Then, he retrieved his small dagger and placed it inside the box and happily showed it off to his father.

“Father, is it so pretty?” Qi Haoran rolled his eyes and turned to Mu Yangling.

“Why hasn’t the child corrected this bad habit of speech yet?” He turned around and said to his son, “There’s no need to add the word ‘so’ when asking if something is pretty.

Just ask ‘is it pretty?’.” Little Bear asked persistently, “Is it pretty?” Qi Haoran nodded.

“Yes it is.” Mu Yangling picked up the skewer on the couch and asked, “Where did this come from?

Why is it in the brocade box?” “It’s a gift from the Luodian.” Qi Haoran pursed his lips.

“What’s the meaning of giving me a skewer of grains?

Could it be that he wants to donate military rations to my army?

Then he could have just written a list and handed it over.

Why did he have to put a skewer of grains in a brocade box?

Hmph, I simply ignored them.” Qi Haoran didn’t understand the meaning behind this gesture, but he knew that one couldn’t show weakness at all times.

Hence, even if he didn’t understand, he didn’t ask.

He originally planned to ask Advisor Qian when he returned, but who knew that his son would take the brocade box first?

However, unlike Qi Haoran, Mu Yangling had been very concerned about the farming matters.

Coupled with Dry Rice No.

1, she had also gotten someone to collect the harvesting data of Dry Rice No.

1 from various places, including the skewer samples sent by the stewards.

Mu Yangling rubbed her fingers gently and crushed the grain shell.

Then, she pinched out a grain of rice from it and placed it in her mouth to taste it carefully.

It tasted a little inferior to traditional medium-grade grain seeds, but it tasted a tad superior to Dry Rice No.

1.

Mu Yangling looked at the number of grains on the skewer, weighed it, and said, “He wants you to look at the grain seeds.” Mu Yangling placed the grain skewer on the table and said to Li Chun, “Go to my small study and bring the data and grain skewers sent by the stewards previously.” Mu Yangling showed the data to Qi Haoran and opened the box herself.

It was filled with grain skewers with labels pasted on them.

Mu Yangling placed those grain skewers on the table one by one and compared them to one another.

After reading the data, Qi Haoran looked at the grain skewers on the table and couldn’t help but narrow his eyes.

Spring muttered, “It’s not much different.

They look about the same.” Mu Yangling said with a smile, “Then count seriously and see how many grains there are on each of them.” Spring and Rain looked at each other and started counting the grains on the grain skewers.

These grain skewers were about the same length and looked no different at a glance.

However, after careful comparison, they realized that the ones sent by Luodian were half a finger longer than theirs.

After counting them one by one, they realized that none of their grain skewers had more grains than the skewers sent by Luodian.

Spring returned the skewers and said in a low voice, “Their skewers have anywhere between four to eight grains than ours.” “It’s just a few grains of rice.

Actually, it’s not much.” Rain didn’t understand why the Princess Consort insisted on comparing the lengths of every skewer.

Mu Yangling said, “Just one grain skewer has four to eight more grains.

Do you know how many grains there are in an acre of land?

The advantage of Dry Rice No.

1 is that it’s drought-resistant but high-yielding.

Under the same conditions, its yield per acre is about 12 catties higher than the traditional rice seeds that we planted previously.

This is the data gotten by comparing the rice fields of nearly 10,000 acres.

If the yield is 12 catties higher per acre, then how many more catties would it be in 10,000 acres, 100,000, or even 1,000,000 acres?” Mu Yangling took a deep breath and said, “Moreover, Luodian’s grain skewer is superior in grade to ours.

This means that the increase in yield might actually be higher than 12 catties per acre.

I wonder how the planting conditions of this grain seed are and how stable it is.

If it is comparable to ordinary grain seeds, even if it’s not as good as Dry Rice No.

1, it can allow the people and the national treasury to harvest a lot more.” Qi Haoran was not stupid.

He immediately understood what Mu Yangling meant.

He picked up the grain skewer and narrowed his eyes slightly.

“No wonder he used such an expensive brocade box to contain just a grain skewer.

So that’s the meaning behind this.” Mu Yangling nodded.

“It’s indeed worth containing in a brocade box.

Go and meet the people from Luodian.

I think they must know that we’re promoting Dry Rice No.

1 and that we value grains production very much, so they specially picked such a gift that we’ll be interested in.” “Seeing how much effort they put into this gift, they must have something to ask for.

But even if this grain skewer is valuable, I’m still not happy about what they did.” Qi Haoran snorted.

“They must think that we’ll definitely beg them for their grain seeds, which explains why they dared to brazenly first come into contact with Little Bear.” Mu Yangling said with a smile, “It might be very easy for Luodian to hide other things, but it’s impossible for them to hide the grain seeds.

Don’t forget that Luodian belongs to Great Qi.

Great Qi may be reducing taxes for now, but next year is the last year.

At the latest, they will have to pay taxes on grains the year after next.

Could it be that they won’t plant such rice seeds in order to prevent us from obtaining them?

Therefore, we’d simply have to wait another year even if they don’t come to us now.” However, Qi Haoran pettily said, “Even if it’s only one year, it’d mean a lot less grain.” According to Ah Ling’s calculation just now, if one acre produced 12 catties more, 1 million acres would produce 12 million more catties of grain.

There was so much he could do with this amount of grain.

Holding the grain skewer, Qi Haoran summoned Liu Qing, Xu Zhi, and Advisor Qian overnight.

Liu Qing held the grain skewer in his hand and personally compared it with Governor Xu.

Then, he looked at the data of Dry Rice No.

1.

Governor Xu’s eyes lit up.

He knew that the this year’s harvest was not bad, but he felt that it was because the weather was good.

After all, other than the drought at the beginning of spring this year, the rain and sunshine were timely.

However, the comparison of the data done by the Prince’s estate indicated that under the same conditions, Dry Rice No.

1 averaged 12 catties more per acre than the traditional grain seeds.

What if it was the higher-yielding Luodian grain seed?

Governor Xu asked anxiously, “Your Highness, did the people from Luodian say what their planting conditions are?” Qi Haoran glanced at him and said, “Didn’t you meet the people from Luodian?” Governor Xu choked and turned to look at Liu Qing.

Liu Qing considered more deeply than Governor Xu and knew how much time and money the Mu family had invested to develop Dry Rice No.

1.

Because this thing belonged to Mu Yangling, she was willing to sell the grain seeds for the sake of Great Qi.

However, it did not mean that others were as motivated as her.

Liu Qing asked, “What requests does Luodian have?” Finally, one of them saw the implication.

Qi Haoran flipped his robe and sat on the chair.

“I haven’t met them yet, so we haven’t started negotiating the terms.

I called you here to ask for your opinions.

If we get our hands on these grain seeds, will we also be able to produce such high yields?

I just want to make sure the Imperial Court doesn’t end up with a batch of trash after we pay the price.” As Liu Qing did not know much about farming, he turned to look at Governor Xu.

Advisor Qian also looked at Xu Zhi.

Xu Zhi had always been supervising agricultural matters and had personally farmed on the fields himself.

However, one could not tell simply by looking at the grain seeds.

They had to plant the seeds before they knew if it would work.

Therefore, he just stared back at the three of them.