After Dai Yan saw the prosperous city of Taoqiu, he summoned Dr. Taoqiu and began to inquire about the details of the city. From www.biquge.info the doctor's mouth, Dai Yan also knew the complexity of the city of Taoqiu.

The city is a purely commercial city, although there are scattered villages around Taoqiu City, but if these villages are to supply the entire Taoqiu, I am afraid that within a month, the entire Taoqiu people will starve to death.

There are only about 15,000 registered households in the city, and it is estimated that the population is only about 100,000. However, if you think that there are only so many people in this city, then you are underestimating it. The city was no different from the commercial cities of later generations, with a large floating population. Although Dr. Tao Qiu did not count the specific floating population, according to his estimates, the floating population of the city should be two to three times the number of registered households, and the population should be about 300,000. This number is comparable to that of Suiyang, the capital of Song, and according to Dai Yan's observation of this place, this data should be almost the same.

At this time, although there were wars between the countries of the heavens, the trade between the countries was extremely prosperous. In terms of international trade between countries, the largest trade volume is salt and grain. The production of salt is relatively fixed, and most of it is concentrated in Qi and Wei. When Qi Huan dominated the Central Plains, the princes of the Central Plains did not obey, and the biggest reason was that Qi mastered the sale of salt. The only exception is the Jin State, which has salt in Anyi and does not care about the threat of the Qi State at all, so it is possible to challenge the hegemony of the Qi State in the future. The grain trade was also the bulk of international trade at this time, and this trade was larger than that of salt, but this trade had a great disadvantage, that is, it could not control the production and source of grain. The entire Chinese civilization is an agricultural civilization circle, and all countries are growing grain, and the people engaged in this trade are from princes to feudal lords, from nobles to rangers, from big merchants to small farmers, and its origin is extremely complex.

As the trade center of the world, Taoqiu also has salt and grain in its trade. Most of the nobles who control the salt trade are the nobles of Qi and Wei, although these nobles do not come forward in person, but their agents are still very powerful in Taoqiu, like such a person, how can the little Song State dare to offend? The people involved in the grain trade are even more complicated, all the big and small forces in the world actually exist in Taoqiu, even a magistrate like Dr. Taoqiu can't judge the exact background of a businessman, and he doesn't dare to offend the big businessmen involved in the grain trade at will. In addition to the two major trades of salt and grain, Taoqiu is also one of the major trades for the specialties of various places, such as the cattle and horses of the Zhao State, the rouge of the Yan State, the fish of the Qi State, the iron of Korea, the wood of the Chu State in the south, the jade of the Qin State in the West, and so on. It can be said that although Taoqiu is a subordinate city of the Song State, in fact, the city is an international city influenced by various forces, and it is far from being completely controlled by the small Song State.

The Yi Doctor of Taoqiu was very aware of this when he was managing this place, and as long as the merchants could pay their taxes on time and the whole city could maintain a basic law and order, the Yi Doctor would not be troubled at all. After Dai Yan learned about the situation here, he didn't comment much on the management of Dr. Yi, but asked Dr. Yi to invite the grain merchant from Taoqiu, and he wanted to talk about business with the merchants.

Soon, Dai Yan met three grain merchants who were very famous in Taoqiu—Bailong, Puyangxing, and Tianbu. Among these three, Bai Long is the descendant of Bai Gui, a great merchant when Li Kui of the Wei State changed the law, and there are the major nobles of the Wei State behind him. Puyang Xingming is a common man of Puyang who defends the country, but it is impossible for someone who can engage in large-scale grain trade to have no background, and Dr. Yi speculates that there may be a background of Zhao behind it. Tian Bu is a native of Qi, and he is also a common citizen of Qi on the surface, but judging from the scale of trade he is engaged in, there must be a large number of Qi nobles behind him.

Dai Yan didn't say much when he saw these three people, but just said that Song Guo had suffered a flood this year, and he hoped to buy grain in the hands of the three of them.

"I wonder how much grain Childe wants to buy?" Bai Longfa asked.

"Not much, 1 million stones is enough." Dai Yan said lightly.

1,000,000 stones! All three were taken aback. You must know that these three people are also well-informed businessmen, and there are not a few kings, nobles, local officials, etc. who buy grain from them, such as the grain trade they engage in, when it exceeds 100,000 stone at a time, and at such times it is generally not a war or a disaster relief. For example, during the Battle of Maling, the Qi State urgently purchased 300,000 stone of grain from Tianbu as military rations. However, it was the first time that these three big businessmen had seen such a million stone grain at a time like this.

"Childe, please forgive the villain's bluntness", but Tian Bu spoke, "I have been to your country Fengyi, this place is small, and the population is not large, even if it suffers a disaster, I'm afraid it doesn't need 1 million stone of grain, right?" ”

Dai Yan replied: "The three of them are businessmen, and it is enough to do business, so why should they care about the use of food? My Song Kingdom has always been a country of honest gentlemen, when have you ever seen my Song people break their promises? At the end of the day, it's just a business, it's just a bigger business, so I found three of them. If the three of them are unwilling to do this business, they will definitely not force it. ”

Pu Yangxing opened his mouth and said: "What Gongzi said is very true, we are just ordinary businessmen, businessmen are only for profit, and I have done this business." ”

Ordinary businessmen? Dai Yan sneered in his heart, if the people engaged in such a big business were just ordinary businessmen, then the agents and white gloves of the nobles here in Taoqiu would not have to be mixed, and they would all jump into Jishui.

