The World Online
chapter-402

Translator: ryangohsf

Editor: Nora

After checking and inspecting the three newly built divisions, Ouyang Shuo stepped onto his path back home.

At this point, all the military and administrative matters of Leizhou Prefecture were on point, and Ouyang Shuo did not need to personally look over all of them.

Heitu Harbor was the place where the Guards division had disembarked onto land. Compared to a month ago, this place had become a huge construction site and was really boisterous.

In the future, this would become a large-sized port directly connected to Beihai Harbor. The trading route between the two would form an important passageway that the Lianzhou Lord's Manor would manage.

Although Leizhou Prefecture was a lone territory, with this naval route, commuting between the two territories would become really convenient. Even a normal merchant ship would need only four days to travel this distance.

At the same time, Hai An City and Yanluo City would each have a harbor. The Hai An City Harbor was mainly used to connect Leizhou Prefecture to Qiongzhou Prefecture.

The Yanluo City Harbor would connect to Lingnan's Jiaozhou Prefecture and even to the imperial city, Quanzhou.

Along with the establishment of Leizhou Prefecture, the sea trade of Shanhai City entered a high speed development phase. Because of the geography of Lianzhou Prefecture, sea trade would become their most important connection to the outside world.

The Guards division and the four directors returned alongside him.

Since they had the perfected the organization structure of Leizhou Prefecture, the four directors would naturally return. In the month that they left Shanhai City, the administrative matters of the Lord’s manor were already enough to give them a headache.

After returning to Shanhai City, Ouyang Shuo started a huge revolution of the territory structure.

Along with that, he naturally made a series of personnel arrangements.

After the establishment of Leizhou Prefecture, there was a need to consider the future Qiongzhou Prefecture and Zhaoqing Prefecture. Ouyang Shuo felt that the time to upgrade the Lianzhou Lord’s Manor had matured.

First, he would officially establish the Lianzhou Prefecture City Hall, separate from the Lianzhou Lord’s Manor. As expected, he appointed Wei Ran as governor of Lianzhou Prefecture.

He chose Shenjuan City to be the governance area of Lianzhou Prefecture. Currently, the city was still being built.

Additionally, he took this chance to officially split Shanhai City from Lianzhou Prefecture. It would become an independently run region and the future capital city.

There were two reasons for setting Shenjuan City as the governance area.

Firstly, Shenjuan City was located in the middle of Lianzhou Prefecture.

Secondly, the position of governance area would increase and promote the growth of Shenjuan City.

Since Ouyang Shuo had appointed Wei Ran as the governor, Wei Ran had to leave Shanhai City. This helped to cool the rumors about him and Baiqi. Moreover, it was a blessing toward the development of Lianzhou Prefecture.

After officially building the Lianzhou Prefecture, they would also build the garrison division to take charge of the daily defense of the prefecture. As for the city protection division, they would be in charge of defending Shanhai City.

The establishment of the garrison division was similar to liberating the Dragon Legion. The 1st division, which was in charge of protecting the prefecture, could now move into Mulan Stronghold.

As for the members of the garrison division, Ouyang Shuo aimed for the prisoners of Zhaoqing Prefecture to fill this role.

Hence, he could only build the Lianzhou garrison division after taking down Zhaoqing Prefecture. Ouyang Shuo chose Hu Yibiao for the role of major general.

Hu Yibiao was the 4th regiment colonel of the 3rd division. Similar to Zhaoyan, he was also a strong and experienced general that Shanhai City developed.

Although this batch of old generals could not become the major generals of a wilderness fighting division, they could still manage a garrison division. This was also the last help Ouyang Shuo would provide to this batch of generals that had been with him since the start.

After Shanhai City became independent, he would create the role of Shanhai Magistrate.

For the position of first Shanhai Magistrate, Ouyang Shuo chose the newly appointed Broken Blade House Prefect, Zang Wenzhong.

Zang Wenzhong stuck out due to his administrative thinking and his identity as an outsider.

Gushan County County Magistrate Lei Fan would take over as the prefect of Broken Blade House.

Lei Fan was always an official that Ouyang Shuo looked up to. During the Battle of Lianzhou, he showed exceptional talent. Ouyang Shuo naturally wanted to use this chance to promote him.

At the same time, Ouyang Shuo officially named Tian Wenjing as the governor of Qiongzhou.

At this point, the Lord's Manor officially ruled over three prefectures.

In the future, more prefectures would enter the ruling scope of Lianzhou Lord's Manor. As for whether or not he wanted to create an organization structure above the prefecture grade, it would probably happen many years later.

The most difficult problem right now was the unofficial state of Lianzhou Lord's Manor's rule over the territories.

Based on the settings of the game, the territory of the Lianzhou Lord's Manor was limited to fifty thousand square kilometers. However, its actual ruling area extended fifteen to sixteen times greater than the set amount.

