Landlord of the Tang Dynasty

Chapter 143 Entering the Grassland for the First Time - Wolf
Every year before the cattle and sheep enter the pen, the Turkic people will drive the cattle and sheep southward in exchange for a batch of winter supplies.People in the customs also need to estimate the surplus and buy a sheep, or a few families pool money to buy a calf, so that it can be fed to the plowing field.This kind of large-scale transaction occurs several times a year, once in spring, once in summer, and once in late autumn, and each time lasts about ten days and a half months.

The location is not certain, some are outside the Great Wall, and some are in the city inside the pass, it all depends on the relationship between the two sides at that time.If the relationship is not good, they can only trade outside the Great Wall, just like this year.

Xu Qing and Huang Shimei wore merchant clothes, brought dozens of guards and a hundred catties of salt, and went to the grass market outside the Great Wall.

After walking northward for more than ten miles, the scenery changed greatly.Before walking all the way, there were clumps of deciduous forests everywhere, but here are endless yellow grasses.Due to grazing, most of the grass has been gnawed to only a short section.A gust of wind blows over, and the wind blows the dust up.

"Oh..." Xu Qing sighed.

"Brother Xu, what's the matter?" Huang Shimei noticed Xu Qing's disappointed expression, so she couldn't help asking with concern.

"I thought that this prairie should be the sky, the wild, the wind blows the grass and sees the cattle and sheep, but I didn't expect it, only the yellow sand and dust..." Xu Qing covered his face with a gauze scarf, He also took a piece for Huang Shimei.

Huang Shimei laughed: "Isn't there still a dark sky and a vast field to see?"

"Hey, there's you~"

After walking for a while, Xu Qing's group ran into another group of people who came to buy goods. After inquiring, they were there to buy farm cattle, and this was the third time they came here, so they knew the way well.Not long after, a temporary market with tents of various colors and various colors came into view.

"Cow~ I'll change two pieces of cloth~"

"Pizi, good leather, let's take a look~"

"There's dried milk for sale! You don't want to change it for a hundred dollars, you only accept white salt!"

This is a frontier transaction, no currency is recognized, most of them are barter.When Xu Qing heard that someone wanted to exchange dried milk for salt, he couldn't help but became interested. He was about to go to see it, but he didn't expect a person to sneak into Xu Qing's side while the guards were not paying attention: "My dear guest, I have a good product here. Are you interested in taking a look?"

Xu Qing stopped the guards who were about to go forward to drive them away, and said, "Listening to your fluent Chinese, you don't look like a foreigner~"

"The nobleman sees it well, the villain is the Yanzhao family..." The man reported his family name, but the land of Yanzhao is so vast, it is useless to say it.

"Oh? Since you are a Han Chinese, your good products should be sold to barbarians. Why do you ask me?" Xu Qing couldn't help being curious. Could it be that he looks like barbarians.

"My lord doesn't know that this is a good product that no barbarian would sell, and I have worked so hard to get it..."

"Oh? You can get there, but I can't? I have to let you go in with your left hand and out with your right hand, so you can make a lot of money for nothing!"

"Hey, it's not that I refuted your face, you can get this product, but you don't want to waste that effort..."

"Could it be stolen!"

"Hey, don't shout loudly, this can't be known by others..." The man played the card of incense and love: "I don't steal Han people, why not steal barbarian people, they can still kill us Woolen cloth!"

This is the theory of "the monk can touch it, but I can't touch it?"Xu Qing didn't speak, and the man said again: "Whether the transaction will be successful or not, it's not too late after seeing the goods..."

Walking to a slightly remote place, the man took out a cloth roll, opened it for Xu Qing to have a look, Huang Shimei also went over to look at it, but she blushed after only one glance.

what?
The fist is big, three feet three, like a big snake, it was originally a thick "bull whip".Niu. Whip is also called Niu Chong.

No wonder Huang Shimei blushed at the first glance.

"Brother, what, are you sorry? You're still ashamed? Don't worry, this bastard is so long..." Seeing Huang Shimei blushing, the man couldn't help but joked.Huang Shimei turned her head away and refused to talk to him, because the man recognized Huang Shimei as a man.Even Huang Shimei herself was wearing men's clothing.He was about to drag Xu Qing away, but the man stopped Xu Qing and said:

"My lord, is this good?"

Xu Qing's heart skipped a beat. He didn't know the specific effect of Niu Chong, but he had also heard about the powerful supplementary function that had expired.

"It's good, but it's not unusual, is it?" Xu Qing pretended not to care, and wanted to lower the price.What Xu Qing said is also true. Although there are not many Niu Chong, people can often hear people eating this stuff in later generations.

"Scared, don't lie to me. You are not allowed to kill cattle in the pass, and barbarian people don't want to kill bulls. This bull rush is not something ordinary people can get..."

"Forget it, I don't want it..." Xu Qing turned to leave, but the man hurriedly grabbed Xu Qing again, saying, "Just 12 taels, this is a bull who has never delivered a cow!"

This is the sorrow of the cow, Xu Qing thought to himself.However, he still didn't turn his head back, whether he eats the Niu Chong or not, it doesn't matter to him, he has a storehouse of good nourishing food.Furthermore, this Niu Chong is so rare, how this unknown little person got it, I am afraid it is also a defective product, I don't want him to say it is difficult.

