The World Online
chapter-1213

Temple of heaven square.

"Nine cauldrons merge!"

Along with Ouyang Shuo's order, the nine cauldrons rose into the air in a circular formation, swiftly rotating. Above the square, a gust of wind started ruffling, and Ouyang Shuo's cape swooshed in the wind.

The nine cauldrons rotated faster and faster. In the end, one could not see anything clearly, and the only thing left was a blur.

At this moment, the Xia cauldron that was placed in the middle of the temple of heaven was pulled by a massive suction. With a 'Hong!' it rose up into the sky, turning into a black light as it appeared in the middle of the circle.

Nine cauldrons rotating around the Xia cauldron, creating a truly majestic sight.

Approximately half an hour had passed. The nine cauldrons turned into black, white, and red, yellow, purple, and other colors of the rainbow and shot toward the Xia cauldron in the middle.

Obtaining the various lights, the Xia cauldron shone brightly, stunning all four directions.

Following which, one could see the Xia cauldron change mysteriously. The hands, legs, and body of the cauldron looked more and more noble and mighty, giving off an indescribable prestige. On the body of the cauldron, mountains, trees, birds, fishes, and the like appeared, projecting into the sky like a mirage appearing in front of one's eyes.

Upon closer inspection, the mountains and animals were all animals present in Great Xia. Within that short period of time, they projected the mountains of Great Xia as well as all the animals that lived within, what a stroke of god.

When Ouyang Shuo saw that, he was awed.

Such a scene only appeared in legends and fairytales. Where would mortals be able to see such things?

In a short while, all the anomalies disappeared, and the totally different Xia cauldron once again turned into a black light and accurately stopped in the middle of the temple of heaven. It was like nothing had happened at all.

However, Ouyang Shuo knew that everything was different.

Jiuzhou King Cauldron: Country upgrading treasure, belongs solely to Great Xia, can help suppress the fate of a country, help with the creation of lands. A result of reopening the nine states, defining the new lands of the nine states.

The description was really simple, but it was really difficult to understand.

Apart from knowing that it was a country upgrading treasure, Ouyang Shuo did not understand much else. Was the meaning of 'Reopening the nine states' the opening up of a new space or reestablishing the nine states gamemode within the game world?

All of this would be found out later on.

Along with the nine cauldrons matter coming to an end, Great Xia was only one requirement away from upgrading to Emperor dynasty. They only needed to occupy a third of the land in China.

Ouyang Shuo roughly estimated that along with Hedong, Zhongyuan, Wannan, and Jiangnan Provinces belonging to Great Xia, they were already really close to one third.

As such, without needing to take down Tibet, Great Xia just needed one more province. With one more, they would be able to satisfy the conditions and smoothly upgrade to Emperor dynasty.

The path ahead of Ouyang Shuo was smooth sailing.

Ouyang Shuo did not hesitate at all, ordering the Cabinet and Honglu Temple to start preparing for the dynasty upgrading ceremony, setting the time on the 1st day of the 7th year to coincide with the festivities of the New Year.

Now was the 10th month, 6th day. Three more months of preparation time was more than enough.

...

10th month, 8th day, Shanhai City.

Ouyang Shuo rode on a Ferghana horse. Under the protection of the Divine Martial Guards, it was a rare occasion where he walked out of the imperial city. When the civilians along the way saw that, they consciously moved aside and some of them even bowed.

In the eyes of the Great Xia people, Ouyang Shuo was the greatest emperor the nation ever had, and he was really well loved.

Especially in Shanhai City, where some of the people had come over long ago when the city was in the village stages. They had witnessed the dynasty grow from the start. Now, their kids had grown up and became the 2nd generation of Shanhai City.

Shanhai City was truly their home ground.

Ouyang Shuo's trip out this time was so that he could visit the Four Seas Bank headquarters to witness a historical contract signing. The Four Seas Bank headquarters was located at the southwest corner of the imperial city. Around it, a finance street had sprung up.

Just as Ouyang Shuo arrived at the street, he saw Four Seas Bank treasurer Meng Zhida, who led his people to welcome him.

"Welcome, my king!"

Ouyang Shuo nodded, dismounting from his horse and passing the reign to a Divine Martial Guard as he asked, "Are the people all here?"

"They are all here; they are waiting in the guest room."

"Wow, they are all quite early." Ouyang Shuo smiled as he quickly entered the Four Seas Bank, entering the main hall and going past the corner. Only then did he arrive in the guest room in the back courtyard.

Appearing in the guest room were Blood Romance, Xie Siyun, and Moon Shines over the River, these few ex-guild leaders and current Imperial Palace Guards generals, Qing Sikou, the legendary figure that went from guild leader to famous merchant, and Feng Qiuhuang, Gong Chengshi, and Wufu, these ex-Lords that were now officials of Great Xia.

There was even Xunlong Dianxue, this lost soul, who sat at the corner and kept silent.

Regardless of their current and past identities, they were invited over to the Four Seas Bank headquarters today because of their common identity - shareholders.

Due to the heavy financial burden after this round of military expansion, Ouyang Shuo as the Xia King had to think of ways to increase the financial income of the dynasty.

