However, it is obvious that it is almost impossible to solve the problem of food shortage in Zhao through private purchases.

If you can solve the problem by buying food, Taoyi, which is closer, is also a more convenient place, so why should Zhao Kuo go far and come to Linzi, the country of Qi, to buy grain.

The reason why buying grain can't solve the problem is very simple, the grain that Zhao Guo needs is counted in millions of quintals, and such a large amount is not at all what today's businessmen can have.

Even Taoyi and Linzi, which bring together the world's Thai and semi-businessmen, can't add up to so much food.

You know, in this era, food is the population, food is the soldiers, and food is everything!

Therefore, agriculture is an absolute pillar industry no matter where it is. Even in Taoyi and Linzi, which are famous for their commerce, and even in the former Los Angeles, as well as in the country of Han, which made a profit from selling iron tools, the people engaged in agriculture still accounted for the vast majority.

At the same time, the dignitaries and nobles generally have their own fertile land, and there is no need to buy and sell grain at all, and at most it is only a temporary turnover.

Coupled with the general stability of grain prices, grain prices in other regions tend to be stable unless there is a major war, in other words, unless grain is sold to war zones, the profit from grain is extremely limited.

This is also the result that the government is happy to see.

As a result, profits and sales cannot go up, so it is naturally doomed that the trade of grain cannot be too large.

Not to mention the big deal in millions of quintals, the sum of the grain in the hands of all the grain merchants is no more than 100,000 quintals.

Therefore, only by taking the country as a unit can we come up with the figure of one million quintals that Zhao Guo wants.

So is Zhao Kuo doing useless work?

Apparently not!

This is done for at least three purposes:

First, nature silently told the King of Qi that the purpose of this trip was inevitable for Zhao Guo, and this silent action was an invisible pressure;

Second, it is to show the wealth, so that the king of Qi and the ministers of the state of Qi can see that the state of Zhao is coming with full of "sincerity", and the interests will drive the king of Qi to carefully consider the transaction with the state of Zhao;

Third, it is to put a certain amount of realistic pressure on the Qi State, under the operation of the Zhao State, the grain price of the Qi State will soon usher in a new high, which is definitely a big blow to the people of the Qi State who make a living from the salt industry. The salt industry is the pillar industry of Qi country.

Whether it is for the purpose of protecting the people or for the sake of the stability of its own salt industry, Qi Guo must discuss it with Zhao Guo.

Obviously, in order to win the king of Qi, Zhao Kuo not only used the overlord status that Zhao won from the battlefield, but also used the economic means he brought from later generations.

In just one day, the envoys of Zhao State had already purchased all the grain in the entire Linzi City. Even the grain transferred by several major grain merchants in the past month was set by Zhao Guoren at a price that could not be refused.

Not only that, but the envoys of Zhao sent personnel to squat directly at the four gates of Linzi, and when they saw the grain transportation team, they took it directly, and even helped them save the cost of entering the city.

In this way, starting tomorrow, except for small and medium-sized grain merchants, there may be a small amount of grain in their hands, and the entire Linzi City will have no grain to buy.

But even so, the grain that Zhao Envoy received was only 70,000 quintals.

Less is less, but how much is not.

Taking advantage of the fact that the city gate was not closed, the envoy of Zhao State waved his hand and transported the collected 70,000 quintals of grain from the east of the city back to Zhao State.

After all, Linzi is the capital of Qi, and such a large-scale grain purchase incident occurred, and these deeds of the envoys of Zhao soon spread to the ears of King Qi.

Combined with the national letter that had just been handed over, King Qi didn't know what Zhao wanted to do.

There seemed to be no better choice in front of King Qi.

Refusing Zhao's request to borrow grain?

The king of Qi believed that once he refused, the Zhao State would spare no effort to continue to buy grain in the Qi State, and the grain merchants of the Qi State would not care so much, and would try their best to get grain for the Zhao people. Even, the surrounding grain merchants will bee

rushed to provide food to the Zhao State.

