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Chapter 322: Mechanism Wooden Box

The next morning, Zhou Chang woke up from the Luohan bed in the study again.

After having breakfast in the study, I was doing nothing and staring at the boxes of all sizes on the floor.

Zhong Yu brought some people and brought in a box of banknotes.

Zhou Chang rubbed his hands together and said, "How is it? Mr. Zhong, how many of these do you have?"

After returning to her parents' home three days ago, in her opinion, the wedding was complete.

I can finally make some time to prepare to go debt collection. I will first get back the money owed by the wedding guests, and then I can go back to my "main business" in peace.

Zhong Yu took stock and counted quickly in the account book, and finally came to the conclusion: "There are about 32 people who haven't sent money yet, but it's not a big deal, Your Majesty, why don't you wait a few more days."

"I went out and came back these two days, but why didn't I see anyone giving me money?" Zhou Chang turned his head and asked.

Zhong Yu laughed and his brows relaxed a lot: "Your Highness, is there any public gift of silver in this kind of situation? They all went through the back door, mainly to get back the token and the receipt. They gave the silver bill and then they just ran away."

"Oh, so that's it..." Zhou Chang was very satisfied with the little "deterrent power" that Prince Yi still had. Wouldn't it be more efficient this way? Looking at the white banknotes, he was excited, "You have to take good care of these banknotes, make sure there are no fake ones."

Zhong Yuyi nodded and said, "Manager Fu has been staying in the mansion these past two days to help with this matter. Most of the banknotes are from Yulong Bank, so they can't be fake. And the subordinates have also marked them in person to prevent anyone from taking advantage of the situation."

"Mr. Zhong is really good at what he does." Zhou Chang gave Zhong Yu a thumbs up, and reached out to take out a stack of banknotes from the box, thinking about how to find a reason to keep a large number of banknotes in his hand. "Mr., why are you in such a hurry? Just wait for three more days. It would be best if you can spread the word. If there is still someone who is so blind as to not send banknotes, I will come to their door in person. It won't be too late to deposit them once the banknotes are collected."

"Your Highness, there is no need to bother me. I'm sure they won't be so tactless." Zhong Yu put down the account book and stood up. "Your Highness, you have seen all these banknotes. I always feel that they are not appropriate. It is better to deposit them in the bank first, so that it will be convenient to use them later."

"Uh..., okay, but this..." Zhou Chang weighed the stack of silver bills in his hand and had to find another reason to delay.

Zhong Yu said again, "Oh, right, Chen Yuan wrote to me the other day, saying that since the beginning of the new year, because the three states of Ji, Shu, and Mai have just been recovered, there are more people displaced. People who were originally unable to return and became slaves are now pouring back, and the local officials don't know what to do. Although this matter will definitely be reported to the court, I think that since I have this money in hand and originally planned to build a shelter, it would be better to let Chen Yuan build a shelter in Beiji first."

"Ah..., that's great, but how much silver will it cost?" Zhou Chang could no longer laugh.

Zhong Yu thought for a moment and said, "The more the better. For something like this, throwing money into it is like a drop in the ocean. However, when we do these things, we save as many people as we can and help as many pairs as we can. We don't care about the number, but we just want to do it with a clear conscience."

Having said that, what else could Zhou Chang say? He had originally planned to take out tens of thousands of taels in addition to the pile of silver notes in his hand, but now that's impossible.

Zhou Chang had no choice but to count out 10,000 taels of silver from the banknotes in his hand and put the rest back into the box: "Okay, everything will be arranged by Mr. Zhong. I will keep 10,000 taels for emergencies, and give the rest to Mr. Zhong."

Zhong Yu nodded: "Yes."

Zhou Chang was distressed. Why couldn't he ask for a high price every time he faced Zhong Yu? It was obvious that she had worked hard to earn these banknotes.

At this moment, the skinny monkey came in again.

He was holding a black wooden box in his hand, and he presented it to Zhou Chang directly: "Your Highness, this was left on the carriage last night."

Zhou Chang took the wooden box and asked, "Ah, where did you find it?"

Only then did she remember that after she came out of Yuan Mansion last night and got on the carriage with Yuan Qi, she had never seen the box that Yuan Yu mentioned containing the evidence of Prince Duan's bribery and the account books.

When he got off the carriage, Yuan Qi was already very drunk.

Zhou Chang hurriedly sent Yuan Qi back to the bedroom and forgot about this matter.

The skinny monkey stretched his neck and stared at the wooden box: "It's right under the seat of your carriage. It's black so it's hard to notice. But what's inside it?"

Yesterday, there were two carriages returning home. When they left, the carriages were full of gifts, and when they came back, they were still full of gifts.

In the next carriage, Yuan Yu loaded a lot of new and exquisite gadgets, mostly southern food.

This morning, Yuan Qi gave all those things to the servants in the mansion as rewards.

Especially knowing that Shouhou was a foodie, he gave him a lot of dried fruits and candied fruits that he had never heard of.

The skinny monkey couldn't help but wonder if there might be some more precious food in the box.

Zhou Chang tried to open it, but found that it was not an ordinary wooden box. He tried back and forth, left and right, but could not open it at all.

"Mr. Zhong, do you know how to open this?" Zhou Chang said as he handed the wooden box to Zhong Yu.

Zhong Yu stood up and took it, looking at the wooden box in the direction of the light coming in from the open door of the study: "This is not difficult, it should open by pressing the right hole."

There are only three holes on the surface of the wooden box that look like decorative patterns. They are arranged in parallel and connected to each other, just like a combination lock from the previous life.

Zhou Chang couldn't help but recall carefully, Yuan Yu never mentioned anything about the password.

Zhong Yu had already started trying, twisting and turning it a few times. With a "click", the wooden box opened and the inner box popped out.

"So simple?" Zhou Chang was disappointed. "Then what's the point of setting up such a lock?"

Zhong Yuxiao said, "This box only has three holes and few combinations. It is usually for children to play with. If there were more holes and more combinations, I don't know if the presets would be impossible to try out."

Zhou Chang didn't say anything else. Perhaps Yuan Yu just handed over this troublesome thing to save trouble, and he didn't intend to be on guard against anyone in advance.

Zhong Yu returned the wooden box to Zhou Chang.

Zhou Chang took out an account book. Under the account book there was a pile of letters and documents. He flipped through two pages and then lost interest: "Mr. Zhong, take a look too."

Zhong Yu took out the letter and document as he was told and looked through them, exclaiming, "Oh, Your Majesty, this is..."

"Shh... I know what this is..." Zhou Chang lowered her voice instinctively. Although it was written in vertical traditional Chinese characters, she could roughly recognize that it recorded dates, names, and amounts of money. It was a thick and densely packed book. There were also notes under the names, recording official positions and corresponding matters. "Are these things real? Why not leave them with Mr. Zhong first?"