Zhou Dahe, wearing a blue bank work uniform, stood at the south gate of Zhenyuan Fort and waited for the police officers to escort the prisoners. It was almost 8 a.m. when the police escorted the prisoners and finally arrived.

The two Charuas looked like they had been cleaned up enough last night, which was expected by Zhou Dahe. Because these two dumb-headed and ignorant guys committed a big taboo, they even shouted the slogan "Outsiders get out of the way" at Wang Jian and their group, isn't this their own death? You must know that among those people present at that time, there were Ming, Swedes, Tatars, and French, which one was not an outsider? While it is true that outsiders have encroached on the land where you have lived and thrived since ancient times, it is purely self-defeating for you to shout so loudly. Zhou Dahe can imagine that these two people will not have a good life when they arrive at the Changshan Iron Mine, and they are likely to die in a dark pit after three years, there are too many such things, otherwise why do you think the Changshan Iron Mine will have the notorious reputation of "black shop"?

In addition to a middle-aged police officer from the police station, there were also two militiamen and an assistant police officer who was escorting the prisoner - coincidentally, this assistant police officer was the same Albanian Bogdan that Zhou Dahe met when he and Liu Jilu had dinner together yesterday. At this time, this gentleman changed into a gray assistant police uniform, and his beard was also shaved, and he looked more energetic.

Seeing Zhou Dahe staring at Bogdan, the middle-aged policeman Ronald explained: "Bogdan single-handedly defeated three Gaoqiao horse bandits who came to loot in the wild yesterday, killing one of them and seizing a horse, which effectively guaranteed the safety of the herdsmen who went out to graze. In order to encourage this kind of righteous and courageous behavior, the head of Ouyang Township promoted the people's martial atmosphere. Therefore, Bogdan was recruited as an assistant police officer of the Zhenyuan Police Station. At the end of the one-year probationary period, you can become a full-fledged police officer. At the same time, he was also rewarded with 10 yuan in cash as encouragement. ”

"I see." Zhou Dahe nodded, then smiled kindly at Bogdan, and said: "Hello, Mr. Bogdan, welcome to our cause, you will definitely be proud to be a citizen of the East Coast Republic of China in the future." ”

Bogdan smiled kindly, the scar on his face slightly intimidating under the tugging of his facial muscles.

Officer Ronald looked at the sky. Then he said, "It's getting late, let's go now." It's really unlucky, now the Changshanbao iron mine is in short supply, and a while ago, the state issued a regulation, requiring all localities not to exile prisoners to South Africa, Falklands or the New China region, and uniformly send prisoners to Changshanbao to mine. I heard that the mining tasks set by the superiors for Changshan Fort are getting higher and higher year by year, and the mine is almost overwhelmed, so this regulation was introduced. The leaders of the county bureau have bluntly said that there are no prisons in various places, and one prisoner is counted as one. All of them were sent to the Changshan Iron Mine. Sentence one to the other, without delay. Alas, in this way we have a lot of work. Forget it, let's not talk about this, let's go. ”

Naturally, the others had no objection and walked towards the bus stop together.

The distance from Zhenyuanbao in the capital area to Changshan Fort in the Yihe region is about 150 kilometers in a straight line, but in this era, there was no direct land road. The only way to get to the iron ore mining area of Changshanbao, which is located on the remote border of the northwest of the country, is to go to Miannongbao and take a small steamer to Dongfang Port, then change to a return coal ship from the north, and sail along the offshore sea to Zhenhai Port to disembark. After arriving at Zhenhai Port, he took a supply ship from the north to the Yihe area again and went to the Changshanbao iron ore mine area in the Yihe area through the Lianghu Canal - Milin Lake - Yihe River. The whole voyage is about hundreds of kilometers, excluding the time spent on intermediate stops, transfers and waiting, and the whole voyage takes more than ten days.

On November 11, the group set off from the Cotton Farmer Fort Wharf, and after more than ten days of travel, they finally arrived at the Changshanbao Iron Ore Mine on November 28, which is located on the north side of the junction of the Xiling Mountains and the Yihe River.

The small steamer Yiyun 003 slowly docked at the small wharf of the Changshanbao Iron Ore Canal with black smoke, and the officials of the wharf and port authority began to instruct the dock workers to go up to unload the cargo in an orderly manner. Zhou Dahe noticed that several steam cranes had been installed on the dock to unload the cargo. The base of the steam crane is made of cement, and the entire structure of the crane is mostly made of hardwood, which makes it easy to lift the supplies and iron ore that are not too heavy, and saves a lot of manpower, the latter of which is particularly important for the East Coast Republic today.

