Chapter 1165 Shock

Chapter 1165 Shock

Chapter 1165 Shock (Part )

Yangkou suddenly became lively, and it has been going on for several days.

After getting up in the morning, Shi Hong yawned, washed up quickly, and then had breakfast.

He is nineteen years old this year. He got married in Luoyang last year. His uncle arranged for him to marry the concubine's daughter of Shen Zhong, the governor of Yangping.

After getting married, you can also start a business, which is this manor located in Yangkou.

Of course, the money and people to build the manor were provided by my uncle, but the land was allocated by the emperor.

My mother worked as a female official in the palace and had a very hard life.

The emperor did not go to the harem every day. Sometimes he would review memorials and handle government affairs in Jiafu Palace and other places all night long, and the female officials would take turns to accompany him and help him.

After nightfall, if there was any important military intelligence or memorials, he had to get up and check them one by one, and decide whether to wake the emperor up, making it difficult to get a good night's sleep.

The above is actually nothing, but the role of a palace lady, in theory, sleeps in a side hall outside the emperor's bedroom, but in reality it is not necessarily the case. Except for those with special hobbies, who would dare to marry her home? So rumors are inevitable.

Shi Hong felt at ease with the manor, but at the same time he felt a little ashamed, and even had a deep-seated humiliation.

The mother was forced to do it and it was difficult for her.

After sighing, Shi Hong pushed aside his half-eaten breakfast, and then came to the courtyard, called the manor accountant and the chief of the troops, and asked, "Where is the guest?"

"He went to the workshop early in the morning." replied the accountant.

"Come on, follow me to have a look." After saying this, Shi Hong paused and said, "Tell Madam not to take garden sunflowers, spring chives, chicken eggs and the like to the mansion to sell. The newly bought servants will come over in a few days."

"Yes." Dianji called his nephew and asked him to report quickly.

Shi Hong was walking in front with big strides, and the chief adviser and the commander of the troops, who seemed to be the duo, were following behind him. In a short while, they arrived at the workshop next door.

Shi Hong's manor was actually not very big, with only about 230 farmhands in total. He lived next to Sima Li, Sima Pi and a new arrival from Qiao named Xiahou Mu this year. Although the others didn't know much about Xiahou Mu, the three of them knew that his wife was the daughter of Yang Xianrong, Princess Qinghe of the Former Jin Dynasty.

The four families gathered together, which was a bad taste. Moreover, they found that there seemed to be an empty piece of land next to them, and even a wooden sign was inserted, indicating that someone occupied it but had not yet come to open up the land.

The others were confused. Shi Hong guessed that it was Tuoba Shiyijian's, but he was too lazy to say.

In fact, it is quite good for several families to live together. With more than a thousand households in total, they can already build some ponds and dams.

Moreover, there is even an abandoned pond nearby, which shows that people in the Eastern Wu or Jin Dynasty settled and cultivated here. It was only later abandoned due to wars and other factors, and now it only needs to be restored.

The villagers of Shi Hong's village mainly grow wheat and rice, and have not yet been able to fully balance their income and expenditure.

In the first month of the year, his mother asked someone to bring him 100 strings of cash, 200 pieces of silk, and 20 pieces of gold and silver utensils. While Shi Hong accepted the money, he didn't even dare to think about how much humiliation his mother had endured in order to save up the money. In short, he felt extremely ashamed, and his desire to save money became even stronger.

When the group arrived at the workshop, Xiong Minghu immediately came over to pay his respects.

"Rui Xiang, you don't mind the strong smell here." Shi Hong said with a smile.

"Why do you say that, Daya?" Xiong Minghu said with a smile, "Last year I went to Shancheng. There is a lot of kudzu vines there, and a lot of paper is produced there. It is sold in Yangzhou, Jiangzhou and other places, and is called 'Shan Teng Paper'. The taste there is strong, Daya, your family's is considered light."

Xiong Minghu was from Nanchang. His father, Xiong Jin, was the prefect of Poyang, and his uncle was Xiong Yuan, the Chief Censor of the Jin Dynasty.

"My workshop is just a small business." Shi Hong shook his head and said, "I just followed the trend when I saw others were making a lot of money from papermaking."

"Can you make money?" Xiong Minghu asked.

"To be honest, you can make money." Shi Hong said, "The court has set a rule that all government offices must use rattan paper. The supply of this material is in short supply."

"Jianye is the same." Xiong Minghu said with a smile: "Do you know Wang Xizhi?"

"I don't know." Shi Hong said, "Could he be the son of Wang of Langya?"

"That's right." Xiong Minghu said, "This person's calligraphy is quite good and he is very famous. He likes to use rattan paper, praising it for its fineness, smoothness, and density like a cocoon. Therefore, this paper was popular for a while. I didn't expect that the Northern Dynasty was also like this."

There was no change on Shi Hong's face when he heard the word "Northern Dynasty". He only thought that the morale of the people of Jin was so low that they did not even consider themselves the legitimate dynasty, but listed the Southern Dynasty and the Northern Dynasty on an equal footing.

It’s just that the Northern Dynasty is a bit too powerful. It has just taken over Shuzhong. How many years can the Southern Dynasty last?

While the two were talking, the craftsman in the workshop had already brought over a bundle of kudzu vines and was ready to soak them in the pool.

It is called kudzu vine, but it is actually the skin of kudzu vine. After peeling, it is dried, tied up, and then sold to various papermaking workshops. Xiong Minghu is the one who sells this stuff. He collects it from Jiangnan and sells it to Yangkou. Shi Hong's workshop is one of his customers.

