Once you have found the right coal and ore, the next step is to determine the location of the iron factory. Chun Yuzhen brought a map, the location of the high-grade iron ore mine is in the western part of Chang'an, and there is Weishui flowing through the county. It was about 17 miles overland to transport the iron ore to the Wei River, and the ships went down the river, passed through Chang'an, and then went north against the water, and arrived at the coal and lime mines, Tongguan County. In order to make use of the hydraulic bellows, the ironworks needed to be built next to the water. In order to make the distance of coke transported by land the shortest, Zhao Xingde started from the point where the charcoal field was located and made a perpendicular line towards Fushui, and the intersection with the river was five or six miles away from the county seat of Tongguan.

Zhao Xingde pointed to this intersection with a pencil and said, "Build the iron factory in this location." ”

Chun Yuzhen nodded and said: "I will bid for those two veins, and this piece of land along the river is not expensive." It's just that after buying it, you have to apply to the coordinator Cao and the local military government to convert it into a chamber of commerce area before you can build a workshop, and it will take some time to delay. ”

Zhao Xingde wondered: "But why?" ”

Chun Yuzhen said with a smile: "Our ironworks are much better than his family's, if we don't build a closed workshop, I'm afraid that some villains and traitors will try to steal the skills of charcoal ironmaking." Seeing that Zhao Xingde's face was puzzled, he explained, "Mr. Zhao doesn't know that the so-called workshop is to build a wall and stand on its own. Without the permission of the master, even the sergeants and officials were not allowed to enter and disturb without permission. However, if it is not zoned as a chamber of commerce area, no workshop can be built. ”

Zhao Xingdeqi said: "Could it be that the apprentice money system is useless? ”

Chun Yuzhen said: "The apprentice money system is only available in the country, and the profiteers in the Kanto region don't care about this, they can steal the skills and make iron in the Kanto region." "The Xia Kingdom does not have a ban on salt and iron, and Chun Yuzhen considered that after the scale of ironmaking expanded in the future, it may be sold to the Kanto region, so he naturally refused to let the Kanto merchants steal the master.

Zhao Xingde nodded, and listened to Chun Yuzhen and said, "The iron smelting technique of stone charcoal is not trivial. The apprentice's money was only a small profit, and when the trial production of charcoal ironmaking in other iron factories was about to be successful, we went to the Prime Minister's Mansion to register and collect the apprenticeship money for 20 years. Zhao Xingde was dumbfounded, and he couldn't imagine that Chun Yuzhen planned to do so thorough in squeezing out the technical dividends.

Seeing that his face was different, Chun Yuzhen was slightly embarrassed, rubbed his hands and smiled: "In business, Mr. Zhao is a person who does big things, and these little things are left to me to arrange, and it's right to keep them." In order to prevent the leakage of secrets, Shi Tan would rather use more that is not used, rather than only mining coking, and I will arrange different groups of apprentices to do each process of coking and ironmaking. All the workers at the bottom went to the displaced people in the Kanto region, tried for a month, and then signed a long-term contract for 15 years, and if the contract was not satisfied and left without authorization, each person was compensated 500 yuan. ”

Zhao Xingde's heart moved slightly, and he doubted: "With such a long contract period and high compensation, don't the government and the chamber of commerce care?" "The Bianliang helpers don't earn more than 100 yuan a day, and after 15 years of hard work, even if they don't eat or drink, it is difficult to make up enough liquidated damages of 500 yuan. He doesn't know much about the market of wages in Guanzhong, but he doesn't think it's much different. This made it impossible for any of the workers who had signed a contract with the ironworks to switch to another owner within the contract. Even if other ironworks technically imitate one scale and half a claw, it is difficult to train enough workers at once to overwhelm Chunyu ironworks in scale.

