Mid-July.

Harbour City, a prisoner of war camp.

This temporary camp, which covers an area of more than 100 acres, can accommodate more than 47,000 prisoners of war at the most, which can be described as very lively.

However, after more than half a month of processing, more than 40,000 ordinary prisoners of war have been sent to Shandong to work after signing a "employment contract" - in fact, they are going to the mines to mine, but in order to avoid causing their collective resistance, the "employment contract" stipulates that these prisoners of war each owe 100 taels to Xujiazhuang. Ransom silver', as long as they go to Shandong to mine, work hard, earn 5 taels a month is no problem, do two or three years to restore their free body, of course, if they can directly take out 100 taels of redemption silver, they can be released directly, without being sent to Shandong.

It's just that there are almost no ordinary prisoners of war who can get a hundred taels, after all, if they are not so poor that they can't do it, they won't join the Jiangnan army, but they didn't expect to lose so badly, so on the way to Shandong, they can only admit their fate in addition to thinking that they are unlucky, and they can only accept their fate, and the monthly salary is 5 taels, they knew that the mining salary was so high, they went directly to the Shandong mine to work, and what kind of cannon fodder soldiers, I just hope that after saving enough 'redemption silver', I will work for a few more years to achieve a turnover.

And this is the characteristic of ordinary Chinese people, as long as they can live, as long as they can see a little hope, they will not resist, and they are the most forbearant group.

Of course, it was those high-level captives who brought surprises to the top of Xujiazhuang.

In the past half a month, among the nearly 1,000 high-ranking captives, the families of 117 people paid 10,000 taels of gold to ransom them back.

Xujiazhuang received 1.17 million taels of gold.

Xu Yuan secretly smiled, you must know that 1 tael of gold is equal to 37.5 grams, multiplied by 1.17 million, that is, a full 43.875 million grams, that is, 43.875 tons of weight - but the purity of gold in ancient times is generally only about 80%, and it is actually only equivalent to 35 tons of pure gold.

Even so.

This batch of gold has also greatly improved Xu Yuan's economic situation in the real world, reversing the shortage of income, at least this year, he no longer has to worry about running out of money.

It's just that after more than a hundred high-level prisoners were ransomed, there were not many family members who came to ransom people again, and the ransom they could get was getting less and less, and even some high-level prisoners of war, I am afraid that no one would come to ransom them, either because the family had no money, or because they felt that it was not worth so much money, they simply gave up and counted it.

However, the three-month deadline has not yet arrived, and before the deadline arrives, these high-ranking prisoners of war will still be given a proper care and will not send them to Shandong to mine, but the ransom has not yet been delivered when the deadline arrives, hehe, then I can only congratulate them on becoming an honorable miner.

"The Legend of the Fairy Tree"

In addition, as prisoners of war in a prisoner of war camp, they naturally do not have a place to eat and sleep, and they don't have to do anything in peacetime, which is really beautiful, and in the prisoner of war camp, whether it is ordinary prisoners of war or high-level prisoners of war, they all have to work, they all have to pay their physical labor, and all the arrangements are dirty and tiring.

For example, go to a brick kiln factory to move bricks.

For example, manure is transported by manure truck to the filling port of the digester.

For example, when building a road, a group of prisoners of war pushed a dozen tons of boulders back and forth to compact the road.

And so on and so forth.

Among the high-ranking prisoners of war, Zheng Cai, a young man in his early twenties, is a relatively special existence.

He is the deputy general of the Zheng family's firearms army, the nephew of Zheng Zhilong, the chief soldier of Quanzhou, Fujian and the maritime merchant, and he has a special and important position in the Zheng family navy, which now dominates the southeast coast, and is a young man with a very bright future.

However, he overturned the car under Yangzhou City, and did not achieve the goal of getting along with the Jiangnan gentry, but became a prisoner of Xujiazhuang, and life and death were no longer in his own hands, and suffered a major life setback.

But Zheng Cai is not worried that the Zheng family will not be able to take out the money to redeem himself, it is just ten thousand taels of gold, and the Zheng family, which is rich enough to rival the country, can easily take it out, and the uncle (Zheng Zhilong) will definitely send someone to bring money to redeem him.

It's just that Fujian is far away, and it takes more than a month to go back and forth, and if you want to wait for the ransom, it will be the end of July at the earliest.

In short, Zheng Cai is not worried about the ransom issue at all.

And this half-month career as a prisoner of war is not only a setback and blow, but also a tempering for a young man like Zheng Cai, who is young, in a high position, and originally had an unlimited future.

He is not afraid of hardship, as a person who went on a ship at the age of ten to beg for a living at sea, he endured no less hardships than anyone on land! There are dozens or hundreds of battles experienced, fighting with God every day, fighting with other pirates and pirates, and fighting with the court sailors! That's what we have today, and it's all fought for by myself.

Servitude was nothing to him.

During this time, Zheng Cai also observed everything in Xujiazhuang from the perspective of a prisoner of war, found many unique features, and was secretly surprised.

