After the immortal disappeared

The exception was the He Lingchuan brothers, He Chunhua would not give it to them.

Wu Shaoyi picked up the bamboo tube and shook it. There was something rustling inside, something solid, a lot in number but not large in size. "This is?"

"Can you tell if you open it and take a look?"

Everyone unplugged, and a strong smell of tobacco overflowed.

Wu Shaoyi said in surprise: "Chewing tobacco?"

He took out a piece, put it into his mouth and chewed it slowly, while nodding: "Okay, okay, it's really top quality! Thank you, sir."

He Yue could only watch helplessly: "Father, where did this come from?"

"This is a specialty of the Bejia Kingdom. It has been sent here from the north." He Chunhua took a piece without chewing it and just put it in his hand to play with. "Dayuan has an agreement with the Bejia Kingdom and buys a lot from there every year." Things, chewing tobacco is just one of them. Now that the border line has reached Xiazhou, the task of sending people to the border depot to pick up the goods will fall on me. In addition, I just found out today that the official post in Xiazhou is also here. It must be provided to Bega merchants first; if Bega’s caravan is robbed, local officials must investigate and get to the bottom of it.”

The main function of the official post is to serve the couriers. Without them to provide drinking water, food, accommodation and horse exchange, where would the X Baili Express come from? However, Yuan Kingdom actually has an agreement with Bejia, and the official post cannot refuse Bejia's caravan to stay.

This kind of privilege is not available to the people of this country.

Zeng Feixiong, who doesn't smoke cigarettes, frowned: "What's so difficult about chewing tobacco? Why not produce it yourself?" Transporting it all the way here is time-consuming, labor-intensive and expensive.

"The things produced in Bega are of the best quality and are the most popular. You see, this bamboo tube alone is made of the jade bamboo unique to the south of Bega. It has a color like jade and is like gold when struck. Some people even use it to make musical instruments; The outer layer is only very thin and is light in weight." He weighed the jade bamboo tube casually, "Look at the packaging of the chewing tobacco produced in Yuan Kingdom, and what kind of quality are they?"

Zeng Feixiong was speechless.

"I have been in Shihuan these days, and I have seen nobles using Bega chewing tobacco in their social interactions, which shows how popular it is. The bamboo tubes they use are painted with gold for easy play. Rich private businessmen also use Bega chewing tobacco. He Chunhua weighed the bamboo tube and said, "Such a small tube costs one tael of silver. The further south you go, the more expensive it becomes. The higher the quality of the chewing tobacco, the higher the price." times."

"This tobacco leaf has no impurities. It is first smoked and then roasted, and soaked in honey. It tastes really good!" Wu Shaoyi was very intoxicated. "I used to chew all the shitty stuff!"

He used to be a mud-legged person, so why should he chew good tobacco?

He Lingchuan's heart moved when he saw it.

This kind of sapphire bamboo tube looks familiar. When he received the military merit reward in Panlong Dreamland, this was the thing he got!

In Panlong City, there are people who collect this kind of bamboo tubes, process them and sell them for money.

Yes, the chewing tobacco distributed by Panlongcheng Pengcheng Department is only slightly different in color and shape from what everyone has in hand, but it was a product more than a hundred years ago, and it is reasonable for the technology to have improved over such a long time.

In other words, the chewing tobacco distributed to the soldiers in Panlong City was also produced by Bejia!

Hey, he seemed to have heard Hu Min say that Panlong City also does business with the Bejia Kingdom, and the annual trade volume is quite large.

This country's foreign trade is really very developed.

He Chunhua sighed again: "Of course the most important reason is that Yuan Kingdom has to buy it. How much it will buy every year and at what price are all written in the agreement. As natural and man-made disasters have continued in recent years, we have to buy from Bejia Kingdom There were less things, and the payment was not timely. The country of Bega was very dissatisfied. "

If the real Mr. He were here, he might just ask "Why do I have to buy it?"

So He Lingchuan did the same.

He Chunhua did not answer directly. He was silent for a few breaths before saying: "It accepts Xunzhou's Year of Shepherd's Praise just to give us eye drops."

He coughed again: "We will face a more complicated new situation after arriving in Xiazhou, and this is one of the troubles. I say this so that you can have a sense of security. No matter how we fight with Nian Zanli, Bejia and we are Don’t offend easily. Okay, let’s get down to business.”

He nodded to Lao Mo, the housekeeper beside him, who immediately went out and led someone in after a while: "Master, the money manager is here to bring you."

Then Lao Mo closed the window and exited to guard the door for everyone. After all, this is a post house, so be careful that the walls have ears.

He Chunhua pointed at the latecomer dressed as a businessman and said: "This is the steward sent by the Zhu family to Dunyu to take care of business. He has been in Dunyu for twenty years and is more familiar with the capital of Xiazhou than the locals."

"Mr. He is very flattering." Manager Qian bowed to everyone around him and smiled kindly, "I have met all of you."

"At my request, Mr. Zhu specially ordered him to come from Dunyu to explain to us the situation in the city. In case you are unfamiliar with the place after I enter the city, you will not be able to start."

After he returned Zhu Xiuer to Zhu Xiyan, he established a pure friendship with the Zhu family. The Zhu family also has business in Xiazhou, and they also pointed out that the new general manager can be a leader, so they will naturally try to meet his reasonable requirements.

He nodded to Manager Qian: "Tell me, how is the war on the northern front, and how is it in Dunyu City."

