In the fifth year of Yongjia, in the second half of the first month, the general of the Jin Fu army, the governor of Qingyan Zhujun, and the Yanzhou assassin Shi Gou Xi were defeated for the first time to Cao Wei, the general of Zhendong of the Xiongnu Han State, and then fled to Gaoping with only a few thousand remnants alone, and the situation in Qingzhou has become more and more tense since then.

Since the beginning of February, Cao Wei has been reorganizing his troops and horses to prepare for the complete elimination of the remnants of Gou Xi, and at the same time actively spreading the word to all parts of Qingzhou: anyone who does not obey the order will order the army to cut it down. Since Gou Xi's defeat, there are no local forces in Qingzhou that can compete with Cao Wei, and all localities have received letters and surrendered one after another.

"It's really the Great Banner of the Changing King at the head of the city!"

Knowing that Cao Wei was in charge of Qingzhou, Wei Shuo couldn't help but shake his head and sigh, but he didn't have much disgust with Cao Wei's rule in Qingzhou. At the same time, it rebuilt the Guanggu City of Qingzhou Governance, which has very important political, economic and military significance.

It can be said that Cao Wei's arrival also brought opportunities for the development of Wei Shuo, after all, a stable and prosperous Qingzhou has the ability to consume the refined salt he provides.

With the arrival of the warm sea monsoon, the weather near Laoshan gradually becomes warmer. People who have been cats for a long time have come out of the house and started to get busy for the new year.

The fugitives in the valley are not idle, under the leadership of Wei Shuo, they first sorted out dozens of acres of fields in the valley, and this place will be the base for Wei Shuo to cultivate sweet potatoes and corn in the future. Next, everyone took all kinds of tools and followed Wei Shuo to the seashore and began to cultivate the salt pans.

In these years, because the vegetation in the upper reaches of the river is lush and the soil and water have not been lost, the river carries very little sediment, and even if it is offshore, the color of the sea water is azure and blue. The vast sea is presented in front of everyone without reservation, the endless sea extends to the horizon, the naughty waves are endlessly surging from the depths of the ocean to the seaside, the back waves chase the front waves, and the front waves die on the beach, going forward and one after another, and the cycle is endless

Wei Shuo walked towards the sea, picked up a handful of seawater with his hand, and put it to his mouth, as expected, the seawater had a unique fishy and salty taste. He was not in a hurry to let everyone do it, but looked left and right. This salt pan is not meant to be built, you must find a relatively flat beach.

"Brother Wei, shall we start here?" Zhang Dalang said with excitement in his eyes.

Wei Shuo shook his head with a smile and said, "Not yet, the conditions here don't meet the conditions for building a salt field, let's take a look elsewhere." ”

Everyone walked far away for a while, and finally found a tidal flat, although the area is not large, but it is relatively flat, and it is enough to dry salt. Yantian is most afraid of unevenness, this tidal flat is a little smaller, but fortunately it is smooth enough, but it is a natural salt field.

In fact, Wei Shuo has only seen the salt pans on the seaside, but he has not seen the specific how to dry salt, but he generally knows how the salt pans are cultivated, so this salt drying still has to move forward in exploration.

First of all, under Wei Shuo's command, more than 200 young men and women waved their arms and built three mounds about 15 meters below the tide line of the sea. Naturally, the purpose of building the ridge was not to block the seawater, but to fill the salt pans when the sea rose and then prevent it from flowing back.

Then, at a certain distance from the mound, the crowd began to level the tidal flats behind. The only thing that made Wei Shuo feel unhappy was that the bottom of the salt pan and all around it were ordinary dirt, and it would be better if there was cement. But cement has not yet been included in Weishuo's development plan, and we can only think about it now.

When it was almost noon, the people finally leveled the five salt pans, and the family members who were guarding the mountains brought lunch to everyone. This is also thanks to the refined salt business, after selling refined salt once, in the following half a month, Wei Shuo and Zhang and Yang sold nearly 500 refined salt, and then exchanged all the money obtained for grain, which is the current ration for everyone.

