Daming: If I find a great-grandson, I will teach an emperor through the ages

Chapter 93 Telescope, shocked Sapphire!
Making salt is not complicated or difficult for Cao Wei. In fact, Cao Wei had thought about figuring out the salt making method a long time ago.

In his previous life, Cao Wei had read many novels. After traveling through time, the protagonist could make a fortune and reach the pinnacle of life by making salt with his own hands.

But after Cao Wei had a rough understanding of the laws of the Ming Dynasty, he wisely gave up this idea.

After Zhu Yuanzhang founded the People's Republic of China, in order to develop the economy and appease the people, Ming Dynasty opened the people's permission to sell salt.

But it is not so easy for ordinary people to sell salt.

This matter has to be mentioned in June of the third year of Hongwu. At that time, there was an urgent shortage of food in Shanxi. The imperial court collected food relief. In order to solve the problem of food transportation, the imperial court came forward to recruit businessmen and said that after the food was delivered, it would be given to Merchants have a certain amount of salt, which means that after obtaining the salt, the merchant can go to the designated place to sell salt and obtain a fortune.

This is also called the method of opening up the middle. It not only solves the problem of food transportation, but also allows merchants to pay an extra tax when selling salt to make profits.

After the opening up of China was implemented, caravans transporting grain to border areas appeared in many places such as Gansu and Shaanxi.

For these merchants, if they want to engage in salt selling business, they need to complete three steps prescribed by the court.

First of all, what they need to do is to transport the grain to the specified location according to the plan given by the court, and then they can exchange it for salt.

Then, the merchant takes this salt quota and goes to the salt field to wait. At this time, he can pay for the salt, and then he can usher in the last step, the market transaction.

This method is the most primitive way for the salt dealers in the Ming Dynasty to obtain profits from salt, which is to complete the designated tasks through the opening method.

However, if the merchant does not arrive at the destination during the transportation of grain, or fails to complete the task of delivering grain, he will not be able to obtain salt, and there will be no way to sell salt.

Although the imperial court allowed smugglers to sell salt, the prerequisite was that the merchants had to help the imperial court transport the grain to the border areas. Just think about the difficulty of this. After all, the imperial court would not be stupid enough to give away profits to the merchants.

Therefore, if you want to sell salt, you still need to complete the designated tasks assigned by the court, starting with obtaining a salt guide.

Cao Wei is just a farmer. How can he complete the tasks assigned by the court and obtain salt?Naturally, there is no way to get involved in table salt.

But if you have to touch salt without salt, you will definitely die. Cao Wei is not that stubborn.

Now, in order to avoid the fifty big boards, Cao Wei pulled out the salt-making technique, which was just the right time.

[Countdown to return: 184 days, 15 hours, 07 minutes and 24 seconds]

Cao Wei left home and went to the manufacturing bureau to wait. Before noon, Yan Zhen went to court and brought a lot of salt stones.

Salt stone is also called brine salt, which is the main raw material for salt production. However, most of the brine salt produced in Daming is coarse salt, because there are too many impurities in the brine salt, including not only salt but also some messy elements and heavy metals. The coarse salt that comes out is also hard to describe.

The production method of more refined green salt is generally extracted from salt mines with good texture, or dried from sea salt.

Naturally, Cao Wei's salt-making method cannot be done by going to the beach to dry salt in a conventional manner. In that case, it cannot be called a new salt-making method. What he wants to do is to purify these salt stones and obtain green salt and refined salt with less impurities. .

Yan Zhen pointed at the salt stones on the ground and said with a smile, "I really want to see how you turn these salt stones into green salt."

There are too many impurities in the salt stone. No matter how it is processed, the resulting coarse salt will be bitter in the mouth. This is already known to everyone.

Cao Wei said that he could make green salt from salt stones. Yan Zhen, who was the minister of the Ministry of Industry, was very curious.

The official salt produced by the imperial court was all manufactured by the Ministry of Industry. There were many salt mines in Daming, but there were only a few good quality salt mines. Most of them were coarse salt mines with mostly salt stones.

No matter how hard the Ministry of Industry intensifies production, the output of salt is only a handful. This is why the price of official salt remains high, which gives private salt merchants the conditions to make profits.

If Cao Wei's salt-making technique is successful, the Ministry of Industry will no longer have the pressure to make salt. After all, there are as many salt stones as there are.

Without saying a word, Cao Wei ordered people to break the salt stones one by one, then found linen cloth and burned a pile of plant ashes and charcoal.