This is still secondary, the question is that the people of Zhao bought the grain, what should the people of Linzi do?

Do you want the king of Qi to give grain to the people himself?

Obviously, if the Qi government puts grain at a low price, the grain will be sold to the Zhao people in the blink of an eye. If Qi also sells grain at a high price, considering the vitality of the people, the government really does not dare to offer sky-high prices.

Rather than letting the money be earned by these grain merchants who don't know which country it belongs to, it is better to let yourself earn it.

Of course, there are still resistances, and the biggest resistance is the deterrence from the Qin State.

King Qi, who had seen the tiger and wolf division of the Qin State, did not want to offend the Qin State by helping the Zhao State, and the quiet years were his only thoughts now.

It's just that what the envoy of Zhao did was obviously ordered by King Zhao's death, and he vowed not to give up until he reached his goal.

If you don't help, you will offend Zhao Guo, and Zhao Guo's momentum over the years is no weaker than that of Qin. In addition, the land of Huaisi has just been assigned to the Zhao country, and from the land of Huaisi, it is possible to directly enter the hinterland of the Qi country!

The lesser of two evils, since it is destined to offend a strong country, it is obvious that offending the one who is farther away will be a better choice. Not to mention that if you choose Zhao Guo, you can also get a lot of benefits.

Soon, King Qi, who received the news, had already made a decision in his heart. The only question now is the question of how much Zhao is willing to pay for this batch of grain.

Sure enough, when the people of Linzi suddenly found that there was no grain to buy in the entire Linzi City, the king of Qi summoned the envoys of Zhao who were still collecting grain into the palace.

Because both parties are interested in facilitating this deal, mutual negotiations will naturally be smooth and smooth.

Of course, the envoys of Zhao also made a certain "struggle" for the interests of Zhao, but obviously, the willingness to struggle was not obvious, and it was almost half-pushed, and the envoys of Zhao reached an agreement with the king of Qi.

How so?

It can only be said that King Qi is really a good person.

From the very beginning, the king of Qi did not have any territorial and demographic claims to the Zhao state.

And Zhao Kuo's order to the envoy was: As long as my land, population, and other things are not touched, they are all desirable.

In other words, from the very beginning, King Qi's requirements were already lower than the bottom line given by Zhao Kuo.

In this case, the envoy of Zhao State still insisted on several rounds of bargaining, which was almost his limit - if he continued to talk, Zhao Envoy would probably laugh out loud.

There is no way, the biggest request of the King of Qi is actually to ask the Zhao State to protect the Qi State from being retaliated against by the Qin State?

This "reasonable" request could not be "reasonable", and Zhao Envoy naturally agreed without hesitation.

As for the rest, it is nothing more than the interest on the repayment of grain, what money, what treasures, of course, the king of Qi is not completely stupid, and he still made some "serious" requirements.

For example, Zhao Jun's weapons.

Also, the country of Qi does not produce iron, and the development of iron tools is not fast, and the strength of its weapons has always been the bottom of the Qi country, not to mention the three kingdoms of Qin, Zhao, and Han at the top of the level of sophistication, and even the bitter cold Yan and Chu countries, Qi countries are not comparable.

Therefore, proposing that Zhao Jun give some weapons can be regarded as the right thing to do.

It was also the quantity of this weapon that made the envoys of Zhao State bargain. After all, the export of standard weapons that is in use in a country is still very sensitive.

It's just that if Zhao Kuo knew that Qi Guo actually wanted his own standard weapon, I am afraid that he would laugh out loud on the spot.

Family, who knows!

Over there, the Shangdang Arsenal has just made a technological breakthrough and can finally make weapons in batches, and there are people here who want to pack up and recycle the old weapons.

It's like we're just about to install the 95 gun system, and the brothers in Africa are already snapping up our bars. Not only does it save a lot of disposal costs, but it can even earn a fortune.

Wow, that's not too cool, okay!

