Lin Qianlan also took the time to come to Xuanyao.

When the old people saw each other, they were in tears. That Wu Feixing's age is similar to that of Li Congyi, but after years in Huaishang, he is also full of wind and frost, and it is not easy to come to Huaishang.

remembered that a year ago, Lin Qianlan was still a carefree general's daughter, but she experienced the tragic experience of being sold to others and being widowed, and then being sold into the national mansion as a maid.

Fortunately, I met a lover, so that the pearl was not dusted. Perhaps it was the providence of heaven that made Lin Qianlan return to Xuanzhou, and finally Wu Feixing also returned to Xuanzhou.

Wu Feixing and the others came first, and their families were still behind. With the Xu family's shop as a cover, coupled with the route carefully arranged by the military advisor Lu Shilang, and some of the family members are also quite martial arts, they don't have to worry about safety.

Now, in the name of special funds, it is equivalent to Li Congyi himself to support this army, and military spending cannot be as lavish as paying salaries to the guards of the Guogong Mansion. Li Congyi wanted to set up a special business department under Xuanzhou Commerce and Trade to provide special goods for military families. This matter can be arranged for Wu Feixing's family members to do it first.

Wu Feixing was naturally very satisfied with such an arrangement.

However, Xu Le'an's trip to Huaishang was actually not so smooth. Lin Renzhao's guards were skeptical of Xu Le'an's description, and did not believe that Li Congyi, the Duke of Jiangguo, could be better than the current emperor Li Yu. In addition, those who joined the gang in Huaishang were reluctant to leave for a while, and some people had a natural sense of distrust of the officers and soldiers, so there was a lot of opposition.

Just when Xu Le'an felt that he was about to lose confidence, Wu Feixing looked for Xu Le'an and put forward a few conditions to Li Congyi:

First, the heirs born to Li Congyi and Lin Qianlan, regardless of men and women, want to pass on one person to Lin Renzhao and General Lin incense; The second is that everyone is willing to serve Jiang Guogong today, and if anyone wants to leave in the future, he will also ask Jiang Guogong to let him go, so that he can gather and disperse; Third, we need help to settle family members.

For Li Congyi, these conditions are nothing unacceptable. Xu Le'an didn't expect that the willows would be bright, but it was because he spent very little time in Huaishang, but it was more like a "sales" in this private salt team, so he didn't know enough about the difficulties faced by Wu Feixing.

There are many smuggler salt dealers in Huaishang, and one background is that the salt production of Huainan Sea is very huge, and it is actually the largest salt producing area in China at that time; Another background is that after Zhao Kuangyin ascended the throne, Shi Huainan Jiedu made Li Chongjin rebel, and after Zhao Kuangyin's peaceful judgment, Huainan's local military strength has been very weak.

In this case, there are many smugglers in Huaishang. The sources of the private salt team are varied, in addition to Wu Feixing, who pulls the pole by himself, there are also those who cooperate with salt merchants, or the dark line of salt merchants, or some even have the background of salt officials.

The competition between these smugglers is very cruel, not only will they eat each other, but sometimes they will use the power of the government to attack their opponents. This makes it difficult for someone like Wu Feixing who has no solid footing to recuperate and recuperate in a truly safe place.

At the same time, Zhao Kuangyin is also constantly rectifying the salt administration and setting up a special salt protection army in Yancheng. Although there is no combat effectiveness, unless there is a last resort, the smuggler cannot take the initiative to fight the salt protection army, which greatly limits everyone's ability to move.

It was also because of these reasons that after thinking about it for a few days, Wu Feixing decided to defect to Li Congyi. And Wu Feixing came here, and the biggest awakening to Li Congyi was Lu Shilang.

Lu Shilang was originally a native of Sizhou, but also in the Southern Tang Dynasty, and then cast a pen from Rong, into the Southern Tang Dynasty Liu Yanzhen's department as a staff, Shouzhou was defeated, Lu Shilang then entered the Zhou Huainan Jiedu to make Li Chongjin's staff, but after the Song Dynasty, Li Chongjin was sentenced again, defeated by Zhao Kuangyin, Lu Shilang collapsed in the chaotic army, and then started a private salt business with a chaotic army. After several ups and downs in Huaishang, licking blood from the knife edge, several leaders died one after another, and the rest of the people wanted to take Lu Shilang as the leader, but Lu Shilang thought that he was not a general, so he led the team to partner with Wu Feixing and recognized Wu Feixing as the leader.

