The cavalry arrived, and along the way, they had already appeared as garrisons in various cottages. The chapters are updated the fastest, and these cottages are no longer as lively as they were at the beginning, but there is only a small team of guards left behind to be responsible for early warning. When the border market is built in the future, these small villages will also become temporary supply points for the caravans that come to Huaihuang. The left-behind garrisons of these cottages saw the large group of cavalry appear from a distance, and they were a little flustered at first, but fortunately, Lingyun's men and horses were all holding high banners, and the banners were clear. The cottage garrison quickly recognized that it was the lord of Yi Meng and his pro-army hussars in his tent, and the captain of the garrison hurriedly led his brothers down the mountain to greet them.

Ling Yun comforted and praised these good students of the garrison, and finally gave each of them a reward, which was regarded as a reward for their serious and loyal duties.

Moving on, after passing through several cottage garrison areas along the way, Salt Lake City finally appeared in front of you.

When Ling Yun was on the way, he had already sent a forward team to come to announce, so as soon as he arrived outside the city, the guards and hall masters in Salt Lake City and Yu Hou had already gone out of the city to greet him.

Salt Lake City is built on the edge of the Salt Lake, where the city is located, just on a slope by the lake, one side is close to the lake, and it is condescending, and the terrain is very good. The circumference of the whole castle is about two miles, a square shape, boxy, and each side is about half a mile long. The outside is a city of stone and earth, and the city is two feet high, and there are four gates, of which the west gate is the water gate. There are female walls on the city wall, protruding horse faces, city towers, corner towers, arrow towers, and even a small urn city was built at the city gate, and a ditch was dug outside the city. This made Ling Yun very satisfied, and the castle had a good defensive capability.

Salt Lake was originally a small town, but now it has replaced Baima Pi as the central fort town. The master of the rudder hall is He Lanhong, one of Yanyun's eighteen horsemen, and the garrison is also Liu Ying, Lingyun's old subordinate, and Tuoba Xiaodao, the young head of the Tuoba family who once controlled here. Now hangs the position of the lord of Salt Lake City. He Lanhong, Liu Ying, and Tuoba Xiaodao are in charge of Salt Lake City, Liu Ying is in charge of the army, Tuoba Xiaodao is in charge of civil affairs, and He Lanhong is in charge of supervising criminal law. Such a setting is somewhat similar to Zhu Yuanzhang's separation of power over the provinces during the Ming Dynasty. The management of the army, the people, and the law is separated, and mutual supervision is carried out, so that no one family can dominate.

"Liu Ying. I've brought you a batch of longbows, and you can take them and equip them for the Salt Lake garrison. Let them train diligently. Ling Yun directly beckoned Liu Ying to come over.

At the beginning, Liu Ying's three brothers went south with him, but Liu Hu and Liu Bao were all killed in battle, and only Liu Ying was left. For him, Ling Yun was always a little grateful. So as soon as he arrived in Salt Lake City. The first to talk to him was also to improve his status in the salt lake. After saying a few words to Liu Ying, Ling Yun turned his head and talked to Tuoba Xiaodao and He Lanhong, who was also his old subordinate, and he didn't have to speak so politely. It's this Tuoba knife, although Tuoba Horizontal Knife is now fully committed to himself, but the Tuoba family's influence in the salt lake is still huge, and it was because of this. In the end, Tuoba Xiaodao was appointed as the lord of the city. At this time, Ling Yun also had to be careful about the Tuoba knife.

"Knives. In a short period of time, Salt Lake City has already had such a scale, and you, the city lord, are very dutiful, and you should be rewarded and praised. ”

"The leader of the alliance praises falsely, and the knife is ashamed. Tens of thousands of people in Salt Lake City have been building Salt Lake City all day long, and so far only the exterior wall has been preliminarily repaired, which is really worthy of the trust of the alliance leader. Tuoba Xiaodao got his father's guidance, knowing that this Lingyun always seemed to be gentle, but in fact the methods were very ruthless, so he didn't dare to be careless, and his posture was very low.

After some pleasantries, Ling Yun led his troops into the city.

Climbing the Salt Lake City Tower and looking at the white lake, you can see that in addition to the houses and shops that are still being built in the city, there are also many people outside the city, and those people are also from Salt Lake City.

"Those people are collecting salt." Tuoba Knife said that Salt Lake City was named because of the salt lake in front of him. The salt lake is a large saltwater salt that produces salt. In the past, the salt lake rudder built a village here, and it was a good income to control the salt trading here. Although it is said that after the founding of the Great Sui Dynasty, there was no monopoly on salt, and even no salt tax was charged, but after all, this is outside the Saiwai, and no matter how much Huai salt, Xie salt, Sichuan salt, and green salt in the Central Plains are, they cannot be sold here. Most of the herders on the grasslands get their salt from these salt lakes scattered across the grasslands.

Ling Yun listened carefully to Tuoba Knife's introduction, and the more he listened, the more he frowned.

The Baihai Salt Lake is very large, arguably the largest salt lake near the Bashang Grassland, and for several years, Murong Ke and Tuoba Hengdao have been controlling the salt production of this salt lake since they joined forces to defeat their opponents. However, guarding such a treasure mountain, the salt lake produces only about 30,000 stone of salt every year. With such a small output, Tuoba Knife also said that his eyebrows were flying, and he was very proud.

Ling Yun slightly summed up, a person eats about ten catties of salt a year, and the 100,000 or so population of the Tiger League alone consumes more than 10,000 stone of salt a year. In this way, the Tuoba family used to guard such a large salt lake, but in fact, the annual output was only enough to supply about 200,000 people.

