At the end of the Sui Dynasty

Chapter 431 Burning Money
The spring of Daye’s [-]th year has arrived as scheduled. After several continuous spring rains, the grass buds under the ground popped up again.The grassland has turned green, and the Yufeng Racecourse has also welcomed the first batch of cubs born this year. Every time around this time, the racecourse is the busiest. The most important thing is that it is like the seeds sown by farmers in spring, which are related to the harvest of the whole year in the future. Once there is a problem, it will inevitably affect the harvest, or even no harvest.

At this time, the fifty Chuli women sent by Hachi played a role. As nomads, delivering horses seems to be their innate skill, and they also regard the birth of horse cubs as a very sacred thing. , Mares usually give birth at night, and these women can stay up all night for several consecutive days, kneeling next to the mare and waiting devoutly for the birth of the cub.

Therefore, when the herd of mares begins to give birth intensively, these women in Chuli are often exhausted and skinny. Get enough nutrition every day.

Under normal circumstances, a mare can be pregnant normally when it grows to eighteen months, that is, it is about one and a half years old, and it takes eleven months from pregnancy to delivery. Month, so February to May of the second year is the intensive birth period of horse cubs.

However, if the cubs are born too scattered, the management will be too troublesome, which is not conducive to mass breeding. Therefore, the male and female horses in Yufeng Machang are usually separated, and they are mixed together to mate and conceive when they are in estrus. In this way, the regular intensive birth of horse cubs can be achieved, which is convenient for large-scale breeding.

The successful birth of this batch of horse cubs this year means that Yufeng Racecourse is finally on the right track and has entered a virtuous cycle. In this way, adult warhorses can be slaughtered continuously every year, whether it is shrinking production or expanding production. As far as independent control is concerned, of course, if you want to expand farming, you must also consider the carrying capacity of the pasture itself. After all, the growth of pasture takes time.

Yufeng Racecourse has a radius of more than ten miles, and it is more than enough to produce [-] war horses a year. The current breeding scale is only about [-] horses, and there is still a lot of room for improvement. In terms of cost, the expansion of production must also consider the issue of efficiency, otherwise there will be no underwear left.

After another year of construction, the main building of Heishi Mountain has been completed, the outer moats have also been completed, and even the wall has been built to be more than two meters high. This thing is extremely expensive. Gao Bufan has seen Xia The account book of the God of Wealth, the money spent on the city wall has exceeded the main building of the racecourse, reaching a jaw-dropping 20,000 taels of silver.

However, safety is priceless, and the racecourse is the foundation. It is the only stable source of income for Gao Bufan at present. To put it simply, whether to eat meat or to eat bran, it all depends on the Yufeng Racecourse, without this fund Income, not to mention the Youyan iron cavalry, Gao Bufan is afraid that he can't even support a thousand private soldiers, so the city wall has to be built at any cost to ensure the safety of Yufeng Racecourse.

At this time, in the study of Yufeng Racecourse, Gao Bufan was staring at the ledger in a daze. Xia Caishen, who was always smiling, had a stinky face at this time, but Wei Zheng, who was always dark-faced, was drinking tea calmly.

The cattle and sheep harvested from the Chuli tribe last year are almost sold out, and the horses were sold in total about 80 horses at an average price of 50 taels. At the end of last year, another 26 horses were handed over to the imperial court at a price of [-] taels each. , the total income last year was about [-] taels of silver.

Undoubtedly, this is a huge amount of money, but the expenditure is also quite huge. The construction of the racecourse has already cost nearly 50,000 taels. After deducting the 20,000 taels soft food money given by Dou Xian at the beginning, an additional 30,000 taels were added; , daily expenses, the monthly salary of racecourse employees, etc., all together cost nearly 20,000 taels.

In other words, Gao Bufan still has 21 taels on hand. At first glance, he is very rich, but don't forget that most of this money is from the windfall made last year. This time, Gao Dashao is already seriously negative equity.

Next, there are many places to spend money. The first priority is to ensure the normal operation of the racecourse. Let’s start with 30,000 taels of silver, because the breeding has been expanded this year, and manpower has also been increased. The second is to recruit private soldiers. The number of soldiers in the Yang Mansion expanded to two thousand, of which one thousand was paid by the court, and the remaining one thousand private soldiers had to be paid for by himself. Calculated at two taels of silver per month, one thousand private soldiers cost 4000 yuan a year. Taels, this is just the food and salary, as well as the maintenance of weapons and the feeding of military horses, etc., 30,000 taels will start.

Calculated in this way, the cost is as high as 60,000 taels, and money has to be poured into the city wall of the racecourse. I am afraid that 20,000 taels are needed, but this is 80,000 taels. The most costly thing is yet to come, and that is You Yan, who promised to Xu Shiji cavalry.

Gao Bufan specifically asked Wei Zheng to calculate, to train an iron cavalry, including man and horse, plus weapons and armor, 200 taels of silver to start with, that is to say, an iron cavalry with 1000 people would cost 200,000 taels , This is only the cost of equipment, without counting the food and wages of men and horses, Gao Bufan was so shocked that he almost died on the spot.

