Lu Tai breathed a long sigh of relief, and suddenly asked Lu Shizhi: "Uncle, can you get in touch with the people over there?" ”

Lu Shizhi couldn't help but be stunned when he heard this, of course he knew that what Lu Tai said was referring to the people of the Ebony Cliff of the Chu State, since Bai Mo monopolized the power and the Lu family was suppressed, there were constantly people from the Ebony Cliff who came to test it, Lu Shizhi was not opposed to contacting the people of the Ebony Cliff, but Lu Tai was resolutely opposed to this.

"Have you thought about it?" Lu Shi said, "The people of Ebony Cliff are not well-intentioned. ”

Lu Tai nodded heavily and said: "I have already thought about it, our Lu family will never betray the Han, but Bai Mo must be moved, Bai Mo will not fall, my Lu family will be uprooted by him sooner or later, but we alone can't shake Bai Mo at all, if we want to win this decisive battle, we must rely on the strength of the Chu State." ”

Lu Chan said suspiciously: "But, what can Ebony Cliff help us?" ”

Lu Tai said: "Second brother is stupid, behind the ebony cliff stands the entire Chu State, the Chu State began to vigorously develop industry and commerce sixteen years ago, and its wealth is not comparable to that of my Han Dynasty?" Xiang Zhuang plucked the roots casually, and he could buy all the grain in Guanzhong, as long as Ebony Ya was willing to stretch out his hand, Bai Mo would lose this time. ”

Lu Shizhi nodded heavily and said, "Generally, the uncle will go to them." ”

Lu Tai advised: "The people of the Black Ice Platform are everywhere, and the old uncle must pay attention to secrecy. ”

Lu Shizhi smiled coldly, and said in a determined tone: "Don't worry, the uncle has no other skills, but the group of eagle dogs that deceived the Black Ice Platform are more than enough." ”

##########

In the blink of an eye, half a month has passed, and the grain from Anyi and Handan has been solved, and the grain mobilized by Baimo from various counties and counties has also been transported to Xianyang one after another, and more than 2 million stone of grain have been put into the market, and the grain price in Xianyang has not dropped at all, just this morning. There has even been a vengeful surge in food prices. From 500 dollars per stone to 1,000 dollars!

Moreover, there are even rumors in the market that the price of grain will continue to rise to 2,000 yuan!

##########

"Ping!" The white ink splitter swept the inkstone on the case to the ground. His expression was furious.

Just now, Liu Huan, the king of Han, summoned Bai Mo into the palace in a hurry, and really complained. also asked Bai Mo to immediately find a way to stabilize the price of food in Xianyang.

Chen Ping's face next to him was also a little embarrassed, obviously, there was a huge error in the information provided by the Black Ice Terrace, he thought that the other party would be able to make up 100,000 yuan at most, so if 2.5 million stone grain was thrown, it would definitely be able to support them, and when the time came, they would be able to buy it back at a low price.

But it turned out that was not the case, and they were running out of food. The other party seems to have some energy left.

Chen Ping said: "Prime Minister, there must be something wrong in the middle, and the old man will ask Hei Bingtai to check it out." ”

"Taishi. Look no further. Bai Mo waved his hand. Said categorically, "The appearance is certain." There must be people from Ebony Cliff behind this matter. ”

"Ebony Bluff? Did the prime minister say that the State of Chu borrowed money from them? Chen Ping frowned and said, "This old man doesn't understand, this is not hundreds of thousands of dollars or millions of dollars, but tens of thousands of dollars, according to the current price of gold and five baht in Chu State, it is hundreds of thousands of taels of gold, Xiang Zhuang is not afraid of being lost?" ”

"The country of Chu is rich, what is hundreds of thousands of taels of gold?" Bai Mo said coldly, "As long as you can mess up my big man, even if you pay millions of taels of gold, Xiang Zhuang will probably not frown." ”

Chen Ping nodded and said, "That's right, so what now?" ”

Bai Mo said coldly: "Guanzhong has no food to support, so I have to borrow food from Han Zhao." ”

"Still have to borrow food? Han and Zhao Guo have already borrowed 800,000 stones, will they borrow again? ”

"Fortunately, I didn't borrow much this time, as long as there were 300,000 stones, it would be about the same, and the prime minister was going to personally repair two letters and send them to Bai Xuan, the general of Zhao State, and Han Xin, the king of Han, respectively, so it shouldn't be a big problem." …,

"The question is, what if Chu State intervenes again?"

"We have figured out the reason for the matter, and the response will be simple, it is very easy for the Chu State to smuggle hundreds of thousands of taels of gold in, but if you want to smuggle tens of thousands of five-baht coins in, it will be difficult, so when the time comes, we only need to prohibit the free exchange of upper and lower coins, and they will definitely die!"

##########

"Hmph, Bai Mo is really powerful." Xiang Zhuang touched the short beard that curled up at the corner of his lips and sneered, "I found a way to stop my Da Chu from participating in the chaos in Guanzhong so quickly. After a pause, Xiang Zhuang said again, "However, he only found out about this now, but it was too late, and the widow had already completed the layout, hehe." ”

Widow Qin and Tang Tong, who were sitting at the bottom of Xiang Zhuang, also looked excited.

