At noon, in the south of Yue'an City, a few days ago, a crowded city in Caoshi. The barbarians who came out of the mountains came to Caoshi with all kinds of mountain goods and exchanged various supplies with merchants with strange accents. The scene was very lively.

Caoshi originally refers to regular markets spontaneously formed in rural areas. They are generally located in major water and land roads, ferries, stations and other areas. They are a good place for people from all over the country to sell and purchase materials. In some areas, due to the strong commercial transactions, the original Caoshi became a fixed market, and then a large number of settlements appeared and evolved into cities.

Yue'an is the capital of Huozhou Prefecture and is adjacent to the Dabie Mountains in the south. If it is a peaceful season, there will often be barbarians in the mountains coming out to Yue'an to exchange mountain goods and locals for scarce supplies such as salt and iron. Therefore, the grass market will appear regularly in the southern suburbs of Yue'an City.

In order to win over the mountain barbarians, the Huozhou government fixed the Caoshi to "barbarians", so that the mountain barbarians could exchange for necessary goods, alleviate the impulse of sending troops out of the mountain to rob, and also attract merchants from all over the country to come here to sell goods and increase taxes in the prefecture.

However, all businessmen are not traitors. Most of the businessmen who come to Yue'an Man City to do business with Shanman City pursue huge profits, so the kind of thing that uses inferiority as good people and raises prices is very common in Man City. Sometimes the people of Man can't bear this tone and have disputes with merchants, and then the words will evolve into actions, causing death.

Therefore, Yue'an Man City is open and closed at any time, and as the current situation is turbulent, the number of business trips willing to come to Yue'an has gradually decreased. The Man City in the southern suburbs of Yue'an City has not opened for a while. This time, the market was reopened, in order to avoid causing unhappiness among mountain people, the new government no longer called it "Man City".

At this moment, the Cao Market has become the "Huangzhou Small Commodity Fair". The merchants and the leaders of the mountains use "communications" to negotiate and bargain for the price comparison of goods.

The merchants in Huangzhou are very experienced in doing business with mountain villagers. They know what the other party wants and what the other party can provide. After all, many merchants come from Zhongshanzhai, Dabie Mountains.

The so-called mountain goods are a general term for products in the mountains. The Dabie Mountains are so large that there are many products that can be sold in the mountains at a good price, such as furs, gems, precious herbs, rare animals and plants, etc.

There is even gold and silver, which can be regarded as hard currency wherever you go.

The mankind also needs a lot of things, and Huangzhou has produced them, so it is a good time to do business. Many merchants directly ask their friends to show off their goods, first of all, iron pots.

Iron pots are the first cooking utensils that appeared in the territory of the Huangzhou General Administration. A few years ago, since the government took over Yingzhou (renamed Ezhou) on the south bank of the Yangtze River and smelting iron in Kaishan, Daye, the production of iron pots has become increasingly large and is sold well in various places.

Cooking vegetables with an iron pot is better than using a cauldron, which saves firewood and can also "fry". Of course, this requires a stir-frying spatula. There are two routines to show the benefits of an iron pot.

First of all, compare it. Put the same amount of water in the iron pot and the kettle and cook it with the same amount of firewood. The result is naturally that the water in the iron pot will be boiled first.

The second is live cooking, and the kitchen uses various fancy actions to show what cooking is, which makes the onlookers stunned.

This kind of sales routine has become familiar to the merchants, and it attracted many mountain people to watch in just a few seconds. As the delicious dishes were released and the mountain people tried it, everyone had the most direct feeling of the performance of the iron pot.

Then there is a rush to buy and exchange the mountain goods you brought to iron pots.

In addition to iron pots, there are also various iron products, such as hoes, shovels, sickles, axes, and small iron products include embroidery needles, fish hooks, scissors, awls, hammers, pliers, etc. These are all necessities of daily life, but they are very scarce in the mountains because there is a shortage of iron in the mountains.

A lack of iron does not mean there is no iron, but precious iron is used for weapons and farm tools. How can the mankind have so many iron to grind needles? Many people use bone needles or even wooden needles for sewing clothes, and bone hooks for fishing. As for scissors, they are heirlooms.

Now, facing the dazzling array of iron products with low prices and good quality, the barbarians did not hesitate to take out mountain goods to exchange them, but this was not enough, because the merchants still had good things in their hands, that was floral cloth.

The floral cloth of various colors and patterns is significantly more washable than ordinary floral cloth. The colorful patterns make the barbarians of various villages look at it. Compared with the local cloth they woven by themselves, it is simply eclipsed.

However, among the mountain goods brought by Manmin, there is a kind of cloth that gives merchants a strong desire to buy, that is, cloth cloth.

Batik, that is, batik cloth, is a cloth dyed from the unique batik technology of the copycat. It has beautiful patterns and can be sold at a good price outside the mountain. Therefore, merchants and barbarians all take their needs.

