Back to the end of Ming Dynasty to be a warlord

Chapter 257 Yang Chao's News

With the help of Yang Chao's prestige, Wang Xiao successfully established quite a harmonious relationship with several salt merchants, but he has not yet entered the circle of salt merchants completely and cannot enjoy the huge profits of the salt industry.

This time Yang Chao won a big victory, defeating more than 300 captive soldiers and beating more than 200 soldiers. As soon as the record spread, Wang Xiao immediately seized this opportunity to feast on the rich merchants, planning to integrate into the salt merchant circle in one fell swoop.

After the mid-Ming Dynasty, the Yellow River silt that was taken from the coastline of the south of the Yangtze River into the sea pushed a lot into the sea, and the salt content in the seawater decreased.Therefore, the salt production center moved northward, from Huainan to Huaibei. The seawater near Haizhou Bay has high salinity and longer sunshine hours than in the north, making it a salt production center.

Haizhou encountered captive soldiers, and the salt merchants could not get enough salt supply. Although they would not go bankrupt, they did suffer heavy losses.

So this time when Yang Chao went to rescue Haizhou, all the salt merchants supported it, so they were willing to associate with Wang Xiao who was holding the banner of Yang Chao, but they really thought that Yang Chao could defeat the captive soldiers and solve Haizhou in one fell swoop There are not many people around, and the most optimistic one is to hope that Yang Chao can help defend Haizhou City, and don't let captive soldiers invade Haizhou and wipe out the people there, so that Haizhou will be more than just In a year and a half, no salt could be shipped, but the salt production was completely destroyed.

Therefore, Wang Xiao's desperate publicity was just to convince these wealthy merchants that the Wang family can rely on Yang Chao, a brave general, and that's all.

As for whether Yang Chao is so powerful and an invincible brave general, few people really believe it. Some people even think that Yang Chao will never return to the battlefield, and maintaining a relationship with the Wang family under the banner of Yang Chao is just a matter of fact. Just out of sympathy.

But when the news of Dasheng arrived, not only these salt merchants were shocked, but also gave birth to other thoughts.

Haizhou is the center of the salt industry. Haizhou was under siege. Yang Chao rescued Haizhou and solved the siege of Haizhou in one fell swoop. The connection of these few things is really too imaginative.

Countless people would wonder whether the Wang family will take this opportunity to form a close relationship with the salt producers in Haizhou and the government of Haizhou; whether the Wang family will use this opportunity to break into the salt production industry in Haizhou.

Based on these salt merchants' understanding of the strength of the Wang family, they don't think this is a difficult task, although under the salt monopoly system, the most lucrative part is not salt production, but the salt trafficking link.

However, Haizhou has been under siege for such a long time. Even if it is opened up, it is impossible to produce a large amount of table salt immediately. At that time, the price of salt will inevitably rise, and the Wang family has opened up the salt production relationship, so it is worth their wooing. Just to give priority to whom to supply salt is enough to make whoever is the first to make huge profits under the good market of rising salt prices.

So several big salt merchants quickly accepted Wang Xiao and promised that the Wang family could participate in the Jianghuai salt transportation.

Of course, it's just salt transportation. Anyway, the Wang family is originally engaged in transportation, and has a relationship with the salt-producing areas. It is reasonable to do salt transportation. As for the core interests of selling salt to various places, these salt merchants will never let it go. Because selling salt is not only a business, but also a power. Not everyone has the right to sell salt. Without the relationship established with the government in several lifetimes and the contacts formed with various joints, this business cannot be done. The Wang family thought It is still impossible to squeeze in so easily.

But just the business of transporting salt from Haizhou to Huai'an is enough to make Wang Xiao wake up with a smile. You must know that the reason why Huai'an has been able to become the four major cities on the canal in the past hundred years, faintly rivaling Yangzhou, is precisely because of the Jianghuai salt industry From Huainan to Huaibei, to be precise, it is the coastal area centered on Haizhou.

The canal in Haizhou leads directly to Huai'an, so the salt in Huaibei basically passes through Huai'an, and then travels to various places in the south of the Yangtze River. Commercial traditional city competition.

Think about the most important link in the salt industry that has created Huai'an's status, the salt transportation from Haizhou to Huai'an, their Wang family can operate in the future, then the strength of the Wang family can have a huge span, and they will become the top of the Ming Dynasty in the future The group of wealthy businessmen is already around the corner.

