Counterattack of the Cannon Fodder Chambermaid

Untitled Part 49

The days passed one by one as the weather grew colder.

As November arrived, the skies seemed to be covered by endless snow. Xiao Hua felt that the snow outside hadn't stopped once these past few days. However, since she never left the hall the cold didn't really affect her, and she also didn't have time to check whether the snow had stopped falling.

During this time the Jing Prince had left the estate once again. Only after he departed did Xiao Hua find out from two low-ranked eunuchs that one of his counties had been snowed in and the situation seemed quite serious. Therefore he personally made a trip to check it out.

Xiao Hua had come to the conclusion that the Jing Prince was a good vassal prince.

Xiao Hua hadn't seen a snow-in before.

After she was sold off as a child, she stayed in several rich households as a maid and no longer experienced any natural disasters. When she was young she did witness flooding, but she couldn't remember much of it. All that remained in her memories were her parent's and brothers' faces, and crying everywhere.

As Xiao Hua concluded the Jing Prince was a good vassal prince, the person in question was riding on horseback through the snow. The estate's guards had recommended him to take the carriage, but he felt it would be too slow and thus chose to continue on horseback.

The Jing Province was always a bitter and cold place. The bitter part comes from the difficulty of growing crops which caused its people to live in poverty, and the cold part because it was located in the north which made the weather cold and snow fall heavily come winter.

Because the land was barren, the emperor was extremely generous. The Jing Province was the largest vassal state in terms of area.

The so called vast, distant plains referred to this place.

Actually the prince didn't have to go. There was no reason for the prince to personally head out for a small county that was snowed in. But the Jing Prince had always been serious in handling his affairs. In his past life he wasn't as diligent in operating his vassal state, and the place had always been impoverished. In this life, he decided to put more effort into his land.

Since crops were hard to grow, he had specially gathered some talented farmers who grew crops suitable for the Jing Province's climate. For example, high yielding crops from foreign lands such as potatoes and yams. These two years under his rule, there had almost been no cases of people starving to death.

Since business was hard to develop, he had his own people go to estates of prosperous provinces to conduct business. He even had the specialty products under his jurisdiction, good stuff such as fur clothing and ginseng, sold outside in order to attract business.

The Jing Prince's way of thinking was simple. If he couldn't even govern his vassal state properly, then he had no business trying to change his destiny.

The effect was pretty good over these few years. Not only did the amount of taxes they received increase, the Jing Prince's own coffers were sufficiently filled as well.

The reason for his trip this time around was also a show of force, warning the various governors not to mistreat the people under his eyes. He didn't need to do anything else. He just had to spend a few days and make a round trip for all his subordinates to take him seriously, and there would be no one starving or freezing to death. The Jing Prince thought this was a pretty good deal.

Although the prince's way of thinking was different from others, the commoners under his rule lived pretty good lives. In recent years, they had all praised him as a good vassal prince.