Chapter 124 Liu Fengen begged Tai Shi Ci
“Good!”
Liu Feng clapped his hands excitedly: “Mr. Zeng, you can stay here, I will send you a complete set of salt fields when I get back. Please send reliable manpower to the island for exploration. Those who are willing to stay on the island can be hired to do the work. Those who are not willing to stay can be moved away after I return. I will provide you with a formality. In addition, do you think it would be more advantageous to appoint you as the magistrate of Qu County? "
"No, young master"
Mi Zeng narrowed his eyes and considered: "If there is too much movement, it will cause unnecessary trouble and prying eyes. There are not many people on Yuzhou Mountain Island. We only need to determine the ownership of the island in the state. Then, using money and food as bait, you can quietly digest the island’s residents.”
"After this, we can quietly garrison Yuzhou Island."
Liu Feng hesitated and said: "Mr. Zeng doesn't know something. Sooner or later I will station troops here. Besides, once the construction begins, I'm afraid it should You can’t hide it from Qu County, right?”
Mi Zeng laughed loudly: “It’s three to five miles from Qu County to the seaside, and there’s another three to five miles from the seaside to the island. The island is very big. If the construction is done on the seaside, I'm afraid I won't even smell it here in Qu County."
Liu Feng felt relieved.
“I just don’t know why the young master keeps it so secretive. Is there any other plan?”
Mi Zeng was a man of old age, and Liu Feng was so concerned about keeping secrets that he knew there must be something big in it. It was only then that he asked casually.
Liu Feng didn't mind at all, because he wanted to talk to Mi Zeng about this in the first place.
He will tell everything about what he saw and heard along the way, as well as what he met on the way, such as Xu Qin, a guest of the Wang family.
Hearing this, Mi Zeng took another look at Liu Feng.
He has long been accustomed to this kind of thing, and even his heart has become cold.
It was just that a young hero like Liu Feng was actually angry at the humiliation of such civilians, which really made his eyes light up.
"Then according to the young master's intention, what is the explanation for this?"
"Without him, we will cut off its foundation."
Liu Feng said: "There is a big dispute at the moment. In the ancient times, heroes were born in prefectures and counties, fierce generals were promoted in the army, and economic people were born in farming and managing money. Nowadays, Xuzhou is in trouble, the soldiers have no armor, and the soldiers have no armor, and the soldiers only have a salary of a hundred dollars a month. This is all because Money and food are not under the control of the state government. "
"Like Wang Yu and others, they are greedy for money, exploit the people, and amass wealth, but they have no intention of serving the country."
Liu Feng said impassionedly: "In that case, why not take this money and use it for the people's livelihood and soldiers?"
Zhou Tai and others have been sitting behind Liu Feng. They heard Mi Zeng think about it earlier. When it comes to marrying Liu Feng, they can feel at ease.
But when Liu Feng said these words, these people fell silent.
Without him, Liu Feng has them in his heart.
Zhou Tai and others felt warm in their hearts, and their strong feelings made them want to die for Liu Feng immediately, just to repay the kindness of the other party's national soldiers.
Mi Zeng was also moved by Liu Feng's generosity. In fact, deep down in his heart, he was really annoyed with the Wang and Gan families. Otherwise, why would he retire in his prime and return home to support himself?
This was also the reason why every time he saw Mi Fang, Wang Yu and others enjoying themselves out on an outing, he would always look down and scold him.
It's a pity that Mi Fang didn't understand the pain in her father's heart, and instead defended Wang Yu and others. If Mi Zifang hadn't always respected his father and brother and was obedient, Mi Zeng would really not want this stupid son.
“Don’t they just take advantage of boiling the sea?”
Liu Feng sneered: “Then I will dig up their foundation. They sell one stone for a thousand coins, and I will sell for nine. 100. They sell it for 800, and I sell it for 500. In short, my cost is much lower than theirs, and my output is much higher than theirs. If the state government sets a law to prohibit boiling salt, I see what else they can do! Fight with me?”
Speaking of this, Liu Feng's eyes were cold. Just by looking at this expression, he knew that he wished Wang Yu and others rebelled so that he could directly deal with them once and for all.
Liu Feng then agreed with Mi Zeng to entrust the other party with all the affairs of Yuzhou Island and let the other party start the arrangement as soon as possible.
