The salt pans are all built by rowing the sea, and the salt goods produced are simply stacked with straw mats and tarpaulins not far from the salt works, after all, this salt is a heavy material, and it costs manpower to place it too far away.

There are many hill-like salt piles around the salt pans in Haizhou, and the reason why Haizhou has become the production base of Huai Salt is that in addition to the seaside suitable for salt, there is also his location, which happens to be a very large river - the Salt River, through this river, the salt goods produced are shipped to the salt boats, and the salt is transported into the water system of Nanzhili as dense as fishing nets through the Salt River, and distributed to various places through Cao Yun and the Yangtze River.

Water transportation was the most economical and convenient mode of transportation in this era, and the salt goods produced in the salt fields of Haizhou Salt Works were piled up on the banks of the river, and there were a large number of salt ships waiting to be loaded.

But everyone knew that the Japanese were coming, and after those people landed and assembled at sea, they could only look at the backs of the people of Haizhou, and they watched from afar.

The soldiers in the East China Sea are busy rescuing their own Qianzong, Haizhou City is about fifteen miles away from the sea, and there must be officers and soldiers stationed in the state city, but compared to the performance in the East China Sea, there is no ambiguity at all, these "Japanese robbers" who have come ashore are still digging a low dam to intercept the seawater, and the city gate has been closed.

No matter how the people under the city cried, the leaders of the officers and soldiers at the head of the city gritted their teeth and claimed that they were unwilling to open the door because they cared about the overall situation.

There was already a great chaos under the city because of the stampede, but fortunately, those "Japanese bandits" were slow to move and delayed time on the beach, so these people simply fled around the city.

The pirates have soldiers on both sides of the ship and on the shore, those on the ship are watching the movements in the East China Sea, and the people guarding the shore are ready to meet the officers and soldiers who appear in Haizhou City at any time, but the officers and soldiers on both sides are very tacitly closed.

It is said that these pirates are all going ashore to plunder, once they go ashore, they pay attention to the speed of individual soldiers, and it is right to rush into the city or arrest people, but these pirates are different, and they destroy the salt pans and salt fields in an orderly manner.

After destroying the salt pans, he did not go to a few nearby villages and towns or attack the city, but went directly to the river near the salt field, and all the salt tun near the river bank was directly demolished and the reed fence of the salt was directly demolished, and the salt was poured into the river, and those boats that did not have time to run were directly set on fire and burned.

The soldiers and officials watching at the head of Haizhou City all looked at each other, but those officers and soldiers were also secretly relieved, and it was good not to come to attack the city.

Nanzhili and Zhejiang, is considered the Ming Dynasty from the beginning of the country, the most peaceful place, during the Longqing period of the rebellion of the Japanese Kou to quell Hou, basically did not suffer the scourge of swords, even some time ago the eight kings Zhang Xianzhong was just to the Fengyang Mansion area, far from Nanjing, because of this, the soldiers and horses of Nanzhili have been too long, will not fight at all, and dare not fight.

Suddenly, such a large group of pirates came ashore, and the officers and soldiers were not thinking about fighting, but about running, seeing that the other party was only destroying salt works and burning ships on the seashore, and did not come to attack the city, but they just felt lucky, so what else did they care.

More than two hours passed, and the residents of Haizhou City sensed that something was wrong from their panic, so why didn't they start the war for a long time?

The first to go up to the city to watch are the salt merchants in Haizhou, these people are either the salt merchants themselves or the representatives stationed here, after all, the outside of the city is their source of money, and they also have enough status to be able to go up to the city to watch, and when they look at the city, they can't help but be dumbfounded.

The gate of Haizhou was closed, and there was no enemy to be seen three miles outside the city, but on the edge of the salt field and the salt river three miles away, black smoke rose, and the salt fields in the distance flashed.

At this time, it was the peak of the demand for salt, a large number of salt waiting for distribution and transportation outside the city, and a large number of ships waiting to transport salt, these "Japanese robbers" outside were wreaking havoc, and the income of 100,000,000 taels was destroyed.

Because all the civil and military generals related to Huaiyan were almost fed with silver, someone immediately pointed to the nose of the Haizhou garrison and ordered him to immediately go out of the city to meet the battle and drive these pirates away.

Although the other party is likely to be just a shopkeeper or master, a civilian with a white body, the Haizhou garrison, as a military general, did not dare to refute or scold, knowing that if he offended the other party, his official position as a garrison would be immediately lost, and his life would be in danger.

"Hurry up and get out of the city to drive these widows away, win, you will be prosperous and rich, if you die in battle, your family does not have to worry, you will naturally be rich for a lifetime, if you don't go out of the city, a few people will blame you, I am afraid that you will cut off your children and grandchildren!"

