was reminded by Qin Yilu like this. Zhao Xing began to seriously think about edible salt, which is related to the national economy and people's livelihood, but has not been paid attention to by him.

Zhao Xing vaguely remembered that in later generations, ordinary people mainly ate well salt and sea salt, and most of them were cleaned and a small amount of iodine was added, as if it could prevent big neck disease. The reason why salt can be sold so cheaply is related to the huge reserves of domestic salt mines and the convenience of drying salt in seawater.

Zhao Xing also remembered that after a tsunami in an island country in the previous life, because of the leakage of a nuclear power plant, there was a ridiculous scene of crazy salt grabbing in China. From this, he also reminded that in order to increase fiscal revenue, many Chinese dynasties mostly implemented the monopoly system of the salt industry, controlled the production and marketing of salt with strict punishment and strict laws, and forced salt households to produce salt through the formation of forced labor, and the producers worked extremely hard and had to bear heavy salt taxes, thus seriously hindering the development of production.

It seems that salt is usually inconspicuous, but when it is lacking, it can really make people crazy.

Subsequently, Zhao Xing and Qin Yilu talked separately about some specific situations involving the salt industry. After understanding in the middle of the night, Zhao Xing finally had a detailed and comprehensive understanding of the salt industry in the Han Dynasty.

It turned out that during the Han Dynasty, the salt eaten by the common people mainly came from the salt ponds in Bingzhou and other places, the well salt in Yizhou and a small amount of salt dried by seawater. In this era, the salt drying of seawater was not the main channel, and because there were many impurities in seawater, the color of the salt produced was yellow, unlike the salt produced by salt ponds and deep wells, which was as white as snow, so it was not treated by the people, and only the poor people ate it.

Through Qin Yilu's introduction, Zhao Xing also learned that the most profitable place in the Han Dynasty was actually next to the Jin Kingdom, which was the salt pond in the south of Anyi County, Hedong County, which was directly controlled by the imperial court! This place produced a large amount of salt every year and sold it to various parts of the north, bringing huge profits to the Han court. Of course, in addition to the salt ponds in Hedong County, there are also some small salt ponds in the Jin Kingdom, but because of the poor production process and low output, they can at most ensure self-production and self-sale.

Zhao Xing asked Qin Yilu: "How long is the salt stored in the Jin Kingdom enough for us now?"

Qin Yilu thought for a moment and replied, "If you don't consider the continued production of salt, the existing reserves can supply the people for half a year. ”

"Then urgently transfer three months' reserves from the treasury to the surrendered city!" Zhao Xingfang made up his mind and gave Qin Yilu an order without hesitation.

"Or do you want to marinate the bacon meat?" Qin Yilu asked a little unwillingly.

"Yes, it has to be pickled. Because I can guarantee that in less than three months, the price of salt will plummet, and one day it will be so cheap that it will be available all over the world, and everyone will not worry about not having money to eat salt!" Zhao Xing replied to Qin Yilu very confidently.

Hearing Zhao Xing say this, Qin Yilu thought that he was going to launch a war against Hedong County and capture Anyi County, which was rich in salt, so he hurriedly said: "Please also ask the lord to think twice, for the sake of this disaster relief, we can't turn our faces with the imperial court and shake the established policy of internal affairs construction for three years!"

After listening to Qin Yilu's words, Zhao Xing couldn't laugh or cry, so he had to explain further: "You are thinking wrong this time! Who said that if you want to eat salt, you have to knock down Hedong County? There are more places in the world where salt can be made, and there are more ways to make salt, this time I will let you open your eyes and see how I completely crushed the salt pond of the imperial court!"

After pacifying the people of the surrendered city, Zhao Xing continued to let Gao Shun and his troops join Yan Sheng's division in one place, and rushed north according to the method of smashing snow into ice, followed by the transport team transporting disaster relief materials. These supplies can be used both for the troops who open the way, and for the relief of small tribes besieged by heavy snow along the way. When the first batch of supplies is about to be consumed, the subsequent supplies prepared from all parts of the Jin Kingdom will arrive in the surrendered city one after another, ensuring that the troops who open the road will never be in danger.

After another seven days, the road opening force had advanced north to a place where the snow was deep enough to bury people, and there was no longer much need to go north, so the road opening force turned east, preparing to open up a circular rescue channel in the desert, and try to rescue the herdsmen besieged by the heavy snow as much as possible.