Chun Yuzhen was stunned for a moment, and asked rhetorically: "The iron factory pays taxes on time and in full, and the government and the chamber of commerce are too late to be happy, why should they care?" Seeing the look of disbelief on Xingde's face, he said with a smile, "Mr. Zhao, rest assured, the government of the Chamber of Commerce and the Workshop of Autonomy has been in use for more than 100 years. Each family has its own way of making money, and the government has no control over it. If it weren't for this, how could there be so many Kanto people who set up workshops in Guanzhong, and speculated the prices of ore veins, shops, and workshops to be expensive. The military government should prohibit merchants from Kanto from coming over. He paused and scolded indignantly, "These profiteers! ”

Zhao Xingde's heart was a little heavy, interrupted his words, and said in a deep voice: "Although a contract is signed, if the apprentices are to be attached to the iron factory, they still have to be paid for food, clothing, and wages. Don't do anything that hurts yin and morality. He thought for a moment, and then said, "It is very profitable to make iron from coal, and the wages for the apprentices are tentatively set at twice that of other families." In addition, the houses where the workers lived had to be built spacious, so that there was no need to save charcoal in the winter, since they had transported more counterfeit coal. He looked at Chun Yuzhen and said in an accentuated tone: "This group of workers must not just be used as cattle and horses, the scale of the iron factory will definitely be expanded in the future, they are still of great use, and the long-term vision must be long-term." ”

Chun Yuzhen nodded and said in a deep voice: "Mr. Zhao is kind-hearted, I understand." He added, "To transport coal and ore, you can hire cars and ships at first, and in the future, when the business grows, you can build up the fleet and fleet of iron works." In order to prevent other workshops and profiteers from making trouble, the mines and workshops also invited some retired sergeants to be the leaders of the guards, and then bought some bows and crossbows and firearms to distribute to the guards, and the swords were not needed, everyone had ......" Chun Yuzhen opened the small notebook he carried with him, and read it in a rambling manner, as if he was reporting the harvest to the old landlord. Although Chun Yuzhen has a simple face, he is actually an extremely stubborn person, and after verifying that the charcoal has really been smelted into good iron, he is quite grateful to Zhao Xingde for giving him sixty percent of the shares of the iron factory. Not only did he plan to do a big job with Zhao Xingde, so he invested all the money he earned in casting cannons into the iron factory, and he thought hard about building the factory. In the past two months, in addition to selecting ore to test coke, these details of the opening of the factory have been repeatedly considered in his mind for a long time, and all of them are on the safe side.

On this day, Chun Yuzhen discussed with Zhao Xingde until dusk before leaving, and returned to Chang'an the next day to continue to prepare for the iron factory.

In the autonomous area of the Chamber of Commerce outside Chang'an, many workshops are still rushing to work, and under the dim lights, they are described as withered, and their eyes are so muddy that they don't look like living people. The workers who had just stepped down from the loom dragged their heavy steps back to the low shed, and a few of them fell asleep on the haystack as if they had fallen apart.

Bao Qizhang was so hungry that his chest was pressed against his back, and he fell panting in the grass, smelling a musty smell at the end of his nose. "When the sun comes out, you have to dry the quilt." Bao Qizhang muttered, holding a handful of damp hay in his hand and piling it up on himself. The so-called "drying quilt" is nothing more than piling hay in a place where the sun can shine. The night is cold, and it's better than nothing. Suddenly, his eyes lit up, and he sat up, and on the opposite side of the large row of earth beds, a black scorpion was poking its head out of the crack in the earth, revealing a half-cut tail hook.

"Death!" The worker next to him, who was disturbed by him, muttered weakly. Guo Hong on the other side turned his head and saw the scorpion in Bao Qizhang's gaze. He also sat up quietly.

Bao Qizhang licked his lips and took off his shirt lightly, revealing two rows of ribs. He carefully wrapped his sleeves around his left hand, picked up a pair of chopsticks in his right hand, moved his body lightly to the wall, held his breath, and suddenly stretched out his hand, the chopsticks clamped the fat body, the scorpion struggled desperately, and the tail needle was as fast as if it was crazy, but it was two inches away from Bao Qizhang's right hand. Bao Qizhang pressed the scorpion on the bed with chopsticks, and his left hand wrapped in clothes gently pressed on the scorpion's head, as if he heard a crackling sound, and the scorpion tail that kept shaking did not move, so he breathed a sigh of relief.

"Brother Bao, it's really yours!" Guo Hong suppressed his voice, his eyes shining with excitement.

"There's shredded meat at night." Bao Qizhang grinned, carefully avoided the poisonous tail needle, peeled off the scorpion meat with his fingernails, tore half of it and handed it to Guo Hong, seeing that Guo Hong was about to stuff it into his mouth, he grabbed him and said: "Don't eat this raw, I'll soak it in porridge and eat it as a vegetable later." "I wrapped the other half of the scorpion flesh in the folds of my clothes.

