"Old man Sha Copper, this is Da Lang called Sha Dajin, this is San Lang Sha Santie, and there is a sand and two silver in it." Sha Laohan pointed to the two sons in front of him and said.

But when Gu Haotian heard it, he was secretly amused, thinking that he was worthy of the name of the craftsman's family, father and son, but he took all the metal.

"We are originally from Henan, we moved here a few years ago, and the old man did spend some days in the workshop of the imperial court when he was young, so he still remembers some crafts, and I don't want this guest official to recognize it."

Seeing that the guest seemed to have no malicious intent, Sha Laohan admitted it vaguely.

"It's just that life is hard." The old man sighed, and unconsciously looked at his eldest son's injured leg.

"How did Da Lang's leg hurt?" Gu Haotian saw that the old man looked at his son's injured leg several times, and asked curiously.

"Alas!"

The old man sighed again. Slowly talk about the ins and outs of the matter. After Sha Laohan's family moved here five years ago, the family made a living by striking iron at the beginning, but there were too many iron-making shops here, and the tools used for mining and ordinary daily production supplies were all used for mining. In order to increase income, the eldest son and the younger son went to the mine to open a mine for others the year before last, not wanting the eldest son to break his leg by ore while mining a few days ago, and suddenly spent all the family's savings.

"It's not Ding Baiyan's thief who harmed him. That ore is unstable, it shouldn't have been mined, Ding Baiyan had to ask his eldest brother to mine it, otherwise something would happen. That Sha Santie interjected hatefully.

"That Ding Baiyan is the leader of the mine, called Ding Degui, who is extremely vicious, Da Lang was injured and didn't pay half a penny for medicine, and drove him out. I was also helpless to take out a few knives at home to buy, if the guest officer liked it and gave a price. ”

The old man talked to a few strangers for a long time, in fact, he wanted to win the sympathy of a few people, so that he could sell those knives in exchange for some money for his son's medical treatment.

"How much does the sand shopkeeper cost?"

"These five knives are all good iron materials, and the old man made them himself, and the guest officer will give twenty taels, otherwise fifteen taels will do." Sha Laohan didn't dare to quote the price too high, for fear of buying and selling.

"I want all these five knives, and Bian Xiang will give the shopkeeper thirty taels of silver."

Gu Haotian knew that Sha Laohan's offer was not expensive, he remembered that in "Water Margin", Lu Zhishen hit a ring knife and an iron Zen staff for five taels of silver, this Pu Dao Tang Long is optimistic, three taels of silver is definitely more than one, and he has his own purpose to give more than double.

"The guest officer is fifteen taels." Sha Laohan thought that Gu Haotian was wrong.

"It's just thirty taels, one is that it is important for Dalang to see a doctor, and the other is to ask San Lang to take me to the iron mine to see, and the right to pay for it."

Sha Laohan held the three big silver ingots handed over by Bian Xiang, he was stunned and didn't know what to say, he felt that what was happening in front of him was not real.

"Saburo is convenient?" Gu Haotian turned around and asked Nasha Santie.

"Ah—convenient, convenient, I haven't been to the mine these days, I'm idle." Nasha Santie also showed the deal in front of him, and when he saw Gu Haotian asking, he came back to his senses, and hurriedly responded without a word.

"In this case, we will stay at the Yuelai Inn in front, and you will come tomorrow morning, just say that you are looking for a merchant surnamed Gu." After that, a few people took the Pu knife and walked back.

It wasn't until Gu Haotian and the others walked out of a long distance that the old man believed that Fang Cai's story was true, and he desperately pulled his youngest son out of the door.

"Gu guest officer, please stay, and be bowed by the old man." Sha Laohan shouted, and he and his youngest son fell to their knees.

Gu Haotian turned around and stretched out his hand to help him, and a few people went by themselves. That night, Shi Qian sneaked into Wu's house to get in touch with Zhu Gui, and learned that the progress of the situation seemed to be relatively smooth, so he settled down and waited patiently for two more days.

Early the next morning, Sha Santie came to the inn, just a few people were eating breakfast, Gu Haotian knew that he hadn't eaten breakfast at a glance, so he invited him to come over and dine together. Sha Santie hesitated, finally came over and sat down, white-flour steamed bread corn porridge, and a few delicious side dishes, he couldn't control his appetite with one mouthful, and swept away the food on the table like a storm, and at the end he still looked unfinished.

"San Lang is having fun, otherwise come back to some more." Gu Haotian asked with a smile.

At this time, Sha Santie raised his head from the dining table, but saw a table of smiling faces.

"I haven't eaten a good meal for many years, which makes everyone laugh." He was a little embarrassed.

