At this time, after repeatedly encountering the wall in the search and rescue of the Cai family brothers, Yang Wei, the Qin Mission, ushered in two guests in the line of the Qin Mission. Looking for Cai Dao's matter, I finally have an eyebrow.

The method Cai Dao came up with was to use the ransom money to redeem himself and several brothers from the bandits in Taihang Village.

Taihangzhai's asking price for Cai Dao is quite high, and ordinary people don't have this ability at all, even Zhao Xu, who is the emperor, can't come up with so much money now. However, Cai Dao had a corresponding strategy when he saw Ding Youcai and money before.

It is to support Ding Youcai to become the richest man north of the Yangtze River in the Great Song Dynasty.

Among the farmers and industrialists, commerce is undoubtedly the most able to create wealth. And monopoly is even more able to support a giant business in a short period of time.

From the eighth year of Yuanfeng to the fourth year of Yuanyou, during these four years, the northern region of the Great Song Dynasty repeatedly suffered from natural disasters of varying degrees, and disaster relief materials and food were undoubtedly commodities that could take advantage of this opportunity to make huge profits.

However, because the heavy snow on Hedong Road in the eighth year of Yuanfeng came too suddenly, Ding Youcai definitely couldn't make this money. Therefore, this time the opportunity can only be given to money, backed by the Cai family's fleet, to transport grain from the grain harvest areas in the south, and only need to sell it to the imperial court at a lower price.

In doing so, although it will definitely lose some of the profits from the grain transaction, it will undoubtedly befriend Wen Yanbo and Lu Gongzhu, the two prime ministers of the current dynasty. Moreover, as long as the industry of money in the south is mainly sugar and tea, there is no conflict at all with the business between these great families in the north. Therefore, the conservative ministers, although they all hated this big fat merchant who was full of copper stench, still had to make it as convenient as possible for money to trade in the North.

Because, as long as various natural disasters continue to occur in these areas in the north, Wen Yanbo and Lü Gongzhu must have been in need of money to transport food from the south to the center for blood transfusion.

Compared with money mixing like a fish in water among conservative ministers, it is much more difficult for Ding Youcai to develop.

Because, no matter what goods Ding Youcai sells, there will always be conflicts between vendors from all over the world. For example, when he sold seafood to Hedong Road, others saw that it was lucrative, and the wealthy merchants in the coastal areas of Jingdong East Road, Hebei East Road, and Hainan East Road naturally became red. Naturally, these local gentry will not let go of such an opportunity to make a fortune.

As a result, in the former Xiaocili Shipyard, orders for marine fishing tugboats surged rapidly, and most of the buyers were from these three roads.

However, the seafood was shipped to the inland areas, and some people with connections did make a lot of money in the Gyeonggi area. However, most of the families involved in this business ended up losing their money.

This is because, under the influence of Cai Dao and Su Dongpo, in other areas, a large part of the meat that people can eat is locally bred chickens and pigs, and those who can't afford to eat can also catch river fish in the river.

The Chinese are not as delicate as the Westerners of later generations, and they are not at all rejecting river fish with a lot of spines.

And the main selling place of seafood in Ding Youcai's hands is actually Hedong Road, where Cai Dao is located. To be more precise, it is Taihang Village, where Cai Dao is located. Because most of these seafood are to be distributed to the children in Taihang Village. These children are entering the best period of their lives in learning and need a lot of nutrients to replenish their brain power. It is simply not enough to rely on the chickens and pigs that are widely promoted in various cottages.

The widely planted walnuts are not yet ready to be harvested, so fish caught from the deep sea are the best nutrients for these children. Of course, Cai Dao's family likes to eat seafood, which is also one of the important influencing factors.

Those who followed the trend and wanted to enter the Hedong Road were all stopped from the Yellow River and the mountains.

There are bandits and bandits on the road, and these coastal gentry have no way to open the passage here.

Of course, relying only on the business of selling seafood, Ding Youcai wants to become a wealthy businessman in the north, which is tantamount to cannibalism.

The four elements of human survival in society are summarized in later generations as the four things of 'clothing, food, shelter and transportation'.

However, in a relatively closed social system such as the ancient one, which was dominated by a small-scale peasant economy, the importance of 'walking' was not as good as that of 'medicine'. The people who live in the village may have lived in their kennel all their lives, and some have never even left their own village in their lives. However, as long as you are not an orphan, your relatives or yourself may get sick.