Iron cavalry really cost too much money, no wonder there are so few animal-patterned (iron) armored cavalry in the imperial court. It is said that Li Shimin's black armored cavalry only had [-] in history, and with [-] black armored cavalry, he swept away an army of [-].

Therefore, the 21 silver balance in Gao Bufan's account now seems to be a lot, but in fact he doesn't spend much money on it.

At this moment, Wei Zheng put down his teacup and said, "General Gao Lang, I don't care about Xu Maogong's iron cavalry, but the five hundred private soldiers of Yingyang Mansion have to pay for this month's food."

It is said that ever since Xu Shiji came to Yufeng Racecourse, Gao Bufan transferred Wei Zheng back to Yingyang Mansion as his personal adviser. During this time, Old Wei and Yuchi Jingde were in charge of recruiting soldiers. Now the total strength of Yingyang Mansion has reached Reaching 500 people, 500 of them are very high and paid by themselves, [-] yuan per month, which is equivalent to about two taels of silver, which is quite generous, otherwise it would be impossible to recruit people so quickly.

Gao Bufan nodded, he can still afford the 500 people's food and salary, and now the headache is Xu Shiji's iron cavalry, who praised Haikou at the beginning, wouldn't it be embarrassing if he can't afford the money now?

Xia Caishen said with a dark face: "Now this kid Xu Shiji asks me for money every day, even when I go to the toilet, he squatts outside and throws stones into the latrine if I don't agree, I'm so angry!"

Gao Bufan couldn't help laughing, coughed lightly, and comforted him: "I'll talk to Shiji later."

…………

A large piece of grassland on the west side of Heishi Mountain has been surrounded by a fence more than three meters high, and a layer of turf has been spread on the surface of the fence, so it is impossible to see what is going on inside.

At this moment, there were bursts of shouting and killing, the sound of horseshoes, the sound of weapons colliding, and the smoke and dust billowing from inside the fence, which was quite lively.

In the arena, two iron-clad monsters were fighting fiercely together, and dozens of people around were cheering and cheering, all of them excited as if they had been pumped.

The two brothers Gao Shixiong and Gao Shiheng who were fighting in the arena at this moment were both wearing shiny armor covering their whole bodies, and their helmets also had masks, only revealing a pair of eyes and mouths. The war horses under their crotches were also wearing Iron armor, the whole body of the horse is only exposed to the eyes and the four legs below, and even the tail behind the fart is covered in a tapered iron sheet.Such a combination of man and horse is like a terrifying iron armored monster.

bang bang bang...

Brothers Gao Shixiong and Gao Shiheng, one wields a bronze mace and the other wields a horse lance.

After more than a dozen rounds, the horse under Gao Shixiong's crotch seemed to be exhausted. Gao Shiheng took the opportunity to sweep his elder brother Gao Shixiong off the horse.

After Gao Shixiong fell off his horse, he still screamed strangely, but he couldn't get up for a long time. The armor was too heavy, and he needed two auxiliary soldiers to help him just put it on.Everything has advantages and disadvantages. Every armored cavalry is like a tank. In a frontal confrontation, there is almost no resistance to push. No matter how many people you have, you have to kneel. However, the disadvantage of the armored cavalry is that it moves slowly. And it can't last long, it is only suitable for close-range frontal decisive battles.

At this time, someone rushed up to help Gao Shixiong up, and helped him remove the armor. The latter seemed to be fished out of the water, sweating profusely, but very excited, and shouted: "This armor From now on, it will belong to Lao Tzu, whoever steals it from me will be in a hurry with me."

At this time, Gao Bufan and Xu Shiji walked over, Gao Shixiong immediately smiled and saluted: "Boss Changqing, Master Xu!"

For a long time, Gao Shixiong has been the "captain of the security team" of Yufeng Racecourse. Now that Xu Shiji has come, Gao Shixiong can only be the second child, and the "security team" is also taken over by Xu Shiji. people.

Gao Bufan nodded, took the helmet of the armor, knocked on the iron mask, made a rattling sound, and asked, "What do Shi Ji think of the quality of this armor?"

Xu Shiji nodded and said, "That's right, give me five hundred sets first!"

Gao Bufan only felt a toothache. These two sets of armors were the samples that he asked Cui Hu to secretly build. From the design to the materials, they were all top-grade, even better than those provided to the imperial court, but they were expensive. Speaking of it, the cost price is 80 taels of silver. Even if Cui Hu sells it friendly and cheap at the cost price, 40,000 sets will be [-] taels.

"Five hundred sets is unrealistic, let's have fifty sets for the time being." Gao Bufan shook his head and rejected it firmly.

Xu Shiji actually nodded his head and said straightforwardly: "It's a deal!"

Gao Bufan was stunned for a moment, and couldn't help but secretly smiled wryly, but Xu Shiji showed the proud smile of a master negotiator after successfully signing the contract.

　Writing a novel feels like becoming an accountant.Don't worry about whether the numbers are reasonable or not, I am Hu Crepe's, after all, there is no historical data to test.The main circulation in the Sui Dynasty was also five baht coins, and there were very few silver and gold. The reason why the number of taels of silver was used to calculate is to let everyone be more intuitive.

　　
　
(End of this chapter)