I’m the Farmgirl You Can’t Mess With
Chapter 858 - Chapter 858 Fishing for Gold

Chapter 858: Fishing for Gold Chapter 858: Fishing for Gold Editor: Atlas Studios Qi Xiuyuan held the gold nugget and stood up in shock.

“At the bottom of the lake?

If Qin Fang hid the gold and silver at the bottom of the lake, then the money in the treasuryaEUR|” “I haven’t had the time to send someone to go down and confirm.” Qi Haoran said, “I was busy dealing with the children just now.” Qi Xiuyuan sat back in his chair and tightened his grip on the gold nugget.

“I remember that your lake is very big.

If he’d thrown the gold and silver down at random spots, I’m afraid it will be difficult to locate the spot again.” “Ah Ling found it by the lotus bush, and that box was hidden deep in the mud.

If Ah Ling hadn’t fallen hard into the mud after throwing me out of the water, she probably wouldn’t have discovered the box underneath.” He went on to tell him about how they had accidentally discovered the box because they wanted to save Tiger Head.

“At that time, Ah Ling said that she had only felt one box.

Because she used too much strength, that box shattered.

If you want to know how many more boxes there are down there, you have to send someone with good swimming skills to go down and take a look.” “Big Brother.” Qi Haoran lowered his voice and said, “I think this matter shouldn’t be made public for the time being.

Let’s secretly scoop up the treasures and place them directly in your private vault.

You can borrow from the private vault when you need to deploy funds from the treasury.

Anyway, it’s not the first time the treasury has borrowed from your private vault.” Qi Xiuyuan rolled his eyes.

“Are you saying to hide it from everyone and let them continue searching for the gold and silver left behind by Qin Fang?” Qi Haoran nodded.

“Everyone knows that Qin Fang emptied the Great Zhou’s treasury before he left.

Our Great Qi is just an empty shell and is only holding on until now thanks to the three of us.

If word gets out that we found the treasury’s silver, the subordinates might go from frugal to extravagant.

It might even make West Xia and Great Jin more wary of us.

The relationship between our three countries has just eased a little.” Even when Great Qi was poor, the quality of her soldiers was comparable to that of West Xia and Great Zhou.

If Great Qi became rich, what would happen to the quality of her soldiers?

Great Jin and West Xia would undoubtedly view Great Qi as a huge danger, and the delicate balance between the three countries might be broken.

West Xia and Great Jin were eyeing Great Qi covetously, but the two countries also coveted each other and had fought a huge battle.

Therefore, the situation between the three countries was temporarily stabilized.

Although there were small conflicts at the border occasionally, they were relatively minor.

In order not to antagonize each other, the three countries restrained their soldiers from killing as much as possible.

Although Qi Haoran was a general, he did not want a war.

At least not before Great Qi was ready.

Qi Xiuyuan quickly considered the implications and said, “Alright, get someone to scoop up the treasures quietly without anyone knowing.” Qi Haoran was vexed.

“But where can I find someone reliable who is also good at swimming?” He was not in the capital all year round and had no idea how to go about finding such talents.

Smiling, Qi Xiuyuan said, “I’ll arrange this.

You just need to make arrangements for the servants in your residence to prevent them from noticing.” Qi Xiuyuan quickly sent 20 people to Qi Haoran.

If he should send more, it would cause too big a commotion for the mission to go unnoticed.

The servants in the residence quickly received orders that no one was allowed to go to the East Lake again.

Also, it was emphasized that the young masters were strictly grounded.

Thus, whoever appeared in the Evening Pavilion would be chased out of the residence.

The servants accepted this ban without a doubt, knowing that the five little masters had fallen into the water previously and frightened the Prince and the Princess Consort.

It was only right for the lake to become forbidden grounds now.

Soon, there were rumors that the Princess Consort wanted to have the lotus bush removed after the young masters jumped into the water to pick the lotus seed pods.

The Princess Consort felt that lotus plants were a potential disaster and didn’t serve much purpose in the first place since they didn’t even form any lotus roots.

The servants really wanted to tell the Princess Consort that the lotus flowers planted by Minister Qin were merely for ornamental purposes.