Workshop workers only eat two meals a day, eat a dry meal before going to work, called "big food", this meal has to top seven or eight hours, after work there is a thin meal, called "small food", after eating this meal, and then lie down for more than three hours, then get up to work. Three hundred and sixty-five days a year, day after day. Many of the apprentices died of exhaustion and hunger and illness. Guo Hong is a seven-foot man, just the age when he can eat, although he was starved to the point of high bones, he finally survived. Fortunately, Bao Qizhang is a capable person, this shed is crowded and dark, damp and dirty, and has bred a lot of insects, snakes, rats and ants over the years, and when it falls into the hands of Bao Qizhang, he simply cleans up, can be hungry, and also gives some to Guo Hong to eat.

"Brother Bao, when you earn enough, you will go to Shishan to receive the field in the future, and I will be with you, brother." Guo Hong said gratefully.

"Brothers who cross the river together are welcome." Bao Qizhang smiled innocently, and counted the numbers with his fingers, "There are still two years, and I can earn enough to go to Shishan." "In this dark workshop, the only sunlight is the land of the stone mountain. Although it is as ethereal as Penglai in the fairy mountain. But the small book in the main account room of the workshop is clearly written, the salary of 20 yuan a year, 100 yuan in five years, and the entanglement of his wife and children in Kanto is enough.

"I listen to you, Brother Bao." Guo Hong nodded, carefully hiding the piece of meat that was smaller than a fingernail.

There was a harsh sound outside, the sound of a big spoon striking a clay pot, and the workers lying on the earthen bed reflexively opened their eyes, and groped their way out of the bed to the hay to find the bowls with a few edges, and rushed towards the door. The gruel was not enough every night, and the workers who went late could only drink the water from the pot, and the foreman gave the curse of "lazy ghosts".

Bao Qizhang and Guo Hong were crowded among the ragged workers, and after a while, they grabbed the clay pot in front of the porridge, Bao Qizhang raised the pottery bowl with both hands, his face was full of flattery, and said with a smile: "Brother Qiu, your complexion is getting better and better." Qiu Liu'er, who was holding a big spoon in his hand, glanced at him contemptuously, but he still took the bottom of the bowl and spilled it slightly, and slammed it into the broken bowl of Bao Qizhang, Nunu mouthed, and motioned for the next one.

After Bao Qizhang thanked him, he squeezed out of the crowd with Guo Hong, who had made porridge and soup, and sat in a corner of the courtyard. Guo Hong scolded in a low voice: "Miscellaneous, something for the tiger." This Qiu Liu crossed the river with them, and it didn't take long for him to lick the ditch of the foreman, and volunteered to abduct more Kanto villagers to this workshop to make cattle and horses. In the past three years, twenty or thirty people have been abducted by Qiu Liu, and five have died, and Qiu Liu is the foreman of these twenty or thirty apprentices, and he is also in charge of the power to divide the porridge.

Guo Hong also dared to be angry and didn't dare to speak, but Bao Qizhang next to him didn't complain so much, and threw the piece of scorpion meat into the hot porridge first. He stirred in the porridge with his fingers, picked up two or three rotten vegetable leaves, and said in surprise: "Xiao Guo, have you noticed that the porridge at this dinner has thickened a lot recently, and the vegetable leaves are fresher." ”

"Really?" Guo Hong said suspiciously, for him, a bowl of porridge is far from filling his stomach. He looked at the high wall fiercely, and swore a poisonous oath, when the uncle had granted the field and planted the crops, he would only eat dry food and not drink thin food for the rest of his life. The more he thought about it, the hungrier he became, swallowed his saliva, took a sip of gruel, and closed his eyes to feel the hot food running down his throat to his stomach, the most beautiful moment of the day.

Bao Qizhang was so anxious as him, first licked the gruel attached to the outer edge of the broken bowl, and then drank the rare thickened meat and vegetable porridge in small sips. On the high wall of the workshop not far away, the moon emitted a faint yellow light, as if someone had bitten a pancake, and Bao Qizhang's face was full of longing: "The cake baked by the child is really fragrant." In the dim moonlight, there was a faint reflection in the corners of his eyes.