More than 80% of the salt production on Guangnan Road is in Guangzhou. Since it was called Hong Kong and Hainan in Macau, the Jindou Salt Field, it has been extended inward to Guangzhou. There are more than a dozen salt fields of all sizes concentrated in this bay entrance.

There are two factors.

The first is the method of making salt. Cooking salt. The so-called boiling salt is not to cut off sea water and use firewood to cook it. No one can afford the cost. The real boiling salt is mostly boiling salt like Qiantang River. Break the brine soil and water it with water. The concentration of brine is large and the use of firewood is small, and the cost will automatically decrease. But in this way, there will not be many places for real salt production. Most of them are in the Baykou area. The seawater recedes for a long time, so the salt can be time to settle. Until one day, the high concentration of brine at these Baykou has become less and less, and ancient people only put their eyes on salt drying, which will take three or four hundred years.

The second is the developed Yushui River Basin, which is enough to send Guangzhou salt to all parts of Lingnan, including Fujian Road, Jiangnan West Road, Jinghu South Road, and Qianzhou.

Qianzhou salt originally used JAC salt, but the actual transportation cost is actually not high. For example, a pound of ten cents will be transported, then one stone of salt will reach more than 3,000 cigarettes, floating salt will reach more than 1,000 cigarettes, and a bucket of salt will reach more than 300 cigarettes. This is almost the cost of transporting grain to the northwest front line will be high.

The fact is impossible. The developed Gan River Basin cannot make the freight equivalent to the Northwest freight.

However, with the inefficiency of the government and layers of greed, the actual transportation fee for salt transport in Qianzhou can often reach dozens of cents per kilogram, and then the harsh officials have raised it directly, the salt price in Qianzhou has remained at more than 40 cents per kilogram for many years. The higher the salt in remote areas can often reach more than 100 cents. The salt quality is not good, the inferior quality, and sometimes the amount is seriously insufficient, so private salt is thus produced.

The salt content of the major salt farms in Guangzhou is high, and the cost of salt making is lower than that of the Qiantang River. Lingnan originally had no control over the area, and at the official purchase price of only one pound of salt is only more than ten cents. If there is a way, a pound of salt may be less than ten cents. Then transport the salt to Xunzhou along Longchuan (Dongchuan), and then pass through a mountain road of more than two hundred miles. From Anyuan Water in Anyuan, Qianzhou, to various parts of Qianzhou. If the government seals the case, you can enter Yingzhou from Shixing Water, get off the boat from Yingzhou and turn to Weng Water, enter the southeast of Shaozhou, and then go to Longnan, southwest of Qianzhou through a mountain road of less than two hundred miles, and then send the salt to various parts of Qianzhou through Taoshui. Check again. Pick up a knife and chop you guys to kill. The transportation cost is less than ten cents, and even a pound of salt is sold at a price of forty cents, and the profit is more than 200%!

This is a tragic and majestic history of struggle, and the bricks often praise it.

They ignore the most important point, even if these people oppressed by high-priced salt have the ability to transport salt to Qianzhou, how can they be sold?

Powerful and powerful! All officials!

In essence, the powerful and local officials compete with the court with wits and methods. As for the poor people, they only play the role of cannon fodder in the middle process. This is the truth.

Zheng Lang and Pang Ji are not idiots. They are practical players. Neither of them can talk nonsense, so they are very cautious about the salt reform in Qianzhou.

Qianzhou Private Salt, which has been around for nearly a hundred years, has produced a chain of interests with huge local power. There is also a Sheman on the two hundred-mile mountain road, so the problem becomes very complicated.

But Pang Ji was very smart and pushed Cai Xiang out.

Something must happen, but Cai Xiang is one of the protagonists of Fanlou Banquet, and you, Zheng Lang, don't care.

The two big bosses fought wits and tricks across the sky, and the people and businessmen below could not see it.

I know that the problem is very complicated, but the profit margin is too large. The normal cost of a pound of salt will not exceed twenty yuan, and it will be sold at forty yuan. It will also generate huge profit margins. In fact, it is more than forty yuan! And it is sufficient in quantity and high-quality.

The three prefectures and second armies have a large area and a dense population. Jizhou alone has nearly 300,000 households, and the figures calculated by the Ministry of Revenue have more than 600,000 households. In fact, it is far more than that of the entire Xixia population. The actual use of salt is at least 400,000 shi per year, which is how much profit will it generate!