Someone unceremoniously listed a few conditions with this garrison, and let him weigh it himself, and the Haizhou garrison, which was covered with cold sweat, pondered for a while, and knew that the other party's threat was not a little false, so he had to go down the city to gather troops and horses, and prepare to drive away the "Japanese robbers" outside the city.

To be honest, these "pirates" are all young and vigorous men, and it is okay to fight and kill, but it is difficult for them to do what they do carefully and seriously, otherwise these people will not come to dance knives and guns.

Therefore, everyone stared at the Haizhou city gate, lest the officers and soldiers in Haizhou City not go out of the city to fight, it was already dusk, watching the Haizhou city gate slowly open, and the soldiers inside slowly poured out.

It is indeed slowly, these soldiers are used to their comfortable days, who is willing to go outside to fight to the death, the garrison of Haizhou City and his own soldiers, almost with a whip to drive people out, this Haizhou garrison while driving his men out of the city to meet the enemy, while looking at the opposite side and scolding, thinking that you are quiet in the East China Sea, let Lao Tzu go out of the city to die.

There were also more than 2,000 soldiers in Haizhou City, and in addition to those who were lucky enough to stay behind, more than 1,500 people also left the city.

The "pirates" who were busy there watched each other's soldiers leave the city, and those who were guarding couldn't help but cheer in unison, finally there was a battle to fight.

This cheer, the people who were watching the battle at the head of the city heard it clearly, seeing that the Haizhou garrison had already taken the soldiers out of the city, and the representatives of the salt merchants in the city were not ambiguous, and immediately ordered the city gate to be closed, so as not to be taken advantage of by the thieves to enter the city.

Seeing that the city gate behind him was closed, the officers and soldiers of Haizhou City who went out of the city were in a panic, and immediately some soldiers on the edge wanted to drop their weapons and flee, and the Haizhou garrison hurriedly shouted:

"There are fewer thieves than us, drive them into the sea, those people in the city must have a large amount of silver rewarded, if we don't fight today, can we stay in Haizhou City in the future?"

Coercion and temptation finally stabilized the soldiers, and they formed a team with trepidation, slowly approaching the pirates who were destroying by the Salt River.

"No need to dig, hurry up and assemble, beat those officers and soldiers back, let's continue to work!"

The leader of the pirates shouted the order, and the impatient men immediately threw away their tools, took up their weapons, and began to gather.

Over there, you have to rely on coercion and temptation to gather, and here you are rushing to fight, and compared with the two, the victory or defeat is almost already out.

In the past, when I was a pirate, there was no one to control it, and a lot of energy and spirit were consumed on eating, drinking, prostituting and gambling, but now the daily training is disciplined to restrain it, and the only place that can be vented is the battlefield.

The officers and soldiers who went out of Haizhou City were already cowering, and after seeing the speed of the other party's gathering, they felt that their steps were heavy, and after leaving the city, even if they didn't want to fight, they had to do it, so hesitating, I am afraid that they would lose faster, he was ruthless, and simply took a knife and shouted angrily:

"If anyone is so afraid of the enemy, I won't tell you about the past affection with this knife in my hand!"

After finishing speaking, he ordered his own soldiers to catch a grumbling general and cut off his head with a knife, which always shocked the subordinates of the army, and the officers and soldiers of Haizhou were finally able to advance towards the pirates at a normal speed.

"Rabbit cubs, give Lao Tzu to walk slowly, rush now, and you still have the strength to fight when you get to the front!"

A big man who walked in the forefront of the pirates, carrying a simple knife on his shoulder, walked a few steps and turned back to shout a few words at his subordinates, these pirates have not seen blood for a long time, and they are about to go to war, everyone is excited, and the pace is getting faster and faster, but the distance from the other party is almost three miles, such a distance is even if it is full of fighting spirit, when it comes to the front, it will lose its combat effectiveness because of exhaustion.

The big man at the head didn't understand this truth before, but when he was training these young people, someone told him, and as soon as he verified it with the actual situation, he immediately knew that this was a wise saying on the battlefield.

After walking a few hundred steps, the Haizhou officers and soldiers finally calmed down slightly, and the mood of the pirates also began to calm down, gradually becoming less excited, except for the sound of footsteps and waves, there was silence in front of Haizhou City.

"To a distance of a hundred paces, rush again!"

The Haizhou garrison on the horse had a dry mouth, but his mind was still quite clear, at this time he was engrossed in calculating the distance between the two brigades, there were less than two hundred steps, but he didn't expect the leader of the other party to raise the Pu knife in his hand at this time, waved it in the direction of the officers and soldiers, and roared loudly:

"Kill me, little ones!"

