Hunyuan Prefecture is located in the northeast of Shanxi, in the middle and upper reaches of the Hunhe River, a tributary of the Sanggan River. It is connected to Guangling in the east, Yingzhou in the west, Hengshan and Lingqiu and Fanzhi County in the southeast, and is connected to Datong and Yanggao counties in the north by Liuling Mountain, which is very convenient in terms of geographical advantages, so Hunyuan Prefecture is also correspondingly prosperous.

Today, as soon as the sky is bright, as soon as the city gate is opened, there are peasant households carrying some mountain goods and native products into the city to sell. By mid-morning, the big market in the eastern part of the city was already crowded, and the whole market was full of shouting and bargaining crowds, and many bankrupt farmers were kneeling on the side of the road, both old and young with a straw sign stuck on their heads.

Yue Yang walked in the market with Hu Laosan and a few guards, looking at the bustling crowd Yue Yang couldn't help but nodded, turned his head and said to Hu Laosan: "It seems that the Jiang Governor's Mansion is not completely a waste, and the business here is so prosperous, it is also very beneficial to the people." ”

Hu Laosan also nodded after looking around: "What my lord said is very true, if you pick up the prosperous Hunyuan Prefecture, it is naturally not as good as our Wulizhai and Yingzhou Mansion, but it is not bad compared to other places." ”

After listening to Hu Laosan's words, Yue Yang couldn't help but smile and said: "Yes, Hu Laosan, listening to your tone, you can be regarded as a well-informed person." ”

Hu Laosan replied very proudly: "I don't dare to be well-informed, when I ran the rivers and lakes in the past, I did go south and north for seven or eight years, I don't dare to say that I have traveled all over the Ming Dynasty, but there are still people who have walked from south to north." ”

"Oh, I forgot, you were still a runner before you came to Wulizhai, and your feelings are well-informed!" Yue Yang laughed.

"The adults are smiling, where is what is well-informed, it's not for the sake of mixed food, if it weren't for filling their stomachs, who would want to leave their hometown." Hu Laosan's face was not proud. On the contrary, it was a bitter face.

"Uh...... I forgot about that. ”

Yue Yang then remembered that the traffic in these years was completely incomparable with that of later generations, and a trip to a long distance might be a year and a half, plus the bad road conditions, it would be a crime. Therefore, if it is not a last resort, no one is willing to leave their hometown and go to the rivers and lakes.

Touching his nose, Yue Yang, who felt a little embarrassed, was about to change the topic, but there was a commotion and scolding in front of him.

The curious Yue Yang hurriedly waved his hand: "Let's go, go ahead and see the excitement!" ”

It is the nature of Chinese people to love to watch the excitement, and Yue Yang is no exception, when he and Hu Laosan and others arrived at the scene. Now that the surroundings have been surrounded by water, Yue Yang was anxious and glanced at Hu Laosan. Hu Laosan nodded knowingly, the big boss wants to see the excitement, as a subordinate, how can he not share his worries for the boss, Hu Laosan immediately led two personal soldiers to squeeze up. Relying on their height and strength, they squeezed the people in front of them to the side.

"you grandma, what are you doing!"

"Squeeze a ball, you damn want to die!"

"Don't squeeze it, I'm going to beat someone if I squeeze it again!"

Hu Laosan's behavior soon aroused public outrage, and many of the old men who were squeezed aside by them glared at them angrily, and some of them were short-tempered and even raised their fists. It's just that when they saw the tall and burly, meaty Hu Laosan and the murderous strong men with waist knives on their waists. He automatically put the hand he had raised behind his back, and his face showed what he thought was the most docile smile.

It was only at this time that Yue Yang walked in under the escort of four personal soldiers, and at this time, Yue Yang suddenly remembered his former ideals before the crossing, and it would be more perfect if there was a bird cage in his hand now.

Of course, this was only a momentary memory, and soon Yue Yang's attention was drawn to the scene of a beating.

The first thing that caught my eye was seven or eight officers and soldiers wearing tattered mandarin duck jackets were punching and kicking an old man and a young man, shouting and scolding loudly while beating back: "Two poor ghosts, you dare to come here to buy salt without money, don't you see if you poor ghosts can afford to eat this salt?" If you don't have any money, you should consciously buy those coarse salt to eat. That's what you poor devils should eat! ”

"Uncle, you can do it, sell us a pound of salt, we finally saved three hundred yuan, and the people in the village are waiting for us to take the salt back!"