Of course, the two of them also have a close relationship in private, so much so that Xiong Minghu could even stay overnight at the manor.

Next to the fermentation pond, a woman brought firewood, preparing to steam the kudzu vine bark that she had fished out yesterday.

A little further on, there were continuous "bang bang" sounds; those were sturdy servants beating the rattan bark that had been steamed and degummed, turning it into pulp.

Next comes the pulping and drying process: under the bright spring sunshine, sheets of paper are pasted on smooth wooden boards to dry.

The Shi family workshop had good technology and a complete industrial chain, but it was a little small in scale, so in this golden age of rattan paper, it could only make some leftovers.

The two chatted casually about some paper-related matters, then left the workshop and came to the small river outside the manor.

"After selling the kudzu vines, you will return to Wuchang, right?" Shi Hong asked. "That's right." Xiong Minghu said, "I have been out for a while. My subordinates are buying northern goods in Yangkou. We will leave after loading the boat."

"I'm afraid it's hard to buy these days. The price has gone up a lot." Shi Hong said.

"Who says it's not true?" Xiong Minghu said with a wry smile, "With the arrival of several thousand soldiers, the prices of goods from both the south and the north have gone up."

"The prices of southern goods have increased a lot, but I still made a profit overall." Shi Hong said enviously.

Xiong Minghu shook his head and didn't want to talk about this topic.

Does he care about this little bit of profit? That's just for fun. The real thing is to get information.

According to intelligence from his men, the army that had led the attack on Cheng had already returned one after another. The first group left from Hanzhong, and the second group sailed downstream and landed in Jiangling and Yangkou.

These people had a lot of reward money with them, and when they swarmed into Yangkou, some of them couldn't help spending money, which pushed up the prices.

Xiong Minghu sent out several groups of people, who chatted with the soldiers under the guise of businessmen and obtained a lot of rumors.

He eliminated some of the unreliable ones, but the ones that remained were still - sensational!

In fact, he no longer had much patience and wanted to return to Wuchang immediately to report the news.

In the afternoon, Xiong Minghu and his entourage came from Yangkou, presented Shi Hong with a gift, and then said goodbye and left.

******
"We had a great time robbing this time. We might as well not go home. When winter comes, we will go straight to Jianye and rob again."

"You are too greedy. If you don't come home, your wife will give birth to a child and see what you will do."

"Haha! That's great, there will be one more person in the family."

"How can we attack Jianye if Wuchang is not taken? Zhuge Hui has not surrendered yet."

"Perhaps he has already surrendered secretly."

The dock was extremely noisy. The soldiers were extremely arrogant, as if they were afraid that others would not know that they had won the battle. They kept shouting and talking without restraint.

Xiong Minghu sat in the cabin, silently listening to the conversation a few steps away.

On the shore was a shop selling candied fruits. A group of soldiers gathered there, holding swords and bows, looking very scary.

However, despite their ferocious looks and extremely vulgar language, they were still well-behaved in the market. Occasionally, an officer would come and count the heads, urging them to go back after buying things and load their goods onto the ship for shipment.

The victorious army did not dare to act rashly in the market, which shows that the Liang Dynasty had very effective control over these warriors and the emperor's prestige was very high.

Alas, it is certain that Li Cheng’s country was destroyed.

Xiong Minghu sighed secretly, and at the same time strengthened his confidence.

Their group grew larger and larger, headed by Chen Da, the Secretary of the Central Secretariat, and Xiong Yuan, the Chief Censor. They were either related to Concubine Shi by marriage or had received favors from Shi.

At the local level, the leader was Zhuge Hui, the governor of Jingzhou, with some local governors as well.

Even though everyone is in a high position now and has no shortage of wealth and power, once the country is destroyed, all these will be nothing.

Those who have tasted the sweetness of power will be reluctant to give it up.

Even someone like him who depended on power and made money through business was reluctant to give up this wealth.

No one wants to lose these things.

The Liang army conquered Shu in four months, and the power was truly amazing. To be honest, Xiong Minghu was afraid that the Liang army would attack Wuchang, Poyang, and Jianye, and destroy everything he and his family had now.

When the news gets back to Wuchang, people will inevitably be in turmoil.

In order to pacify Eastern Wu, Jin built a large naval base in Ba County and Badong, and then took advantage of the civil strife and loss of morale in Wu to attack in one fell swoop. In fact, they did not encounter much substantial resistance, and even if there was, it was not on a large scale, and they easily destroyed Eastern Wu.

This shows that the impact of people’s unrest is so great and so deadly.

Xiong Minghu made his own judgment and felt that the situation was already very clear. He did not think that many people would fight to the death. At least among the scholars who had fled south, except for those old guys, no one else was willing to do so. Perhaps only the Jiangdong nobles would take real action.

In fact, the Xiong family is also a powerful family in Jiangdong...

At the end of March, Xiong Minghu returned to Wuchang with several ships and asked to see Zhuge Hui as soon as possible.

Wuchang had actually already received the news, which was brought back by Shi Zhen from Badong. Now Xiong Minghu brought back the news that Yang Kousheng's troops had returned victoriously. With the two confirming each other, there was basically no need to doubt it.

For a time, there was an uproar in Jingzhou and everyone was talking about it.

On the first day of April, Governor Lu Ye and several officials drove to Zhuge's manor outside the city to discuss defense plans.

Zhuge Hui personally hosted a banquet at his home to entertain Lu Ye and his party.

At the same time, the document reporting Ningzhou's victory was also sent to Jianye. This was an achievement of the Jin Dynasty's revival, so naturally it had to be publicized.

(End of this chapter)