In addition to cloth, there is another kind of goods that the mountain people have never heard of, that is lard. Many buckets of lard are placed in front of everyone. The lard is put on salt and boiled into oil paste, which can be stored for about a year.

If there is no oil or water for two meals a day, the food you eat in your stomach will not be hungry at all. Although the prey you get can also boil some oil, it is impossible for ordinary mountain people to eat oily mouths.

The Cao Market opened by the new government sells necessities that are extremely needed in the mountains. For mountain people, the most shocking goods are not iron products, but salt.

Mountains of salt, snow-white and frost-like salt.

These salts are not mixed with sand, and their prices are at least 30% cheaper than the sand-mixed salt sold by those profiteers in the past.

People cannot avoid eating salt. If they don’t eat salt, they will have no strength. However, it is difficult to get salt in the mountains. In order to get salt, they have to endure the exploitation of profiteers. The result of swallowing their anger is that they buy all kinds of inferior salt mixed with sand.

Now, they can get as much as they want in these white and delicate salts, provided that they bring enough mountain products.

Tian Yuanxian, the owner of the Fortress in the wind, looked at the white salt in his hand, looked at the mountain of salt bags in front of him, swallowed his saliva with difficulty, poured the salt back into the bamboo tube, and saluted to the king of Xiyang Yuwen Wen beside him:

"Tian, ​​a man from Yamano Village, didn't know the king's painstaking efforts, and he tried to almost surrender himself. He deserves to die. I'd like to ask the king to surrender!"

Yuwen Wen held Tian Yuanxian with both hands and laughed: "Don't want this to the old fortress. This time, the old fortress led the crowd to surrender to the court again. I was too happy, so how could I punish me?"

He coughed dryly, and Tian Yilong, who was standing next to him, quickly stepped forward. Through Yuwen Wen's introduction, Tian Yuanxian knew that this official general who was born in the mountain barbarian would lead troops to station in Yue'an in the future. No matter what the problem was, Tian Yuanxian could ask Tian Yilong to solve it.

In other words, Tian Yilong's shopkeeper is the "general agent" of Huangzhou Business Group in Huozhou. Huozhou Man, led by Tian Yuanxian, has any needs, and you can find Tian Yilong's shopkeeper to "place an order".

The opening of the commercial road is a win-win result for the Huangzhou Commercial Group and Huozhou Man. This is Yuwen Wen’s soft knife against Shanman.

How to deal with the mountain man? It is not difficult to say it is difficult, it is just treating each other with sincerity, but Yuwen Wen does not intend to impress the Huozhou man chief Tian Yuanxian with sincere gaze. He has a more sincere way, that is, salt.

Let the other party understand that there is real benefits to working with the King of Xiyang, which has salt and iron. If you dare to engage in robbery, then you will wait for the King of Xiyang to send "Yi soldiers" to destroy the clan.

No one is born a murderer. Even if there is, that person is not Tian Yuanxian. In other words, there is no such evil star in the Dabie Mountains, so Yuwen Wen believes that he only needs to ensure the supply of salt to make the barbarians of all the villages truly surrender to the court.

As the saying goes, the family is big and the business is big and the expenses are big. The demand for salt in large and small villages is a "firm demand". Yuwen Wen, who can supply salt stably, is not the enemy of the barbarians. Why should the other party fight against Yuwen Wen?

The key to the question is, where can I get so much salt?

The Yuchi family broke up with Yuwen family, and the salt of Hedong Chi and the salt of Shu are all under the control of Yuchi family, so the only reliable source of salt on the Yuwen family territory is the sea salt in Guangzhou from Lingbiao.

The large amount of sea salt obtained from the salt drying method is transported northward and distributed after crossing the Yangtze River. It is a bit reluctant to meet the needs of various places, let alone use it to win people's hearts. Therefore, the method Yuwen Wen and Wang Xu thought of in Yecheng was to exchange Ruyin for sea salt from Chen State.

When fighting for the world, you cannot care about the gains and losses of a city and a place. It is the kingly way to have sufficient army in your hands. Therefore, using Ruyin to exchange salt, then using salt to exchange soldiers, and bribery to stabilize people's hearts is Yuwen Wen's plan.

Chen State exchanged a large amount of sea salt for Ruyin, Yuwen Wen gave up a city, but exchanged salt for many soldiers. In the face of a large amount of salt, the barbarian chiefs from all over the country, such as Huozhou barbarians, Lujiang barbarians, and Jin Ximan, sent barbarian soldiers to assist in the battle without hesitation.

The barbarians' combat effectiveness is not good and their military discipline is poor. But at least they are considered soldiers, so it depends on how to use it. Looking at the trading scene in the Cao City in full swing, Yuwen Wen couldn't help but look forward to it.
Chapter completed!