Inside the casting workshop, the blazing red coals flickered with dancing flames, their light and shadows playing across every face. Even in the depths of winter, one could work up a sweat in here. The craftsmen were dark-skinned, their arms roughened and muscular from years of forging iron.

Pei Shaohuai picked up another round silver disc, gripped it with both hands, and bent it — the disc curved with ease. He said, “Silver is a soft and malleable metal. Purer is not necessarily better for minting coins. After the crucible melts the silver, we should add some copper to make the discs harder.”

He paused in thought, then continued, “This will also make the silver more resistant to corrosion, less prone to brittleness and breakage, and less likely to develop tarnish and blackening.”

The craftsmen exchanged glances, surprise evident on their faces — clearly they had not expected this young official in fine silk robes, who looked as though his hands had never touched common work, to speak so knowledgeably about the craft of casting. At the very least, he was not the sort of young supervising official who understood nothing yet insisted on demanding refinement.

These craftsmen were skilled ironworkers, but switching to silver coin production, they still lacked a measure of expertise.

Among them was one who had originally been a silversmith. He stood toward the back and, being short, could only crane his neck and stretch on his toes to see, looking as though he had something to say but was too timid to speak up.

Minister Zhang’s sharp eye caught sight of him and called him forward, asking, “Do you have something to say?”

The craftsman spoke with a slight Bianliang accent and was not the most articulate, but he managed to make himself understood. He said, “My forebears worked with silver, and I have seen many silver ornaments… If too much copper is added to the crucible, I am afraid the metal that comes out may turn yellowish — the common people would take it for white copper.”

Coins like that would find no favor with the people.

He continued, “So this one would like to ask Your Excellency — how much copper, in your view, should be added to the crucible?”

The other craftsmen also watched with eager eyes. They all feared being dismissed for poor work and losing any chance of ever entering the Baoquan Bureau again.

Zhang Lingyi had assumed this question would stump Pei Shaohuai and was just about to speak up and smooth things over, when he saw Pei Shaohuai glance in his direction with a questioning look. Zhang Lingyi understood at once and instructed his deputy to send most of the craftsmen outside, keeping only a handful of the senior craftsmen.

How much copper to add would affect the color of the coins — such matters could not be leaked and had to be handled with great care.

Only then did Pei Shaohuai say, “Masters, try starting with thirteen qian of copper per jin of silver. More than that and it will darken; less than that and it will become brittle.” This was the copper ratio used for 925 silver from later generations — bright in luster, with ideal hardness and ductility, and less prone to oxidation.

Upon hearing this, the senior craftsmen each made a solemn pledge to guard the secret closely.

They fetched the silver and began their trials.

An hour later, Zhang Lingyi and Pei Shaohuai returned to the smelting room. On the workbench lay several freshly cast silver discs, not yet engraved. After polishing, their surfaces gleamed brightly.

Zhang Lingyi grasped one and tried to bend it with force — it only curved slightly. He handed it to a craftsman and said, “Try hammering it flat.”

The ringing strikes of the hammer rang out sharply.

The disc stretched to more than three times its original size without any sign of cracking.

Pei Shaohuai said nothing. He picked up another disc and examined it closely, finding the color not quite bright enough. Thinking it might be a matter of lighting, he carried the disc outside and held it up in the sunlight, scrutinizing it carefully — yet he still felt the metallic sheen was a shade too dull.

After a moment’s thought, he suspected the silver itself might not be pure enough, and that thirteen qian of copper might be too much. He instructed the craftsmen to reduce the copper incrementally by one qian at a time and fire a few more crucibles to see.

Sure enough, when the copper was reduced to twelve qian, the silver disc shone brilliantly — and held its hardness.

Minister Zhang said with admiration, “I never imagined that Young Pei would not only write well and have insight into military affairs, but would also understand the art of metal refinement so thoroughly.”

“Mentor flatters me,” Pei Shaohuai said, finding a plausible explanation. “The Rites of Zhou — Artificers’ Record states: ‘Of the six alloys, one part tin to six parts metal yields the alloy for bells and tripods.’ Even the ancients, when casting bells, tripods, axes, blades, and halberds, knew of the six alloys — how much more so those who came after? I happened upon this knowledge by chance and committed it to memory.”