Although the Wang family is a wealthy businessman in Hangzhou with millions of dollars in wealth, compared to those large salt merchants who have been monopolizing salt for several generations, there is still a difference in strength. At least the Wang family was almost ruined under Shi Kefa's attack. , but who has ever heard of a salt merchant being strangled by a high official?For the sake of stability, the government will not easily move a salt merchant who has a salt distribution network, which is related to the salt consumption of millions of people and huge salt tax payments. The common people pay a price equivalent to grain to support these salt merchants. It is the real powerful class among the merchants. Which wealthy merchant family does not want to become a group like salt merchants that neither the government nor the common people can offend.

So Wang Xiao can be said to have made another great contribution to the Wang family.

It's just that playing Yang Chao's banner seems a bit insincere, after all, Yang Chao and Wang Xiao are still friends.

But this is a businessman. When a friend is in danger, he will care about it, but he will never be polite when he can take advantage of it.

However, Wang Xiao still had some sense of loyalty. While he was using Yang Chao, he also sincerely hoped that Yang Chao would return safely. It didn't matter whether he won the battle or not. He was just using the big victory to fool those salt merchants.

So when the news of Yang Chao's victory came, Wang Xiao was also very happy besides finally taking care of those salt merchants. At the same time, he didn't forget to send someone to send the news back to Nanjing immediately to tell Yang Chao's family.

In this regard, Wang Xiao, a businessman, is very comfortable. The reason why businessmen have been suppressed by the government for thousands of years is that they are still an active class in society, which is inseparable from their style of life. It can make people comfortable and feel like a spring breeze. When both the government and customers can get along happily, it doesn't make sense for them not to make a fortune.

The news of Wang Xiao passed through Kuaima, which was faster than the government’s Tang newspaper. First, he used Kuaima to go directly to Jiangpu from Huai’an through the pipeline, and then arrived at Daying in Xinjiangkou after crossing Puzikou. The speed of turning back from the west is fast, but it will take three days.

But Wang Xiao's news arrived one day earlier than Pegasus, because he used Feige as well as Pegasus.

That’s right, it’s carrier pigeons. As a wealthy merchant in the transportation business, the Wang family’s information is very important to them, so they have a strong information network. Raising carrier pigeons is also one of the ways, but it’s the most unreliable way. Carrier pigeons often disappear inexplicably as they fly.

This is all due to the good ecology. There were still many barren mountains and wild ridges in the Ming Dynasty. There was not a single mountain that was not full of greenery, and there was not a single forest that was free from birds and animals. It was really difficult for carrier pigeons to deliver messages in such a primitive environment. The postman was flying over a beautiful mountain forest. Before he could enjoy the beautiful scenery, he was brutally killed by a vicious eagle that rushed out from nowhere. Well, we don’t need an eagle. Only Yaozi is enough.

Pigeons always deliver messages. In addition to their own mistakes and getting lost, the probability of being eaten by birds of prey is very high, so the delivery of messages is very unreliable, but the speed is indeed fast, so the Wang family still has a lot of pigeons, but only when they need the most time. The homing pigeons will be released only when the pigeons are flying, and at the same time, fast horses or boats will be sent to make a backup for the homing pigeons.

This time the pigeon was very lucky. After flying for a day, the pigeon landed in Nanjing after a few rounds, and landed in the pigeon coop of Wang Yihe's grocery store.
Give it water and food.

Then the news quickly spread to the Yang family.

The Yang family made an exception and set up a table of good wine and good food. Yang Yong had a rare meal of wine, and Yang Yue had a rare meal of meat. In the past six months, the mother of the Yang family, Zhao Lan, has been like a violent tigress , pressing on the heads of the Yang family's father and daughter, making them breathless.

drink wine?eat meat?
Who dares!

His son's life or death on the battlefield is uncertain, and he still wants to enjoy himself at this time, so he really doesn't want to live. Yang Yong and Yang Yue dare not even speak loudly at home these days.

When the news of Yang Chao's victory came, Zhao Lan's face, which had been gloomy for several months, finally cleared up. He ordered his servants to buy wine and meat, and at the same time ordered them to set off a large firecracker at the door.

In fact, Zhao Lan was not because of his son's big victory, but because of his son himself. Winning a battle would prove his son's own safety.

While the Yang family was celebrating, Zhao Lan didn't forget to tell her mother's family the news, and her brother and sister-in-law's family was also worried about their son Zhao Kang.

The news spread to Jinchailou, and then the whole Nanjing brothel circle knew about it.

I heard that several girls gathered together to hold a poetry meeting specially for this purpose. It was a poetry meeting about the frontier poems about gold and iron horses. It has to be said that Yang Chao has already mixed up in the brothel circle.

Of course, it was also spread to the officialdom, which caused some chain reactions.

First, Xiong Mingyu rejected Zhenyuan Hou Gu Zhaoji's reconciliation with his brother-in-law's reinstatement and once again serving as the deputy general of the water camp, and he refused bluntly.