The water is deep, but many merchants buy money and go south. Some merchants in Guangzhou also value this business opportunity, buy money and go north. Or someone buys money and then resells it to southern merchants.

After several months of turmoil, batches of Guangzhou salt went north along Dongchuan, and then entered Qianzhou from the Sheman area.

...

After crossing a mountain, the group of people stopped again.

The mountain road was too difficult. Although the distance was not long, it was still marching on these rugged mountain roads. Many wheels were broken by the rugged mountain roads and had to stop for maintenance, which seriously affected the speed of the marching.

Lao Liu stood on a high slope, looking into the distance, and could see the green mountains and hills that could not be seen at a glance. When he marched here, the most impressive thing was not the stuffy weather. It only started in March. Although it was hot, it was still under his mercy. What he could not bear the most was the word, green!

The green mountains and clear waters are so cute, nothing else, green.

But Lao Liu never thought that once he reached the limit, he would not only be unlovely, but also terrifying.

The greenness of the green onions almost made the mountain road turn into a green color. Even though I heard She people singing on the opposite mountain, I could not see a figure. The large and beautiful sound of birds, which seemed extremely noisy in this infinite green, was also very noisy and pissing.

He suddenly thought of Dingchuan Village.

There were hundreds of thousands of people participating in that battle, and there were fighting sounds within dozens of miles. There was a collision of iron armor. At that time, he suddenly thought of the battle of one million people in the Tsingchuan Village. He didn't know what the scene should be. In the battle of Dingchuan Village, the battle of the enemy and us was only a battle of more than 200,000 people, and it was all of this. Does the battle of one million people cover the world? But it was only bloody, and the man's blood can be seen and heard. But here, he could not see it. He saw only green, and it was green beyond green, but it allowed him to see a kind of silence and a terrible murderous intent!

But this section of the road is more than 200 miles.

But Lao Liu could not imagine more.

It's pretty good to get here.

Due to the huge price difference between the two places and the huge profit of millions of dollars a year, a huge chain of interests has been generated, making Qianzhou on Jiangnan West Road, Tingzhou on Fujian Road, Chaozhou on Xunzhou on Guangnan East Road, Xunzhou on Xunzhou on Meizhou, Huizhou on Guangzhou, and Guangzhou on Guangnan East Road, becoming the forbidden area of ​​the salt administration of the Song Dynasty. The government has been repeatedly banned. Not only has private salt flooded, but it has finally led to some salt bandits robbing people of grain and silk and plundering women. Every year, they fight with police officers and soldiers, and directly kill officials and soldiers.

What he could not have imagined was that because the matter was serious, if the government held tightly, these private salt dealers would turn into robbers. They would be caught tightly and turned into the people. Under the cover of local corrupt officials, they would not be able to catch them. They would either hide in the She barbarians' residence, and the government would not dare to touch them. They would continue to be free from justice and would continue to be private salt dealers, or robbers, and by the time of Zhao Zhen Dynasty, the salt administration of Qianzhou became a long-term disaster for the court.

He even expected that Zheng Lang's subordinates in Taipingzhou, and after Fu Bi's good friend Cai Ting served as the Jiangxi prison, he made a series of fine-tuning adjustments to the salt administration of Qianzhou to ease the suppression of private salt dealers, and did not allow the people to privately store weapons. Within 20 kilograms of private salt, they did not follow the armored soldiers, and they could not be arrested. This series of appeasement policies, as well as increasing the quantity and quality of Huai salt, made the salt price slightly fair and reasonable. Invisibly, the scale of private salt dealers gradually decreased.

He could not have imagined that whether it was Guangzhou or Jiangnan West Road, the emphasis on this salt administration reform led to strict guarding of the two waterways, which resulted in peace and stability.

Lao Liu stood on the rock motionless, unable to see, but could hear it with his ears.

Some civilians were repairing cars, while others looked at Lao Liu with admiration. Although they were from the northerners, they participated in the Battle of Dingchuan Village. They killed six Xixia people in the front and back! They retreated from the battlefield only because one arm was cut off by the enemy, otherwise they would have been transferred to an intermediate general due to their merits.

How powerful are the Xixia people? It is a fierce race that often makes the Khitans eat turtles, and the Tubos and Uighurs scared.

Old Liu looked back and saw that the brigade of men and horses were magnificent, with more than 200 cars, 400 civilians and fifty guards. Of course, the profits made after successfully reaching Qianzhou were equally huge. With just one trafficking, you can make more than 2,000 yuan in profits.

