bookrebus Chapter 168: Transporting Goods into the City
Chapter 168: Transporting Goods into the City
At five minutes past three in the morning the next day, before dawn, a waning moon seemed to be about to fall to the bottom of the mountain.
Qin Bingrui and his team were preparing to leave Jiangzhou City.
Because of Prince Ning's relationship, the south city gate was secretly opened for them. Qin Bingrui looked at the dozens of large carriages that were passing by. It was really worthy of being a wealthy and powerful prince's mansion. It only took a day and a night to prepare all this. How much labor force must have been input.
It seems that his and Sister Luo Yu's plan was correct. After all, it increased employment for the ancient labor force and played a certain role in economic development.
Everything went smoothly, but when they had walked a third of the way, they were stopped by a group of yamen runners who looked like government officials.
Qin Bingrui's eyes moved. Needless to say, this was a checkpoint set up by the Qingyang Marquis' Mansion, which specifically prohibited merchants from entering the official road to do business in Wangzhou Prefecture.
"Stop, please show me your pass and documents. Where are you taking all this cargo?"
The squad leader's eyes flashed with coldness, and he didn't seem to be an honest yamen runner.
Qin Bingrui bowed and asked Da Chen from the Imperial City Bureau to take out the token of the Imperial City Bureau.
"We are from the Imperial City Division, and the Emperor has personally issued an order to capture Bai Hu and bring him back to the capital. Which department are you from? How dare you stand in our way?"
The yamen runner's eyes were filled with suspicion. He looked at the token again and again. It should be authentic. No one in the Imperial City Office dared to impersonate it. After all, the clothes and tokens were difficult to fake.
"Why are you, the Imperial City Division, transporting so much cargo, and where are you going?"
"Let's go to Wangzhou. The White Tiger is roaming in Wangzhou City. Our large group of troops will be stationed in Wangzhou City. All supplies must be fully prepared."
With so much preparation, are you going to move directly to Wangzhou?
Qin Bingrui actually wanted to kill everyone, after all, there were only more than 20 people on the other side, but the taciturn Feidao stopped him.
Qin Bingrui thought about it calmly and realized that once this group of people died, the Qingyang Marquis' Mansion would definitely get news and would naturally discover that they were transporting grain to Wangzhou for business.
"Do the people from the Imperial City Bureau need so many things?"
Qin Bingrui snorted coldly and said quietly, "My dear, do you also want to hijack the goods of the Imperial City Bureau? Forget about the forty or fifty of us, even if I am alone, I can kill you all.
By the way, there are still hundreds of Imperial City Guards stationed in Wangzhou. You can go and ask around. A white tiger has appeared in Wangzhou. I'm sure you've heard the folk legend that where a white tiger appears, someone is bound to rebel."
The last sentence was exaggerated by Qin Bingrui.
"You, what do you mean by this nonsense?"
"It's nothing. I'm saying Wangzhou is a treasure land. If someone uses the White Tiger to instill some improper ideas in the common people, hoping to become the king themselves, and the emperor is far away here, who knows what the consequences will be?"
The squad leader was furious, his eyes bloodshot. Just as he was about to explode in anger, a yamen runner behind him whispered in his ear, "Sir, I heard a few days ago that someone saw White Tiger, and he was indeed heading towards Wangzhou. It seems that people from the Imperial City Bureau have rented a large ship to pursue him."
"..."
Before letting Qin Bingrui and his companions go, the group of fake yamen runners secretly discussed.
"It seems the White Tiger has really come to Wangzhou. This is even more miraculous than the legend. Can it actually borrow a boat to cross the Wanjiang River?"
"More than that, look at how many people the Imperial City Division has. They're all incredibly powerful and have mastered top-tier martial arts, yet they can't even capture a single white tiger."
"Wangzhou is experiencing another disaster. The white tiger has nothing to eat. Will it eat people?"
"Shut up, everyone."
The leader stared at the carriage driven by Qin Bingrui and his men with a sharp gaze, but didn't find too many problems.
Prices in Wangzhou are quite high right now, and edible grain reserves are low. Will the people from the Imperial City Department find any clues when they go out to transport grain? He must return and report to the prince as soon as possible.
Qin Bingrui wanted to speed up his carriage and prepare to travel overnight. He estimated that there would be a group of people watching when he was about to reach Wangzhou. The Marquis of Qingyang was really bold!
Fortunately, the name of the Imperial City Bureau was useful. Also, because the reserve meat of this team was stolen, someone discovered that it was Baihu, a dog and a monkey who stole it all. At that time, they suspected that they were seeing things, but now they wish that the people of the Imperial City Bureau would immediately capture Baihu and bring him back to the capital.
