If you traveled back to ancient times, while others ate Guanyin clay, you would actually have giant

"Those present here are all my trusted ministers, so I will not hide anything from you."

After Li Tiancheng finished speaking, he paused slightly. The people below knew that tonight's dinner was about to get down to business, so they all perked up.

"As you all have seen, the development speed of Dalong is too fast, far exceeding expectations. First there was Gaoli, then Dazi, Zhou Wu even discovered Hainan Island, and now another Tubo has arrived. The land area of ​​my Dalong has doubled."

At this point, everyone's faces beamed with pride; at this moment, the identity of a member of the Great Dragon Clan was their pride.

"Rapid development is certainly a good thing, but problems have also emerged one after another. The most important problem now is that there are no officials to govern the new territory."

This problem was encountered when they were conquering the Dazi Kingdom. At that time, everyone pooled their wisdom and efforts and managed to solve it with difficulty. But now that another Tubo has come, there is really no other way. That's why Li Tiancheng turned his attention to these regional officials.

Why? Because within these people's fiefdoms, there were many talented individuals who were not officially registered with the imperial court.

These people were talents recruited and gathered by the feudal lords and were not part of the imperial court's official system, but their abilities were definitely superior to those of the imperial court officials.

Li Tiancheng was after them, hoping these lords would support the imperial court.

"Your Majesty, my fiefdom is willing to support you with fifty men."

"Your Majesty, my fiefdom is small, but I am willing to provide support of thirty people."

These people seemed to have rehearsed it; as soon as the emperor finished speaking, they began to express their opinions.

However, Zhou Wu was right. These leaders were indeed people Li Tiancheng had already colluded with, just to set an example for the majority.

Actually, there's nothing wrong with providing some talent, but Zhou Wufeng's situation is a bit special. He only has one city, Nanhai, which is newly built. He doesn't even have enough officials himself, so he has to do the work of three people. There's really no one to provide support.

But in this situation, if you don't provide support, wouldn't that be blatantly disrespecting the emperor?

"Your Majesty, I will send one hundred men as reinforcements."

The last to speak was Zhang Fan. He had the most supporters among those present, and even Li Tiancheng had completely forgotten his earlier dissatisfaction with him.

But after Zhang Fan finished speaking, he turned and looked at Zhou Wu provocatively.

"Lord Zhou, why aren't you saying anything? Could it be that you don't want to support His Majesty?"

That's a rather malicious remark.

“Your Majesty, my fiefdom truly lacks sufficient officials to support you.”

"I know about the situation in Zhou Wu's fiefdom, it's alright."

Before Zhou Wu could finish speaking, Li Tiancheng expressed his opinion. Li Tiancheng was naturally aware of the situation in Nanhai City, and Zhou Wu's actions were within his expectations. He did not blame Zhou Wu.

“How can that be? Everyone has a responsibility to build the nation. His Majesty just said that everyone present is a pillar of the Great Dragon Empire. Lord Zhou, you support His Majesty so much.”

Zhang Fan had no intention of letting Zhou Wu off easily, so he seized this opportunity to thoroughly humiliate Zhou Wu.

“General Zhang, Lord Zhou’s fiefdom is indeed in a special situation, as my father and I both know, so there’s no need to make things difficult for Lord Zhou.”

At this moment, Crown Prince Li Junren also stepped forward to protect Zhou Wu.

This surprised Zhang Fan somewhat. What was so special about Zhou Wu that the emperor and the crown prince stood up to protect him until his death?

"Since Your Majesty and the Crown Prince are both protecting him, I have nothing more to say."

Even at the very end, Zhang Fan couldn't resist disgusting Zhou Wu and telling everyone that Zhou Wu had someone protecting him, unlike them.

Zhou Wu had been holding back all night. From the initial inexplicable provocation to the current sarcastic remarks, Zhou Wu decided to let Zhang Fan know that he had messed with the wrong person.

"Wait, General Zhang, I haven't finished speaking yet."

"Oh, Lord Zhou, is there anything else to say? His Majesty and the Crown Prince have both granted you permission not to serve the country."

Zhang Fan looked at Zhou Wu with a mocking expression, thinking to himself, "You're just a young punk, and you think you can fight me?"

"I did say there was no official support, but I didn't say there was no support from others."

"Lord Zhou, I don't understand what you're saying. Are you playing word games with me? I'm sorry, but I am a military officer."

"General Zhang, I know you're uneducated, but that's not your fault."

"you.."

"What I mean is that governing and rebuilding a place doesn't rely entirely on officials. Agriculture, industry, construction, computing, water conservancy, and so on all need to be restored and improved. Officials don't know these things, you know. Fortunately, there is an academy in my fiefdom that specializes in teaching students various professional skills."

When Zhou Wu finished speaking, the emperor and the crown prince were already beaming with joy. They then remembered that when they rebuilt Dazi and Gaoli, there was no deliberate shortage of manpower. Zhou Wu had suggested establishing a technical college to teach various technical knowledge.

It's just that we haven't talked about this topic for so long that everyone has forgotten about it.

These talented individuals are no less scarce than officials.

"There are approximately over a thousand graduates this year, and I am willing to provide them all to Your Majesty."

"Good, good, good."

Li Tiancheng said "good" three times in a row, expressing his joy and also representing Zhou Wu's contribution to this incident.

On the other hand, Zhang Fan's face looked like he had eaten a poisonous mushroom, turning red one moment and blue the next.

"Zhou Wu, on behalf of myself, I would like to offer you a toast to thank you for your continued contributions to the court."

Li Junren raised his wine cup and approached Zhou Wu. His words were not only about the talent support this time, but also about the many contributions Zhou Wu had made in other fields, which he had witnessed, and which Zhou Wu had not used to curry favor with the court.

Emperor Li Tiancheng did not stop the Crown Prince's actions, but nodded with satisfaction, indicating that he agreed with the Crown Prince's words and strongly approved of his current approach.

The other officials who had been sent to other posts immediately looked at this young man with higher regard, and were even more determined not to offend him easily. They would investigate Zhou Wu thoroughly when they returned to find out what made him so special.

Only Zhang Fan was staring at Zhou Wu with a sinister look, as if he wanted to tear him to pieces.

. . . . . . . . .

Ultimately, Li Tiancheng achieved his goal through this dinner party.

They obtained scarce officials from the feudal lords to fill the vacancies in the land allocation.

"Your Highness, you performed well tonight."

The Crown Prince's performance tonight was also quite commendable.

Li Tiancheng was pleased that the Crown Prince immediately sided with Zhou Wu when Zhang Fan and Zhou Wu clashed. At least the Crown Prince knew which side to take when two ministers had a conflict, and that it would be more advantageous to take that side.

Zhang Fan is old and frail, and he was the one who provoked first.

Zhou Wu is still young and his future development is limitless. Naturally, Zhou Wu is the best choice.

This is what emperors are like—very realistic.