Every summer, the red and white lotus flowers would bloom one after another, forming a gorgeous and paradise-like view.

Back then, Minister Qin had spent a lot of money to plant these lotus flowers.

However, no one had the guts to say such things to the currently-fuming Mu Yangling.

However, at this moment, Mu Yangling also said with heartache, “Are we really going to pull out all these lotuses?” “Just some.” Qi Haoran said, “They’re here to fish for the gold, not to pull out the lotuses.

They can’t very well leave the lotuses untouched if we want to make the story believable.” “Then I’ll get someone to ask around for buyers for those lotuses.

We’ll sell it to them.

I heard that this type of lotus is worth a lot of moneyaEUR”one tael of silver for just ten segments of lotus roots.

I’ve asked the gardeners, and they said that since it’s early autumn now, the lotus roots can be transplanted.

Even if we sell it at a cheaper price, at say one tael of silver for 15 segments, it can fetch quite a sum of money.

But let me make it clear first that this money will go into our pockets and not the treasury.” Unconvinced, Qi Haoran said, “Why should we sell it at 15 segments for one tael of silver?

We can just ask for one tael of silver per ten segments.” The corners of Mu Yangling’s mouth twitched.

“Considering we have too many of them, the buyer will definitely bargain down the price.” Qi Haoran snorted coldly.

“Who dares to bargain with me?

Alright, don’t interfere in this matter.

Let Zhu Liang handle it.

I went to take a look just now and saw that there were only two to three small lotus roots under a lotus.

Although they’re crisp and delicious, they’re too small.” Mu Yangling smiled and said, “This lotus is ornamental and doesn’t produce lotus roots.

When I’m no longer angry, I’ll get someone to plant a variety that harvests a lot of lotus roots every winter.” Qi Haoran nodded.

While the two of them were talking, the people who had gone underwater came up one after another and reported, “Your Highnesses, there are many boxes along the lotus bush.

We opened them and saw that all of them contained gold and silver.

Aside from gold and silver bearing the official seals of the national treasury, there are also privately made gold and silver.” Qi Haoran and Mu Yangling looked at each other.

“Looks like there’s not only the national treasury’s silver, but also the money he siphoned off back then.” With this discovery, the national treasury was now rich.

One had to know that Qin Fang’s wealth could easily rival a country’s.

Back then, they had found a batch in his garden.

Though not an insignificant amount, it was far from what he had embezzled.

Other than what he had spent on pleasure, there must be a lot of money left.

Qi Haoran instructed, “Get someone to tie a rope on the boxes and pull them up immediately.” Qin Fang had clearly thought this throughaEUR”nearly half of the east side of the East Lake was planted with lotuses.

Along the path where the lotus bush met the surface of the lake, they began to throw boxes from about 20 meters offshore.

The depth there was seven to eight meters.

However, the lotus bush, which was only one meter away, was only three to four meters deep.

Clearly, Qin Fang had calculated it when he had East Lake built.

Not to mention that no one had cleaned up these ornamental lotus bushes, even if someone plucked these lotus flowers, they would not have discovered the sunken boxes beside them because they were covered by mud.

Moreover, there was a depth of three to four meters between them.

If the few brats hadn’t jumped into the water and Mu Yangling hadn’t accidentally plunged into the mud, these boxes would probably not have been discovered ever.

Who would have thought that Qin Fang would hide his money in the lake?

It was even more bizarre than him turning the gold into floor tiles, okay?

It took almost a month for the 20 of them to pull up all the boxes.

Then, they used the excuse of transporting the lotuses to transport the boxes of gold and silver out.

There was no choice.

There were too many boxes, and the water pressure was strong at such a depth.

Qi Haoran did not want anyone to die of exhaustion from working around the clock, so he would have them work for four hours and rest for two hours.

When it was dark, they would stop altogether.

However, the 20 of them was pretty fast, hauling up quite a number of boxes in just a month.

At first, when they opened them and saw the dazzling gold inside, they would be excited.

After a month though, everyone was numb to it.

Then, they deeply sensed Qin Fang’s greed at the thought that this money had been sucked from the common people.