The Flying Tiger Army, which had always worried Zhao Xing, finally had news, but it turned out to be a false alarm. When the weather changed, the Flying Tiger Army was wandering on the territory that originally belonged to the Xianbei people of Liaodong in the north of Youzhou. The military advisor Li Tiezhu was a ghost, and as soon as he saw that the snow was getting heavier and heavier, he immediately advised Lu Bu to retreat south with a large army.

In the process of retreating to the south, the Flying Tiger Army was depressed to find that the wind and snow were endlessly chasing after the buttocks, and finally simply ran into the Great Wall, went to Youbeiping County in one breath, and hid in the Xiong Zhen military camp stationed here, just to avoid a heavy snowstorm, and harassed Xu Shu by the way.

Under the personal command of Zhao Xing, the disaster relief operation in the north was carried out in an orderly manner, and he also diverted his attention from this matter and set his eyes on the salt production plan.

Zhao Xing sent an urgent letter to the Crouching Tiger Iron and Steel Plant to produce 50,000 honeycomb coal furnaces that had just been invented and finalized, and at the same time sent an order to the government-run coal mine in Pingcheng (near present-day Datong, Shanxi) to urgently produce honeycomb briquettes.

Zhao Xing also sent a letter to Shangdang Ceramics Factory, requesting that 200,000 large casseroles that can hold at least 40 catties of weight be customized, and all of them will be delivered to the Taifu Mansion in Crouching Tiger City by June this year at the latest.

All the departments and relevant persons in charge who received Zhao Xing's order were very puzzled by Zhao Xing's anxious request for them to produce a large number of products that did not know the purpose, including Qin Yilu and Liu Jili.

In fact, all these preparations made by Zhao Xing were preparing for the mass production of edible salt. The Jin Kingdom is still thousands of miles away from the sea, and the sun intensity and climate in the north are not suitable for seawater salt, so if you want to base yourself on the Jin Kingdom in a short period of time to increase the production of salt, there is only one way to go - boiling salt!

Compared with relying on the sun and wind to dry the salt, the production cycle can be shortened to one-tenth or even less. The process of boiling salt is not complicated, and only three main materials are required: clean brine containing salt, water container for boiling salt, and firewood. But the biggest problem with boiling salt is that it is too expensive, and before honeycomb coal stoves were not used, it was not only very hard but also a staggering expense to cook salt from wood.

But the honeycomb coal stove and large casserole that Zhao Xing had produced would greatly reduce the cost of boiling salt, and it would be much easier. For the Jin people who lived above the mines, the coal mines buried under the ground of the entire Jin Kingdom were enough for people to use for hundreds of thousands of years without worrying about the depletion of resources, so Zhao Xing used coal to replace firewood and boil salt, which effectively reduced the cost. And the advantage of using a honeycomb coal stove is that the fire is uniform, unlike firewood burning in the stove, which needs to be watched by people all the time, and the smoke is very torturous.

Using a casserole to cook salt is also a great way to reduce costs. If you use an iron pot to cook salt, it won't take long for the pot to be corroded and damaged by the brine, but the casserole, as a ceramic product, does not have this problem. In particular, the coarser casserole is very cheap to produce, but it does not affect the quality and speed of salt production at all.

According to Zhao Xing's plan, in the future, around all the small salt ponds in the Jin Kingdom, ceramic pipes to draw brine were erected, and windmills and keel waterwheels were used to lift water and transport it to each large water tank for boiling salt. Then each of these families specializing in salt production has a row of honeycomb coal stoves in the courtyard, and on the stove is a large casserole, and the pot is boiling brine with a clang. If the whole boiling salt is industrialized and the assembly line operation is formed, an adult can cook 30 to 50 catties of exquisite snow salt every day.

Although salt is a necessary condiment for people, a person can eat ten to fifteen catties of salt in a year. In other words, according to the method of boiling salt designed by Zhao Xing, a salt produced in a year without much effort can be eaten by 1,500 to 2,000 people. The Jin Kingdom, plus the Liang Kingdom and Youzhou, currently has a population of 6.5 million, so only more than 4,000 people need to be used to cook salt is enough for everyone to eat, and Zhao Xing plans to let 20,000 people specialize in salt making!

What kind of concept is this? The salt boiled by 20,000 people a year can supply 30 million people to eat! And the total population of the Han Dynasty at this time is estimated to be no more than 50 million, if Zhao Xing wants to deliberately lower the price of salt, then he is not joking about Liu Jili's mention of the Anyi salt pond that collapsed the imperial court.

Moreover, Zhao Xing has a more complete salt production plan. When he fully controls Xuzhou in the future, he will be able to use seawater to dry salt on a large scale to further reduce the cost of salt production, and at that time, his vow to let the people of the world eat cheap salt will become a reality.