Liu Feng wanted to kill Wang Yu and his gang as soon as possible. Even though these guys were disgusting, it was a great tonic for Xuzhou and Liu Bei and his son.
After careful discussion, Mi Zeng originally wanted to ask Liu Feng to stay.
After thinking about it for a while, Liu Feng declined.
He knew that with the Wang family's eyes and ears behind him, it wouldn't matter if he had a conversation, but if he stayed overnight, it would be difficult to explain and would arouse the Wang family's suspicion.
Liu Feng will naturally not be afraid of the Wang family, but there is no need. What if the Wang family comes and gives in?
Liu Feng wants to maintain his reasonable persona.
Soon, after agreeing on follow-up contact information with Mi Zeng, Liu Feng said goodbye and left.
Xu Qin chose a good manpower this time. He also knew how to stay outside and arranged for the front and back doors.
But his quality was still not up to par. Zhou Tai and Pan Zhang could see through it at a glance.
Liu Feng ignored them and took Zhou Tai, Pan Zhang and others to find an inn to stay.
Early the next morning, Liu Feng left Qu County and headed towards Tancheng.
This time things have been completed successfully, and the process and production technology of the salt-drying method have been left to Mi Zeng. It is time to return to Tancheng. After all, there are still a lot of new things waiting for Liu there. The sealing process is over.
Xu Qin's men followed Liu Feng and others to the gate of Qu County. After watching them leave the city, they immediately rushed back to the palace to report.
"You said they stayed in Qu County for a full half day and did not leave until evening?"
Wang Yu asked Xu Qin's guests carefully and got a positive answer.
"Mi Zifang left a few days ago, otherwise we can try to get some news from him."
Wang Yu quietly breathed a sigh of relief, and the Zhuozhouzi said coldly. When he said, it was really scary: "Forget it, don't pay attention to him. In short, he is from Zhuozhou, so it's okay to leave. My Wang family is not a rude person."
After thinking again and again, and thinking of warriors such as Zhou Tai and Pan Zhang, Wang Yu finally gave up the idea of intercepting Liu Feng halfway.
After all, there are only a hundred or so elite members of the Wang family, and it is enough to suppress the salt workers. But if they really face the fierce warrior Huben, Wang Yu feels that there is still more danger on his side. One more thing is worse than one less thing.
Wang Yu didn't know that his decision would extend his life and that of the entire Wang family.
If he really dared to take action, then Liu Feng would probably be very grateful to him.
Because he didn’t even have to wait until the salt fields were built and production capacity exploded before he would have his house confiscated and charged for attacking Fang Bo’s son.
When I went there, I wasted a lot of time due to a detour for inspection, but the return trip was much faster. The group traveled all the way and returned to Tancheng in just four days.
Liu Feng's trip took more than half a month.
After returning to Tancheng, Liu Feng asked Xu Sheng and Pan Zhang to see the team's training, and at the same time ordered Zhou Tai and Jiang Qin to go back and rest.
After the arrangements were made, he returned to the state capital and first went to his grandmother and Tian's courtyard to pay his respects.
After all this running around, Liu Fengren got a bit tanned, which naturally made his grandmother and Mr. Tian feel distressed.
After appeasing his grandmother and mother, Liu Feng naturally went to pay his respects to his father.
At this time, it was already the end of April, and the weather was gradually getting warmer and no longer as cold as before.
The farming that Liu Feng had vigorously carried out before had already entered the busiest period of spring plowing in an orderly manner. By the time of autumn harvest in June and July, he could deliver more than 300,000 shi of grain to the state.
"Father, my son is back."
He walked to the main hall, took off his shoes and went into the hall. Liu Feng bowed down and saluted Liu Bei from a distance.
“You still know how to come back.”
Liu Bei had actually received the news a long time ago. He didn't care about his precious son. Before Liu Feng and the others set off, he specially sent four sets of iron armors and six war horses to Zhou Tai and the other four.
Although these things are called rewards, they are rewards given by Uncle Fang to Zhou Tai and others.
But in fact, this is a father's care for his son.
Not to mention the war horses, these four sets of iron armor alone can transform Zhou Tai and others into tanks from the classical era.
With the strength, martial arts and courage of these four people, they are enough to defeat a hundred people without or with light armor.