Zhou Dahe stepped onto the dock, and behind him, Officer Ronald commanded two militiamen to drive people into the boat. At the bottom of the line was Bogdan, an Albanian who carried two large satchels and a rifle in his hand, and it was clear at a glance that he had been doing the hard work the whole time.

On the dock, a man in his early thirties in a purple cardigan was talking to another fat middle-aged man with a big belly, and two secretaries and security guards with satchels were beside each other, both of whom seemed to be big men.

Zhou Dahe didn't dare to look more, and took advantage of the opportunity to stay on the dock for a short time, but his ears were already pricked up curiously, wanting to hear what these two big men were talking about.

"I said Qi fatty, I'm here to settle accounts with you today." The man in the purple woolen sweater smiled wryly and said to the middle-aged fat man opposite, "The iron ore you are now sending to our factory is generally large, and the size is basically between 30-60 centimeters, which leads to insufficient mineral sand reduction in our ironmaking workshop. On this issue, the director of the high factory has scolded several people, and the most severely scolded is the department responsible for receiving iron ore, and I have been implicated a few times, what do you say about this? ”

"Director Gao mentioned this to me once before, and it is our fault that the particles provided are too large, but we also have difficulties now." Qi Fatzi began to shout, "You see, you have been asking us for iron ore production these days, and sometimes you even pull the tiger skin of your superiors to put pressure on us, making us very passive." You don't count, how many people are there here now? There are only more than 2,000 South African laborers, and the iron ore mined is in the mountains, so they are completely busy! You also know that the grade of iron ore here can only be said to be average, about 55%, according to the design capacity of your ironmaking blast furnace, we will mine about 60-70 tons of iron ore per day, and then we have to beneficiate, crush and transport. I'll tell you the truth, with the current staff, it's hard to accomplish this goal, so you should take care of it a little more. ”

"Hehe, I know that you want to complain." Purple Wool shook his head and smiled, "Well, I'm here this time mainly to talk about another matter. ”

"What else?" Qi Fatzi was a little dissatisfied, "You always find trouble for me, and it's all a headache." Forget it, whoever likes to sit in the position of director of the Changshan Mining Bureau, I can't sit down anyway. ”

"Okay, okay, don't talk about these useless things." The purple cardigan punched the fat man, and then restrained his smile and said: "During this time, the brittleness of the iron smelted in our iron factory (ironmaking workshop) is too strong, and many users of brother units have put forward opinions to us. Hey, you stop first, I know what you mean! I know the way, I know the way! I know that the sulfur content of iron is too high, and I also know that the quality of coke used in ironmaking is not good, and the sulfur content itself is very high. However, Director Gao means that he will find a way on the coke side, but are you Changshan Iron Mine also considering thinking of a way to desulfurize the mined iron ore first? And it's not a lot of trouble. ”

"Why isn't it troublesome?" Qi Fatzi raised his eyebrows and said loudly: "I know what you mean." Don't you just want me to go to a kiln here and calcinate the mined iron ore in advance? Of course, I understand, this can remove the crystal water and part of the sulfur in it, and it can also improve the grade of iron ore, so it is more efficient to transport. However, I still say the same thing, I don't have enough people here! Moreover, this kiln is not small, and refractory bricks and building materials have to be transported from hundreds of kilometers away, which is troublesome. ”

"You don't have to worry about the materials, Director Gao has greeted the above, and he has been transferred directly from Ping'an County." Purple Cardigan said, "As for the problem of lack of manpower you mentioned, this matter can be solved." The Xhosa blacks on the South African side were at war with each other, and because of the war, we had a large number of slaves, and we could get a large number of able-bodied slaves at a very small cost. Moreover, the situation has gradually opened up on the side of the new Chinese colony recently, and it is presumably possible to acquire a large number of slaves by conquering the indigenous tribes in the future. Therefore, there is no need to be happy about the problem of manpower. ”

"Give me another blank check." Qi Fatzi sighed deeply, "But who made your Ping An Iron and Steel Plant a star enterprise, and our Changshan Mining Bureau is an upstream enterprise that cooperates with you." Forget it, I'll take care of the calcining of iron ore. Also, you'd better send some people over and teach the South African labourers how to crush and sort the iron ore. Of course, we will also increase the sampling of the iron ore that will be shipped out, and strive to eliminate the unqualified iron ore. At the same time, we will also reprocess these overly coarse iron ore particles to meet your requirements. ”

"Okay, Qi Fatty, you're interesting enough." Purple Cardigan said excitedly. Then the two seemed to start chatting about the customs of the place, and then walked towards the office building of the Mining Bureau.

At this time, Officer Ronald was already urging Zhou Dahe to go with him to go through the formalities, so Zhou Dahe quickly followed and went straight to the labor camp in the iron ore mining area. (To be continued......)