In the hot summer, apart from the necessary work activities such as education and agriculture, Xu Chen spent most of his time in the palace, hiding in the cool attic to enjoy himself.
Make a root carving, dig out a gourd, make several utensils with gold and tin blocks, make a pendant with animal teeth, make a horn with animal horns, or spread out animal skin paper to write a diary to record your mood or some temporary creative inventions.
etc.
Of course, when he was busy, he would secretly have a tryst with Pi Wu, play with his son's pair of big milk bottles, or blatantly have fun with Ye in the attic.
The little witch would come to Xu Chen to discuss things every now and then, but what she liked most was to sit quietly next to him and watch Xu Chen knock, write and draw.
Every time she saw Xu Chen concentrating on her work, she always had an extremely gentle expression on her face. She would carefully tidy up the animal skins that Xu Chen had painted on, watch and read them carefully, and then put away each one as if it were a treasure.
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And every time at this time, Xu Chen is in the most peaceful and relaxed mood.
Although nothing happened between him and the little witch, and nothing might happen, the relationship between the two grew stronger day by day, and became stronger in this tranquil and gentle waiting.
There are many complex emotions in life, family affection, love, and friendship, all of which are the most important spiritual support.
Xu Chen insisted that he could change the destiny of mankind and worked hard to make the country of Ba prosperous and powerful, while the little witch silently guarded him and worked hard to help him fulfill this wish.
As long as the weather is fine, after dinner every evening, Xu Chen will take his son, daughter, Ye, the little witch, Pi Wu and others to play in the palace and temple gardens, play the flute and dance, and swim in the flower pond to cool off. The days are full.
And fulfilling.
May passed slowly in such a seemingly light but happy and leisurely way.
…
Things grow old when they are strong.
After entering June, the most violent rainy season has passed. Although there are still violent storms, they have become more frequent.
The water in streams, river valleys, ponds and ditches began to recede, and the mighty Ji Cang River with tidal flatness on both sides gradually revealed its flooded river beaches. The submerged low piers gradually emerged, and boats and rafts on both sides of the river began to communicate with each other again.
The crops on both sides of the strait have entered the mature stage. The farmland surrounding the entire royal city is dark green, and a good harvest is in sight.
The interior and exterior decoration of a large number of ancillary buildings in the royal city are also coming to an end. Some have been completed, while others are in the process of finishing.
The Yizheng Hall issued an order, notifying each tribe to start repairing the granaries, leveling the drying areas, and preparing rattan baskets, back baskets and other agricultural tools.
The military camp arranged for the imperial army to increase patrols inside and outside the royal city and in the settlements of various tribes every day. On both sides of the river in the entire royal city area, the people coming and going became more and more noisy and annoying every day, and the smell of harvest became stronger and stronger.
In mid-June, Xu Chen arranged for Pi Wu to be sent back to the Pi tribe.
Although he really wanted to keep Pi Wu in the royal city, the development of the Pi tribe was inseparable from Pi Wu's guidance and guidance, so Xu Chen couldn't do too much.
Zilong was already two years old, and Xu Chen left him in the royal city, hoping that this little guy who was born with a divine aura would receive better care and education, and would be able to inherit his arduous task of leading the development of the country of Ba in the future.
In late June, various tribes began to harvest large-scale farmland.
The focus of Xu Chen's inspection was still the rice harvesting of the Cicha people.
Compared with harvesting wheat and beans in dry land, rice is much more troublesome, because there is still water in the rice fields, and men, women, old and young have to step through mud and water to harvest, and the speed is obviously much slower.
However, Xu Chen was still very excited when he saw the baskets of rice harvested and brought to the shore. Although the colors were still quite messy, Xu Chen was still very excited.
After the rice is dried and screened, most of it will be distributed as rice seed, but in the end there will definitely be a lot left for consumption.
Of the 400 acres of paddy fields, approximately dozens of acres were affected by waterlogging. Although the production has been reduced, it has not reached the point of no harvest.
According to the evaluation of dozens of acres of rice fields that have been harvested, the average rice yield this year is still close to 60 pounds, and the final total harvest will exceed 24,000 pounds.
Thousand catties, the income is 50% higher than that of dry land of the same area.
This is a very exciting and impressive growth figure.
Therefore, faced with such a big harvest, the Cicha people were particularly excited, and the heads of the tribes and the three little witches who came to observe were even more excited.
Last year's rice harvest was very small, and almost all of it was reserved for rice seed, which was not even enough. In the end, two batches of more than 2,000 kilograms were shipped back from the Cicha tribe to meet the sowing needs.
Therefore, even if Xu Chen wanted to eat it, he could only try something fresh.
But this year was different. From the time when the first batch of new rice was harvested and dried, Xu Chen couldn't wait to invite the three witches and the chiefs and officers of each tribe to have a delicious meal. He finally satisfied his worries about the fragrant rice.
miss.
Because the current farmland area is too large, coupled with the primitive manual harvesting methods and occasional heavy rains, the entire autumn harvest process lasted from the end of June to the end of July before slowly ending.
