As night fell, the dinner officially began. All the craftsmen in the camp were invited, and the open space was filled with tables and chairs, with rich wine and food on it. Because time was a little rushed, the wine and food were not very delicate, but the portion was very large, with chicken, duck, fish and meat.

Seeing such a sumptuous wine and dishes, the craftsmen also felt the concern from the prince-consort, which made many people relax their vigilance, especially after Li Jie came, there was no nonsense and directly greeted everyone to the table.

In addition, Li Jie also sat down at a wine table, with the side of Chief Wei, and the other six craftsman leaders, Liu Si and Cui Ling, who were just released today.

"Don't be polite, everyone eat first, and you will have the energy to talk about things after you are full!" Li Jie also greeted Liu Si and others very generously, and was the first to pick up a piece of fish and put it in his mouth. After all, in such an occasion, if he didn't move the chopsticks, others would not dare to eat them at all.

Seeing Li Jie's actions, Liu Si and others also said a few polite words, then picked up the chopsticks and ate a few bites. However, it can be seen that they were still a little restrained by Li Jie, especially Liu Si, who seemed to have a very serious concern and wanted to speak several times, but they retreated at the last moment.

Li Jie saw that Liu Si and others had no appetite for eating, and he also saw that Liu Si seemed to have something to say, so he put down his chopsticks and said to Liu Si: "Do you have many questions to ask me?"

Li Jie made the words clear, which made Liu Si and others stunned. Then the six of them looked at each other, and finally Liu Si spoke carefully: "Don't blame the prince-concubine, we do have many questions to ask you, but I don't know if it's appropriate now?"

In this era, ordinary people are very humble in facing officials, let alone craftsmen like Liu Si face powerful people like Li Jie, so no matter how cautious they are, they cannot be an exaggeration.

"You ask, actually, I came this time to answer your doubts." Li Jie sat upright at this time, and said with a very serious expression.

When Liu Si and others heard Li Jie's words, they were also happy, but they were still very cautious. Finally, Liu Si spoke again: "Mr. Concubine, what we want to know the most is why the court recruited us to come here, and why did we go out to sea? What do we have to do after going to sea? Is it impossible for us to come back in this life?"

Liu Si asked several questions at once, and these questions were the ones they were most concerned about and discussed most in private. However, no matter how they inquired, they could not find out some definite news. Instead, various rumors continued to appear. Some people even said that the emperor sent them to sea to follow Qin Shihuang's attempt to find the elixir of immortality.

When Li Jie heard Liu Si’s questions, he glanced at Master Wei next to him with some confusion and asked: “Didn’t you tell the craftsmen about these things?”

"Report to the prince-consort, the superiors ask us to keep it a secret. After all, such a big thing is not suitable for outsourcing, and the craftsmen can just follow the arrangements, and there is no need..."

When Chief Wei spoke at the end, he found that Li Jie's face became a little ugly, which made him feel guilty and did not dare to say anything later.

In fact, the idea of ​​Wei is normal, which also represents the real idea of ​​many officials. In their opinion, craftsmen like Liu Si are not qualified to know the major affairs of the government. They only need to obey the arrangements of the court, and the court does not need to explain anything to them.

But they forgot that craftsmen are also human beings, not to mention that this matter also concerns their future and destiny. It can even be said that craftsmen have the right to know compared to officials such as Wei.

However, Li Jie was lazy to scold Wei again. This was not a problem with Wei alone, but a problem with the entire official atmosphere. Moreover, this problem could not be solved at all. He could only try to improve the quality of officials. However, even in later generations, such problems still occur from time to time.

Li Jie looked at Liu Si and others again, and then slowly spoke: "Your questions are actually just a big question in general. Now I can answer you!"

Li Jie came here and took a sip of tea, and then he explained in detail the reasons why Zhu Di was going to the American continent and the need for their craftsmen to move there.

Liu Si is from Kaifeng, and Cui Ling and others were born in the inland, so they know little about overseas affairs. Although the name America has been spread throughout the country for a long time, for Liu Si and the others, they are limited to knowing that potatoes or peppers were transported from America to the Ming Dynasty. They know almost nothing about America, and they don’t know that Zhu Di is going to America.

"If King Yan wants to go to America, he needs a large number of craftsmen to accompany you, so the court summoned you. Moreover, you craftsmen have been carefully selected, most of them have many brothers, and there is no family burden. Even if you leave the Ming Dynasty, it will not affect your family. What's more, the court will give your family a generous compensation afterwards." Li Jie finally added again.

When Liu Si and others heard this, they looked at each other. In fact, they had already discovered that all the craftsmen recruited were bachelors. For example, Liu Si originally had a wife, but his wife died in the early years, so he had no intention of remarrying him. Moreover, he had six brothers, and he ranked fourth in the family, so he had no big impact.

The situation of others is similar to that of Liu Si. The reason why most of these craftsmen are young is that they are not married and have no family burden. It can be said that the Ministry of Labor and the Ministry of Revenue spent a lot of effort to select these craftsmen.

"Mr....Mr. Concubine, we went to the legendary America. Will we never come back again?" Liu Si asked Li Jie with a trembling voice at this time.

Although they had speculations in this regard before, they received a definite reply from Li Jie for the first time, which made them unacceptable for a while. After all, they were hard to leave their hometown, especially for the people of this era, if it were not forcing them to force them, no one would be willing to leave their hometown.

"You can't say that. You have been in Dengzhou for a while. You should have seen steamships emitting black smoke and extremely fast in the port. Now the imperial court is developing new steamships. In the future, there will be such ships between the Ming Dynasty and the Americas. Generally, you can run back and forth in a month. So if you have time, you can still go back to Ming Dynasty." Li Jie replied truthfully.
Chapter completed!