Da Chen was very concerned about the white tigers and asked directly which direction the leading white tiger was heading.
The leader pointed at the vast green mountain range and sighed, "I heard there are many wild animals there. There might be other tigers. If the white tiger is truly intelligent, I'm afraid it will form its own army of wild animals."
Qin Bingrui's eyes flashed, and he said to Da Chen with a smile: "It seems we need to recruit more people to help. If all else fails, we can ask all the disaster victims to help find the person. There will be a reward if we find him."
The leader of the group blocking the road was also a strange man. He anxiously said, "That won't work. Wild beasts eat people, and the victims are all skin and bones and have no strength. They can't run away or fight back."
"Then let the wild beasts maul all the victims to death, and save you the adults from worrying about the victims."
"makes sense."
Qin Bingrui: I just said something nonsense, and you actually think it makes sense? It's terrible, this cannibalistic society...
Da Chen said seriously, "A big reward will surely attract brave men. Let's go back and recruit more men. We have plenty of food subsidies anyway."
Qin Bingrui thought to himself that although Dachen looked honest and dull, he was still very useful at critical moments.
After a while, they were released by the guards.
Seeing the people from the Imperial City Bureau driving away in a carriage, the fake yamen runners continued their discussion.
"Ah, the Imperial City Bureau is really amazing. They transported so many things just to catch a white tiger."
"This white tiger is indeed intelligent and very picky about food. Look, it brought the dogs and monkeys with it and stole all our meat, leaving behind no bones."
There are thirty large carriages. How many people will be needed to catch the white tiger?
Qin Bingrui knew that the motives of the next land transportation would definitely be suspected, so he had to rush to transport the grain back to Wangzhou, then send the carriage back to Jiangzhou, and then transport the grain by water through Pingshan County, which would be safer.
If they could make one more trip, they would earn more money. Assuming each carriage had a carrying capacity of two tons, 30 carriages could carry 60 tons. One ton was 60 jin, so 12 tons was 50 jin. They could make an average of wen per jin, which was taels of silver. If they could make so much money per trip, if they could make dozens of trips, they would earn nearly hundreds of thousands of taels of silver. The money they made was like flowing water, gurgling...
The population of Wangzhou and Pingshan County is about 200 to 60. Assuming that the average daily consumption of each person is 24g of food, people will need to eat kilograms of food a day, so it is worthwhile to transport the food no matter how many times it is transported.
It all depends on whether they can defeat the Marquis of Qingyang in the end...
Then Yan Xuan and He Yuan brought the two large ships back to Pingshan County. The magistrate Gao was so excited that his legs were shaking. He asked Master Wan to support him before he walked tremblingly to the dock. He looked at the two large ships of grain and secretly wiped away his tears.
Although food costs money, it is better than having nothing and starving to death.
Yan Xuan and He Yuan were now extremely experienced. They quickly arranged for the strong victims to work, transporting the food and delivering it to the warehouses in the city. Anyone who worked could get half a pound of food as wages.
Soon, the county government's granary was filled with grain. Luo Yu rushed to Pingshan County that day, opened several rented shops overnight, and invited more than a dozen experienced shopkeepers to sell grain and fruits and vegetables.
The purchase price of refined rice increased from 10 wen to 50 wen per catty, and the purchase price of white flour increased from 8 wen to 45 wen per catty, which was dozens of wen cheaper than the local prices.
The purchase price of brown rice increased from two cents to twelve cents per catty, and the price of old rice increased from two cents per three catties to ten cents per catty. The price increase was not particularly shocking, and ordinary people could barely accept it.
Meat was purchased at 20 wen and sold for 120 wen. After all, it was for the rich; the poor wouldn't buy it even if it was sold at a lower price. However, compared to local prices, this price was already very low. If it weren't for the yamen runners who kept people in line, I'm afraid the grain buyers would have snatched it all up.
Luo Yu discovered that there were quite a few wealthy people in Pingshan County. As soon as the grain started to be sold, they bought it by the stone at a time, without considering whether the other people queuing behind them had enough.
So Luo Yu asked Gao Zhixian to issue a purchase order, which stipulated that each person could only buy two stone of grain at most, and no more than that would be given.
Yan Xuan and He Yuan didn't even have time to eat a hot meal before they immediately returned to transport food.
Princess Rui asked the housekeeper to assign people to collect grain from various places, and piled the prepared grain in the warehouse at the dock. When the ship arrived, she would immediately ask people to load the grain onto the ship. It actually only took about four days to go back and forth.
Princess Rui still felt it was too slow and wanted to rent a few more large ships to go there. If it weren't for Miss Bai's advice to keep a low profile, she really wanted to make all the money in Wangzhou City in one go...