But he looked at the boundless green and felt uneasy.

It was not because of the battle in Xixia that there were pine forests, but that pine forest was different from the forest here. There was only pine forests, this was a forest, a gloomy forest!

Fifty guards are uneven and have poor combat power. They can scare people by acting like a good person. If they really encounter bad things, they may not be able to play a lot.

At this moment, he heard a trivial sound.

He felt uneasy when living in the northwest all year round and participating in battles many times. So he asked the guide: "How far is this place from Anyuan Water?"

"Official Liu, there are more than 120 miles left?"

"After one hundred and twenty miles?" Old Liu frowned and murmured to himself. Then he made a very unsafe distance in his heart, because there was no barbarian living area here. The barbarians were not that smart, but under the seduction of some people with ulterior motives, they became a big fang that could be eaten at any time.

I pricked up my ears and listened, and the sound was getting closer and closer.

Old Liu suddenly said, "Prepare for the fight."

When the guards heard this, they all got up, wiped the sweat from their foreheads, picked up the arrows in their hands, surrounded the convoy, and watched nervously at the surrounding environment. On both sides were mountains, and they stayed in the valley. The mountains were not tall, but the trees covering the sky made the mountains a place where the mountains were, and no one knew what would emerge from it.

Lao Liu was still listening, no one spoke, only the noisy chirping of countless birds, the sound of waves blowing through the green sea, and the trivial rustling sounds mixed in the waves were almost inaudible. If he had not been on the battlefield for several years and had been a scout for a while, he would not have noticed the existence of this sound. But now he felt that it was getting closer and closer.

The slight sound was not harmonious at all. Old Liu was creepy and suddenly shouted: "Get back."

Staying in this valley, the terrain is very unfavorable to me, but the sound comes from the front, so I can only retreat.

Hearing Lao Liu's orders, the group of people hurriedly pushed the salt truck back, causing chaos.

Seeing the convoy retreating, the rustling sound stopped, and finally nearly a hundred men rushed out of the woods. Knowing that they were exposed, they directly held the earthen bow and arrow and hunting knife, jumped onto the avenue, and pounced on the high ground.

"Retreat, retreat." Old Liu shouted repeatedly.

The enemy will not be afraid when they see it. The most feared thing is that the enemy cannot see it. If they don’t know where they are, they will not understand why the court is weak to the barbarians. The woods are too dense and there are too many mountains. Even if hundreds of people are hidden, it is difficult to find them. Even if they can’t find people, how can they be wiped out?

The convoy continued to retreat, and Lao Liu kept using what he saw in the army to command the formation, staring at the enemies in front of him. He was wearing the blue-black robes unique to the Dongman, and his face was ochre with ochre sand, which was very hideous and terrifying.

Some people shouted in fear: "The barbarians are here."

The fear of these barbarians in the depths of the Five Ridges was not only the people of the Central Plains, but also the Han people in Guangzhou.

Old Liu shouted, "Don't be afraid, the Minman (referring to the Sheman) never has any osmosis faces. These people are fake Shengman."

Everyone still believed in Lao Liu. Finally, when these people rushed in front of him, the convoy evacuated from the low-lying valley, which was not very good. But it occupied the terrain slightly. Lao Liu calmed down and said, "Arrowman, prepare."

At this time, he seemed to have returned to the northwest battlefield.

The enemy was getting closer, but he also reached the mountainous point. Seeing the enemy's ignorance, Lao Liu's mind became more stable. He measured the distance, one hundred steps, fifty steps, and saw that he was approaching, Lao Liu shouted, "Che."

Dozens of arrow feathers flew out, and nearly ten people fell down when Wenxian fell. Old Liu shouted again: "Continue shooting."

Two waves of arrow rain flew out and more than a dozen people fell. However, Old Liu felt regretful that his guard army was a miscellaneous army. If it were a regular army, just two waves of arrow rain would shoot down at least thirty or forty people. He pulled out his sword with one arm and shouted: "Kill."

He rushed down the hillside, swung his sword, and an enemy fell down.

When the enemy saw Lao Liu's fierceness and his formation was stagnant, it also gave the guards more courage. They rushed down the hillside one by one. Lao Liu cut out a second sword, and another enemy fell down and saw nearly twenty people falling down by the same person. In fear, the enemy scattered and fled into the mountains and forests.

