The disgraced official I took care of was actually Zhu Houcong's childhood friend.

Chapter 601

"Your Majesty, the train's transport capacity is not a problem at all. In fact, these four carriages should not be the limit. However, for the sake of safety, it is better to have one locomotive pulling four carriages at present."

Upon returning, Zhou Chu bowed to Jiajing.

Then Zhou Chu gave a look to the Imperial Guard in charge of recording the weights, and the guard hurriedly and respectfully presented his record book.

"Your Majesty, this is the total weight of all this coal. Please take a look."

As Zhou Chu spoke, he handed over the booklet.

Jiajing opened the booklet and glanced at it. It contained detailed records of the weight of each box of coal, as well as the final calculated total weight of the coal, which was slightly more than 500,000 jin.

Although he had expected it, Jiajing was still very happy to see this booklet.

"Pass it down, everyone take a look. Aren't the Ministry of Works and the Ministry of Revenue very good at numerology? Calculate whether there's anything wrong with these numbers?"

When Jiajing said this, his voice was very loud, and he was deliberately saying it so that the officials behind him could hear it.

Upon hearing this, Huang Jin respectfully took the booklet from Jiajing and then handed it to Yang Yiqing, who was standing behind Jiajing. Yang Yiqing looked at the booklet and became more and more pleased.

"It's not just 500,000 catties. With this trainload, where in our Great Ming Dynasty can't we hunt?"

Yang Yiqing spoke loudly, but his purpose was different from Jiajing's; he wanted to show off for his grandson.

After saying this, Yang Yiqing handed the booklet in his hand to Yang Shen next to him. Yang Shen glanced at it with a smile and then handed it to Xia Yan.

"Grand Secretary Xia, take a good look. Don't forget the bet you made with Hengqi."

Yang Shen joked.

Xia Yan's face turned green upon hearing this, and those around him, seeing his expression, all wore expressions of wanting to laugh but refusing to.

Everyone here is a cunning fox; who doesn't know that Xia Yan's poor health is an act? He's only in his forties and in excellent health. Now that he's lost the bet with Commander Zhou Chu, it's hard to say whether his health will improve in the future.

"Your Majesty, the train's carrying capacity is far more than 500,000 jin."

Zhou Chu looked at Jiajing and said.

"Oh? How do you say this?"

Upon hearing this, Jiajing became even more energetic.

"This is just one train. In fact, taking this platform as an example, a train can depart every 15 minutes if it is fast, and every 25 minutes if it is slow. In this way, at least 40 to 50 trains depart from this station every day. If there is an emergency, more can be added. Even if there are 50 trains, they are fully loaded with coal. The daily transport capacity is more than 20 million catties. And this is just for this railway."

Zhou Chu said.

Upon hearing this, an uproar erupted behind Jiajing. Everyone realized the terrifying changes that trains and railways would bring to the Ming Dynasty.

Putting aside other things, I'm afraid the salt guilds in Yangzhou will not be able to survive. With the advent of trains, there's no need to use boats to transport salt anymore. You have to understand that the salt guilds consume a lot of resources along the way when transporting salt, and the salt guilds are entrenched in Yangzhou, showing a strong tendency to disobey the imperial court's orders.

Although Yun Jin dealt a heavy blow to the Yangzhou Salt Gang a few years ago due to Zhou Chu's assassination attempt, they have actually recovered quite well in the past two or three years.

After all, anyone could be the leader of the Salt Gang; he was just representing a group with vested interests.

Putting aside other things, this railway line leading to Jiangnan was designed with this in mind, so it was perfectly capable of transporting salt.

Upon thinking of this, many officials' expressions changed.

They had significant financial dealings with the Salt Gang; the amount of money the Salt Gang paid them each year was not small.

Zhou Chu's move was tantamount to cutting off their source of income.

As the saying goes, cutting off one's path to wealth is like killing one's parents.