The man who said this was an old man in his fifties. He was dressed in a tattered single coat, his hands were full of calluses, his feet were bare, his face was wrinkled, and he looked like a typical poor villager. Next to him was a thirteen or fourteen-year-old boy, dressed like the old man, at this time he was being pulled by two soldiers, his face was flushed and he scolded angrily while struggling: "You are still unreasonable, other people's shops only sell 300 wen a catty, but you sell 900 wen, and your conscience is eaten by dogs!" ”

The young man's words made the soldiers laugh, and one of them laughed wildly: "Conscience? How much is a pound of conscience worth? Besides, if you think it's expensive here, you can buy it from another store, and I'd like to see which salt shop in the whole Hunyuan Prefecture has a cheaper price than us. ”

Seeing this, Yue Yang couldn't help but look confused. Because he is now in this salt shop, several men are sitting on stools watching the excitement, but those officers and soldiers are standing up for him, and it seems that those officers and soldiers are more enthusiastic than those guys. Puzzled, Yue Yang casually pulled a passer-by next to him and asked, "This old brother, may I ask me what is going on?" What kind of salt actually costs 900 wen a catty? How did these soldiers come to the salt shop to stand up for the salt merchants? On the contrary, those guys were watching the excitement from the sidelines. ”

The passer-by, who was very unhappy by Yue Yang's slightly rude movements, just wanted to get angry, but when he saw Yue Yang wearing a silk robe and several attendants standing behind him, he changed into a bitter expression and said angrily: "What else can I do, the salt shop that sells salt is the Fang family's shop, and those officers and soldiers are the Fang family's dog legs, so it's like this!"

"What's that...... I still can't hear clearly, can you make this brother clearer. ”

Yue Yang, who was confused, still didn't understand, so he casually took out more than a dozen copper plates from his sleeve and handed them to the passerby: "These are for you to drink tea, can you tell me what is going on?" ”

The passer-by who took the copper plate obviously looked much better, and then said: "It's not that the price of salt is to make trouble, that's the case, this Fang family ......."

With the explanation of this passer-by, Yue Yang gradually figured out what happened, after Yue Yang got a large amount of refined salt from modern time and space, these high-quality and relatively low-priced salts immediately caused a devastating impact on those bitter and astringent coarse sea salts, making the salt merchants in Shanxi complain. In the end, these salt merchants had no choice but to act as second-tier dealers, go to Yingzhou to buy goods from Yueyang, and then transport them to the local area for sale.

It stands to reason that Yue Yang still takes care of these salt merchants who come to buy goods, he gives these people a batch price of 150 wen per catty, and stipulates that their retail price is 300 wen, in Yue Yang's opinion, a profit of 100 wen per catty after the cost of a catty of salt is thrown away, it is already very profitable. But those salt merchants who are accustomed to increasing the price of salt several times will abide by the rules set by Yueyang, and after they buy the salt, they immediately adjust the price of salt to 900 yuan a catty, which makes the people complain.

"Isn't there still coarse salt? Won't the people buy some coarse salt and eat it? Yue Yang asked in disbelief.

"Where is the coarse salt?" Passers-by glanced at Yue Yang with disdain, "In the past year, Yingzhou's overwhelming refined salt has overwhelmed the salt merchants everywhere, and they have all changed their careers to purchase from Yingzhou. ”

"How so?"

Yue Yang muttered a little, such a result was something he didn't expect, he didn't expect that the matter that originally kindly wanted the people in the surrounding area to eat refined salt and earn some silver by the way would finally evolve into this. In the end, it turned out that the common people had no salt to eat, which was a great irony for him!

"How so?" Yue Yang muttered in a low voice, he turned his head and asked Hu Laosan beside him, "How did you say this thing came to be like this?" Am I really doing something wrong by selling salt to those salt merchants? ”

Looking at Yue Yang, whose face was getting more and more ugly, Hu Laosan, who was afraid that Yue Yang would blame himself too much, hurriedly comforted him on the side: "My lord, I can't rely on you for this matter, it's all made up by those gang of profiteers, and it has nothing to do with you!" ”

"No...... It was me who was wrong. Yue Yang closed his eyes and let out a long breath and said softly: "It is I who underestimated the greed and ambition of those people, it seems that Marx is right, if it has a profit of three hundred percent, it will dare to commit any crime, and even face the danger of being hanged!" I was wrong, if I didn't have a strong supervisory body, I would be conniving with the salt merchants by selling salt to them! ”

Speaking of this, a cold light shot out of Hu Laosan's eyes in Yueyang, and Hu Laosan couldn't help but shudder, although he didn't know who the Marx his master was talking about, he was sure that someone was going to be unlucky.

It's just that the chill in Yue Yang's eyes came and went quickly, he turned his head and said to Hu Laosan: "Okay, let's go back, tonight Governor Jiang wants to wash the dust for us, we have to go back to prepare, let's wait for two days to talk about these things!" ”

After saying that, Yue Yang turned around and walked backwards. It seems that this incident has not affected him in any way, but Hu Laosan, who knows his character well, knows that his boss's seemingly calm expression must be burning anger, but he has not yet done it, and he doesn't know how many people will suffer when he does it.