Plant ash and charcoal are both miraculous in absorbing and purifying impurities, while linen is used for filtering.

Later, Cao Wei once again ordered someone to get a large basin of water, melted the crushed salt stones into the water, poured in the plant ash and charcoal and stirred them to absorb impurities, and then filtered them with linen cloth to remove the insoluble ones. Impurities in the water are filtered out.

After repeating this process three or four times, no obvious impurities can be seen in the water.

At this time, after the brine crystallizes, the salt obtained will no longer have as many impurities as coarse salt.

"Get on the pot!"

After doing all this, Cao Wei gave an order, set up a large pot, poured in salt water and started cooking.

Gradually, as the water evaporates, slightly cyan crystals appear at the bottom.

Yan Zhen stared at the cauldron with wide eyes, "Green salt?!"

He really couldn't believe that Cao Wei made green salt so easily!Although he couldn't quite understand Cao Wei's operation, which involved melting water and burning plant ashes.

But Cao Wei did indeed use salt stones to make green salt!

Yan Zhenzhi stepped forward excitedly, picked out a little green salt with his hands, put it into his mouth and tasted it carefully.

"It's really Qingyan!" Yan Zhenzhi looked at Cao Wei with eyes full of disbelief.

Cao Wei smiled calmly and looked at the green salt in the pot.

The reason why these green salts are not pure white is because there are still some impurities in them, such as heavy metals.

But compared with the original salt stone, the impurities of the green salt at this time are much less, and compared with the coarse salt sold by private salt merchants, it is also several grades higher.

"I'll go back and tell your Majesty right now," Yan Zhenzhi turned around excitedly and was about to leave, but Cao Wei stopped him.

"Old Yan, this is not urgent."

"Brine salt can create green salt. How can we not be anxious about such a big thing? It is also a great achievement for you!" Yan Zhen frowned, very puzzled.

Once this salt-making technology was developed, the Ming Dynasty no longer lacked salt. This was a great contribution to the world!No one can remain calm like Cao Wei.

"You're so excited just after making green salt. If you make snowflake salt, I'm afraid I won't be able to hold you back." Cao Wei said with a faint smile.

Yan Zhenzhi's eyes widened again, "What did you say? Snowflake salt?"

Green salt is also divided into grades. The most basic impurities are much less than coarse salt, which is green salt. There is also snow salt which is better than green salt.

Snowflake salt, as the name suggests, is as white as snowflakes, with fewer impurities. It can be said that it is almost free of impurities.

But if you want to make snowflake salt, you must at least have a very good texture salt mine, or it can only be obtained after purifying it from seawater.

According to Cao Wei's words, he wanted to use this salt stone to make pure white snow salt with almost no impurities.

How could Yan Zhenzhi, the minister of the Ministry of Industry, not be shocked by this?
"Salt stone...can it really make snowflake salt?"

Looking at Yan Zhenzhi, who looked doubtful, Cao Wei nodded, "Although it's a little troublesome, it can be done." Yan Zhenzhi and Cao Wei have known each other for so long, and they know that Cao Wei is someone who will definitely do what he says. People who are willing to believe in Cao Wei no matter how impossible they feel in their hearts.

"Then do it quickly. If your Majesty finds out, you may be very happy." Yan Zhenzhi began to urge Cao Wei.

However, Cao Wei shook his head and said, "It takes a few days to make snowflake salt."

Yan Zhenzhi nodded immediately. That's right. How could it be so simple to make snowflake salt from salt stones?

"Your Majesty and I agreed that it will take half a month. During this period, Lao Yan, you must not say anything. We will wait until I make the snowflake salt."

Yan Zhenzhi nodded seriously, "I can spare this."

After Yan Zhenzhi left, Cao Wei lay down directly.

Making snowflake salt does require some preparation, but it is not complicated either. Just use the simplest saturated crystallization method.

Cao Wei was deeply impressed by the saturated crystallization method because it was one of the few experiments that his teacher could do with all the students in the modern academy.

Now, if we want to use the saturated crystallization method to make snowflake salt, we just need to make each reference object larger, so that we can produce snowflake salt in large quantities.

To successfully make snowflake salt, three to five days is enough.

But Cao Wei was afraid that Zhu Yuanzhang would arrange other things for him, so he delayed it for a few days.