Of course, it's a pity that the military factories of the party are also

It is a top secret, and the weapons of the new standard are even more secrets in secrecy, even the envoys of Zhao State do not know about their existence.

Naturally, for the sake of his own safety, Zhao Envoy still tried to reduce the number as much as possible.

However, this is fine, after all, changing clothes is not achieved overnight, and Zhao Guo himself must still have sufficient weapons reserves.

But in any case, after a whole day of dark negotiations, the basic framework has been formed, and at the same time that dozens of carts of treasures carried by the envoys of Zhao State drove into the treasury of Qi, the first batch of 300,000 quintals of grain has also begun to depart from Linzi.

After eating Zhao Guo, King Qi did not forget to harvest a handful of his own leeks.

Taking advantage of the high price of grain, the king of Qi decisively took out tens of thousands of quintals of grain from the treasury, detoured to the city near Linzi, and sold it to various grain merchants at a high price.

At the same time, the king of Qi quietly sold grain in Linzi City.

Because of the distance, the grain merchants had no idea what was happening in Linzi while they were buying grain at a high price.

And the people of Qi who were invaded by the fear of no food finally saw the food, and they hoarded it regardless of the land.

When the grain merchant drove the carriage back to Linzi humming a small song, he found that the envoy of Zhao had stopped collecting grain the day before yesterday, and the people in Linzi who needed grain had already hoarded enough grain.

The relationship between supply and demand was inverted in an instant, and the huge economic pressure and storage pressure became the last straw that crushed grain prices, and almost within a day, grain prices fell more than ten times.

Fortunately, just when food prices were about to fall into the quagmire, a "good Samaritan" finally appeared and began to buy grain.

But at this time, the price is already half the price of ordinary grain.

The halving is also going to be sold!

The price of this halving can be said to be just stuck at the node where the merchant vomits blood but does not die.

Looking at the follow-up stream of grain sent to Linzi, all the grain merchants instantly understood that if they sold it, they would not be able to break their muscles and bones, and they could continue to do business if they collected the capital, but if they didn't sell it again, if the mysterious person stopped buying it, the grain and cocoa would all be smashed in their hands, and there would be no place to die.

However, what everyone didn't know was that this endless stream of grain was arranged by their king himself; As for the kind-hearted man, it was naturally the handiwork of King Qi Neiku.

So, the king of Qi followed Zhao Guo's hand, but he looted the merchants in Linzi, ate high-priced grain from other places, collected and ate Linzi at a low price, and sold it to Zhao Guo to eat again.

Just went around between Linzi and the surrounding cities, and King Qi gained more than several times.

Moreover, this harvest is still quiet. Even Qi people can't find someone to settle accounts.

Who to look for?

Looking for an envoy from Zhao State? People said at the beginning that they only received it for a few days, and everyone wanted all the grain that had been deposited, because they were not strong enough to swallow the elephant, and they would sell it again and more.

What's more, even if you want to find the envoy of Zhao State, you have to find it. When the turmoil intensified, the envoys of Zhao had already embarked on the return journey with 300,000 loads of grain from the King of Qi

Looking for someone behind the scenes?

Then you have to know who is behind the scenes!

Of course, others may not know, but Zhao Envoy, who watched the whole battle, would not know.

In fact, if you think about it, the inference is not so difficult.

In Linzi, apart from the King of Qi, who can mobilize so much food and money in a short period of time to carry out this operation;

Except for King Qi, who else can not find any clues after making so many operations.

Looking at King Qi's seemingly clever set of operations, Zhao Envoy shook his head helplessly: Take the people as mines, and cut them down from time to time, how can you not die?!

In order to accelerate the demise of the Qi State, the Zhao envoy also quietly left some traces of their king's buying and buying for the merchants of the Qi State.

With the shrewdness of the Qi people, it is believed that it will soon be discovered what role their king has played in this.

Water can carry a boat and also capsize a boat, which is often handed over by Zhao Kuo

The words of the courtiers of the Zhao State......