"It's okay, a good man should be able to eat and drink, what's ridiculous." Gu Haotian replied, and then several people hired two carriages to go to the mine.

After sharing breakfast, Nasha Santie got a lot closer to everyone at once, and he was originally a free and easy character, so he talked about the things in the mine all the way.

It turned out that the Sha family brothers were in the Wu family's iron mine, there were about 300 miners, and the steward was called Ding Degui. Ding Degui's elder brother is called Ding Defu, and he is the confidant of Wu Erye, so he bullies people and does all kinds of evil in the mine. The Sha family brothers are upright and popular in the mine, and they often contradict him and are regarded as a thorn in their side. Therefore, on that day, he forced Sha Dajin to go to that dangerous place to mine stones until he was injured, and used this as an excuse to quit him. Sha Santie tried to reason with him many times to no avail, and hated him very much.

In the middle of gossip, the carriage entered the mining area, only to see a dense patch of dilapidated shacks at the foot of the surrounding mountains.

"This is where the miners and their families live, and my brother and I used to live here." Sha Santie saw Gu Haotian's doubts and explained.

"I'm afraid there are thousands of them."

"There are also people, there are nearly 300 people in the Wujia Mine, and there are 5 or 600 people in my family. There are five or six mines around here, and six or seven hundred of the big mines work. ”

Seeing the miners, Gu Haotian suddenly thought of a famous army in the Ming Dynasty, Qi Jiguang used the miners of Yiwu to resist the Japanese, and it was the miners who could endure hardships and were not afraid of death that gave rise to the prestige of the Qi family army. Liangshan is now short of soldiers, and here are good seedlings everywhere.

"How much does it cost to work in this mine?" He wanted to find out how much the miners were earning and seeing if the income of the guards was attractive to them.

"There is no certainty, tired and tired for a whole month, there are one or two or five good ones, and less than one or two bad ones, and they don't care about food and housing, if they are accidentally injured, they will be driven out of the mine and live or die."

"The wages are low, and the ordinary nursing home in our manor also has three or two months, and we still have food and housing." Tang Long said in surprise when he heard it.

"My brother has a good manor, I can go there." Sha Santie heard that there was such a good thing, and hurriedly inquired.

"If the manor comes to recruit people, the miners here are willing to go." Gu Haotian asked.

"A good place is where even fools know how to go."

Sha Santie's reply made Gu Haotian know in his heart, he thought to himself that this trip to Jinling Town was really worth it, Wu Erye didn't say it, but this miner was unexpected. At this time, the carriage entered the shack area, and everyone got out of the carriage and walked.

The mining area of the Wu family is on the mountainside of the first mountain in front of it, and there was a section of road in the past, Gu Haotian originally wanted to go up to take a look, but now he has changed his mind, one is afraid that he will meet Na Ding Degui, which will bring variables to Zhu Gui's actions, and the other is that there are more important things at present.

A few people walked slowly along the dirty path between the shantytowns, it was the time to go to work, there were not many men along the way, only some old and weak women and children appeared from time to time, but they were all ragged, yellow and thin.

After walking a little way, he arrived at the foot of the Wu family mine, and Sha Santie pointed to a shack at the foot of the mountain, saying that he and the rest of the more than ten single miners usually live there. Gu Haotian and a few people went in to take a look, but it was a long row of simple soil pits, with some dirty clothes and quilts piled on them, and the smell was very unpleasant. Gu Haotian turned around and retreated, and at this moment, a tall and burly man came in front of him, full of swear words and didn't know who was scolding.

"Brother Jiao, why don't you work in the mine today, but what are you doing here?" The person Sha Santie recognized went to say hello.

"Ding Baiyan, this beast is so deceitful, and what kind of bird work he does, and now I don't do it, so I just asked him for his wages, but the thief said that he didn't do enough this month and refused to pay me, If it weren't for the crowd, I would have beaten him to death with one punch. It's the three iron brothers, aren't you already out of work, why don't you come here, the legs of the Dajin brothers are a little sharper. ”

"My brother's legs haven't healed yet, but today I led the way for these brothers and came to see the mine."

"What is so beautiful about this bird mine, the miners do not care about life and death, and the workers are poor and unbearable, and go back early, so as not to stain their eyes."

"This is my good brother in the mine, called Jiao Ting, a good kung fu, that sumo wrestling skills, thousands of miners are unbeatable." Sha Santie pointed at the big man and said to Gu Haotian and the others.

At this time, Gu Haotian had already looked at this big man carefully, and saw that he was about 1.8 meters tall, with a round waist and thick arms, and he was extremely powerful. But the word "Jiao Ting" spit out of Sha Santie's mouth surprised him, and he thought to himself: Could it be that he met another one.