rivers must not be delayed anymore.

Once the strength of mountains and rivers rises with the return of Heaven and Earth Essence to a certain level, the difficulty of some originally planned roads will drastically increase. Though it won’t lead to the situation where Legion Attack can’t shatter mountain peaks, it will definitely cause significant impact on the construction period.

The geomancy experts under Sun Qian even conducted experiments; some among them managed to refine gunpowder.

That person even considered it a Divine Artifact, thinking it could become a strategic weapon, so they conducted thorough research. Based on Chen Xi’s observation of the results, they roughly managed to produce black gunpowder, and the level has overtaken the Tang and Song Dynasties. After all, in this era with Inner Qi, the ease of research is evidently reduced.

However, after reaching this point, the other party decided to abandon it. According to Chen Xi’s understanding, abandoning it was perfectly acceptable. After all, due to an accident, over a hundred pounds of black gunpowder exploded and merely blackened the person and their clothes...

Following that, the focus shifted to using this material to research materials; as for scaring warhorses with it, forget it. Legion Attack can’t even scare them, with Zhang Fei for the smoke and countless others for the flames, yet still the Xiliang Iron Cavalry and Bingzhou Wolf Cavalry won’t shy away from confrontation.

Additionally, the difficulty of obtaining this stuff is too high. So, although it’s still produced, it’s no longer used for combat, but rather as an auxiliary tool to study material strength. The current situation is that twenty kilograms of this stuff sealed inside mountain rock holes can no longer shatter the rock.

In short, the significance of this stuff has become even more meaningless, it has completely turned into a toy. You have to know that mountain rock is merely a naturally nurtured entity, which is fundamentally similar to Chen Xi’s initial estimation. Cold weapons well nurtured in this era could probably slice open a battleship’s deck with a single strike...

Whereas shells from the end of World War II might not be able to break through a battleship’s deck in one shot. Similarly, if the current Lul Family’s Seventh Generation Ship were placed in World War II, probably only nuclear weapons could penetrate its defense, while other direct hits may not even penetrate the deck. Indeed, without the suppression of Cloud Qi, this era’s material properties are simply incomprehensible.

Thinking of these, Chen Xi realizes that he cannot delay any longer. Roads with complex terrain need to be built as soon as possible; otherwise, further delays will become trouble.

"What are your thoughts?" Chen Xi directly asked.

"We think, this road cannot be built by Liu Yizhou alone; we also need to contribute financially and physically. Ideally, we should contribute more money and effort." The three exchanged glances, and Zhen Mi stepped forward, looking at Chen Xi and said.

"Should it be loaned from my side, or gathered internally and then transferred to Yizhou under my name, or should there be direct investment from my side under the Han Dynasty’s name?" Chen Xi nodded, showing understanding, and then offered three suggestions.

"Invest under the Han Dynasty’s name, but loan part from you, while we gather another part ourselves, along with Yizhou’s contribution." Obviously, this group had thought it through before coming, they were merely reporting to Chen Xi.

The Han Dynasty’s name is indispensable; even if one wants to make money, this aspect cannot bypass the Han Dynasty. Similarly, Chen Xi’s bank cannot be bypassed; even if one’s not short on money, they must bring it along as a backer, while Yizhou’s contribution cannot be omitted, even if they don’t provide money, using the road’s future revenue as early collateral, the people in the chamber of commerce are willing to build it!

If this road is completed, it would truly be a golden path, so after receiving this news from Yizhou, all major chambers of commerce expressed willingness to support Yizhou in building this road. When these people pool together it’s definitely sufficient, and if it’s not, they can revolve funds while building, which will be enough.

Actually, they would prefer the Governor of Yizhou not to invest, but given the current situation, even if Liu Zhang doesn’t invest and just presents the plan, they are willing to invest and build it themselves, and Liu Zhang is even happy to see them do so; however, the cost of doing so will certainly upset Liu Zhang when he realizes it in the future.

As the saying goes, harmony breeds wealth; although these individuals have backing of various sizes, there’s quite a disparity when compared to Liu Zhang. Besides, Liu Zhang himself is a big shot, and has a huge backer, the Han Dynasty.

Since it cannot be bypassed, Liu Zhang needs to be included, and Wu Yuan here plans to return to Yizhou to negotiate with Liu Zhang, trying to get Liu Zhang to invest less and instead let him use future revenue as collateral.

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