Manager Qian spoke eloquently.

He Lingchuan knew that the war on the northern front of the Yuan Kingdom was not going well, but he did not expect such troubles.

Nian Zanli, who was the former general who conquered the north, took the entire Xunzhou to defect to the Northern Demon Kingdom, so the northern front line suddenly moved from Xunzhou to the south to the eastern part of Haozhou. You must know that Xunzhou has been the border line for many years, but the soldiers in Haozhou did not have much experience in fighting the enemy. As a result, the resistance here was weak, and they were defeated by Nian Zanli in less than a month.

With the Nian Zanli's momentum overwhelming, the battlefield unsurprisingly reached the southern part of Haozhou.

It was already close to the border between Haozhou and Xiazhou. As long as Nian Zanli captured the last three cities in the south of Haozhou, he could bring the war to Xiazhou, which was He Chunhua's territory.

Nian Zanli should also know the news about He Chunhua's transfer to the north. This former border general was probably eager to avenge the murder of his son, so he launched wave after wave of offensives in the southern part of Haozhou.

Currently, the one holding the southern part of Haozhou is Zhao Pan, the general stationed by Wang Ting. I heard that he and Nian Zanli have their own victories and defeats, so they can temporarily hold back the latter's southward invasion.

There is no doubt that Zhao Pan needs the full support of the rear.

There is no doubt that he encountered the same troubles as Ke Jihai:

Logistics was weak and supplies were in short supply.

Xiazhou was at the rear of the battlefield and had the unshirkable responsibility to bear a large part of the military supply. Wang Ting repeatedly ordered Xiazhou to fully cooperate.

"My family is in the fabric business in Dunyu. Originally, we mainly dealt in silks, satins and furs. After the war started in the north, Dunyu had to cooperate with the whole city to transport cotton cloth and rush to make cotton clothes. My family did the same." Manager Qian sighed, "General Zhao before the winter. We urged for 30,000 winter coats, but now the spring snow is almost melting, and only more than 7,000 cotton-padded coats have been sent to the front line, less than 40%.”

He Yue frowned: "Can't all the materials for the war be raised by Xiazhou?"

"Xiazhou is the closest to the front line, and the tasks assigned to it are also the heaviest. More than 3,000 pieces of cotton-padded clothes alone were assigned. We spent a lot of effort to complete the task, and we still paid for the goods and labor money out of our own pockets. The officials have not yet "Reimbursement." Manager Qian continued, "It's just a lack of clothes. The shortage of food is huge. I heard that the camp was bombed once, and some soldiers were so hungry that they defected to the other side's camp at night."

If the morale of the army is unstable, the battle cannot be fought well.

Mo Zhe Jingxuan asked him: "Didn't Xiazhou have good weather and good food harvest in the past two years?"

"Yes, so Wang Ting asked Xiazhou to send food to the front line nearby to meet the urgent need. But after sending it three times, Dunyu's largest granary suddenly caught fire."

"I heard about it in Shihuan. Hundreds of thousands of stones of food were burned down." He Chunhua said expressionlessly, "After the king received the news, he was so angry that he smashed two cups and couldn't sleep all night."

Who can help but feel distressed if the food that can feed the front line for a year and a half is burned down in a fire?

There were a few frozen autumn pears soaked in the basin on the side. He Lingchuan took one casually and heard Manager Qian smile: "How can there be hundreds of thousands of stones? 90% of them are empty. The villain has reliable information. Originally, There are only 20,000 stones at most.”

"At most!" He raised two fingers. "No one knows the specific amount, not even the person in charge of food. After this fire, it calmed down."

Zeng Feixiong couldn't help but ask: "Where did the food go?"

"The grain in Dunyu Granary has been rarely used in recent years, so every year after the autumn grain is harvested, it is only left empty in the granary, and then smuggled out, and the old grain is even used to replace the new grain that has just entered the warehouse." Manager Qian said, " Last year, we didn’t know that General Nian would betray the country, and we didn’t know that Xiazhou suddenly turned around and became a front line. A lot of food was sold to Xunzhou, and the warehouse was severely short of money. "

Several generals were very angry: "In other words, the other side will eat our rice and kill our people?"

"Who is the leader?" He Lingchuan gnawed on a pear, "There must be someone in charge. He has been doing this for more than a year or two, once or twice, right?"

"Dunyu is the ancestral home of Mr. Li Dushan, Minister of the Ministry of War. The old family members are here and make a big living. The government dare not provoke them at will." Manager Qian swallowed, "Baoxiang, the largest grain company in Xiazhou The owner’s surname is Liu, but the actual controller is the Li family.”

"They didn't dare to make a big show of it at the beginning, and it was just a small matter to exchange accounts for food. But after doing this for several years, everything went smoothly. Others were jealous and imitated others. Everyone came to change, and the accounts became more and more chaotic. , the inventory in the warehouse is getting less and less.”

"This grain official should be killed." Wu Shaoyi said in a serious tone, "Hey, it's still a familiar trick and a familiar taste."

He used to be under Hong Xiangqian's command. Didn't the rebels rise up to resist because of several years of floods and droughts in the south and the royal court's brutal conquests? They have seen these chaos, these tricks, and these tactics many times in the south.

Now that he has become an official and a soldier, the corruption in reality remains the same.

He Chunhua nodded.

As the saying goes, you can tell when you see the slightest thing, not to mention that Dunyu's old bad debts have turned into a big hole.