In the seventh year of Xianchun, the sixteenth day of the first month.

The first harvest began in the sisal plantations on the edge of the Pearl River Delta. Sima Qing held a knife in his hand, facing the plants he had been taking care of for more than a year, and he was very emotional for a while. Each acre of land is planted with 300 sisals, and these dense green plants have sword-like leaves, the emerald green leaves are very smooth, and the leaves are as straight as a sword. The sisal pieces are neatly arranged like soldiers, which shows how careful Sima Qing is when planting.

Near the sisal garden, the people of the Nautical Guild had set up their tables, chairs, and scales, and on the table were strings of copper coins, all of which were used to buy sisal. When he was first arranged here, Sima Qing felt that he had been cheated by his family. Those strings of copper coins mean that the harvest season has finally arrived.

When planting food, everyone usually dances a prayer and thanksgiving dance before the sickle is opened. That is, the Han version of the dancing god, mainly the meaning. However, Sima Qing didn't know which god to pay tribute to, these plants from tens of thousands of miles away. Moreover, his religious beliefs are the same as those of ordinary people in the Great Song Dynasty, and he will only think of gods when he has something, and he will not deliberately make any special distinctions about gods.

At this moment, the students of the Agricultural College who had been helping the plantation owners to popularize agricultural science stepped forward, probably because of Sima Qing's awkward standing posture that made the students think that Sima Qing did not know how to cut, and a young student said: "Don't cut off the leaves at the roots, leave about an inch." ”

Being talked about with such a scientific attitude, Sima Qing's piety to pray for God flew out of the clouds in an instant, and he simply didn't want to toss anymore, and honestly walked up to sisal and began to cut.

A sharp knife easily cuts through the roots of the brittle leaves, and a sisal leaf is thrown into the basket. Everyone started together, and there were even some natives inside, and the plantation was immediately lively. More than a year ago, Sima Qing felt that the natives were all rushing down the mountain to burn, kill and loot, like a fierce mixture of savages and bandits. It wasn't until he actually met the natives that he realized that this was not the case. The natives were black and thin, and their bodies did not look as strong as those of the Han Chinese. With Sima Qing's figure of doing farm work, he felt that he could fight two or three of them.

The natives did descend the mountain, but it seems that they had been driven up the mountain from the bottom of the mountain. There are also local people who understand the local dialect, and after negotiating the conditions for providing food, the local people agreed to help Sima Qing and them work. Because of their weak health, these natives can only be worthy of that bowl of rice when they work.

However, the strength of the people is large, and it does not require a lot of strength, but the harvest requires a long period of repetitive labor, and the number of natives plays a role. The agricultural school allows everyone to plant 300 sisal trees per acre of land, and every household here has 200 acres of land, which is 60,000 trees. If there weren't so many natives to provide labor, relying on Sima Qing's dozen people, he wouldn't know what kind of desolate land he would harvest. It took seven days to harvest two hundred acres of sisal, and Sima Qing felt that he was tired and wanted to die. Even if he was happy when he got the money, Sima Qing, whose arms and back were sore to death, still just wanted to sleep.

The farmers were happy with the harvest and began to enjoy the rest after their labor. Zhao Jiaren's side has not stopped working, they have built a dam on the hillside near the sisal factory, and the processing equipment has been brought in. Taking full advantage of the hydraulic equipment, the sisal leaves are pressed, scraped and those fibers are collected and treated with lime.

As a subject of the foodie empire, Zhao Jiaren has a good memory for things related to eating. The sisal plant is rich in proteolytic enzymes, which can be used in meat tenderization, beer clarification, cheese making, seafood processing, proteolysis, and the treatment of certain diseases such as inflammation and indigestion.

Even if it can't be treated as delicately as in the 21st century, sisal residue has at least been used in seafood processing and sake brewing through school experiments. Because of the relationship of time, these Guangdong sisal fibers are temporarily in a state of processing, and the slag of Guangdong sisal is quickly transported to the sea by ship. Here, fishing nets made of Fujian sisal fibers made of white and brown ropes are being fished in the distant sea. Offshore oysters have grown large in nets made of white and brown rope.

After soaking the soaking solution in this treatment, the hydrolase enzymes in the cut seafood can break down the odor-causing components, soften the protein, and make the seafood taste better. The soaked seafood is cooked into a fish sauce and encapsulated in a jar sterilized by boiling water. Tightly seal the mouth of the jar, label it, and then load it on the ship and send it to the coastal city. Or send it to an inland city.

This fish sauce is rich in salt and spices, so it has a longer shelf life. It is a great condiment for rice. Sima Qing likes this fish sauce very much, and what those local people especially love when they eat is to put a big spoonful of this fish sauce in the bowl, and eat it with relish. However, what made Sima Qing feel concerned was not the taste of the natives, but Zhao Jiaren's methods. Rural areas are divided into busy farming and idle farming, and many times they are busy for half a year and idle for half a year. Of course, this kind of busyness and leisure is not the whole block of time.

Nowadays, the hydraulic treatment equipment has greatly increased the time for everyone to be busy, and even if they do not know how to operate delicately, the natives can at least carry things. It can be seen that they have little interest in the equipment, crops, and manufactured products owned by the Han people. Even Sima Qing didn't know the point of Zhao Jiaren spending so much money to buy sisal, let alone those natives.

However, there is food that can be eaten every day, and there are dishes that often change a little variety, especially the sake that is given every five days. There are also some fabrics for the natives, which are all that these natives desire. From this point of view, the low daily wages of the natives can be said to be frenzied.

Of course, if Sima Kao knew the value of the white and brown rope, he would feel even more frustrated. The corrosion resistance of sisal is not at all comparable to that of ordinary hemp fibers, and in order to ensure the reliability of the boat, the rigging of brown hemp rope must be very thick and must be changed frequently. Now Zhao Jiaren has nearly 100,000 riggings on thousands of ships that need to be replaced, the rigging has become thinner, the use time has increased, and the expenditure in this regard has been saved by more than half.

There were more than two hundred ships in the fleet that did not go south, and they waited for Zhao Zhizhou's order. On the twenty-eighth day of the first lunar month, Zhao Jiaren ordered the fleet to set off. The armies of these fleets were armed with gray iron cannons, equipped with the best white-brown rope rigging in the world at this time. More than 200 ships, carrying 10,000 marine troops, landed at the mouth of the Yao River. After setting up the camp, the brave envoy went to meet the king of Jiaozhi and asked him to once again submit to the Great Song Dynasty and break off all contact with the Mongols.

As Zhao Jiaren expected, Chen Rixuan, the king of Jiaozhi, severely reprimanded the envoy. He solemnly expressed that since the Great Song Dynasty could not defeat Mongolia, and he was not able to protect Jiaozhi when Mongolia attacked Jiaozhi, then everyone would break up in two, and no one would owe anyone.

As far as King Chen Rixuan is concerned, he thinks that his speech is serious and deliberate. However, the king did not think of another possibility, and Zhao Jiaren didn't care what he said to him. As long as the king did not surrender unconditionally, Zhao Jiaren would take military action.

So on the tenth day of the second month of the seventh year of Xianchun, the two sides laid out battle columns on both sides of the Yao River, and the battle of Jiaozhi officially began.