This is not the slightest bit boastful. It is quite impressive for the elite troops raised by Wang Yu's family to be able to withstand about 10% casualties. Of course, there is a high probability that they will not be able to do so. For a group of one hundred people, as long as ten people are killed first, the opponent will almost collapse.
Is this difficult?
Of course, this would kill ten out of a hundred people.
Is it difficult for Zhou Tai and others?
But it was no longer difficult. Pan Zhang was wearing civilian clothes and killed seven unarmored bandits.
It is impossible that Pan Zhang, who was wearing iron armor, could not do it.
Pan Zhang can fight so well on his own, there is no reason why he can’t fight with the addition of Zhou Tai, Jiang Qin, and Xu Sheng, right?
Not to mention six war horses specially sent as a gift. Isn’t this just to make things difficult for Liu Feng so that he can run away with Zhou Tai and others?
This gift is also quite important. Whether it is iron armor or a war horse, in today's world, it is not just something that can be bought with money.
Liu Feng blinked his eyes and flattered him: "What are you talking about, father? This time the child went out, he thought about his father day and night. He just wished he could have wings so that he could fly back to his father as soon as possible to fulfill his filial piety."
< br>"Okay, okay, I won't accept your trick."
Liu Bei said that he would not accept this trick, but the expression on his face became vivid: "In the following days, you Don't run around anymore. Yuan Benchu and Cao Mengde have sent letters to send envoys to me to discuss important matters. According to their estimates, the envoys will arrive in the next few days, so you can make preparations."
"In another month, we will start mobilizing and prepare to go south to Guangling."
When Liu Bei said this, his pupils were full of daydreams, and he had obviously dreamed of unifying Xuzhou.
"Father, don't be too happy too early."
Liu Feng couldn't help but pour some cold water: "I always felt that Cao Yanzhou and General Hou were not so easy to talk to, so they watched us go south to Guangling. Even if they really can't make a move, they will definitely find a way to stop us."
Liu Feng continued to ask: "Is there any news about Shouchun and Juancheng's work these days?"
< br>Liu Bei sighed, it is really difficult to do something.
Hearing Liu Feng's question, Liu Bei shook his head: "There is no news. Cao Cao is fighting fiercely with Lu Bu. I heard that he just won a victory. He surrounded the point to send reinforcements and defeated Lu Bu's army of ten thousand people. , it can be said to be a great victory for Cao Cao, beheading thousands of people.”
When it comes to Cao Cao, Liu Bei is still a little scared.
He was beaten so hard by Cao Cao before that he almost had a psychological shadow.
He is not afraid of losing to Yuan Tan, because it is a disadvantage in terms of military strength and materials, coupled with Tian Kai's random command.
But losing to Cao Cao really hurt Liu Bei. At that time, he was waiting for work and had a military advantage.
Liu Bei wanted to use the city to fight back and win a small victory, but in the end he was stunned and beaten by the opponent on the head, and was defeated head-on.
Liu Feng smacked his lips and shook his head: "I always feel that Cao Cao and Yuan Shu are too honest, and even Yuan Shao is too honest. This makes people very uneasy."
When Liu Bei heard this, Wariness flashed in his eyes, and he asked carefully: "What do Feng'er think they will do?"
"It shouldn't be possible to do anything."
Liu Feng thought about it carefully: " Yuan Shu, who has food, has no troops to mobilize, but Cao Cao, who has troops but no food, can't say that Yuan Shu can still form an alliance with Cao Cao and send him food? "
When he said this, Liu Feng laughed first. Not to mention the deep hatred between Yuan Shu and Cao Cao. The former was driven all the way to Yangzhou by the latter.
Just looking at Yuan Shao's face, it is impossible for Cao Cao to abandon his original brother and go to the withered bones in the grave.
Later, Liu Bei asked about the results of Liu Feng's eastward journey.
Liu Feng reported with a little show off: "I, the Han people, need to eat an average of 6 kilograms of salt a year (the average person in modern times eats 5 kilograms of salt, which is equivalent to 20 kilograms in the Han Dynasty). One stone is 120 kilograms. Now, excluding Pengcheng, there are still 1.6 million people in Xuzhou, and they need 80,000 rock salt a year. If the salt tax is 100 yuan per rock salt, the annual income will be as high as 8 million yuan, and this is just the salt tax. Part of the income, if we can promote the salt method and take over the production and wholesale of salt, we can make hundreds of millions of dollars every year.