During the grain harvest, the Yizheng Palace also began to collect a new round of grain taxes from the settled tribes near the royal city based on the newly promulgated tax decree last year.
The granary of the royal city is now almost at its bottom.
The big consumer is the Royal City Forbidden Army.
This group of young hunters, who are the most well-dressed from each tribe, do almost nothing except training. After eating and drinking, they train non-stop. Their only leisure activity is to arrange for people to patrol on horseback inside and outside the royal city every day.
Although this job does not seem to be of much significance, it also greatly deters the barbaric groups from various tribes who have the habit of stealing and are prone to fights.
Of course, Xu Chen's main purpose of arranging patrols was not to prevent theft and fights, but to patrol ditches, ponds and river banks to prevent accidents such as falling into the water.
In Xu Chen's view, primitive people were actually very easy to manage.
Because they are very simple and honest in mind. This simplicity is not kindness, but a kind of reverence for nature similar to the mentality of beasts. They may not be afraid of poisonous snakes and beasts, hunger, or even death, but they are most afraid of offending the gods.
Because after offending the gods, not only will you be punished, but the entire tribe may also be affected.
Therefore, as long as you hold high the sign of gods, you can rule well through the group of witches.
Stealing and fighting are the instincts of animals, and they are also the ability of human beings to thrive in this primitive and barbaric era.
Stealing things from strange tribes is not only not a shame in their eyes, but a kind of credit to their own tribe, because it increases food and wealth for their own tribe.
As for fighting, both men and women, old and young, can fight, and fights with tribes of different groups can be almost overwhelming, even to the point of death.
Even in the highly civilized era tens of thousands of years later, there are still endless incidents of whole-village fighting with weapons in many villages.
As for stealing, it has become a kind of profession, which is known as the way of survival for people in the lower-class society.
Therefore, it is impossible to completely prevent these two things from happening. The only way is to use force higher than the ethnic group to intimidate and suppress, so as to minimize the occurrence of such public security problems.
Although the cost of establishing the Forbidden Army is huge, almost half of Pakistan's tax revenue last year was spent on this team of only a hundred people.
But it is undeniable that the presence of the Forbidden Army has greatly increased the security of the Royal City area.
Every day when these imperial troops patrolled by on horseback, all the men, women, and children of all tribes would unconsciously feel nervous and obviously have a sense of awe.
Even those hunters who are usually unruly and unruly except for Xu Chen and Wu, will act like they are very obedient every time they see the Forbidden Army appear.
It's not that the Forbidden Army is very capable of fighting. These stupid young men who have just trained for a few months are not the best hunters in each tribe, but they represent the palace, His Majesty the Witch King, and the three military and political palaces.
Boss, once you are caught fighting and causing trouble, no matter how bad you are, you will be taken to the Fazheng Hall and given a severe spanking. In severe cases, you will be fined and sentenced to reform through labor.
At first, some people laughed at the joke, but after experiencing it a few times, everyone became much better behaved.
Because the beating was in vain, even the clan leader and the great witch of the clan would be ashamed, and then they would be punished not to drive piles, not to participate in hunting, not to enjoy the best food, etc.
Anyway, the Imperial Guards can't afford to offend.
In order to continue to maintain the existence of the Forbidden Army, the royal city must support the operation and expenses of the kingdom through taxation.
After autumn this year, some auxiliary government offices will be established, and there will be more freeloaders, so the demand for tax grains will be greater. From the beginning of preparations for the autumn harvest in mid-June, the order to pay taxes and grains this year has been conveyed through the Yizheng Hall.
Each tribe.
Ye is now the chief officer of the Wangcheng Warehouse. He has recruited several boys and girls from the Ba and Gonghuo tribes who are proficient in writing and calculation to serve as tax collectors. They travel by car between the tribes every day to calculate the taxes and grains that need to be paid.
The data is notified to each tribe, and then each tribe delivers the dried grain to the royal city granary as required.
So with the beginning of the autumn harvest, the tribes near the royal city began to transport the harvested grain to the royal city warehouse for payment.
Throughout July, almost every day, one could see several royal roads leading to the warehouses, filled with an endless stream of men and women carrying carts and horses to transport tax grains.
It has been three years since the construction of the Royal City Settlement. During these three years, the farmland area has almost doubled every year, and the food output has naturally increased significantly every year.
According to rough statistics in Kaichun, the amount of farmland on both sides of the Jicang River has reached nearly 20,000 acres.
If the average output of such farmland is calculated at 35 jins, the total grain income this year will reach an unprecedented scale of 700,000 jins.
This amount has basically satisfied the annual food consumption of nearly 3,000 people near the royal city.
These tribes are the main targets of the royal city's food tax collection. In addition, some tribes around the Gonghuo Basin will also levy a large amount. Most of the other remote tribes will collect and pay other taxes.
The storage of this batch of tax grains will completely alleviate the food consumption of the military camp.