The principles of alloying held true across all variations. The explanation was reasonable enough.

“It seems that metalworking is not merely a matter of brute strength — it requires learning as well,” Zhang Lingyi said with a laugh, then made a further mental note, adding, “In the future, when the Ministry of War forges swords and short blades, I hope Young Pei will come by and offer his guidance.”

“I am at your command, Mentor. This student will do his utmost.”

The silver smelting had already yielded promising results. Now came the coin-making. The smelting room was filled with many ceramic molds, and on the low wooden tables lay piles of fine casting sand — these two items represented two different minting methods: stacked ceramic mold casting and the mother-coin sand casting method.

The former was straightforward: pour molten metal into the mold and allow it to cool. The latter was more efficient: no dedicated molds were needed — instead, the mother coin was pressed into the fine sand to leave an impression, into which the molten metal was poured and allowed to cool into a finished coin.

Zhang Lingyi clearly favored the mother-coin sand casting method and said, “Young Pei mentioned earlier that the coin patterns were not refined enough. You must already have something in mind — should we now carve a few mother coins? How do you intend to proceed?”

Only with mother coins could one proceed to sand casting.

However, Pei Shaohuai had no intention of using sand casting. Though efficient, it had a fundamental limitation — no matter how fine the sand, it could not reproduce fine details.

Printing a few characters as on copper cash was manageable, but reproducing detailed patterns would be beyond this method’s capability.

Moreover, sand casting tended to produce coins of uneven thickness — something that mattered little for copper cash but was entirely unacceptable for silver coins.

Pei Shaohuai said, “Since the silver, once smelted, can withstand a hundred hammer blows, we might as well try hammering and pressing it into coin shape.”

Hammering and pressing was a technique used in crafting silver ornaments: a silver ingot was placed in a mold and shaped through the application of external force.

“One coin at a time — wouldn’t that be too slow?” Zhang Lingyi worried the process would be inefficient.

Pei Shaohuai explained, “If a heavy implement applies the force, shaping a coin’s impression takes only an instant.”

Zhang Lingyi was forthright in temperament and said, “The Ministry of War can forge heavy weapons of war — how could we be daunted by a mere striking process? With Young Pei’s assurance, we shall use hammer pressing to shape the coins.”

Over the following half-month, the Baoquan Bureau followed Pei Shaohuai’s designs and used hardened iron to forge a great deal of new equipment.

For instance, two enormous iron rollers were built — as they turned, smelted silver bars were fed through, and after several passes, thin, uniformly thick “silver sheets” were produced.

Then circular chisels of various sizes, used with hammers against the silver sheets, could punch out individual round discs of uniform size.

Depending on thickness and size, the discs came in denominations of one qian, two qian, five qian, one liang, and two liang.

Only the final step remained — hammer pressing: placing the round disc in a circular concave mold and stamping it from above and below to shape it.

As for the designs on the front and back of the coins, Pei Shaohuai devoted considerable thought to this.

He had originally considered marking the faces with one circle, two circles, and five circles, but on reflection, he decided it was better to respect local customs and accommodate the habits of Da Qing’s people. So he retained the traditional denominations — one qian, two qian, one liang, two liang and so on — to facilitate transactions by denomination, along with the reign era name.

The difficulty lay in choosing the design for the reverse.

Minister Zhang brought in many artists, and Pei Shaohuai even went to the Mangshan Temple to consult Old Daoist Wu. Yet the designs produced never quite felt suited to a coin.

Some artists had brushwork that was too fine — the resulting patterns were beautiful but overly intricate and too difficult to engrave.

Some excelled at landscape painting, with an emphasis on ink-wash atmosphere — but such brushstroke sensibility could not be translated into engraving.

Until one day, Pei Shaohuai noticed the embroidery on his own robe. Unlike brushwork, embroidery could never be as delicate — it was always rendered more simply, capturing essence without excess, and yet stitch layered upon stitch gave it a distinct three-dimensional quality. Patterns like these, engraved onto coins, would be perfect.

With an idea in mind, Pei Shaohuai quickly settled on the designs.

