Chapter 215: Open the Door, Let’s Do Business!
Yuan Ye was also a bit confused by the sudden changes in Wanjin. He was just following suit, habitually supporting industry and commerce, and never expected such a fierce reaction from the people—in his estimation, this phenomenon should have only started to show signs in another three to five years.
Perhaps, this was a “factor aggregation effect”?
Once certain conditions are met, without further human intervention, these conditions will naturally undergo a “chemical reaction” and produce corresponding results?
Now, Wanjin has been stimulated by policies, the expected market has expanded, leading to a surge in labor demand, further triggering the migration of rural populations, creating a multiplier effect, causing a large number of “zero marginal output” zero-value laborers to transfer to emerging industries and commerce, thereby greatly increasing the overall labor efficiency of society?
After labor efficiency increases and workers’ incomes rise, it will further expand demand, leading to “premium distribution” of a large amount of wealth, thus upgrading the consumption structure, and a large number of rural families will shift from “survival-oriented consumption” to “development-oriented consumption,” thereby further promoting the development of industry and commerce?
The next step is capital accumulation and technological expansion? Expand production or improve technology and processes, further increase production efficiency, and form a virtuous cycle of “profit-investment-growth”?
Until the expected market is realized?
In essence, this is a reallocation of labor, land, and commodity production between urban and rural areas, maximizing the efficient utilization of resources through market activation?
Yuan Ye didn’t quite understand. He regretted not just aiming for credits in his economics class back then and instead using all that time to sleep. Now, he wished he had studied more, as he couldn’t even clearly explain this most basic urban-rural dual-model development model. He was confused, but Wanjin’s development was ultimately a good thing. He just needed to guard against…
the Malthusian trap, and be careful to prevent man-made famines? And excessive urbanization, leading to large-scale slums? Or perhaps be wary of the price scissors effect, leading to rural impoverishment?
Social issues like economic disputes also need more attention. At least the laws and regulations in this area should be further improved, and it would be best to establish a separate department to handle these matters.
Yuan Ye, as Wanjin’s foremost “economist” at present, cautiously observed the sudden surge of vitality in Wanjin, continuously taking notes, with new ideas constantly popping into his mind. He felt that this year’s tax reports should look quite good.
Of course, the core of all this lies in whether the “expected market” can be realized.
If the expected market cannot be realized, all of this will be an illusion, disappearing in an instant. Most of these workshops, one by one, will likely go bankrupt, and more than half of the workshop owners might even hang themselves.
Therefore, this “sales expedition” cannot be taken lightly. Even if there isn’t much gunpowder smoke and not too many people die, this war can still determine Wanjin’s future.
If it fails, Wanjin will be forced back to its original state and won’t recover for the next five to ten years.
If Wanjin can’t recover, Yuan Ye won’t have the strength to land in North Ise and seize territory. Without territory, he can’t continue to develop. If he can’t develop, he won’t be able to complete his ultimate plan, and all the suffering he endured during this transmigration will have been in vain!
…
The development of things always progresses step by step. Yuan Ye originally just wanted to support Hirajima Kichijiro and others to go out, and incidentally use this voyage to complete another side quest. But now the situation has completely changed, or rather, with the rapid development of events, he needs to invest more power to ensure everything goes smoothly.
At this point, Yuan Ye’s own accumulated resources are definitely not enough. He didn’t hesitate and immediately sought the assistance of his two allies, asking to borrow their ships.
Well, in this era, Japanese warships and merchant ships are all made from the same mold: Atakebune ships, Kan-sen ships, and Kobaya ships. He doesn’t need soldiers, just the ships and ordinary sailors—he plans to refit these ships and organize a large armed merchant fleet, where these ships will carry goods and provide combat support.
The main reason is that there are too many small and medium-sized industrial and commercial owners participating in this sales expedition, and they are working overtime to produce. The transportation demand has suddenly surged, and the Wanjin shipyard cannot build enough suitable ships in a short period, so they can only borrow.
Once this hurdle is passed, it will be fine. The Wanjin shipyard is expanding, and given some time, they will gradually increase the number of ships.
Oda Nobunaga was quite generous. He is currently using Yuan Ye’s construction team to help build a castle at Komakiyama. Seeing that Yuan Ye even sent his wife to borrow ships, and upon hearing that they planned to sell goods, he casually lent them over ten Kan-sen ships, not caring at all if the maritime trade at Atsuta Port would be affected.
Or rather, he wished Yuan Ye would stay further away from Atsuta Port, so he wouldn’t have people coming and going from Atsuta Port all the time. He also didn’t believe that Wanjin could truly snatch all the business from Atsuta Port.
Matsudaira Motoyasu was also easy to talk to. Yuan Ye’s focus shifted to the sea, spending time and energy selling goods far away, which was a hundred times better than hoarding heavy troops in the northeast corner of the Chita Peninsula and eyeing the Mikawa river mouth. Without hesitation, he fulfilled the alliance and scoured Mikawa, providing him with over twenty ships of various sizes.
