Keqing, it’s just cultivating immortality, is it that difficult?

Qiao Zhang was unwilling to accept this. If he really became a prisoner, what future would he have as a miner?

When Qiao Zhang thought about being trapped in that iron mine mining day and night, he felt like he was going crazy.

No, he didn't want to be annihilated like this.

He quickly looked at Keqing:

"My Lord Princess, I am willing to make amends for my crime. I know the location of the other private soldiers!"

He shouted, but Keqing paused.

Sure enough, there are more than one private soldier!

Chapter 587: Mineral Processing, Qiao Zhang's Surrender (4000)

Keqing had already guessed that Song Zhi must have more than one plan.

From the information I have heard, this iron mine can produce countless iron ores every month, which is more than enough to make hundreds of weapons. What about the remaining ore weapons?

There are so many bandits helping him to rob people, let alone others.

According to estimates, this iron mine has been discovered for many years and has been producing iron ore in large quantities and of good quality. Song Zhi would not waste it. He would keep it in his hands and make full use of it to obtain greater benefits.

Whether selling it to others or keeping it for personal use is a good choice. The most important things to worry about when starting an army are food, soldiers, and weapons and silver. However, Song Zhi has all three.

As the prefect, he has the right to dispatch the food in the prefecture, so there is no shortage of food. As for the source of soldiers, there are natural disasters everywhere and refugees everywhere. As long as there is enough food, why worry about the lack of soldiers? As for weapons... let alone.

As the saying goes, the prefect of the Qing Dynasty had a fortune of 100,000 taels. He had been in office for so many years and owned iron mines, so his assets were inestimable.

"It's a bit troublesome..."

Keqing felt that the situation was a little bit tricky and not good for her. If it was really as she imagined, Song Zhi would be able to mobilize a team of thousands or tens of thousands of people with just a wave of his hand.

Fortunately, I did not go directly to the capital city and expose myself to his sight, otherwise there would be some trouble.

Although that little trouble was nothing to her.

In just a moment, Keqing thought a lot, but quickly collected her thoughts.

"Let's just look at the iron ore first..."

She said that although Song Zhi was troublesome, he was only slightly troublesome.

Keqing did not treat Qiao Zhang's suggestion about the location of his private soldiers any differently.

She still sent these people to mine according to the plan to make the best use of the resources. As for Qiao Zhang, who was their former leader, he also needed to be tempered first to see how much evil he had done and whether there was any possibility of atonement before considering other things.

How could Keqing not see that Qiao Zhang wanted to use this as an excuse to gain benefits for herself, but since he said so, did she need it?

In her opinion, private soldiers were just something to be dealt with along the way, and Keqing's goal was still on food and population.

Qiao Zhang thought that after he shouted out the key information, the princess in front of him would look at him differently. However, he was wrong, so wrong!

Same treatment, same mining. After taking the poison, his strength was slightly greater than that of ordinary people. The shovel in his hand was so familiar and yet strange. Qiao Zhang never thought that one day he would end up digging ore in a mine.

Looking at this dark mine, the dull air was filled with the smell of dust, and the chains under my feet were heavy and rubbed my skin, bringing rough pain.

He felt deeply terrified. Was he going to live here in darkness for the rest of his life?

This is worse than killing yourself.

……

Keqing doesn’t care what Qiao Zhang thinks. Most of these private soldiers are not good people. Letting them mine is already very forgiving to them. Didn’t they see that all their companions died before?

Mining is a physical job and also a tiring job that is not very pleasant. Such a job naturally requires those who are strong and healthy. She would not let the rescued refugees go to mining again and cause physical damage, which is a stupid thing.

So let the mining work be left to the captives as a form of atonement.

As for the time of atonement, it depends on the extent of one's sins.

"I didn't expect it to be so big. No wonder Song Zhi stationed his private soldiers here and asked Qu County and Hengshan County to cooperate with the private soldiers to guard this place.

iron ore."

Keqing looked at the mine which was full of high-quality iron ore, and sighed when she saw that the mine seemed to have no end.

This is not a mine, it is a mineral vein, and a rich one at that. It is very high quality iron ore with a very high iron yield.

With this mine, we can probably supply not only thousands of weapons, but perhaps tens of thousands or even hundreds of thousands.