As for sales and circulation, it is best to leave it to businessmen. >
Firstly, to avoid the bloated government agencies, which will lead to a sharp increase in costs and support a group of idle people to become corrupt.
Secondly, part of the profits can also be distributed to the private sector, which increases business activity and enables the government to increase tax revenue.
The third point is that facts have proven that, in addition to completely abandoning the salt tax, this kind of government-private joint venture business structure is undoubtedly the best way.
After Liu Yan reformed the salt law, it began to be continued by subsequent dynasties.
When he heard that he could earn at least eight million yuan a year, or even hundreds of millions of yuan, this made Liu Bei cry.
He immediately became concerned about the progress of the salt policy. He heard that the construction of the salt fields had just begun, and it would take several months to take effect at the earliest. In the future, we will need to continue to increase production capacity and expand the scale of the salt fields. It may ultimately take a few years to reach a scale with an annual income of 100 million yuan. I am obviously a little disappointed.
"Father, even if you can earn tens of millions of dollars a year, it will greatly increase the income of our state."
Liu Feng hurriedly cheered Liu Bei up. After all, he still had something to ask of his father.
Liu Bei thought the same thing. His treasury was almost empty, so it would be great to earn more than ten million a year.
"It's just that we still need my father's help in this matter."
Liu Fengtu said: "Father doesn't know something. This time my son visited the place and found that there are powerful nobles in the coastal areas. They also used their own power to monopolize local areas and hired a large number of farmers as salt workers to make huge profits for themselves. They then used the proceeds to support thugs and recruit more salt workers. ”
Liu Bei's face darkened. With his sensitivity, it was not difficult to figure out the problem.
It happened that Liu Feng also added at this time: "Father, these salt workers come in groups, ranging from more than a thousand to as many as ten thousand. Because they are engaged in salt cooking activities, they have a certain degree of discipline. And the coordination team, if there are more thugs in the center, this will be a country soldier that can be mobilized to fight at any time."
Liu Bei nodded with a sullen face, obviously he also thought of this.
"What do you think about Feng'er?"
"I beg my father to let my son compile another one so that he can be stationed in Qu County in the future."
Liu Feng calculated in his mind that it would take at least half a year to a year before Yuzhou Mountain Island needed to consider the garrison of regular troops. Before that, the Mi family's servants were enough to deal with any threat.
After all, the biggest power in Qu County is the Mi family.
The team drawn by others is only a thousand people including Yan Ding, but the Mi family can easily pull out thousands of people with just their own servants.
If you include the Mi family’s Yanding, tens of thousands of people can do it easily, which is scary just thinking about it.
But fortunately, the Mi family is on his side, so there is no need to worry for the time being.
Liu Bei pondered for a moment and then nodded: "Xu Sheng's department has been expanded to two thousand people. In this case, let Zijing be given the title of captain of the First Navy, and Zhou Tai and Jiang Qin will be the commanders of the other departments. I will organize and train a thousand navy troops for the expedition to Guangling. After Guangling is captured, I will promote them as commanders of other divisions based on their military merits, and they will all be under your command for the time being."
After listening. Liu Feng was a little happy about Liu Bei's arrangement. This had already reached his minimum standard.
It’s just that he still wants to pay back the price.
Liu Feng cautiously probed: "Father, the child has another request, and I would like to ask your permission."
Liu Bei raised his eyebrows. Now he has a lot of experience. , whenever Liu Feng is particularly polite and well-behaved, there must be something he wants very much.
This time, words like request and permission were used. It seemed that such a big boy like me had a big plan.
"My son, please tell me first and listen."
Since Liu Bei has noticed it, he naturally became defensive and did not dare to speak too fully.
Otherwise, if he regrets it later, where is his dignity as a father?
Liu Feng smiled sarcastically and wanted to continue setting up the trap: "Father, I just want to beg someone from you. It's just a simple effort from you."
Liu Bei still refused to accept this trick and asked, "Who is he?"
Seeing that Liu Bei was determined not to fall for the trick, Liu Feng had no choice but to confess: "My son wants to ask Taishi Ziyi. "
"Tai Shi Ziyi?"
"Exactly, my son heard that Tai Shi Ziyi was skilled in bow and horse. , The yellow scarf who shot him did not dare to chase him, so he could only let him do what he wanted."
Liu Feng looked envious: "This is a real man."
(End of this chapter)