"Such a big business, the three of you should also see it for the first time, and there are many details below, I hope you can agree. You are engaged in the grain trade, and there must be a large number of ships to transport it back and forth, and I hope that the place of delivery of grain will not be in Taoqiu, but in my fiefdom Fengyi. With such a large amount of grain trade, you can't get it for a while, but it doesn't matter, this grain is not in a hurry, and you can deliver this million stone grain in two years. This year, I need three people to deliver 500,000 stone of grain to my Fengyi, and the remaining half will be delivered to me by the end of next year at the latest. You should be able to do it, right? Dai Yan asked.

The trio breathed a sigh of relief when they heard that it would be settled in two parts. You must know that even if even the three of them want to collect millions of stone of grain in a short period of time, it is impossible at all. If it is divided into two years, although it is also difficult, the business can finally be done. A business like this can almost wipe out the three of them in two years' worth of mobile food, and a stable business like this is rare to come by.

Subsequently, Dai Yan and the three agreed on the price of the grain deal. As soon as the three of them talked about the price, they talked about such a large amount of business, and it needed to be transported to Fengyi, if the profit was not enough, they would not do it, and they proposed that the price of grain must be twice the current price before they would do this business, or let Dai Yan find someone else.

Dai Yan accepted twice the price without bargaining with the three of them, and soon Dai Yan paid a 10% deposit for the business. A contract is then signed, which sets out the rights and obligations of the buyer and the seller. In this era, there was no international law and no WTO, so it was necessary to swear an oath to heaven after signing the contract. Dai Yan was very efficient, and after completing the oath, the two sides left separately.

After the three big merchants left, they did not disperse. Bai Long said to Puyang Xing and Tian Bu: "Two, now Gongzi Ziyan is buying such a large amount of grain, I am afraid that it is not for disaster relief, and one million stones of grain can feed 100,000 people for two years. The two of them know why Gongzi Yan bought so much food? ”

"It's supposed to be preparing for war." Tian Bu analyzed, "However, even in the Battle of Maling, the Qi State consumed only 500,000 stone of grain and grass, so why did the Song State need to prepare 1 million stone of grain?" ”

"Why do you think so much?" Pu Yangxing said. "The Song people have always been honest, and if you think that Gongzi Yan, as the prince of the Song Kingdom, will definitely not lose his trust for a business, why should we speculate on the motives of the Song Kingdom to buy grain here?"

Bai Long replied: "What Brother Puyang said is extremely true, no matter what Ziyan is going to do, as long as it is beneficial to us, we will let it go, so why bother looking ahead? If Brother Tian doesn't want to do this business, he can give up, that is, the younger brother is willing to take over Brother Tian's share. ”

Tian Bu replied with a smile: "Brother Bai is worthy of being the ancestor of Shang, the three of us have divided 1 million stone grains, and Brother Bai has already divided 400,000, and the supply of such a large amount of Brother Bai is still insufficient, and the younger brother admires it." ”

Bai Long didn't say anything, just bowed his hand to the two of them and said goodbye. The three soon separated as well.

What the three of them didn't know was that the buyer of this transaction was actually not Dai Yan, but the entire Song Kingdom. Although Dai Yan was a nobleman, it was impossible for him to come up with such a large sum of money, and the amount spent on buying grain alone cost half of the entire Song State's fiscal taxes. Buying such a large amount of grain, even if the delivery method is divided into two years, this also makes Song Junzi feel painful. Fortunately, Dai Yan promised him that the current expenditure will be doubled in the future. Zixi also recognized the big gamble made by his younger brother.

Soon after, the kingdoms of Heaven learned that Wei and Qi would be the king of Xue Yi in Qi in March of the following year. Because Xue Yi belongs to Xuzhou in the world's Kyushu, this matter is called the king of Xuzhou by the countries.

After learning of this exact news, the upper echelons of the countries fell into silence, while the lower echelons of the people and the various academic factions in the world fell into an uproar. The biggest reaction was from Confucianism, which believed that only southern barbarians such as Chu Yue would arbitrarily usurp the title of "king", but now the princes canonized by the Son of Heaven recognize each other as kings, which is a symbol of the complete collapse of etiquette. Mencius, who was in Daliang, left Wei in anger after persuading the king of Wei to no avail, and returned to Qi to persuade Qi Hou, but to no avail. Mencius had no choice but to return to his home country, Zou, to give lectures.

However, just when Mencius was depressed and returned to his home country, two ordinary scholars joined the army of travelers from all over the world to "find work". Compared with the many depressed travelers of the nations, these two easily won the favor of the two great kings, and there is no doubt that they were both successful people among the travelers. And they will have a profound impact on the history of the world in the future.

These two people, one is called Kuang Zhang, and the other is Gongsun Yan.