"It doesn't take much manpower to lift a heavy object. Is this a yao art?”A servant was dumbfounded as he pointed at the construction site in the middle of the sandbar and muttered to himself.
A few laborers crawled into the circular wooden cage under the arm frame like hamsters running into a windmill. The wooden arm frame lifted the stones and building materials, and then other laborers pushed the machine to move the arm to the gap in the fortress.
"Yao arts?!"
The wooden machinery that frightened the servants was a large crane that constantly rose and fell on the construction site of the fortress. The construction of the fortress, which originally required a lot of manpower and time, had now been shortened by more than half.
If a European saw this, they would definitely mistake the machine in front of them for a simple squirrel cage crane. However, the crane had been reformed and improved, adding a transmission and a gear controller, which made it safer and more efficient. However, for a narrow-minded servant, it was still too shocking to lift heavy goods like a giant beast.
Lin Mingjin thought to himself that he was in trouble. His hands and feet were cold as if he had fallen into an ice cave. His servant lost his composure on the spot. How could pirates who killed without blinking be easy to deal with?
He raised his eyelids, his heart pounding so hard that it almost jumped out of his chest. He stared at the short-haired man who spoke Hokkien. The interpreter whispered a few words to the young leader, and the two of them threw him a mocking smile.
"Let's continue walking…" The middle-aged man with short hair spoke in Hokkien.
Was this an adult forgiving a petty person?
Lin Mingjin subconsciously moved his right hand and took out a handkerchief to wipe the sweat off his face. At this moment, he had no intention of doing business at all. Even if this group of short-haired people wanted to take him hostage and rob him of all his goods, it would not be a problem.
As long as there was life, there would be hope. As long as he kept his life, it was more important than anything else. As for business, he had to leave this place alive first.
Therefore, he immediately decided that as long as he escaped today, he would definitely go home and manage his own land properly. He would no longer take the risk to participate in the sale of goods by boat.
This decisive thought only lasted for less than ten minutes before it disappeared. Lin Mingjin saw a vast expanse of white salt soil, which was casually piled up into a few small mounds as tall as a person.
"Look at what this is?" The short-haired man pointed at Bai Tu beside him and puffed out his chest proudly, like a five-star chef who had cooked a sumptuous meal and was waiting for his family to applaud.
Lin Mingjin carefully looked at Short Fur. After getting the latter's approval, he gently dipped his finger into the white pellet and put it into his mouth to taste.
It was salt!
It was pure white and flawless salt!
Lin Mingjin's tongue was dry, and his eyes were green. The short-haired man treated such clean salt like dirt.
It was not that he had not seen the salt produced by the salt village, but it was black in color, bitter in taste, and coarse salt with many impurities. It was not worthy of being compared to the white salt in front of him. This was the true snow-white!
Even an illiterate old farmer would know that people would have no strength if they did not eat salt. Salt was almost equivalent to an alternative head tax of various dynasties. Moreover, the types of recipes in ancient times were monotonous, and most of them were pickled foods. The average amount of salt used was far more than that of modern people.
Salt was a necessity that never worried about sales. Even if the government monopolized salt and iron, it could not stop the flood of high-quality private salt. Moreover, with the low-level control of the feudal dynasty, the official salt produced by the salt village was already on the verge of collapse.
The price of salt in the Ming Dynasty ranged from 5 to 20 wen per catty. At the end of the dynasty, where productivity was affected by the war, supplies were scarce, and everything was expensive, the price of salt also rose along with the tide. The price of salt in areas where salt was scarce was several times higher.
The taste of the fresh and delicious white salt of the short-haired people was better. Whether it was the low-level or the high-level route, it was an excellent product that was more competitive than the crude official salt.
Excellent civilian products meant seizing market share. At this moment, in Lin Mingjin's eyes, the mountain of white salt was no longer edible, but a pile of white silver!
The short-haired people did not directly behead him to sacrifice to the flag or annex his goods. Instead, they brought him to the saltworks, which meant that the short-haired people's true intention was to do business.
Understanding the other party's thoughts, Lin Mingjin's merchant soul instantly recovered. His confidence and humble attitude helped him win the favor of the short-haired man.
Wang Kaizhi offered a price of 30 copper coins per catty of salt. This price was already a welfare price for Fujian Province, which was short of salt. The people from the industrial and commercial team once proposed to sell it at a price of 100 copper coins per catty, but Wang Kaizhi directly rejected it.
100 wen per catty of salt was several times the average price of salt. Although it could indeed be sold and could earn a lot of trade, if it was sold too expensive and upgraded to a light luxury item, the lower class civilians would definitely be far behind.
Moreover, the purpose of the transmigrators selling salt was not to make a fortune, but to make friends and establish a stable trade route. Secondly, leaving a good first impression on the Fujian natives was very beneficial to the transmigration group.
Lin Mingjin immediately expressed that he wanted to purchase 200,000 catties of salt. The price of 200,000 catties of salt was 6,000 taels of silver. This was the total value of the rice, sugar, and raw silk that Lin Mingjin had brought.
However, Wang Kaizhi planned to give the merchants more preferential treatment, allowing them to borrow an additional 100,000 catties of salt.