However, half a month was really not that long, and it disappeared in the blink of an eye as Cao Wei wasted his time. Fortunately, he had successfully experimented with the saturated crystallization method and produced snow-white snow salt.

[Countdown to return: 170 days, 10 hours, 12 minutes and 35 seconds]

Zhu Yuanzhang brought Yan Zhenzhi to the manufacturing bureau again. After seeing with his own eyes that Cao Wei asked the craftsmen to pull out many ropes covered with white salt grains from a large pool of water, everyone was stunned!

Snowflake salt was actually made by Cao Wei out of salt stones!

Three days later...

The court suddenly released news that the price of official salt had plummeted, falling to half the price of private coarse salt!
At first, people were skeptical, and salt merchants even claimed that it was impossible. The cost of making salt for the imperial court was so high, and the salt had to be used by the royal family first. Where could there be excess to sell at low prices?

But when a small group of people actually bought green salt at a low price from the government, everyone was dumbfounded!

Is it true that the official salt price reduction is true?
For a time, the common people no longer saw the coarse salt of the past, and they all rushed to buy the green salt from the government. They also tasted the taste of green salt for the first time.

Although the people did not know why the government suddenly lowered the price of salt, they were grateful to the emperor and the court for such things that benefited the people.

People are undoubtedly very happy to be able to eat green salt at a lower price.

But the salt merchants began to complain one by one.

No one bought their salt...

Now everyone is starting to buy green salt at the government's low price. They have a lot of coarse salt in their hands, and they can't sell it all of a sudden!

Originally, in order to make profits, the salt merchants joined together to drive up the price of salt. None of them had much coarse salt in their hands, but they didn't expect that now they would all have it in their hands.

Even when they started selling coarse salt at a very low price, only a few people came to buy it.

Although such a turmoil did not seriously damage the vitality of these salt merchants, it also caused them to suffer a lot.

The most important thing is that the salt business they have been profiting from has been completely cut off!
Unless they can also create green salt, or pure white snowflake salt, the situation can be reversed, but how do they know about green salt?

After a group of salt merchants gathered together to discuss, most of them decided to enter maritime trade.

Only by doing business overseas can we continue to make a lot of money. It is no longer possible to have such a hugely profitable business as selling salt in the Ming Dynasty.

Now, they are all looking forward to the return of the wealthy businessman who has sailed to sea.

As long as the situation is clear, they will enter maritime trade without hesitation.

[Countdown to return: 165 days, 09 hours, 27 minutes and 41 seconds]

Cao Wei suddenly remembered that the weapon he had built for Lan Yu had been completed long ago, so he asked someone to notify Lan Yu and give him time to pick it up. Unexpectedly, Lan Yu turned around and ran over.

Lan Yu is accustomed to using long knives. Because it is convenient for slashing, the weapon Cao Wei made for him this time is also a long knife.

The blade is extremely wide, just right for a powerful warrior like Lan Yu, and there are two grooves on the blade, called bleeding grooves, which can cause maximum trauma to the enemy. With one slash, the enemy will no longer be able to survive. reason.

Lan Yu looked up and down with the long knife in his hand, his eyes full of satisfaction.

He pulled out another long knife he was wearing and slashed with it.

"clang!"

After a crisp sound of gold and iron clashing, the long knife Lan Yu brought was cut in half.

"Okay, okay." Lan Yu nodded, "With this knife in hand, I no longer have to worry about killing the enemy until the knife is sharpened."

Human bones are also very hard. It is normal for an ordinary iron long knife to curl its blade after long-term use.

"As long as the general is satisfied," Cao Wei said.

Lan Yu put away the steel knife carelessly, and with sharp eyes saw a strange object in Cao Wei's hand.

"What is this? Why have I never seen it before?" Lan Yu asked.

I saw that what Cao Wei was holding in his hand looked like a thick wooden stick, but it was of different sizes from top to bottom, and it looked hollow.

Cao Wei raised the thing in his hand and said with a smile: "This is called a telescope. I just polished it two days ago. It allows people to see the scenery several miles away."

When Lan Yu heard this, she immediately became energetic and said, "Is it really so strange? Let me take a look."

Cao Wei handed the telescope to Lan Yu, who put it in front of his eyes.

"Huh? It's strange, why can't I see anything?" Lan Yu grinned and held up the telescope, looking hard into the distance.

"The general holds it backwards."

When Lan Yu heard this, she was not embarrassed. She just turned the telescope and looked intently again.

Suddenly, his mouth opened wide!
(End of this chapter)