Wei Feng nodded and reminded, "If you trade tea with a Roman merchant in the name of the Chenjun Xie clan, you can increase the price tenfold!" ”

"Huh?" Xie Gongyi was stunned and said, "Why is this? Isn't it too dark? ”

"Righteousness, you listen to me" Wei Feng introduced to Xie Gongyi as he walked about the situation where Sassanid sold silk to the Romans at a hundredfold price, which made Xie Gongyi and the dominatrix led by Miss Chen almost stunned and almost stared at them!

In Xie Gongyi's expectation, after deducting the production cost, labor and transportation costs, the price increase of his own tea is already very high, Wei Feng proposed a tenfold price increase, his first thought is that this person's heart is too dark!

However, the Sassanids sold the silk to the Romans a hundredfold higher! You must know that the basis of this hundred-fold pricing is not the purchase price in the middle of the earth, but all the costs consumed by the long-distance travel of tens of thousands of miles by land and a certain profit given to the silk merchant as the base, otherwise the acquisition becomes a robbery, and the merchant suffers a loss once, who will run a second time?

Although it is impossible to estimate the purchase price of Sasanian, it is certain that this is an extremely terrifying figure, so what is the concept of a hundred-fold increase? Doesn't that mean that silk that eventually fell into the hands of the Romans was more expensive than gold?

Compared with Sasanian's true black heart, Wei Feng's proposal to increase the price of tea by ten times, this is clearly a friendship price! Xie Gongyi recognized Wei Feng's little black heart, and at the same time, he also understood, there was nothing he couldn't do, only he didn't dare to think, for a while, he actually felt that piles of gold, silver and copper coins flashed in front of his eyes!

Scholars pay attention to being close to natural landscapes and regard money as a blockage. In the final analysis, the temptation is not big enough, and who can handle it calmly in the face of ten times the profit? Before this tea stone was sold, Xie Gongyi had already felt the benefits of overseas trade, which was indeed better than farming!

Miss Chen seemed to think of something, and couldn't help asking: "General, Sassanid made huge profits in the silk trade, but the Roman merchants bought silk directly in Panyu, and the price they received should be very cheap, deducting the cost of long-distance shipping, the concubine thought." Even if the price is lowered tenfold, it will also make a profit. Wouldn't they sell at a reduced price? Who still buys the sky-high price of silk from Sasani? ”

Wei Feng smiled slightly: "Miss Chen, you don't understand, since silk can be sold at the Sassanid price, why should Roman merchants sell it cheaply?" Isn't it that you can't get along with yourself? Not to mention the risk of offending Sasanian. The current situation in Eastern Rome is quite bad. It was thanks to a military alliance with the Sassanids that the country was able to maintain a semblance of calm in the country. They can't afford to cut off the Sassanids' financial routes!

More importantly, the essence of merchants is profit-seeking, and they will only maintain the Sassanid price and will not easily lower it. As an exporter of commodities, we should have the right to set prices, and we can't let outsiders make a lot of money, and we only earn a fraction of the pitiful bastard, overseas trade is not only used to make a living, but also to make a fortune, so that the country can become rich and strong! Our people, instead of waiting for others to come to the door, should go out, sell silk, tea, and porcelain that can be mass-produced in the future as much as possible at Sassanid prices, and do business anywhere the warship can reach, specifically to Eastern Rome, I have summed up six words, that is, people are stupid, there is a lot of money, come quickly! ”

Everyone had a feeling of blood boiling, and they recognized Wei Feng's six-character evaluation of the Romans from the bottom of their hearts, especially Xie Gongyi, and they couldn't wait.

At this time, Antonio's signature call came from a distance of twenty feet: "Envoy, these five are our ships!" ”

Wei Feng looked up and couldn't help but be stunned, this was not a merchant ship at all, but a warship! It's clearly one of Rome's most famous galleys!

It is equipped with a huge iron cone at the front end, the length of the hull is about thirty zhang, the width is four zhang, there are three layers, the front, middle and rear three masts are each hung with a pair of huge soft sails that have been lowered, there are nearly thirty oars on each side of the ship, the hull is full of mottled bump marks and knife and arrow wounds, and dark red blood stains seeping into the wood, obviously from the fierce battle, and a considerable part of the imprints are still relatively new!

This made Wei Feng's heart move, he suddenly understood the true face of Antonio's group, they are indeed merchants, but secretly they must also be doing pirate business, when they meet other caravans in the vast ocean, if the other party's strength is not as good as their own, most of them will launch an attack to eat black, maybe if you are lucky, you can grab a woman, you know, the hungriest thing in the world is the sailor, and the woman on the ship such as Julia may not dare to think about it, but the robbery is different, Maybe there's a snatched woman in the cabin.

This is similar to the caravans of the European Age of Discovery, which also played the dual role of merchants and pirates!

Wei Feng couldn't help but set his eyes on Julia, this woman is a female pirate, and Antonio, on the surface, is shrewd and careful, but when he turns around, he is actually a ruthless pirate leader!

Seeing Wei Feng's gaze, Julia beckoned, "Envoy, do you want to get on the boat and take a look?" ”

"Oh? That's exactly what I wanted! Hehehehe~~" With hearty laughter, Wei Feng and everyone quickened their pace.