The lack of medical care has become the norm in those more remote villages. In ancient times, unless it was a high-ranking official and nobleman who diagnosed a disease, there was no such serious doctor-patient relationship between Langzhong and the people as in later generations.

Cai Dao pointed out this clear road to Ding Youcai - selling and planting medicinal herbs, and at the same time, using the relatively barren land on Jingdong East Road to grow grass cotton on a large scale. As long as you have a firm grasp of the two aspects of 'clothing' and 'medicine'. It's impossible not to make a lot of money.

In history, probably during the Tang Dynasty, grass cotton had appeared in the Hainan region or Lingnan region of China. And the large-scale promotion and planting of grass cotton in the real sense is what happened after Zhu Yuanzhang ascended the throne as emperor.

Even though it is not yet the Xiaoice period, the winter in northern China is still very cold. Ordinary people themselves lack food and clothing, let alone fur to wear in winter.

Even in the Great Song Dynasty, it is impossible to estimate the number of people who die of typhoid fever every year, or who are directly frozen to death by heavy snow. Even in Bianliang City, the capital of the Great Song Kingdom, where the facilities and institutions are perfect, many ordinary people still freeze to death every winter.

With the advent of cotton, it will undoubtedly greatly reduce the threat of cold to ordinary people. With the widespread cultivation of cotton, the price of clothing made from it will gradually decrease.

Moreover, there is a very big advantage to the cultivation of cotton. That is, although cotton cannot be used to satisfy hunger, it is very light in total and easy to transport.

There are several places in the Great Song Dynasty that are very suitable for large-scale cotton cultivation.

For example, Bashu, since there was Dujiangyan, it has become the land of fish and rice, but still, because this is a place of four stops. He Guanzhong is sandwiched by Daba Mountain and Qinling, and Jinghu North Road is sandwiched by the Three Gorges with dangerous terrain, if you want to transport the surplus grain in Bashu to Guanzhong.

It's simply more than worth the loss.

Even Bashu, which has always been a salt-producing place, has always been unable to compete with Huai Salt because of the problem of road obstacles.

If part of the land in Bashu is used to grow cotton, it will not only solve the problem of surplus grain in Bashu, but also accelerate the economic and trade exchanges between the Bashu region and the Central Plains. Compared to hemp, cotton is very easy to grow, light and inexpensive, and very warm. Very appetizing alternative to traditional Chinese hemp clothing.

There are also the inland areas of Guangnan West Road and Guangnan East Road, and the coastal areas south of Hangzhou on Liangzhejiang Road are very suitable for growing grass cotton.

In this way, with these three businesses, Ding Youcai easily became the richest man in the Central Plains in only five years. However, the richest man still has moisture. Because, the amount of land occupied by those big families in the north is quite amazing, and it is better for Han Qi and the Han family to be called Han Xiangzhou. The 'Xiangzhou' here is not Han Qi's county prestige, but that the Han Qi family has incorporated almost the entire cultivated land of Xiangzhou into the name of the Han family.

In other words, the people of Xiangzhou as a whole are tenants of the Han family.

After receiving Cai Dao's message, in fact, Ding Youcai and Qian had already come to Taiyuan Mansion, but in order to let Yang Wei know the difficulty of this matter, they had not shown up before.

After waiting for half a month, the two of them came to Yang Wei and offered to use money to redeem Cai Dao and the others.

For this errand, Yang Wei has been physically and mentally exhausted in the past half a month. No matter what the thieves of Taihang Village put forward, the promise that he Yang Wei could make was only to allow these thieves who refused to accept the court's recruitment. If you want to redeem Cai Dao with money, not to mention the price of the ransom, whether the court can afford it, just the ransom is a question, and it is impossible for the court to reach an agreement with the bandits.

Perhaps, after that, Zhao Xu was forced to choose to pay the ransom in secret in exchange for Cai Dao. However, he must be the executor of this matter. And once this matter is exposed in the future, the person who bears the black pot will definitely be him.

Just when he was at a loss, suddenly two businessmen took the initiative to jump out and solve the biggest problem for him, how could Yang Wei not dare to move, how could he not be excited?

This time, without resorting to the name of the imperial court at all, Cai Dao was redeemed. He, the ostensible executor, will surely reap more praise.

However, for reasons of personal habit, Yang Wei still asked about the identity of Ding Youcai and Qian, and why these two people were willing to be the wronged boss this time.

As soon as Ding Youcai and money were talked, Yang Wei realized that these two were acquaintances of Luo Guozi!