Xiang Zhuang asked the two again: "Is the agent you are looking for reliable?" ”

Widow Qin hurriedly said: "The slave family is looking for the nephew of the old country of Zhao State. ”

"Guan Gao is a respected minister, even Bai Xuan has to give him some face, not bad." Xiang Zhuang bowed his head slightly, and asked Tang Daodao again, "What about you?" ”

Tang Tong hurriedly replied: "It's Feng Guozhang who is looking for it below." ”

"Feng Guozhang?" Xiang Zhuang said, "The father of King Han's favorite concubine Feng Miaonu? ”

"Yes, yes, King Han loves Feng Miaonu in every way, so the Feng family has great influence in Anyi, and with the Feng family as an agent, there will definitely be no mistakes."

"Good." Xiang Zhuang waved his hand and said fiercely, "Then let's do it." ”

##########

Half a month later, the second batch of 300,000 stone grain from Handan and Anyi arrived in Xianyang.

With the arrival of another batch of grain, the price of grain in Xianyang once again fell slightly.

As mentioned above, there are three main groups in Xianyang to do grain hegemony, the most powerful are dozens of noble families headed by the Lu family, the weaker ones are more than 200 merchants headed by the Sima family, and the weakest are more than 300 wealthy families who follow the trend and buy.

Although more than 300 wealthy families did not form an alliance with the two major groups of Xun Qi and Shangjia, but before that, the three parties still completed the speculation on Xianyang grain prices very tacitly, but their speculative psychology determined that they were unreliable, and once the market fluctuated, they would not hesitate to short and leave.

Prior to this, these wealthy families had not wavered, and they had also sold tentatively, but due to the strong buying of the two major groups led by the Lu family and the Sima family, they realized that the price of grain in Guanzhong was far from the limit, and people's hearts were greedy, and under the temptation of huge profits, they chose to follow up again and again.

The slight drop in food prices in Xianyang this time is still a temptation for the wealthy families, if the Xun Qi and Shang Jia groups continue to buy, they will continue to choose to follow up, if the Xun Qi and Shang Jia two groups stop cooking, they will not hesitate to sell all the food they have hoarded in their hands, and step on the corpses of the Xun Qi nobles and the giant businessmen to escape.

These wealthy families didn't realize that with the group of servants and servants in Guanzhong alone, they couldn't digest such a huge grain market, in other words, they couldn't escape at all! Of course, then again, there are also a small number of wealthy families who have already thrown away their grain and left the market and made a lot of money.

When the wealthy family was watching, and the relatives and merchants were ready to buy, Liu Huan, the king of Han, suddenly issued an edict prohibiting the circulation of gold in the Guanzhong market!

Since the Qin Dynasty, there has been the coexistence of gold and copper, but there is no clear price between the two, in other words, gold is the same as the antique calligraphy and painting of later generations, it is very valuable, but you have to sell it first to exchange it for five baht money, in the bazaar, you can't buy goods directly with gold. ..., but Xiang Zhuang's change has changed this situation.

In order to encourage the development of industry and commerce, Xiangzhuang issued a gold coin with a denomination of one tael, and clearly stipulated that one tael of gold was exchanged for four thousand coins, more than ten years have passed, and the price of this exchange rate has fluctuated to a certain extent, but in general it is still stable, and the rest of the countries have also acquiesced to the circulation of gold in their own markets.

Without this prerequisite, Xiang Zhuang would not dare to fight an economic war with the Han State at all.

But now, the Han King Liu Huan has changed this status quo with an edict, prohibiting the direct circulation of gold, which is equivalent to cutting off the capital chain that Guanzhong merchants rely on to continue to buy bulk grain.

Liu Huan's ban could not fundamentally prohibit the circulation of gold currency, but it inevitably affected the mentality of some wealthy families, which became the last straw that broke the camel's back, although the Lu family and the Sima family repeatedly sent people to lobby to persuade the wealthy family to continue to receive gold, but they were refused.

More than 300 wealthy families were the first to start panic selling, and then the wave of selling spread to more than 200 merchants, and when more than 20 nobles and nobles also began to sell grain, the grain hegemony that had been maintained for more than three months finally collapsed completely, and the price of grain, which had risen to 1,000 dollars per stone, began to fall wildly.

##########

Xianyang, Xiangfu.

"Taishi, it's done!" Bai Mo raised his eyes to Chen Ping.

Chen Ping raised his wine to cover his sleeves and drank it all, then smashed his mouth with unfinished thoughts, and said: "Good wine, it's really good wine, but it's a pity that our Great Han Kingdom still can't make it." ”

Bai Mo smiled and said: "Although this wine is good, it is always difficult to satisfy hunger." ”

Chen Ping also smiled and said: "Prime Minister, the grain price in the Xianyang Bazaar has dropped to 400 yuan per stone, hehe, I really can't imagine it, it's only been a few days, and the grain price has dropped to 400 yuan per stone." ”

"Master, this is just the beginning." Bai Mo smiled slightly, and said, "The amount of grain hoarded by those lords, merchants, and wealthy families has far exceeded the digestion capacity of Guanzhong's husbands and mercenaries, if nothing else, the price of grain in Xianyang will have to fall all the way, in short, if the price of grain does not fall to thirty yuan per stone, the original appearance will not make a move." ”