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Chapter 470: 236: Wealth Soars 2

After so many years, the people and local gentry of Xi Shu State have become extremely tired and impoverished due to the prolonged war and chaos.

However, as rulers, the Qiang and Zhou people, and even the local governments, have become extremely wealthy as a result of the series of looting and pillaging.

Previously, when capturing Jinguan City, the capital of Xichuan, Lu Yuan had directly confiscated more than 20 million silver taels worth of gold, silver, jewelry, and other valuables from the city’s government treasury and the inner treasury of the royal palace.

According to the officials in charge of the treasuries, the original amount of wealth stored in these two treasuries was even more, about three to four times what it is now.

However, due to Shu State’s continuous warfare and the impoverished state of the local area, they had to spend a large amount of money buying arms and grain from Zhou Country and other southwestern Yi countries to sustain the army.

When the Zhou army arrived, they had to give them rewards and supplies, which was another huge expense.

After several rounds of this, the city’s treasury only had this much left.

Upon hearing this, Lu Yuan couldn’t help but be amazed and was almost tempted to follow Li Xiong’s example.

However, he considered that Li Xiong had completely emptied the resources of the entire Xichuan region, trading its current dilapidated state for such wealth.

In comparison, his Changsha State’s Dongting Prefecture, although also recently affected by the war, has gradually begun to provide him with sufficient taxes as local production resumes and officials are replenished.

Not counting Tianmen Prefecture, his territories in the southern region could provide him with an annual tax revenue of over 5 million taels of silver, and this amount would increase year by year as local production recovers.

According to Sun Siwen and Cui Changqing’s estimates, when Dongting Prefecture returned to its pre-war peak, the yearly tax revenue could reach over 8 million taels.

With such wealth, a decade of recuperation would be equivalent to Li Xiong’s spoils from looting the entire Xichuan.

However, after his plunder, Xichuan became devastated, and it would take decades, if not centuries, to recover its vitality, rendering it useless in one fell swoop.

In contrast, Dongting Prefecture could produce more income and resources over time through sustainable development.

Between these two options, the better course of action was obvious.

Therefore, Lu Yuan only entertained this thought for a moment before discarding it and happily began to take over Li Xiong’s legacy.

Apart from the current silver, Li Xiong also had a large amount of other properties, worth more than ten times the current silver.

After all, this Emperor of Shu had wiped out the entire martial arts world of Xichuan, along with many local gentry and landowners.

It could be said that he had almost completely eradicated the ruling class of Xichuan, accumulating an astonishing amount of wealth in the process.

Even if only considering the current silver, it was as high as 60 to 70 million taels. If other assets such as antiques, calligraphy, shops, and lands were added, the total wealth could reach hundreds of millions of taels.

Such an incredible fortune was naturally very tempting.

Lu Yuan was currently relocating a large number of immigrants from Hanzhong, estimating that more than one million people would be moved, which was more than half, or even a large majority, of the current population under his actual rule in Changsha State.

Such a large-scale migration would require considerable expenses in terms of food and transportation, as well as the resettlement of the immigrants, including the allocation of land, provision of seeds and farming tools, housing, and assistance in resuming production – a process that would take at least one to two years.

The silver spent on these various tasks would flow like a flood, unstoppable.

Based on his previous expenses in dealing with the refugees, Lu Yuan estimated that the reception of one million refugees would cost no less than ten million taels of silver.

And now he was responsible for the expenses of the migrating people all the way from Hanzhong to Dongting.

It was over a thousand miles from Hanzhong to Dongting, and even further to the southern part of Dongting, with a total distance of up to two thousand miles.

The mere expenses for food and drink during such a long journey would be staggering.

Conservatively, Lu Yuan estimated that the total cost of the migration would reach as high as 20 million taels of silver.

That large sum of money was not unaffordable for Lu Yuan with his current finances.

After all, he had nearly 20 million taels of silver savings, and his annual tax income was more than 5 million taels.

All those funds could barely fill the hole created by the migration expenses.

The problem was that once the hole was filled, there would be no money left for Lu Yuan to maintain his army.

His army of 100,000 soldiers required an annual salary of six million taels of silver. With additional expenses, the total cost could reach between seven and eight million taels.

If they were engaged in a battle, like they were now, the cost could reach as high as ten million taels.

How could such a huge expenditure be sustained without the small treasury of 20 million taels supporting it?

In fact, Lu Yuan currently had less than 20 million taels of silver on hand.

Since the Northern Expedition started in December last year and lasted until the end of March, he had already spent about three million taels of silver during these four months.

This was only possible because his army included 60,000 Miao soldiers, who had relatively low expenses. If they were regular soldiers, it would have cost him four million taels of silver.

At present, it seemed that the war was far from over and might continue for several more months or even longer.

By the time the war was over, Lu Yuan conservatively estimated that it would have cost him around eight million taels of silver.

In this case, during the war and including the cost of maintaining the 40,000 soldiers he had stationed in Jiangnan, his annual expenditure would be as high as 10 million taels.

As such, once the war ended, Lu Yuan’s small treasury would only have around 10 million taels of silver left, which would not be enough to cover the cost of the migration.