Chapter 364 - 364: Paying Taxes

Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation

The Emperor thought for a moment. It was true. The Imperial Duke had fought on the battlefield when he was young. He did know martial arts, and he was quite good.

So it was not that he could not do it, but that he had never learned martial arts before.

“Then the reason I can’t ride yet is because I have never learned martial arts before. Forget it, I won’t practice it today,” he said confidently.

Then, he looked at Jian Qingqing and asked, “Qingqing, I heard that the students of the Academy outside are riding bicycles to school?”

Jian Qingqing nodded and said, “Yes.”

The Emperor thought for a moment and suddenly asked, “Then how much are you selling this bicycle for?”

“100 taels,” Jian Qingqing replied honestly.

The Emperor let out a long ‘Oh’ and seemed to casually ask, “There are quite a lot of people who want to buy it, right?”

Ever since Xiao Ye had hired many craftsmen, he had also taken on orders from ordinary people. She did not know the exact amount, but from Xiao Ye’s words, she knew that there were thousands of orders.

“There should be a few thousand,” she said.

The number of orders shocked the Emperor. His pupils shrank. One order was 100 taels, so the thousands of orders were worth hundreds of thousands of taels. Heavens, he did not expect this bicycle to be so profitable!

He thought for a long time, suppressed the shock in his heart, and asked casually, “I don’t know if Princess Ding’an has paid the taxes?

Jian Qingqing was speechless.

It turned out that he was waiting to ask this question. However, she was not angry that the Emperor had schemed against her. She knew that the Great Wei Kingdom had been fighting for years and the National Treasury was empty. According to the tax law of the Great Wei Kingdom, the merchants’ tax was 7 out of 10, the farmers’ tax was 4 out of 10, and the scholars’ tax was 3 out of

The reason why the merchants’ tax was so heavy was that they were afraid that everyone would think that doing business was more profitable. Everyone would go to be merchants, and no one would farm.

Agriculture was the foundation of a country. If all the farmers became merchants, the country would be finished. That was why the merchants had to pay such heavy taxes.

If Jian Qingqing had to pay taxes, she would naturally pay according to the standards of a scholar. She thought about it for a moment. It seemed that the tax for the bicycle was indeed not paid because the other shops’ taxes were recorded by the accountant. The matter of paying taxes was also handled by the shop manager. She only needed to check the account book to make sure that there were no problems.

As for the bicycle shop, she did not open it at all. The so-called account book was only the number of orders that Xiao Ye had recorded, and nothing else was written, so she had forgotten about the tax.

Now that the Emperor had asked, she naturally could not lie, so she said, “I’ll go back and order people to hand it over to the Ministry of Revenue.”

The Emperor nodded his head in satisfaction, “Since you forgot to pay your taxes, and you need to be punished, then I’ll fine you to pay 50 percent of your taxes. ”

Jian Qingqing was speechless.

You’re really not polite, huh?

However, Jian Qingqing did not have any objections. It was useless to have too much money on her. The Emperor treated her quite well, and this country was also quite good. When the country was in trouble, it was necessary to donate some money to the country.

So she said yes.

It was also the first time for the Emperor to ask for money from an official like this. Moreover, Jian Qingqing had done a great service to the Great Wei

Kingdom. He also felt that he was not very kind. However, the Great Wei Kingdom was really in need of money now. Not long ago, the southwest border was invaded by the Yu Kingdom. People asking for food and weapons were sent to the Imperial Court one after another. He even took out his own private warehouse, but it was still not enough. He really had no choice. The temptation of Jian Qingqing’s hundreds of thousands of taels was too great. He could not help but say it out loud. He felt that it was despicable.

“Qingqing, I’m sorry,” he said gratefully and guiltily..