The price was that the merchants had to do their best to transport food, pig iron, cloth, copper, lead, tin, cotton and other livelihood materials for the high officials, horses, cattle, sheep, pigs, dogs, chickens and other livestock, mules, donkeys and other livestock
Wang Kaizhi also showed interest in the merchant's ships. If the Fujian merchant was willing to sell two transport ships, then the ships sold could be converted to collateral according to the cost, and the merchant could buy more salt.
In addition, the transmigrators also conveyed their urgent needs.
The transmigrators urgently needed human resources!
They promised that as long as Lin Mingjin could transport young and middle-aged laborers, men under 30 years old and women under 35 years old, they would give him a preferential price for salt.
Wang Kaizhi was not afraid that Lin Mingjin would run away with the salt. After all, no businessman could resist the temptation of " getting rich ". As long as he tasted the profit of high-quality salt, he would organize more ships and goods to sell goods in Dongyi. After all, who would be willing to give up a long-term " iron rice bowl " for short-term benefits?
Lin Mingjin tried his best to maintain his composure, but he could not hold on any longer.
A catty of salt was thirty copper coins, and he could sell it for fifty copper coins. He was rich!
With money, he could buy many farms in his hometown and leave a foundation for his children and grandchildren.
No! On second thought, Lin Mingjin realized that he still wanted to buy a boat! He also wanted to buy more ships for the officials to do business. He wanted to earn more money and send the people they wanted to these rich short-haired people. What Ming did not lack the most was food. Poor people who didn't know what to do next.
This year's harvest was not very good. There were droughts of varying degrees in many areas of Guangdong and Fujian. As long as he had the intention to guide them, he could bring those who were displaced and had their families broken to these short hairs. This would not only offset the silver, but also save the local officials trouble. It was killing two birds with one stone.
Moreover, the short-haired old men did not look like heinous bandits. They were all Han people, so they would not harm the Han people like the Dong Krupp. Lin Mingjin thought, The young emperor has been on the throne for more than two years, and he has been working hard to make the country prosperous. The Ming Dynasty is going to rise again!
As for saying that the government wanted to crack down on the sale of illegal salt, that was a fool's dream. Which illegal salt seller did not have a backer behind them?
All the officials in the world were transferred or promoted after serving one or two terms. They only wanted to be appointed. Nothing happened to their superiors. No one would have anything to do and want to do some political achievements. Not to mention offending people, if they were not careful, they would lose their heads if they were to " incite a popular rebellion."
Even if he was afraid of the consequences of selling illegal salt, Lin Mingjin could still sell it directly to General Zheng. He was a former "sea bandit" who had been officially recruited by the imperial court.
Who would dare to find trouble with him for selling illegal salt??
After spending the night in the town of the high-ranking official, Lin Mingjin brought a few boats full of salt the next morning and couldn't wait to set off on his return journey, looking forward to making a big profit the next time he returned.
Looking at the back of the merchant leaving in the boat, Pu Zhou, the clever man of the Fire Fighting Camp, scratched the back of his head in confusion. As for rushing home as if he had found gold?”
"The production capacity of ancient times cannot be compared with modern times.
In addition, the phenomenon of 'starvation' that seemed very rare in modern times was a common occurrence in ancient times. In general, many areas of the Ming Dynasty were very lacking in salt.”Mo Li crossed her arms.
"Hey, I logged out of the game yesterday to surf the internet and heard that a poor netizen starved to death at home.
"That person is indeed very pitiful, but the truth is:
In modern times, almost no one in a truly sovereign country would starve to death due to excessive poverty or lack of food. However, in ancient times, even during the golden age, many people starved to death because there was no food to eat.
Seeing that the two teammates were about to break out in a fierce argument, Ding Xiu interrupted the topic in time." Since salt is so scarce, why don't we do salt business?”
"Huh?" Dade glanced at Ding Xiu angrily." Where are you going to sell the salt?“
"Don't tell me you're going to Fujian to sell salt? However, we can't afford a boat. A 70-ton fishing boat costs hundreds of taels, and our entire team only has 600 guilders.”
Ge Yun was always carrying a bundle of bamboo shields. According to him, the bundles of bamboo were tied to bullets that could block fire.
" I don't have 600 shields left. I spent a third of it on equipment…" Liu Qi was quite satisfied with his bamboo armor.
"Don't tell me you're going to look for the High Mountain Tribe. It wasn't easy for me to gather a set of rattan armor, a round helmet, a musket, and a bow and arrow.”
Su San waved his hand. He carried the flintlock and arrows on his back, an ammunition pouch slung across his chest, and a leather quiver with fifteen arrows stuck in it hung horizontally at his waist.
" Of course I won't let my beloved brother go. Ding Xiu raised his eyebrows and pointed at the player who had been standing behind him for a long time. That person was dressed like a barbarian. Other than his Chinese face, he looked exactly like a German barbarian.
"Allow me to introduce you. This is Tian Suo, the commander of the Blood Eagle Legion.”Ding Xiu said," He plans to partner with us in the maritime logistics business.
This book comes from：m.funovel.com。