Surprised by the wealth of Xujiazhuang.

Shocked by the strength of the Xu family's army.

And through Xujiazhuang's management of prisoners of war, he realized that Xujiazhuang was strong in organization and management, not only far beyond the government, but also far beyond the Zheng family in Fujian.

Why did he say that?

For example, a few days ago, the steward of the prisoner of war camp took more than 3,000 prisoners of war to repair a section of the road, and this kind of work required a lot of hard work, and the enthusiasm of the prisoners of war was certainly not very high, but the steward organized the senior prisoners of war into a team, and the most tiring work of pushing stones and grinding was handed over to the senior prisoners of war, the moderately tired work of smashing stones was handed over to ordinary prisoners of war, and the easier work was handed over to the criminals and hard labor in Xujiazhuang.

In this way, when they are working, the convicts and hard laborers, seeing the treatment of the prisoners of war, and then looking at their own treatment, will feel that even if they are punished with hard labor, they are much better than the foreign prisoners, and not only will they work harder, but they will also have the idea of reforming themselves and never committing crimes again, and decide to become a good law-abiding villager.

As for the ordinary prisoners of war, although they are very tired and hard, seeing the treatment of those high-ranking prisoners of war, and seeing these high-ranking officials, nobles, and gentry of the imperial court, not only reduced to working with them, but also undertaking the hardest and most tiring work, their hearts are much more balanced, and there are a lot less negative complaints, and they will even sarcastically ridicule these old men who used to be high.

The high-ranking prisoners of war naturally complained of bitterness, all kinds of protests and sabotage, but the hemp rope whip soaked in water was heavily whipped down, and earth-shattering screams sounded, and the phenomenon of passive sabotage was immediately reduced.

"The old man is not convinced, you can't treat the old man like this!"

Zhang Shijun, the governor of Yangzhou, who was whipped, said to the steward who whipped him: "I am Zhang Shijun, the governor of Yangzhou, the parent official above your head, the official of the imperial court, and the scholar!" If you beat me, it is a big rebellion, it is a rebellion against the court, and you will be executed by Ling Chi and the Nine Clans! If you let me go right away, the old man may not be guilty of this. ”

"Zhang Shijun, did you send 10,000 taels of gold from home?"

The steward asked sarcastically: "Have you forgotten your identity and regarded this place as your prefect's yamen?" ”

"The gold will be sent, it will be sent soon, it's just a thousand taels, why rush it so much?"

Zhang Shijun immediately said: "I'll write a letter tonight and ask my family to send the money." ”

"Yangzhou City is so close, if you can send it, you can send it a long time ago, don't be lazy, give me honest work, otherwise I will kill you!"

The steward's whip pulled out an explosion in the air, and the frightened Zhang Shijun's face was like ashes, his family was absolutely rich, but after Yangzhou City was captured by the Xu family's army, his home was raided, and the property loss exceeded 500,000 taels, so in terms of ransom, I can only count on Xu Hongji, the Duke of Wei, whether he will pay to pull him along, but more than ten days have passed, Xu Wenjue has been ransomed, and the Duke of Wei seems to have forgotten him, or rather, he has become an outcast.

Thinking of this, Zhang Shijun's face was full of despair, but in order not to be whipped, he had to work with his life.

Zheng Cai, who was observing all this on the side, naturally understood that this Zhang Shijun must be finished, otherwise the whip of the steward would not always fall on people like him who can't get the ransom at home, and those who don't have to worry about the ransom, such as himself, have not been whipped once, and the steward is quite polite to him, and even took care of him several times.

It can be seen from this that Xujiazhuang's management methods are clever and the differential treatment is very good.

There was another thing that impressed Zheng Cai deeply and was greatly shocked.

It was yesterday that he followed a group of captives, on the barrage embankment outside the harbor city, carrying a thick white wind turbine blade on his shoulder, and then under the operation of the engineering crane, the large blades were assembled on a large white pillar, assembled into a complete 30KW wind turbine, and finally in the strong sea breeze of five or six levels, a steady stream of electricity was emitted, and then the pumping machine was driven to pump seawater, the water pump was driven to speed up the drying speed of seawater, and the electric heater was supplied with electricity, so that the salt plant could produce 10,000 tons of snow salt per day.

It was this experience of assisting in the installation of wind turbines as a coolie that made Zheng Cai see the miracle of technology in his eyes for the first time, and saw the strength of industrial mass production, and was shocked and shocked by unimaginable, so that he couldn't sleep all night, and he wanted to grab something, but he couldn't catch it.

The next morning.

Zheng Cai was not arranged to continue to work, but the prisoner of war camp Steward Cai called him over and told him a message: "Zheng Zhilong from Fujian already knows about your capture, but he doesn't seem to have the intention of ransom with gold, but is ready to lead the Zheng family fleet to attack Harbor City." ”

"Assault on Harbour City?"

Zheng Cai was shocked, his face changed greatly, and he blurted out: "No, this matter is absolutely impossible!" ”