The first thing he thought about was the Four Seas Bank.

After five years of development, the current Four Seas Bank was a worthy giant, attracting close to 300 million in savings. It was not only the top bank in China but also in the world.

Till date, there was still no one who could shake the Four Seas Bank's position as the top in the world.

Along with Great Zhou getting weaker by the day, the Huitong Bank that was equal to the Four Seas Bank three years ago was not even on the same playing field.

Ouyang Shuo placed his eyes on the Four Seas Bank, but he naturally could not use the savings stored there to dish out salary for the military. That would be the typical case of drinking poison to quench thirst, and Ouyang Shuo was not stupid enough to do that.

He wanted to establish the Great Xia Bank on the foundations of the Four Seas Bank.

Each country had its own central bank, and currently, the Four Seas Bank played such a role. The problem was that the Four Seas Bank was not only the central bank, but it was also a commercial bank. It had too many roles, which made it really messy.

There were even some private people who invested, which resulted in no distinction between public and private.

Hence, after hearing Meng Zhida's suggestion, Ouyang Shuo approved it and decided to buy back all the shares of the Four Seas Bank. Subsequently, he would start a reorganization of the Four Seas Bank.

He summoned all of them to sign the share handing over agreement. As this matter was really important, Ouyang Shuo had to find time to personally head over to the Four Seas Bank headquarters to witness this historical ceremony.

From now on, the Four Seas Bank would become a thing of the past.

Three years ago, Blood Romance and the others invested in the Four Seas Bank at 200 thousand per percent of shares, and at most, they could only purchase 5%.

After three years, along with the Four Seas Bank expanding, the shares in their hands naturally thinned out and went from the highest 5% to the current 0.5%.

Even so, this bit of shares was worth a lot.

Apart from Xunlong Dianxue and Qing Sikou, the rest worked in Great Xia and were considered one of their own. Ouyang Shuo naturally would not take advantage of them, and after balancing everything, he gave them a reasonable buyback price.

As the Four Seas Bank was not listed on the market, and there was no so-called share price, Ouyang Shuo decided to set a mark. They could obtain five times the amount of whatever they paid at the start.

For example, if one had invested one million, one would be able to get five million back.

Considering the inflation during these three years as well as a logical return on investment, this number was really reasonable. One must not look at how the Great Xia income increased to a whole new stage every year. That was because the game used gold as a common currency, and the inflation rate was not really that high. As such, the value of gold remained stable.

Taking back all their investment, Blood Romance and the others earned a huge amount.

As for not wanting to sell their shares, there was no one that was that shameless.

Even Xunlong Dianxue, who Ouyang Shuo had problems with, did not dare to use his identity as a shareholder to insist on not selling. With the current prestige and authority of Great Xia, without even needing Ouyang Shuo to act, just Meng Zhida alone could make him submit.

Luckily, Xunlong Dianxue knew his place.

Along with the Sui Dynasty joining Great Xia, Xunlong Dianxue, who had been living in Quanzhou, could be considered a Great Xia civilian now.

Ouyang Shuo had long forgotten that unhappy memory. Although he was unwilling to use Xunlong Dianxue once more, he would not find problems with him and would allow him to be at ease in Great Xia.

"It would be best to forgive and forget."

At 10 AM, with Ouyang Shuo as the witness, they signed the share transfer agreement. For that, the Four Seas Bank had to take out 35 million gold in cold hard cash.

Luckily, this sum was from the Four Seas Bank. If not, the Financial Court would not be able to handle it.

After signing the agreement and obtaining a sum of cash, Blood Romance and the others said goodbye one by one. This sum of money was not their personal assets and needed to be split with their members. If not, they could be considered as tycoons.

Ouyang Shuo remained to discuss with Meng Zhida about the dividing plan.

The basic rule would be to turn the headquarters of the Four Seas Bank into the Great Xia Bank to act as the central bank of the dynasty. It would be in charge of currency dealing and would not interfere in loans, savings, and the like.

Speaking of which, Great Xia had long started printing currency, but they had not been able to push it out well. This time, Ouyang Shuo was determined to use the hand of the Great Xia Bank to make the Great Xia currency widely used.

The branches of the Four Seas Bank all over China would become Great Xia agriculture and Great Xia business banks. One would focus on commerce matters, while the other would help the agriculture development of the dynasty.

With that, he could ensure the prestige of the central bank while promoting the financial development of the dynasty, strengthening the dynasty's finances.

Due to the enormous size of the Four Seas Bank, the splitting work was really complicated. Ouyang Shuo ordered Meng Zhida to finish it all before the ceremony.

After the splitting matter was completed, Meng Zhida would be the first president of the Great Xia Bank.

Apart from that, Ouyang Shuo also ordered the Administrative Court to use this chance to recruit economic and financial experts from the player groups to work in the three banks.

China was filled with talents who were good at finance, and they should not be a lacking in that area.

Now that Great Xia had stopped the restrictions and opened its doors, there would definitely be a bunch of players who had not had a good time as adventure gamemode players who would decide to return to their original jobs in the bank.

Moreover, this would also be a landmark event, signifying that the adventure gamemode player group would split up and would not be mixed together as one.