Thinking of this, Keqing secretly made up her mind that she must not let the iron mine fall into the hands of others, and Song Zhi must not be aware of it, at least in the short term.

In order to avoid being detected, the transaction of the mineral vein must continue. Of course, in order to prevent Song Zhi from noticing, the people involved in the transaction must be familiar to them.

Thinking of this, she thought to herself that it seemed that Qiao Zhang had to stay.

Keqing thought about the information she had seen from Qiao Zhang before, and was surprised to find that his loyalty to her was 3, not a negative number. Moreover, from the information she observed, he was the one who had done the least evil among the captives.

The so-called less evil doing does not mean less murder. After all, it is impossible for the second-in-command of Song Zhi's team to be a good person.

The so-called evil deeds include bullying, insults, torture, and the like.

The other captives had done some such evil things to a greater or lesser extent, but Qiao Zhang had done very few, almost none, which was puzzling.

According to the prisoners, this man is not interested in women, likes to practice martial arts, and is very smart. However, he is only the second in command because he cannot beat Li Qiang in terms of martial arts.

From all these things, it can be seen that Qiao Zhang is very ambitious. Precisely because of his strong ambition, his methods are clean and neat, and he is flexible and resilient. On the contrary, he rarely does evil things. This is why Keqing did not kill him immediately, but gave him a chance.

……

Because it would take some time to get from Qu County to the mine, Keqing assigned a part of her people to stay in Qu County, and asked a reputable and trustworthy gentry to temporarily manage the affairs of Qu County to ensure that there would be no chaos in Qu County. She took another part of the people to escort the captives to the mine, and sent someone to deliver a letter to Hengshan County to ask for the prisoners.

Someone definitely needs to be sent to manage Qu County, and the mine also needs to be supervised by its own people to feel at ease, so when she captured Qiao Zhang and others, she immediately sent someone to deliver a letter.

Naturally, the messenger was not as fast as Keqing. By the time the people from Hengshan County arrived, Keqing had already dealt with the problem with the mine.

The people who were guarding and supervising were immediately captured, and those who were captured to mine were also rescued.

She was well prepared. The vehicles used to escort the iron ore were replaced with medicinal materials and food. She also brought a doctor with her to prevent any possible problems.

As expected, those who were captured were emaciated and covered with wounds. Doctors diagnosed that many of them were full of lesions and would die if they did not take good care of themselves.

The medicinal herbs and food brought also played their due role.

Keqing was not in a hurry to open the mine. Instead, she occupied the mine first, rescued the people, nursed them back to health, comforted them, gave them food to supplement their nutrition, and medicinal herbs to treat their diseases. She then pulled out the captives and let them vent their anger. She then pulled out those who had committed the most serious crimes to appease the public anger and hacked them to death.

After this operation, the evildoers were punished and the emotions calmed down. Keqing then began to arrange for the remaining captives to start mining.

After digging for a few days and seeing the quality of the iron ore, Keqing was sure that this vein of ore was indeed a rich mine because of its excellent quality.

A few days later, Hengshan County finally sent people over.

The neatly-organized soldiers, in uniform, with solemn faces and menacing momentum, looked like dragons soaring and tigers leaping. When they arrived near the mine, they scared the other people brought by Qu County into a panic.

The misunderstanding was not resolved until Keqing heard the noise and went out.

"Ji Mian? Why are you here?"

"Ji Mian pays respect to the princess. I am late, I hope the princess will forgive me."

Ji Mian hurriedly stepped forward and knelt down. Fortunately, the princess was safe and sound. He had been worried for a long time! Fortunately, the princess was extraordinary and not an ordinary person. In just half a month, she had killed the captured private soldiers, conquered Qu County, and found iron ore and food! She tricked thousands of people.

It is truly outstanding and extraordinary.

So when he received the letter and learned about the princess's news, he sent someone over hurriedly.

Keqing was a little surprised to see Ji Mian. Logically, he should be training refugees in Hengshan County and garrisoning Hengshan at this time, so why did he come here?

Now that he is here, who will defend Hengshan?

Soon, Keqing thought of something.

"Is it General Geng who is back? Did he ask you to come?"

"The princess is smart, and I can't hide it from her..."

Ji Mian smiled.