In Ouyang Shuo’s last life, Di Chen and the others also met a similar problem.

The only solution was to ask for the positions of governor, provincial governor, or governor-general from the imperial court. Only then could one have jurisdiction over the territories they had taken over.

Undoubtedly, Ouyang Shuo needed such a position.

Such an important position naturally would not come for free.

One of the requirements would be to pay a certain fee to the imperial court every year. Not only that, if one did not have a certain level of reputation, the imperial court would not accept you.

The imperial court that Ouyang Shuo chose was naturally the one in Dali.

After all, the Dali Imperial Court had granted him the position of Lianzhou Lord.

Since he had made a decision, Ouyang Shuo chose a messenger to travel to Dali to meet the king.

Based on Ouyang Shuo's intentions, he wanted to become the Governor-General of Nanjiang. In turn, he would build the Nanjiang House.

One had to say that his appetite was really big.

The position of governor meant absolute control, while the position of general meant that he could lead troops. As such, a governor-general was an overall ruler, the biggest official of an entire region.

Nanjiang simply covered a really huge region.

Ouyang Shuo wanted to change everything in one step. Before he set up a country, he would use the structure of the Nanjiang Governor-General House to prevent the need for constant change.

In his last life, Di Chen and the others had all asked for positions to rule a region. For example, the position of Huajie Governor. They would build up a provincial governor house before slowly climbing up.

Who would act like Ouyang Shuo and attempt to directly climb all the way up?

In all likelihood, the Dali Imperial Court lacked the power to make the decision. They would need to ask the Quanzhou Imperial Court. Only then would Gaia approve his request.

This was going to be really difficult.

Luckily, Shanhai City had a bit of a relationship with the Quanzhou Imperial Court. Especially with the aid of Mazu, their relationship had grown closer and closer.

For this reason, Ouyang Shuo possessed such confidence.

If he did not have such beneficial elements, Ouyang Shuo definitely would not have even thought of such a thing.

Next, he had to decide on who to chose as the messenger.

Different from the intense wars during the Spring and Autumn Era, the war between the lords in the territories usually ended in mutual destruction.

Hence, the use of diplomats and messengers were not as important as that in history. Not only did Shanhai City not set up a diplomatic department, he could not even find a professional diplomat.

When he thought about this matter, Ouyang Shuo felt a headache.

Helplessly, he could only ask the four directors for their opinions.

"Who do you all think should be the diplomat?"

The four directors looked at one another; they did not know how to reply.

The financial director Cui Yingyu could not be the diplomat. As a woman, she was still okay in the territory. After all, with Ouyang Shuo's protection, no one dared to say anything. However, to enter the court, the emperor would not even want to see her.

Administration director Fan Zhongyan? It would not work.

Fan Zhongyan was a just and fair person. If Ouyang Shuo wanted to show the prestige and strength of the territory, Fan Zhongyan was naturally a good choice. However, this trip was a private event to try and obtain an official position. Naturally, Fan Zhongyan was unsuitable.

The ones that remained were Du Ruhui and Wei Yang.

Ouyang Shuo had no choice. He immediately decided to send both Du Ruhui and Cui Yingyu to Dali.

Du Ruhui would take the role of ambassador. His main duty was to meet the emperor and form a strong relationship. Cui Yingyu would be the deputy ambassador. She would use the power of the Cui Family to hold activities.

On the other hand, Wei Yang and Jingjian would visit Quanzhou.

Ouyang Shuo knew that Jingjian was an ambassador for the Qin Country. As such, he had a certain amount of experience.

After choosing the ambassador, he needed to prepare a gift.

Apart from the meeting gifts for the various officials, the most important aspect was setting the yearly payments.

To obtain the position, Ouyang Shuo had decided to give it his all.

He personally decided that Shanhai City would give twenty thousand gold, ten thousand sets of colored silk, fifty kilograms of White Tea, a hundred strings of precious pearls, and two thousand jars of three flower wine to each imperial court.

The total sum value of the goods was over a hundred thousand gold.

Ouyang Shuo knew that only these territory specialties could move the emperor. Normal goods would just be throwing his own face.

Out of all the lords, probably only Ouyang Shuo could manage to take out such a huge sum.

The moment his words left his mouth, the four directors took in deep breaths.

Luckily, the four of them were people with foresight. When Ouyang Shuo suggested the building of the Nanjiang Governor-General House, the four of them understood what it meant for the territory.

One could say that if they were successful, it would be a monumental event for the development of Shanhai Territory.

Compared to taking over Leizhou Prefecture, this was just as important.

Du Ruhui and Wei Yang stepped out and bowed. Then, they solemnly said, “Do not worry, lord. We will not let you down!"

In truth, with such a huge yearly payment as the base, their chances of success were really high.

Just because of that, the two of them seemed really confident.

Ouyang Shuo nodded and did not say anything more.

The next day, the two ambassador teams brought their gifts and left.