The Lone Star of the Tang Dynasty

After leaving the barracks, Li Er did not rush to disarm reform, but decided to use the reserves in the treasury to fully promote the mass production of the Divine Arm Bow. He knew that the risk of directly disarming and reproducing the Divine Arm Bow was too great, and in the event of a sudden war, there would not be enough troops to deal with it, and the consequences would be unimaginable. Although large-scale spending could strain the treasury, he weighed it up and made the decision resolutely.

First of all, the Divine Arm Bow is not manufactured in large quantities at one time, but in phases and batches, and 20,000 pieces of manufacturing tasks are delivered to households every month, so that the financial pressure is relatively dispersed.

Secondly, Li Er is also concerned about another equally important cause - the promotion of papermaking.

These two initiatives go hand in hand, both in terms of military innovation and cultural prosperity and development, with the aim of building an empire that is both culturally and politically powerful.

Li Er was determined to personally promote the development of the paper industry, and this idea lingered in his heart for a long time.

More than a month has passed since the promulgation of the imperial examination system, and the imperial court has indeed selected a group of outstanding talents, but the problems that have come with it have become increasingly prominent.

On the one hand, there are many scholars who have failed to make the list, and they have worked hard for many years but have not been selected, so the imperial court naturally cannot simply persuade them to return to the countryside and give up the pursuit of fame. Most of these scholars will continue to prepare for the imperial examination in the coming year, and although their knowledge accumulation and time cost, that is, the "sunk cost" in economics, are not explicitly stated, Li Er, Fang Xuanling, Du Ruhui, Wei Zheng and other important ministers are well aware.

The crux of the matter lies in the fact that before the implementation of the imperial examination system, there was no clear direction and standard for reading, in addition to studying the ways of Confucius and Mencius, many scholars dabbled in a wide range of fields, and there were not a few who studied the art of war, vertical and horizontal arts, and even the theory of yin and yang.

However, the imperial examination mainly assesses the comprehensive literacy required by officials, which requires not only proficiency in certain aspects, but also basic knowledge such as etiquette and etiquette. For example, when going to court, you need to be familiar with the process, and you should not wear a dragon robe that symbolizes imperial power in your daily life.

Nowadays, a large number of scholars find that they need to fill the gaps in certain basic courses, which is not extracurricular tutoring in the modern sense, but learning from scratch in areas of knowledge that they have not been exposed to. Therefore, it became their urgent need to buy books and enter the academy for further study.

Recently, Li Er heard that many colleges had taken the opportunity to raise the admission fees and the specifications of the gifts, and he was deeply angry. He knew that these academies were often controlled by prominent local families, and the high tuition fees discouraged the children of ordinary people, and only a very small number of gifted people were admitted exceptionally, and eventually became vassals of the great families.

Faced with this situation, although Li Er was heartbroken, he was in a dilemma: if he directly intervened in the academy's fees and severely suppressed them, then the already limited learning opportunities for poor students would be even more scarce.

However, the high tuition fees of the academy are certainly an insurmountable threshold for poor students, but what really pushes the imperial examination to the brink of crisis is the crazy soaring prices of paper and books.

Originally, the children of the poor family could still buy the books they needed by cutting back on food and clothing, but now they need to exhaust everything they have in their families, and even selling a few acres of thin fields and a few dilapidated houses cannot meet their needs.

Countless scholars have completely lost their careers due to a defeat in the imperial examination, and in despair, there are many people who hang themselves or die of poison.

The imperial court advocated meritocracy, but the reality was that an unattainable mountain was built for the road to study, which made the world's scholars complain.

Most scholars did not clearly understand to whom to vent their hatred.

Li Er is well aware of the importance of the people's will to the stability of the country, and he relied on the support of the people to win the Xuanwumen Change, and always stood with the people at the bottom. In the face of such a bad situation, Li Er naturally couldn't sit idly by. Therefore, after initially solving the problem of the production of the divine arm bow, he immediately approached Du Ruhui to discuss the establishment of a paper industry in Chang'an, rather than a simple workshop.