After running into the mountains and forests, Lao Liu had no choice. Amid the cheers of his subordinates, Lao Liu shouted: "Go."

He felt even more uneasy.

The convoy continued to set off on the road and passed this ambush. Everyone realized the danger and the speed was finally fast. However, the mountain road was too bumpy, and cars broke from time to time. They had to stop repairs, but the speed was still not fast.

The sun was about to set, and Lao Liu was planning the journey. There was a river valley in front of him. The terrain was open, which was very beneficial to his own defense. This was the place where he camped tonight. It was the open space left by the Sheman repeatedly slashing and fire. After passing this river valley, it was still the territory of the barbarians, but gradually it was mainly mature and barbarians, so it became safe. So he shouted again: "Hurry, hurry."

The team speed increased again, and the afterglow of the sun became cute. As the light was softer, the weather was not as hot as noon, Lao Liu wiped the sweat from his forehead. The singing of the She barbarians sounded from time to time in the distance. Although he couldn't understand what they were singing, his singing voice was beautiful and moving. He could only hear the sound, but he could not see where the figure was.

As I saw the valley getting closer, countless screams suddenly came from the woods.

A figure flashed out of the woods, like ape, with its body flexibly jumping among the dense forests and bushes. There were more and more figures, and they were making noises around the convoy. Old Liu's face turned gray, and he finally knew where he was uneasy.

When private salt dealers want to take salt dealers from Guangzhou to Qianzhou, how can they not deal with these savages? These savages are not ungrateful and often buy them with one bow, an arrow, or an iron pot. After years of dealing with each other, there are always several tribes who have close contact with these savages.

On this mountain road, it is the paradise and paradise for the barbarians, but it is the nightmare of his own people.

When he glanced over, he found that there were more and more people, one hundred or two hundred, and he could not count them.

As more and more people gathered, some barbarians pulled out small bows from their backs. The funny little bow was actually a bamboo bow and arrow, but it still killed people.

Old Liu's forehead was getting more and more sweat beads. He was making a judgment and finally said, "Drop the salt truck and rush."

You cannot retreat, you will die faster.

Hundreds of people ran forward and ran away desperately after hearing the news.

The bamboo arrow fell down, and from time to time the screams of his companions came from behind him. Old Liu just ran forward and thought sadly that his lifetime of heroic reputation would be lost from now on.

The valley was getting closer and the sun was low, and the Sheng Barbarians finally stopped to surround and kill. Old Liu counted his companions, and 400 civilians, plus his fifty-one guards, and escaped safely here. There were only twenty-six guards, 251, and some were even shot with arrows and wounded. Nearly two hundred people were killed by Sheng Barbarians just now. He said, "Let's go."

Even the valley was not stunned, without supplies, and without luggage, most of the guards who survived by chance even lost their weapons in order to escape, and staying in the valley was not safe. The group fled forward desperately.

The long night passed, and saw a building in front of me. It was a post. The people inside saw the group of people fled in panic and met out of the post. There were several garrison soldiers. The group escaped desperately for the night. Looking at these Song soldiers, they collapsed to the ground together and said, "Brother Soldiers, save us..."

The news was quickly conveyed to the court.

In fact, life is not scary, and some unfilial Han people are not scary either. What is scary is that the two join forces.

Such a large-scale attack occurred after the Nong Zhigao incident, which would make people have all kinds of bad associations. It is an unknown number of life in Fujian, Guangxi and Jiangxi, but once the turmoil is unrecognized, it will directly endanger the safety of Jiangnan West Road, Guangdong and Guangxi Road and Fujian Road. The most terrifying thing is that Di Qing led the main army in the south to the Temo Road, which was beyond the reach.

The story also reached Guizhou. It was the Shangsi Festival, and Zheng Lang held a meeting in Guizhou. Like the previous time, Zheng Lang still focused on slapping and even promised to transfer some farmers from the mainland to provide technical guidance. The information first came to Yu Jing's hands. Yu Jing was shocked when he saw it and hurriedly handed it over to Zheng Lang.

After seeing this, Zheng Lang's hands trembled slightly. Although they could not be compared with Nong Zhigao, they were 264 lives alive!

After walking for a few steps, his face became cold. He looked at the barbarian chiefs in front of him and said grimly: "This is the favor given to you by the court. Of course, if you still don't accept it and insist on resisting the court, sometimes, killing people is to save people!" (To be continued...)
Chapter completed!