However, he wasn’t as generous as Oda Nobunaga. These ships were not lent for free; Wanjin had to repay the rent with goods, and Wanjin also had to compensate if the ships sank.
Yuan Ye didn’t care. After gradually acquiring the ships, he would re-lease them to workshop owners like Hirajima Kichijiro through public auction. He also gathered the guards they recruited and trained them uniformly for a period. He also promulgated and implemented the management regulations for the purple bladed firearms, thus implementing some control over high-powered weapons.
This continued until late summer. After the typhoons passed, everything was ready, and the sales fleet began to set sail in batches from Xin Wanjin Port.
The atmosphere at the pier was very heavy. After all, almost all private workshop owners in Xin Wanjin participated in this long voyage. The workshop owners boarding the ships were all carrying matchlock guns, their faces solemn, determined to carve out a path for their products. It had a sense of “the wind whistles and the Yi River is cold.” These people had borrowed a large sum of money from Yuan Ye for production expansion. If the sales failed, many of them were not prepared to live and intended to jump into the sea.
Under such circumstances of “success or death,” many of their wives and children had red-rimmed eyes, and their relatives and friends had solemn expressions. They couldn’t say many comforting words, only repeatedly promising to take good care of their families and to encourage them to forge ahead. The production expansion boom in Wanjin had affected everyone, and most of these relatives and friends had also invested money, waiting for dividends. They absolutely did not want these workshop owners to die at sea.
After the reluctant farewells, with three conch shell trumpet blasts, the fleet officially set sail amidst weeping. On the pier, some people set up an altar to offer sacrifices to the “Three Gods of Sumiyoshi.”
These are sea gods in Japanese folklore, also known as the “Three Gods of Watatsumi.” It is said that by believing in them and offering enough money, ships can receive blessings and return safely from sea voyages. They are quite popular on the Chita Peninsula, but now very few people are worshipping them. A large number of people immediately distanced themselves from these individuals and looked around, whispering—praying privately for such things was not punished, but doing it publicly was very dangerous.
As expected, before these people could finish their prayers, they were taken away by the police, along with their altars. After all, Wanjin did not welcome gods and Buddhas. The shrines of the Three Gods of Sumiyoshi on the Chita Peninsula were personally ordered to be burned by Yuan Ye, and the head of the Saji family, who served as the Shinto priest, was also personally led by A Man to be killed. The Sumiyoshi Shrine and related organizations have been classified as illegal entities in Wanjin.
Indeed, after the Battle of Okehazama, the Saji family occupied Ono Castle on the east side of the Chita Peninsula and refused to relinquish it. They also incited local shrine followers to riot, attempting to force Yuan Ye to compromise and recognize the Saji family’s ruling status in the Ono Castle area.
Yuan Ye obliged them, burning down the branch shrine of the Sumiyoshi Shrine on the Chita Peninsula and killing all the male members of the Saji family, thus completely annihilating this influential local lord on the east side of the Chita Peninsula. The followers who rioted with the Saji family were driven to Oda Nobunaga’s territory to fend for themselves.
In any case, Yuan Ye would not allow any organization to siphon off benefits from the Chita Peninsula, not even traditional beliefs that had popular support.
He intended to build this area as his base, so he couldn’t leave any bloodsucking leeches behind.
As a side note, historically, the Saji family was quite well-known, being one of the pillars of the Oda Navy. Their head, Saji Nobukata, married Oda Nobunaga’s sister after the Battle of Okehazama, who is now Yuan Ye’s wife, Inu-hime.
However, Yuan Ye was unaware of this. His historical knowledge wasn’t that good, so he treated the Saji family as a stubborn local lord who refused to leave and casually annihilated them, even seizing their fleet. Currently, nearly 50% of the Kan-sen ships and Kobaya ships in the Wanjin Navy used to belong to the Saji family. At that time, the Saji family didn’t expect Yuan Ye to be so strong and didn’t flee. Instead, they gathered all their forces to resist in the Ono Castle area, attempting to seek peace through battle. As a result, they were defeated in open battle and annihilated in the siege, and all their possessions went to Yuan Ye. They were truly miserable.
It was the general trend, and they could only be considered unlucky. There was no other explanation.
…
Yuan Ye was unaware of the farce at the Xin Wanjin pier, and even if he knew, he wouldn’t care. That was the responsibility of the police department, unrelated to him. He was just waiting on the open sea.
The “Chita” was too large and drew too much water, making it inconvenient to dock at a commercial pier like Xin Wanjin. The current anchorage was on a small island in Ise Bay.
That island could be considered the Wanjin Army’s naval base. In the past, islanders who evaded annual tribute and military service lived there, but after Yuan Ye went there and planted his “Gourd Flag,” it became his, and no one objected.
Since the “Chita” could not enter Xin Wanjin Port, Yuan Ye had already stationed himself on the “Chita” and was drifting on the open sea with the Wanjin Navy, waiting for the armed merchant ships to arrive and rendezvous with him. After receiving the last batch of merchant ships and verifying them, he gave the order, and all the ships raised their sails and set anchor, beginning to sail south along the coastline.