The first thing on the ship is to look around, for the Roman warship, everyone feels fresh, especially the three piles of canvas on the deck are attracting attention, Wei Feng is interested in the warriors and sailors on the ship, these people are even thicker than the Romans, their eyes are shining with a beastly light, not only do they have no respect for themselves, but they only casually say hello to Antonio, the pirate leader.

The interest of these people is the dominatrix led by Miss Chen, pointing and pointing, and the chatter in their mouths is mostly not good, and it is accompanied by whistling, which looks rude and savage.

The Romans were a little embarrassed, and Julia hurriedly leaned up and explained: "Envoy, and Miss Chen, please don't worry about them, they are barbarians, and they specialize in rough work in our Rome, and they were hired by their uncle." ”

The barbarians in the Roman population are Germanic and Frankish, judging from the stout bodies of these people, most of them are Germanic, which makes Wei Feng think of Western Rome, Western Rome used a large number of Germanic people as mercenaries, and as a result, the wolf was lured into the house, which planted the bane for future destruction, in fact, Eastern Rome was limited enough, but they had a military alliance with Sassanid as a guarantee, so they could barely suppress the Germanic people from doing anything wrong.

After shaking his head secretly, Wei Feng smiled slightly, indicating that it was understandable, and then asked, "How many people are in your caravan?" How many mercenaries are there? ”

Julia replied honestly: "There were fifteen hundred men, including sailors, of whom 1,000 were hired barbarians, and on several occasions they encountered pirates during the journey, and about 100 were killed in battle. ”

As soon as these words came out, Wei Feng was completely sure that this was indeed a pirate! Xie Gongyi gasped, 1,500 people are equivalent to the defenders of a hinterland city, this is clearly a small army, Wei Feng just estimated that fifty Ding Zhuang per ship is obviously undercounted, he immediately had a sense of urgency, thinking that the management of merchant ships should not be delayed!

After throwing Wei Feng a tacit look, Xie Gongyi pointed to the pile of sails and asked, "General, how is his sail different from our hard sail?" How does a soft sail withstand the wind? ”

Wei Feng said lightly: "The hard sail has high wind efficiency, can rotate around the mast, can face the wind, because there are support bones, so the quality of the sail is not high, even if it breaks a lot of holes can still be used, and the soft sail is divided into a cross sail and a longitudinal sail, although the wind efficiency of the sail is lower than that of the hard sail, but its area can be made large enough, the mast can also be higher, the sail can not be upwind, the headwind should use a longitudinal sail, from the same weight and the same area of the sail, the hard sail has a large advantage, and the cost is much lower, but the soft sail can offset this advantage by increasing the area and raising the mast.

In short, these two kinds of sails have their own advantages and disadvantages, the hard sail is low-cost, simple to lift but extremely laborious, suitable for small and medium-sized ships to travel along the coast and rivers, but because we do not have the technology of mast and sling, so the mast is not high, which limits the large shape of the sail surface.

Relatively speaking, the soft sail is expensive, the lifting is laborious but labor-saving, the large ocean-going ship has obvious advantages when driving in the open sea, the speed is greater than the hard sail ship, the same size of the ship, our Dajin ship is not as fast as the ship of Eastern Rome! ”

The Romans were stunned by the Tao at the head of Wei Feng's analysis, and Antonio praised: "The knowledge of the king is admirable, and in a few words it tells the main point of my Roman soft sail." ”

"Your Excellency Antonio has won the prize!" Wei Fengqian conceded, and suddenly showed an unspeakable look, and after a while, he hesitated: "I have a reluctant request, I don't know if to talk about it?" ”

Antonio smiled and said: "We Romans and the envoy are heart-to-heart, please don't be polite." ”

Wei Feng nodded, and said bluntly: "Because I have a rebellious desire to be unfavorable to His Majesty the Emperor, I am ready to build a naval fleet to help me quell the rebellion, and today I saw Your Excellency's warship, I plan to combine the advantages of Eastern and Western warships to rebuild ships, such as your mast and soft sail are very good and practical, I don't know if the people you brought are good at shipbuilding?" Can I be involved in the design of my new warship? ”

Brush! Brush! Brush! The eyes of the Romans were all on Julia, and Julia's face showed a look of eagerness.

Antonio suddenly secretly said yes, Wei Feng has a request for him, this is a good thing, it can deepen the connection between the two sides, so he signaled: "Envoy, my niece has loved sailing since she was a child, and her understanding of warships is no less than that of an old shipmaster with decades of experience. ”

"Oh?" Wei Feng was a little surprised, looked at Julia and said, "Julia lady, you are a real person who doesn't show your face, I don't know if you want to help me?" ”

"This," Julia muttered on her lips, with a distinctly intentional expression, but as if she wanted to remind of something.

Antonio hurriedly added: "Envoy, Julia is a Roman citizen with full personal freedom, although I am her uncle, I can't be her master, just like this time I went to sea, I spent an annual salary of thirty gold coins to hire her, and you can also hire Julia." ”

Wei Feng understood, didn't he just ask for money, and immediately laughed and said: "Lady Julia, I ignored your Roman customs, please don't mind, I will give you an annual salary of five hundred gold coins and hire you as the deputy chief designer of my battleship, how about it?" (To be continued......)