The one-qian silver coin was the lightest and smallest, and would circulate most widely among common people — it ought to represent the common people’s most heartfelt aspiration: a bountiful harvest. So Pei Shaohuai chose a design of two interlocking rice stalks, each grain clearly defined.

The two-qian and five-qian coins would still circulate primarily within Da Qing’s folk economy. Pei Shaohuai chose to engrave images of Da Qing’s magnificent landscapes — “The Yellow River descending from the heavens” and “The towering heights of the Eastern Peak.” Mountains and rivers were, after all, etched into the very soul of Da Qing’s people.

The one-liang coin, which would likely circulate beyond Da Qing as maritime trade expanded, ought to bear Da Qing’s most iconic symbol. Pei Shaohuai chose to engrave the image of the majestic Forbidden City.

The two-liang coin would similarly serve beyond domestic circulation — and as it was also a common denomination for imperial gifts, Pei Shaohuai chose for it a design of a coiled dragon playing with a pearl, the dragon striding through crimson mist, rolling clouds and bringing rain.

Engraving a circular mold in hardened iron was extremely painstaking work, but Da Qing was blessed with craftsmen of exceptional skill. Several senior masters, working with precision hammers and fine chisels, eventually produced the fitting molds.

The lower mold bore the pattern; the upper mold bore the text. The two were brought together and struck with external force, and the smooth silver disc was shaped and transformed. The mold opened — and with a crisp, clear clang — a silver coin of fine, delicate texture and brilliant surface dropped to the ground.

To test the coin’s counterfeit-resistance, Pei Shaohuai had craftsmen use this coin as a mother coin and attempt to produce inferior imitations using the sand casting method. The results were rough in texture, capturing only the vague outline, and the coins came out thick — a two-qian coin had consumed two qian and five fen worth of silver.

If the cost of counterfeiting was too high and the result too unconvincing, few would bother attempting it.

Basketfuls of the trial-minted coins were brought out into the sunlight, where they shimmered and dazzled the eye. Each one was as exquisite as a piece of jewelry — and yet these were coins. The quality of the silver itself elevated them further.

Zhang Lingyi had already held Pei Shaohuai in high esteem, but when he saw these minted coins barely a month later, he felt a quiet sense that his expectations might yet be raised even higher.

Zhang Lingyi said with a cheerful laugh, “Young Pei is truly exceptional — allow me to offer my advance congratulations.” With coins like these, how could the Emperor not be pleased? A well-executed task would surely be rewarded in due course.

“It is Mentor’s sound management that made this possible,” Pei Shaohuai said modestly. He added, “Coins are like flowing spring water — only when circulating do they flow ceaselessly and sustain life. If hoarded in one place, they will soon become stagnant, and the spring will run dry. After the coins are minted, what is more important is setting them into circulation. I ask Mentor to continue lending me his support.”

Pei Shaohuai’s footing in the court was still shallow. Spreading the coin exchange widely was not something he could accomplish alone.

“That goes without saying,” Zhang Lingyi replied. “I never considered myself well-versed in matters of currency — but over this past month, having repeatedly pondered what you said at that day’s court assembly, I have come to understand that governing wealth is itself a form of military strategy. Those who mint the coins always hold more authority than those who merely use them… I will do everything in my power to promote this system.”

……

Several days later, at the morning court session in the great hall, Minister Zhang stepped forward and said, “Your Majesty, this minister and Jishizhong Pei have completed a trial minting of silver coins with promising results. We respectfully present them for Your Majesty’s inspection.”

“Granted.”

The Ministry of Rites officer on duty called out, “Present them!”

A junior official carefully carried a tray draped in red silk, upon which the silver coins were arranged by size, and bore it before the Emperor.

The civil and military officials below all craned their necks in curiosity, wondering what coins the newly established Baoquan Bureau had produced — though they were too far away to see clearly. They could only watch as delight spread across the Emperor’s face. As he picked up the coins one by one and turned them over in his hand, his expression brightened further.

The Emperor shed some of his imperial reserve, caught up in a sudden moment of pleasure, and said with a smile, “All of you, be still.”

The hall fell silent.

Then the Emperor — holding a silver coin as an ordinary townsperson might when inspecting money — flicked it near his ear with his finger.

The great hall amplified the sound. A resonant, sustained silver ring filled the air.