"General Geng returned with a great victory, bringing back a large amount of food and fodder, as well as a thousand refugees. He is now staying in Hengshan County, so he sent me to pick up the princess."

"Sure enough...from the looks of you, it should be going smoothly over there."

As bandits, they were able to attract thousands of people. It seemed that the situation in other places was indeed very bad. How cruel was Song Zhi to have taken away food from several counties? It had only been a short time since the natural disaster, and yet he was already like this?

"Who did you send from Qu County?"

"They are Qi Xiucai's classmates, Qu Fang and Su Li. You should remember them too."

"Qi Xiucai knew that you were in charge of Qu County, and it just so happened that his classmate was quite capable, so he asked me to escort him here. Now 150 people are staying in Qu County to help the two scholars manage Qu County, and the rest will come with me to welcome the princess and take over the iron mine."

Keqing nodded.

Leave professional matters to professionals. Since they are classmates with Qizhou, Qizhou also sent two people here. I believe that these two people are quite capable and can govern Qu County well.

Keqing also had an impression of these two people when she left. They also assisted Qizhou in managing many affairs of Hengzhou in Hengshan County. Now that the enemy in Qu County has been destroyed, there are still more than a hundred soldiers helping them, which is equivalent to hundreds of people. There should be no problem in Qu County.

"Okay, then I'll hand it over to you. You can let someone you trust take over the mine and calculate the income of the mine."

Keqing nodded and took over the task. Qizhou was considerate and asked Ji Mian to bring people who included accountants and former miners. Although they were different mines, they were basically the same, so the matter was quickly handed over to them. Plus, with soldiers guarding the place, there would be no trouble after she left.

However, Keqing was not in a hurry to leave. She just asked Ji Mian to send some people to take the people to Qu County for resettlement, and she stayed where she was and did not leave.

Ji Mian didn't ask anything and just followed beside her. The princess had her own ideas and he wouldn't take over the show. His purpose in coming here was just to bring the necessary manpower to the princess, not to follow his own self-righteous ideas like asking the princess to go back to the city for safety reasons.

He knew very well that he was the subordinate and the princess was the master.

In the following days, Keqing was quite leisurely. From time to time, she would go to the mountains to hunt some game, roast some meat to reward the soldiers, or go to the mines to explore, and occasionally give guidance on the direction of mining.

Ji Mian had no idea how capable the princess was. She was even good at exploring mineral veins.

With the princess's guidance, those responsible for the exploration actually discovered lead, copper, and other associated minerals. The minerals were of high quality and had few impurities, which was truly a pleasant surprise.

In response to this, Keqing just wanted to say that it was just good luck, because she is the mother of dragon.

"Don't you think so, little one..."

Keqing rubbed the little bag of the little silver dragon with her index finger, and felt relieved.

That’s about it…

……

……

"Deputy General, how about joining us? We have found a good escape route."

"The route? The one you talked about investigating earlier?"

Qiao Zhang looked at the people who came to invite him again and asked back.

"Yeah, we can't stay here forever..."

"That's right. Not only did that bitch insult us, she also made us spend our whole lives mining here with no way out in the future."

The man was very angry and seemed to be dissatisfied. He raised his voice slightly:

"It's better to escape and do whatever you want. Brothers can make a comeback, so why stay here?"

"We have already discussed it! When the time comes, we will take advantage of the gaps between the guards' patrols and... go see Lord Song."

Watching them discuss their escape, Qiao Zhang lowered his eyes slightly:

"Aren't you worried about the poison?"

"Tsk, what kind of poison can a cheap girl have? Even if there is, I don't want to work here until I die!"

"Yeah, having a good time before dying is better than anything else!"

The leaders all talked a lot, expressed their dissatisfaction, and began to decide the next escape route.

A few days later...

On a quiet night, everyone packed their bags and prepared to escape during the patrol break.

However, he didn't expect that before he could run, someone rushed in and caught him. It turned out that someone had informed on him.

"Who! Who told the truth? Damn it!"

"How do you know!"

Those who were about to escape cursed as they watched the people guarding them rush in, tie them up, and prepare to escape.

Looking at this group of dishonest people, Ji Mian snorted and then looked at Qiao Zhang who was standing beside him.

"Qiao Zhang, you did a good job."

"Interrogate these leaders carefully to find out what their relationship is with Song Zhi."