"How much does salt sell for here?"

"Ten dollars per bucket, all the time." When he said the price, Tuoba Hengdao's face was full of satisfaction. A bucket of ten wen, but it is more expensive than grain. The grain has to be ploughed in the spring and harvested in the autumn, but this salt is taken directly from the lake, which is really a good deal. Over the years, the Tuoba family has been able to earn thousands of dollars from this salt lake every year. It's a pity that now that this salt lake has belonged to the alliance, it's a pity to think about it.

When Ling Yun heard the price, he shook his head. The price of this salt is really cheap compared to the salt sold by the Tang, Song, Ming and Qing dynasties, but what he sighed at is the output of this salt lake, which is only 30,000 stone salt a year, and the annual income is 3,000 yuan. This is really asking for rice with a golden rice bowl.

Think about it, a person eats at least ten catties of salt a year, ten people eat almost one stone, 100,000 people eat 10,000 stones, and if it can be sold to a million people, it is 100,000 stones. Moreover, people in this era eat obviously more salt than in later generations, especially to use salted vegetables and pickled meat to prevent corruption, the demand is huge, and it is not a problem for one person to double or triple the amount of salt. And with such a large salt lake, salt production is not a problem, as long as there are as many sales, as much salt can be sold. If you sell 500,000 stone salt a year, and each bucket of salt is 10 yuan, you must have 50,000 yuan in the account. In his mind, this aspect can also be improved, and the salt produced in the salt lake is the coarsest salt, and it cannot be processed at all, so the price of salt is very low. In fact, don't look at the price of salt is twice the price of grain, but a person has to eat several stones of grain a year, but at most he only eats a few dozen catties of salt. There is little demand for salt, so even if the price is higher, it won't cost much, and there is absolutely room for growth here. If the salt can be reprocessed and the quality of the salt can be improved, then the annual salt profit can be doubled several times more than a problem.

Thinking that what could have been a big deal of hundreds of thousands and hundreds of thousands of guan was turned into a business of thousands of guan by the Tuoba family, Ling Yun suddenly felt a faint sadness.

The rest of this salt trade is really profitable, and it is very profitable. The location of Huaihuang is just at the junction of Hebei, Hedong and the grassland, yearning for the Hetao East Turkic Khanting, to the east of Xi, Khitan and other places, with Huaihuang as the center, the surrounding is a huge market, with a large population. And their biggest competitors, Haiyan in Hebei, Huaiyan in Jianghuai, Jieyan in Hedong, Jingyan in Shuzhong, and Qingyan in Hexi, are all far away from this line in northern Xinjiang. And salt, a commodity, like grain, is the most limited by the distance of transportation. As long as the distance is long, the transportation cost will be high and the profit will be thin. Compared with those salts, the salt of the salt lake has a great advantage in the cost of selling in the vicinity, and if the quality can be improved, it can even be sold to the Hedong and Hebei regions in the south.

Walking along the lake on horseback out of the city, you can see the process of salt mining by the salt miners by the lake, and they are completely the most primitive salt mining method. This salt mining method not only has a very low yield, but also the quality of the salt produced.

This method of salt mining, in fact, is almost the same as other places at this time, which are all natural crystals, and they are collected by collective labor. This primitive way of salt mining is also very afraid of rain and waterlogging, and once it encounters rain and waterlogging, it will have a great impact. He grabbed a handful of picked salt, the salt particles were uneven, the size was there, and the color was black, and he put it in his mouth to pay for a little, and it was extremely bitter.

Lingyun knows that the salt in the Central Plains today has the highest production and sales volume of Huai salt, followed by Hedong Jieyan, then Shuzhong's Jing Salt, and Hexi's Green Salt. The salt production in these places has begun to enter the era of salt processing, and the salt they produce began to be divided into different grades according to the processing process, and will be sold at different prices, the best salt is sold to those noble and wealthy families, the price is high, and the refined salt, the salt is like snow, and its taste is beautiful. Ling Yun remembered the salt in the salt pond in Hedong, and by the time of the Tang Dynasty, the way of salt mining had changed, and it was no longer the original method of harvesting, but the method of reclamation and watering, which not only solved the disadvantage of relying on the weather to mine salt, but also greatly improved the quality of salt. Fresh water is added during the brine drying process to improve the salinity. Natural brine contains many impurities, and once it is salted, the particles are crunchy, lack luster and have a bitter taste. The new method of blending fresh water plays a role in eliminating impurities, making the salt particles hard and white, without bitter taste, and greatly improving the quality and taste of salt.

Good salt can not only be sold at a higher price, but also can be sold to more customers, and the more sales it sells, the more money it will naturally make.

Ling Yun pondered, he has the most advanced salt lake salt mining and processing technology at this time, and this is the largest salt lake at the northern foot of Yanshan, can he still hold a golden rice bowl and cry poor? Moreover, I still need people, and there are a large number of people in my hands who have moved out of the cottages, and they are all idle.

Pull these idle people out, teach them advanced salt mining and processing techniques, and then they happen to be building a Huaihuang border market, when these high-quality salts are put on the Huaihuang market, are you afraid that there will be no market? Are you afraid that there is no money to make?

Okay, this is a big deal with an annual output of hundreds of thousands, or even hundreds of thousands of millions, and it can even become one of the local pillar industries in Huaihuang Town.

Thinking of this, Ling Yun couldn't help but get excited, why didn't he think of it in the first place? (To be continued......)

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