The Empress came ashore and beheaded the meritorious officials, forcing me to wear the yellow robe

At first, the empress didn't care about the high interest on deposits.

but……

Over and over again, for several months, Boss Zhang kept his word! After paying the exorbitant interest...

The whole kingdom went crazy. Word spread from one person to ten, and from ten to a hundred, and everyone started sending money.

In addition to merchants and officials participating, somehow the news reached the palace.

Many palace maids and eunuchs pooled their money and started lending money at high interest rates.

Eunuch Gao was one of them. The empress found out that he had taken money out of the palace.

When the emperor called the eunuch and asked him about the specific matter, the old eunuch was frightened to death.

He knelt down and tremblingly told the story...

It was thought that the empress would severely punish him, but unexpectedly, the emperor, who was high above him, not only did not punish him, but instead had evil intentions.

She asked Eunuch Gao, how much money is left in our treasury?

Eunuch Gao: “…”

Just like that, the empress scraped together 800,000 yuan! She even sent a eunuch to pass on the imperial decree, summoning Boss Zhang, a mere businessman, to the palace to see the emperor!

Good guy!

Since ancient times, scholars, farmers, artisans and merchants have been the lowest class!

How could the emperor personally receive him?

But now in Da Qi, the empress's treasury is only 800,000, so there seems to be nothing wrong with her meeting with Boss Zhang.

In a word, after the talks between the two sides, the Boss Zhang, who had superb acting skills, successfully deceived the empress and took away her 800,000 taels of silver.

Don't underestimate these 2 taels. If you follow the interest rate mentioned by Boss Zhang, he will have to pay 4 taels in interest every month.

It’s 28.8 taels a year, and the capital can be broken down in more than two years. Who wouldn’t want to do this business?

Like many people who dream of getting rich, the empress spent all her money and drained away all her assets just to get more interest from Boss Zhang.

Although Lao Zhang handled things very calmly, he didn't even reveal any clues when meeting the emperor.

but……

After returning home, he looked at the place he rented and the boxes full of silver, and he was so scared!

When his boss, Li Jize, first mentioned his Ponzi scheme, he thought it was childish. But after it was actually implemented, Lao Zhang was thoroughly aware of the greed and madness of human beings.

Now the entire capital, no! I should say the entire Da Qi.

The common people were exchanging their children for food, but the silver of the officials and the rich was almost going moldy.

As the amount of money grew, Lao Zhang became increasingly panicked. It's easy to imagine how he would react when the Ponzi scheme collapsed...

The entire Great Qi! From the emperor to the common merchant, I'm afraid they all have to greet his ancestors for eighteen generations.

How much money did Lao Zhang collect in a few months?

It is simply shocking that he has silver here, a full 70 million taels!

It can be said that Lao Zhang was very nervous, and the court of Da Qi was even more nervous than him.

For fear that the silver would be robbed, under the special care of the Wucheng Bingmasi, the security around Lao Zhang's residence can be said to be the best.

Fortunately, Lao Zhang, who was always worried, finally received news from Li Jize, the King of Qin...

That’s about it! Time to close the net!

What Lao Zhang has to do now is the same as before...calmly bring the silver on board, then pretend to go out to sea, and finally hide the silver in a remote place without anyone noticing, and then have the brothers on "Liangshan" quietly transport it away.

Mmm! Perfect!

Of course, the brothers of Liangshan relied on this silver to survive, and the court also relied on this silver to make a fortune.

Naturally, there were also third-party forces that took a fancy to this batch of silver.

Who?

Rebel army!

Strictly speaking, the rebels are the victims of disasters who are suffering from hunger and are rebelling.

They were not professional soldiers, so naturally they did not receive any military pay. Basically, if they captured a city, they could rob some of the loot.

But the biggest share is basically taken by those at the top, and the subordinates get very little.

The capital was full of spies of the rebel army, and they naturally knew that a huge sum of money was about to be loaded onto a ship, going directly from the canal to "Tianjiang", and then out to sea from Tianjiang.

Therefore, the news was quickly sent out by the spies and reached the hands of the rebel leader, "King of the North" Li Zhenbei.

This time...

Li Zhenbei is attacking Zhongjing in the Central Plains, but the situation is not good!

First of all, Zhongjing was the ancient capital of 13 dynasties, which means its city walls were very high.

Secondly, since the prefect of Zhongjing has already reported to the court for help, it means that he will definitely fight to the end!

The worst thing is...

According to a letter from Wang Yuanya, a spy lurking in the Li family, the person going on the expedition this time is not the fool Li Jihuan, but Li Jin, the head of the Li family.

Although Li Jin's reputation was not as frightening as that of his eldest son, "General Tiance", he was also a veteran who had been on the battlefield for a long time. Moreover, he brought with him 800 family servants and could mobilize the garrison troops in the entire Central Plains.

Looking at Zhongjing, which was so close but had never been taken, news came that reinforcements were coming to rescue it.

A sense of unease began to permeate the entire rebel camp.

Li Zhenbei now faces two choices. He has not been able to capture Zhongjing. Should he continue to fight or retreat before Li Jin arrives?

But if we want to continue fighting, how should we fight?

Just when he was racking his brains, who would have thought that a piece of great news came.

A secret intelligence was delivered to the military camp. The content was very simple. A huge sum of money would be shipped out to the sea along the Tianjiang River from the canal of the royal capital. It was preliminarily estimated that there were tens of millions of taels of silver on the ship!

Seeing this astonishing figure, tens of millions of taels of silver...

Li Zhenbei jumped up excitedly!

If he had tens of millions of taels of silver, he could use it to reward the army. If he had this amount of silver, he could buy a large amount of food.

To put it bluntly, if he could get this money, even if he failed to rebel, it would be enough for him to have enough food and drink for the rest of his life.

Thinking of this, Li Zhenbei had an evil idea and ordered someone to bring a map...

Find out the route that Tianjiang takes to the sea, which provinces it passes through, and where is the most appropriate place to start.

After the location was finalized, Li Zhenbei immediately ordered the most elite soldiers in the army to take up their weapons, change into casual clothes, and sneak into the most suitable place to ambush.

Of course!

That alone wasn't enough. They needed to know exactly what this ship, loaded with tens of millions of taels of silver, looked like. When did it depart from the capital? Who was on board? What were its armaments?

If there is insufficient intelligence and we simply send people to ambush it, even if we know it will go through Tianjiang, how can we guarantee that we can ambush it accurately?

but……

It’s very difficult to get this information!

Li Zhenbei could only give another order, asking his ace spy Wang Yuanya to find a way to get all the information on the ship.

Very good! Well done.

By the time the information was passed back and forth and returned to the royal capital, it was already three days later.

That afternoon, the senior brother once again contacted his junior sister Wang Yuanya, "The Northern King has issued an order! Find out the information on the silver ship at all costs."