Finally, Feng Kezong, the governor of Nanjing Jinyiwei, who had been fighting fiercely with Xu Zhongxiao, a thousand households of Jinyiwei, suddenly changed his mind, and cruelly rejected Xu Qianhu's invitation to drink flower wine many times.

In addition, there were a few military officers who were seeking vacancies in the central part of the Xinjiangkou camp after Yang Chao went north, and they immediately restrained themselves and never mentioned their plans to be promoted.

In fact, what Yang Chao didn't know was that his power in the officialdom could not be underestimated, especially in the officialdom in Nanjing, he was already considered the No. [-] figure, and he was a figure that no one else could understand.

Of course, the biggest impact is actually on the market.

When Yang Chao was there, he had the final say on the pricing of freight on a section of the waterway near Nanjing, and he would announce the pricing details through the Jinchai Building's trading venue at all times, and only accept the freight bill with the best price.

But after Yang Chao went north, the freight rate began to fluctuate. Not only did Zhang Dawei lead the fleet more and more difficult to control the freight rate, but also encountered many competitors. Many competitors began to imitate Yang Chao's fleet, Engaged in escort business, including other water battalion officers and soldiers, and escorts in Nanjing.

The result was that during the six months since Yang Chao left, the freight business on the Yangtze River was very chaotic, and the freight Zhang Dawei earned was less than half of what he earned when Yang Chao was there.

As a result, after the news of Yang Chao's victory came, many people who had registered permanent residence on the river all year round, including those bodyguard fighters, came to pay a visit to Zhang Dawei, expressing the hope that everyone could make money together, and the freight rate was discussed, and no one wanted Maliciously grab other people's business.

The reason why Yang Chao's news aroused so many reactions was that apart from the fact that he already had a certain amount of weight, the biggest reason was that he had won the battle.

Yang Chao in Haizhou didn't know about the invasion of the Eastern captives this time, but he knew some things in other places. For example, people in the officialdom knew that the Eastern captives were raging in Shandong. Lai with a large army in Tongzhou never went south, never went to Shandong.

Lai spent all day in Tongzhou drinking and having fun with officials at all levels without mentioning it, but instead reported a good news to the emperor at every turn.

The whole world knew what happened to Zhou Yanru's victory, but the emperor didn't know that he was not stingy at all with various rewards and awards.

However, Yang Chao's military exploits are different from the so-called repelled hundreds of thousands of captive soldiers reported by Zhou Yanru. There are two young captive soldiers, and one of them is a captive chief who leads troops to plunder. This has a very different meaning.

Therefore, it is shocking in the official circles, plus sideways glances, basically no one doubts that Yang Chao will rise to the top because of this military exploit. As long as Yang Chao can fight like this, it is very possible to grow into the next Zuo Liangyu, so he offended him at this time. Yang Chao is unwise.

So Xiong Mingyu originally planned to reconcile with the Zhenyuan Houfu and promised Gu Zhaoji to let his brother-in-law come out of the mountain again. At this time, when the news came, Xiong Mingyu immediately used the authority of the Minister of the Ministry of War in Nanjing to recommend Gu Zhaoji. Give a no.

Therefore, because Xu Zhongxiao is very good at being a man, when Yang Chao went north and believed that Yang Chao would definitely die, Feng Kezong had long since lost his mind to clean up Xu Zhongxiao, and enjoyed Xu Zhongxiao's various filial piety in a down-to-earth manner. As a result, Yang Chao beat him. When the news of the victory came, Feng Kezong immediately made up his mind to break off ties with Xu Zhongxiao.

In fact, Feng Kezong was frightened to death when he heard the news. Yang Chao's operation in Nanjing really brought too much harm to Feng Kezong's weak heart. Think of Yang Chao as the living King of Hades.But not only did he fail to do the job entrusted to him by Huo Yanwang, but he hooked up with Xu Zhongxiao and shared the benefits.

Feng Kezong immediately recalled his past feelings, and scolded himself in his heart for being stupid. How could Yang Chao fail when he went to kill the Tartars? How could Yang Chao be the kind of reckless person? Is it sure that Tartar can be killed? Who cares about the legend that Tartar is full of invincibility? Feng Kezong only knows that as long as Yang Chao wants to do something, he can't fail to do it. If he wants to kill Tartar, Tartar just keeps his head down. Feng Kezong didn't find it strange to let him cut off his head obediently.

As a result, when the news came, Feng Kezong was immediately at a loss and lost his sense of control.

But within a few days, another news about Yang Chao spread in Nanjing. Yang Chao was surrounded by [-] troops in Haizhou City!
(End of this chapter)