“It’s truly magnificent!”
Currently, Wanjin has no external threats, and its defense capabilities and people’s loyalty are sufficient, so there’s no need to specifically leave A Man to guard the home. She also set out with dozens of elites from the “Life Preservation Style.” Now, sitting on the railing of the deckhouse of the “Chita,” she couldn’t help but exclaim in admiration as she saw hundreds of ships of various sizes cleaving through the waves and sailing in formation on the sea. She felt quite inflated at the moment, thinking this could be called a “nation-destroying fleet.”
Yuan Ye also glanced at it. He felt that his hard work during this period was not in vain, but he said indifferently, “It will be even more magnificent in the future.”
These ships are not all from Wanjin. Some were borrowed from allies, and some were hired by workshop owners privately from Atsuta Port. They are of various sizes and not uniform, which doesn’t fit his engineering aesthetic. After collecting this year’s taxes, he will enter a period of large-scale shipbuilding. At that time, he will have about ten main ships like the “Chita.” Then, sailing in formation, it could barely be called magnificent.
Even in modern times, it could be called magnificent. After all, such foolishly large wooden crates wrapped in copper ships would never be built in modern times. Bringing them out would truly be a spectacle.
He and A Man admired the fleet for a while. They looked like they were in good condition right after departure, with no signs of straggling or formation confusion. At this moment, A Qing gently tugged at Yuan Ye’s clothes, signaling that the seafood was ready—a rough cooking method called the “water bandit set meal,” where various shellfish, crabs, and shrimp are put into a wooden bucket and then scalded with boiling water.
This is a traditional way of eating for the poor in ancient times. It lacks oil, salt, and flavor, and is not nutritious. Eating only these things will make one thinner, or even die. However, Yuan Ye’s daily diet is very healthy, and he doesn’t lack this bit of oil and water. If he’s just eating for the fresh taste, he found it quite good after trying it a few times.
Of course, parasites and the like are not considered. If everything is considered, then he might as well eat rice every day and not think about indulging his taste buds.
However, if there are any, it’s fine. He can cure them. His “Elderly Death Squad Workshop” now produces various deworming pills, which are sold internally in Wanjin at a barely break-even price, considered a national welfare.
Yuan Ye sat down and began to eat. A Qing sat gently beside him, peeling shrimp for him. He also occasionally fed A Qing, and at the same time, gestured with his eyes for A Man to get lost, not to be a third wheel here.
A Man wasn’t leaving. Yuan Ye was no longer her Lord, so why should she leave?
She ate even more than Yuan Ye. While eating, she chattered, wanting some wine. In the end, she even gnawed through more than half of the watermelon that was simply brought to replenish water and had no sweetness at all. The fresh water on the ship was too bad. Even if it didn’t smell bad when sailing near the coast, it still had a strange odor. The watermelons Yuan Ye had people plant before were indeed useful. Eating a piece occasionally could reduce the amount of water drunk, and even if it was a bit bitter, it was better than drinking strange-tasting water.
Now A Man also often travels by boat and has gotten used to eating watermelon instead of drinking water. As for her previous complaints that Yuan Ye planting watermelons was a complete waste of effort, she had forgotten them.
The formation sailing of the fleet was handled by Wanjin Navy instructors and officers like Yu Da, not by Yuan Ye and his companions. They ate seafood and gnawed on watermelons all the way to the tip of the Chita Peninsula, then turned east and soon arrived at Chenjin Port on the Atsumi Peninsula.
This was formerly Imagawa territory, but after the Battle of Okehazama, the Imagawa family declined completely, and it was occupied by Matsudaira Motoyasu. Or rather, the local lords here had changed their allegiance and defected to the Matsudaira family. Wanjin arrived with over a hundred ships at once, appearing as a vast swarm from a distance, almost scaring these local lords to death—they only had the strength of two to three hundred followers, considered scraps from major battles. Did they need so many people to deal with them?
After realizing that Yuan Ye and his group were just passing through and intended to stop here to rest and recuperate, they finally felt relieved. They fulfilled the alliance between the Yuan Ye and Matsudaira families, providing them with some freshwater and grain, even though it was unnecessary.
Yuan Ye did not conduct business here. If he wanted to trade with the Matsudaira family, he could use the land route, without having to detour around the peninsula and cross the bay. He was only here to re-form the fleet, adjust some problems exposed during the short voyage of the large fleet, and send out a vanguard to scout ahead.
The Wanjin Navy had trained for so long, they knew the situation of the sea area near the Chita Peninsula, but not further out. Moreover, to avoid ambushes by large groups of water bandits, a scouting party was definitely necessary.
In this era, there was no other way. They could only move forward bit by bit, which was certainly not as convenient as in modern times.
At the same time, stopping here was also to collect hydrological information of the surrounding area, so that if they needed to find a place for a forced landing in the future, it wouldn’t be difficult.
The Wanjin fleet rested here for more than a day, then set sail again, carrying matchlock guns and cannons, heading for their first business target—the Imagawa family.
Open the door, let’s do business!