The battle under the city of Haizhou, the casualties were surprisingly few, only three people stumbled to the ground because of their footsteps, and were trampled to death by the people behind, the Haizhou officers and soldiers who had not fought for a long time saw the pirates who shouted loudly on the opposite side, brandishing weapons, and seemed to be beasts, and no one could rush over, in fact, the first person to run was the Haizhou garrison, because he had horses and ran faster.

The main general will run first, even the soldiers who have no courage and fighting spirit will not be stupid to insist on the battlefield, they all follow the turn and run, fortunately, everyone hesitates, everyone is afraid, every Haizhou soldier is ready to escape, as soon as someone takes the lead, it will immediately be a complete collapse.

The pirates chased all the way to the city of Haizhou, and Haizhou City naturally did not open the gate to welcome the defeated soldiers, and those soldiers had long expected this outcome, and fled around the city one after another.

If you have a heart, you can almost see that the purpose of these pirates is not to rob money, not to kill, but specifically to destroy the salt works and salt warehouses in Haizhou. When the pirates rushed to the bottom of the walls, they had not yet reached the range of the bows and arrows of the soldiers above, and the big and small leaders stopped their men.

Driven back to their work, the salt merchants and their representatives at the head of the city, looking at the murderous pirates below the city, went back in despair to continue destroying the salt warehouses and burning the ships.

There are not too many soldiers in the city to defend the city now, there are nearly 2,000 pirates outside the city, as long as they make simple siege tools, maybe this extremely rich Haizhou City can be taken. The big families in the city have begun to gather their male men to prepare for self-defense when the city is broken.

But it seems that these pirates don't have much interest in Haizhou City, and they pay more attention to digging ditches and burning fires.

To Haizhou's relief, these inexplicable pirates got on their ships and left Haizhou City when it was almost dark, and the ships sailed away from the narrow strait between Haizhou City and the East China Sea, not knowing where to go.

Until noon the next day, Shuyang and Ganyu's two armies came to the rescue, this is the careful opening of the city gate, the salt pans outside the city have been soaked in seawater for a whole day, need to be re-repaired before they can be used, the ships preparing to transport salt by the salt river are burned and scuttled, the salt warehouses on the river bank are opened, and the salt is allowed to flow into the salt river.

And what is even more troublesome is that a large number of salt workers working in the salt field and around the salt field have been attacked by yesterday's Japanese invaders, and they are scattered and fled in fright, and it will take several days to collect them.

In fact, in the short term, in absolute terms, the losses of the salt merchants are not large, and the renovation of the salt pans is nothing more than civil engineering, and everything else is very simple.

But in the long run, the salt was delayed in the peak season of salt sales, and the loss was immeasurable, and many people who hid in the city yesterday ran out today to cry by the river and the sea, fearing that they would lose all their money.

Those leading figures in the city, such as the Zhizhou Yamen, for example, the salt merchants and their representatives, after the urgent collegiate discussion, on the one hand, arranged for people to go to the Yamen of Yingtian to report the bandits, saying that a large number of pirates were invading Haizhou, and asked Nanzhili to send troops and horses to protect the thieves, and on the other hand, they sent people to Yangzhou to report the news and explain the situation.

As for sending people to repair the salt pans and collect the salt workers, these are all normal things to do.

Some of the officers and soldiers who didn't go far came back, but they also said it clearly, looking at the clothes of those people yesterday, they were all Han clothes, and there were some accents from Shandong where they were scolding.

How many years have not been the so-called Japanese invaders on the seaside of Nanzhili, but the bloody and brutal, like the image of birds and beasts is deeply imprinted in people's minds, for a time the entire seaside of Nanzhili, wherever the news is known, are afraid and panicked, the slightest wind and grass, are afraid, and the time of the city gate closure is also much earlier.

Five days later, the two salt farms near Huize were also broken into by the "Japanese Bandits", this time compared to the Haizhou side, only one person was injured when he fled, and there were no deaths.

However, these two salt farms can not resume normal production within ten days, from the beginning to the middle of October in the twelfth year of Chongzhen, Yancheng County, Huaibei to Huainan, there are fourteen salt farms that have been attacked and destroyed, and the various state capitals along the coast are all grass and trees, and the tension is abnormal.

In mid-October, even at Yunti Pass at the mouth of the Huaihai Sea, some people saw this so-called "Japanese Kou" fleet.

The salt merchants in Yangzhou were surprised to find that if they continued to be harassed, they might have no salt to sell by December.