Li Er was deeply influenced by Li Changge's philosophy, and was convinced that the production capacity could be increased tenfold or even hundredfold by the change of production mode alone, which was the fundamental difference between traditional handicraft workshops and modern industrial production.

Although the treasury was overstretched by the manufacture of the Divine Arm Bow at this time, Li Er still insisted on calling this small-scale attempt "industry", because he was keenly aware that behind "industry" there was an unknown but infinite world full of infinite possibilities. In his opinion, Li Changge seemed to hold the key to this new world.

At the same time, on the rural road outside Youzhou, Uncle Liu, an old farmer who had just finished farm work, was wiping the sweat from his forehead, and suddenly saw a young man wearing a coarse cloth short suit and delicate and noble eyebrows passing by.

This is Li Changge himself, although he is dressed simply, it is difficult to hide his heroic temperament.

During the conversation between the two, the old farmer mentioned that his children were studying to catch up with the exam, and due to the soaring price of books, the family's economic pressure increased sharply, so they had to consider selling more than a dozen acres of fertile land for their children to continue studying.

This made Li Changge quite surprised, and at the same time recalled the grim situation of the recent rise in the price of paper books.

Li Changge realized the problem and responded seriously: "Old Liutou, don't be in a hurry to sell the land first. In a few days, go to Chang'an, where there will be cheap books for sale. He knew that if the cost of books could be reduced by promoting the development of the paper industry, then peasant families like Lao Liu Tou might be able to get rid of the predicament caused by the high price of books, and more poor students would have the opportunity to change their fate through the imperial examination.

"Oh, Chang'an is the place where His Majesty lives, how can I go to that kind of place easily as a farmer!" Old Liu Tou replied in astonishment.

Li Changge was a little helpless, and couldn't help blurting out: "Hey, you just say if you want to buy books for your children, right?"

He was

quite unhappy with the recent skyrocketing price of books, and he wondered if there was no stock market in this era, could it be that there was still hot money speculation? Nine times out of ten, there are big people playing tricks behind this. Although he was in the countryside, he had some understanding of the political situation and internal and external contradictions in the Tang Dynasty, but he was not very clear about the specific factional battles in the court and the details of the family.

As an ordinary person, Li Changge can only complain a few words about Li Shimin. No matter who is behind the scenes, as an emperor, but ignores this, then the emperor is not in vain? But he also understands that in order to avoid civil war, Li Shimin can only use peaceful means to solve such problems.

As for whether his paper industry reform proposal to Lao Li reached the palace, Li Changge had no way of knowing. However, Li Changge often asked Ying'er to help buy books in Chang'an, so he knew a little about the market.

Recently, the price of books has skyrocketed, and some have even soared to sky-high prices, and it is not uncommon for merchants to stock up on goods and reluctant to sell.

At the same time, several newly opened bookstores and paper and ink shops suddenly popped up in Chang'an City, and the paper and books sold in the stores were of high quality, and surprisingly the prices were quite low, much cheaper than the books on the market after the price increase, and the books that originally cost two or three taels of silver can now be purchased for just over 200 yuan.

What's even more amazing is that such bookstores have not only appeared in Chang'an, but also sprung up in various states and counties of Datang.

In addition, the imperial court has recently issued an edict to establish government-run academies in major prefectures and counties, and all books can be read free of charge.

Although these new changes aroused Li Changge's curiosity, he did not delve into them because he had no intention of taking the imperial examination, and only bought books to pass the time and obtain information, as a substitute for the modern habit of always thinking about playing with mobile phones in his spare time.

It has been a month since Lao Li last visited, and the two have known each other for two months.

During this time, Li Er was busy with government affairs, and Li Changge was not idle, and was devoting himself to an experiment - using a few wagons of saltpeter and sulfur that Lao Li helped him get, trying to make HUO medicine!