Finally, with the concerted efforts of everyone, a large salt pan was leveled before the sea tide rose in the afternoon, of course, because of the height difference, Wei Shuo led everyone to build a lot of terraces, so that a lot of effort to level the land was saved.

In the afternoon, the tide came as scheduled, and soon filled the first salt pans, and then the second, along the reserved openings...... The raging sea water flowed into the salt pans dug by everyone......

"Brother Wei, this, this, this is it?" As Wei Shuo's status among the crowd continues to rise, Zhang Erlang, who was originally dismissive of him, is now also the one who opens his mouth and closes his mouth.

"That's pretty much it, the rest of the time will have to wait, as the weather warms, the water that flows into the salt pans will slowly evaporate, and the remaining crystals will be the initial salt lumps, and the next thing is to purify them into refined salt."

After listening to Wei Shuo's introduction, everyone couldn't help but be speechless, even Second Uncle Yang didn't expect that salt could be dried, they used to use a large pot to cook salt. It is not only time-consuming, labor-intensive, but also costly. As it is now, it is just a matter of directing seawater into the salt pans.

"Alas, the old man, I am convinced, with this simple and inexpensive method of making salt, why worry about not bringing everyone a rich life." Second Uncle Yang couldn't help but sigh when he looked at the salt fields.

Seeing that the sea water was slowly rising, Wei Shuo began to stare nervously at the salt pan and observe, while instructing everyone to prepare for first aid.

"But it's a bit of a pity that due to the lack of necessary reinforcement materials, our Yantian is not insured. Next, everyone should concentrate on guarding the salt pan to prevent it from being washed away by the rising seawater, and at the same time check whether there is any water seepage in the salt pan. ”

As soon as Wei Shuo's words fell, after a wave surged up, two of the three mounds were instantly washed away, and the salt pan gradually collapsed with the erosion of the seawater, and at the same time, a large amount of water began to seep up inside the salt pan......

Tragic! All this was unfortunately said by Wei Shuo's crow!

At this time, everyone was like ants on a hot pot, rushing left and right, rescuing the few surviving terraces and blocking the sea water from entering the sand tin, but unfortunately, there were no suitable tools and little success.

With the exception of a few marginal salt pans, all of them were washed away. In order to save everyone's efforts, Wei Shuo divided the people into two groups, repairing the washed out mounds while re-isolating the remaining intact terraces from other places.

In the end, after some rescue, less than 30% of the salt pans were preserved, and the area was about 50 acres. Although the area is a bit small, at least it lets everyone know how to build the salt pan. It also let Wei Shuo know what it means to be a good eye, some things seem simple, but if you really have to do it, you will find that things are far from being as simple as you imagined.

For example, in the reclamation of the salt pans, Wei Shuo underestimated the previous difficulties, resulting in less than 30% of the reclaimed salt pans being retained. He already had a rough plan in mind for how to improve.

The weather in February is still relatively cold, the temperature is not high, and the lack of sunshine leads to insufficient evaporation in the salt pans, as for how long it will take to dry the sea salt, even Wei Shuo himself does not know.

In the evening, everyone returned to Laoshan after a busy day, and everyone chattered non-stop along the way, only Wei Shuo frowned.

"Brother Wei, you seem to be preoccupied, is there anything wrong with our salt pan?" Since most of the Yantian was destroyed, the careful Zhang Dalang noticed that Wei Shuo was in a bad mood.

"Alas, I thought things were too simple, thinking that it would be enough to dig out the salt pans and wait for the salt to come out, but who knows that the salt pans lack cement to fix, resulting in the unstable foundation of the salt pans, and the sea water will be completely destroyed as soon as it washes, and I am thinking about what materials can be used to consolidate our salt pans."

"Brother Wei, this is also a helpless thing, we are already very satisfied, according to the annual output of 10 stone refined salt in one acre of land, it is 1,200 catties, and fifty acres of land is 60,000 catties, and we can earn 12 million yuan when we change hands, which is a good thing that I can't think of in the past."

Wei Shuo smiled bitterly when he heard this, how can there be such a good thing, drying salt is not just about leading seawater to the field, in fact, drying salt is a technical job, and once it is windy and rainy, you have to go down to the field to protect the salt field, which is very hard.