The existence of the two Huai salt merchants for more than 100 years, has a huge influence in the officialdom, this time there is such an urgent matter, these influence and the intertwined relationship, quickly applied, Huai'an Mansion, Yangzhou Mansion, Xuzhou, Chuzhou four Yamen jointly to the Ying Tian Governor urgent, Nanjing City all related Yamen are received the imperial court to send troops to levy the urgent document.

There were also officials in Nanjing City who immediately sent a report to the Jingshi Imperial Court, explaining that there were police along the coast of Nanzhili, that Nanzhili was an important place in the country, and that the ancestral temple was located, so it should not be neglected, and the imperial court should be sent to support immediately.

There are not many soldiers in the hands of the governor of Yingtian, because Nanzhili is different from other places, the eunuchs guarding the town, the Nanjing garrison, and the Shangshu of the Nanjing Military Department are in charge of the troops, and the only one who can mobilize and support is the more than 4,000 soldiers in Yangzhou Mansion and Huai'an Mansion, and there is a large army stationed in Fengyang Zhongdu.

But now Huguang and Henan are in turmoil, Fengyang has been burned by Zhang Xianzhong once the imperial tomb, this time there must be no mistakes, so the army stationed in Fengyang Mansion is on alert, and it is impossible to draw out excess soldiers and horses to support.

According to the news reported layer by layer, there are 10,000 people and more than 1,000 ships, although they also know that there is too much water on the text below, but it can be estimated at a discount that there are always thousands of Japanese pirates.

After several negotiations between the governor of Yingtian and the governor of Fengyang, there was no result, but the influence of the two Huai salt merchants was beyond the imagination of ordinary people, although the emperor's ancestral mausoleum was important, but in front of a large amount of gold and silver, it was not a too important thing.

I don't know how these salt merchants persuaded them, but in late October, 5,000 soldiers and horses stationed in Xuzhou supported the coastal defense of Nanzhili.

At present, more than 10,000 soldiers and horses have been put together, and the governor of Yingtian and the prefects of Huai'an and Yangzhou are finally relieved, these soldiers and horses are in one place, and they should be able to deal with thousands of Japanese soldiers, but the other party is on the ship, constantly harassing the various salt farms along the coast, coming and going, and how to fight is also a problem.

Originally, the pirates either smashed the lair directly, or pursued at sea, the other party's lair didn't know where it was, and the pursuit at sea was a joke, the Ming Dynasty had no sailors for many years, and the Zheng family in Fujian had some old knowledge in Haizhou, but the Zheng family said that they only had merchant ships and could not fight.

I knew that this was the other party's prevarication, but the salt merchants had no choice, the relationship between the two sides was not good, and it was good that the Zheng family did not take advantage of the fire to rob at this time, and it was just a matter of trying luck to ask them for help.

I can't find the enemy, but the production of salt has been cut off for almost ten days, and if it goes on like this, many places will collapse, for example, in the Huguang area, Sichuan salt has always wanted to be sold in Huguang, and even sold to the south of the Yangtze River, but it is blocked by the commercial means of two Huai salt, and there is a Changlu salt field near Tianjin, aiming at Shanxi and Beizhili, if Huai salt is not produced, these markets are in danger of overturning.

In desperation, the extermination of the Japanese invaders was put aside, ensuring the production of salt goods is the highest priority, more than 10,000 soldiers and horses are divided into three places, stationed in Haizhou, Ganyu, and Huize three, of which Haizhou has 5,000 soldiers and horses, refusing to defend the city, if there are pirates coming, the three places take care of each other, as long as any place can support a day and a half, there will definitely be a place of soldiers and horses to fully support.

With soldiers stationed and the local salt pans almost repaired, the salt workers finally felt more at ease to work in the salt pans, and Haizhou officially resumed production on October 22.

These soldiers and horses were not stationed in the city, but camped outside the city, which is quite surprising for the officers and soldiers of this era, but you can understand it when you think about the influence of the salt merchants.

The morale of the imperial soldiers and horses stationed in the guard was quite high, and the salt merchants were indeed rich, and when they first came, they were paid two months' full salary per person, and promised that if the pirates were exterminated, or how many days of salt production were guaranteed in the salt farm, there would be a greater reward.

At the same time, the two Huai salt merchants mobilized their networks to inquire where these pirates came from, and they knew that this was not a widow at all......

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I was going to attend the wedding of two friends today, but I'm afraid that the most basic code words can't be completed, but I still have a cold, and I support it to write until now, and I finally completed the 6,000 words, please have a monthly pass to support Lao Bai, thank you, thank you for your monthly pass and subscription.

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