Xu Qing took Huang Shimei back to the man who sold the dry milk, but found that the man's goods had all been exchanged.Turning around again, an idea popped up in Xu Qing's heart, exchanging things for things, isn't that possible... Xu Qing said to Huang Shimei:

"I'll do a magic trick for you, watch carefully..."

"Magic?" Huang Shimei was puzzled.

"To put it another way, I'm going to create something out of nothing today..." Xu Qing said shaking his head.

"How is it possible, Brother Xu was joking..." Huang Shimei didn't believe it, and the guards also shook their heads.But Xu Qingti slipped a bag of salt, made a weird fingering, made a "click", and trotted to a large shed.

"How to change this fur?" Xu Qing asked,
"Salt, iron tools, rice, everything in the south, I will change..."

"How to change the salt?"

"One whole, five taels of salt, I have twenty."

Five taels of salt, one piece of skin, Xu Qing held back his surprise at the price, frowned and said, "Five taels? It's a bit expensive..."

"If you have good salt, you can do it for four taels!"

"Okay, this bag of salt weighs eight catties, what do you think?"

"Hiss~ white salt! Alright, I'll replace them all!"

Xu Qing exchanged twenty pieces of skins, then went to a Han man's shed, lowered the price several times, and exchanged fifteen pieces of cloth.Continued trading, went to a barbarian's shed, exchanged eighteen cows, five sheep...

I saw Xu Qing changing back and forth, and after a long time, the bowl was already full, and he had to keep asking the guards to move things to get it. When he returned to Huang Shimei, he had already led ten big and small sheep, five or six females Cows, as well as hides, wool, dried milk, cloth, and yellow salt.

Huang Shimei's eyes widened, she couldn't believe it.But I saw Xu Qing exchanged the barbarian for the first time, walked to Xu Qing's side, and said:
"This honorable guest, just now saw such a good salt, he got excited and changed all the furs at once, alas... I want to change some other winter items, I don't dare to take out these salts without the skins... ..."

"So you want to switch back?"

"My dear guest, I..."

"It's okay, let's change it back, there is yellow salt here, you can exchange it for more white salt..."

After hearing this, the merchant Hu burst into tears of gratitude, and returned the white salt intact, and directly exchanged a lot of yellow salt, cloth and other supplies with Xu Qing.At this point, the bag of white salt that Xu Qing took out was back in his hand, and there were still many special products of cattle and sheep, which can be described as "creating something out of nothing".

Huang Shimei and her guards were all in admiration.

When exchanging things just now, Xu Qing found out that there is a bigger exchange market deeper in the grassland.Where there are many items, and the quality is good.

Indeed, after Xu Qing looked around, most of the cattle and sheep here are relatively thin.But even the more expensive livestock like horses can't be seen.

Thinking of Xun Xueer at home, Xu Qing decided to go north to take a look, buy a few cows, live milking sheep, and bring them back to Cangzhou.To make up for her.So, Xu Qing continued to go deep into the grassland with the guards.Although the relationship between the two sides is not harmonious, fortunately, the times are good, and the conflicts between the people on both sides are relatively small and relatively safe.

If the grassland is hit by snowstorms and the cattle and sheep freeze to death, then the bad side of the relationship between the two sides will be revealed.At that time, let alone go deep into the grassland, let Xu Qing go out for a walk, see if he agrees...

The sky was getting dark, the cool wind was blowing, and the moon was shining, making it look very desolate.Huang Shimei coughed, and Xu Qingcai came out from the realm of admiring the scenery, and ordered his guards to find a place to camp and rest.

After dinner, watching the afterglow of the setting sun, the clear sky, the moon has come out, and after a while, the stars are shining.

It makes sense to say that every star is a person. At this time, Xu Qing saw the faces of all the people in the starry sky who had met in the past and who were scattered in this life.

There is a poem that Xu Qing often holds in his heart:
"There is no one before, and there will be no one to come after. Thinking about the long life of heaven and earth, I am so sad and tearful!"

Xu Qing was alone in the Tang Dynasty, and I am afraid that Chen Ziang's feeling of "the world is long and lonely", Xu Qing can experience the deepest.

Xu Qing is doing well, and the wind is flourishing.However, he is very lonely.The kind of loneliness that can be relieved by company is just boring, just lonely.Even if there are beauties around, officials and nobles, and a big family, they can't alleviate Xu Qing's loneliness.

There is nothing to say about Xu Qing's loneliness.

Therefore, lonely people are most afraid of silence...

The chilly night wind brought a sound. At first hearing, Xu Qing didn't pay much attention to the whistling of the wind blowing across the ground.But the guards around him were different. An experienced veteran called out in a low voice:
"Be careful, there are wolves around!"

When Xu Qing heard the words, he sharpened his ears and listened carefully. It turned out that the sound brought by the night wind was howling wolves!
One, two, three...

Xu Qingse's ears were about to explode. He felt that hundreds of wolves were calling the moon.Those hundreds of wolves were moving around where Xu Qing could hear...

Wolves generally don't eat people, but the cattle and horses in Xu Qing's team are the favorite food of the wolves. The scary thing is that the wolves have the characteristic of killing people.

Thinking of ferocious wolves is really creepy.

(End of this chapter)