Wu Feixing joined Li Congyi and also strongly recommended Lu Shilang to Li Congyi. Li Congyi and Lu Ganlang had an in-depth chat, and they also appreciated it. After all, it is not easy to find such a military staff officer who understands military affairs, has strategy, has determination, and is also familiar with political affairs.

set up a staff department under the Guogong Mansion, with Lu Shilang as the director; The Logistics Department was formally established, with Dong Jingye as the director. At this point, a very rudimentary structure of army management has been formed. However, these two divisions are only the internal names of the Guogong Mansion, and they cannot be made public for the time being.

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Now that the people are ready, the next thing is the matter of weapons and equipment.

Li Congyi thought a lot about this, but implemented it less, and the reason was that the iron making did not keep up.

Nor has it been without progress. Although Xu Jianzhang had not yet finished the iron ore matter, it was not difficult to find a blacksmith, and he soon recruited a blacksmith team of more than 100 people for Jiang Guogong, most of whom were craftsmen in the government-run iron yards in Jinling or quarrying. Anyway, what's the difference between doing things for the government and doing things for Jiang Guogong? Xu Jianzhang gave some money to those prison officials, and even deceived a few iron craftsmen and even people with their families (courts) and apprentices (younger brothers) to Xuancheng.

Li Congyi neither dragged these people to the city, nor did he pull them to Wuthering Heights, after all, the matter of iron making is to engage in large industries, and transportation is the most important. On the bank of the Shuiyang River at the ferry port of Xuancheng County, he bought a large piece of land, first set up a tent to deal with it, and then arranged Xuanzhou Construction to build a yard, and the foundation had just been laid.

Some of these masters arranged to go to the coal mine to try to make coking coal furnaces. With coking coal furnaces, not only coking coal could be used to make steel, but especially coal tar was used in clay pots as oil tanks, which had a miraculous effect on the hoplites of the Song Dynasty.

There are also some master craftsmen who are arranged to make tools for making honeycomb briquettes. This thing is not complicated, that is, there is a shell on the outside, and a handle is attached to the top of the sticky steel pipe to hold briquettes; There is also a layer of steel plates in the shell, on which 12 iron pillars are erected, and then a steel bar is extended to the top through the steel pipe of the jacket. After smashing the coal and mixing it with the yellow mud, use this tool to make honeycomb briquettes, first let the slime fill the shell until it is tight; Then use the upper handle to push down, the honeycomb briquettes will come out of the shell, and they can be used after drying.

It is not difficult to make this tool, but Li Zuoyi's requirement is to standardize. The briquettes can not be big or small, the coal holes can not be more or less, left and right, and the coal making tools made by everyone must be a mold. Then Li Congyi put forward the concept of process splitting and asked for assembly line production.

The transformative management concept has brought about a significant increase in production efficiency and a significant reduction in production costs. At the beginning, those craftsmen were tired and half dead, and a dozen craftsmen would make a pair of tools every day; Later, after the process was split, the masters no longer did it, and more than 50 apprentices or children were doing it, but they could produce more than 100 pairs every day.

As a supporting set, Xuanzhou porcelain industry is firing honeycomb coal furnaces, single-hole, double-hole, three-hole coal furnaces have experimental firing. The barracks near the Xuanyao kiln became the first batch of experimental users.

The various squads in the barracks were very happy with this thing. The most important thing is that the coal stove can keep a fire at any time, as long as you want to make a fire, open the air outlet at the bottom of the coal stove, the fire can quickly rise, pile some firewood on it, and then go to light the fire to burn the earthen stove is also very convenient. And the coal stove is not heavy, you can put a burden on it, and it is also very convenient to bak cakes in the morning, especially the three-hole coal stove, and the kang cake is simply an artifact.

Dong Jingye immediately wanted to place an order with Xuanzhou Coal Industry to buy honeycomb briquettes, but Xuanzhou Coal Industry said that it is best for a large household like the army to buy the company's honeycomb briquette cake making tools, and then buy some coal, and find some yellow mud water to mix well and make it more cost-effective.

As soon as it was used, Dong Jingye was very interested in honeycomb coal and coal stoves, and quickly notified his father to go to Xuanzhou Coal Industry to discuss the sales agent.

However, the first to obtain the right to act as an agent is of course Xuanzhou Commerce.

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Xuanzhou Commerce and Trade has finally opened. There are three giants of Xuanzhou Assassin History, Xuanzhou Governor History, and Records of Joining the Army in person, and there are heads and faces in Xuanzhou City, who can not come and take a look?

This glance is even an eye-opener.

Xuanzhou Commerce and Trade now has several major product lines: refined salt, soap, tea, high-end porcelain; Sells furniture, coal stoves/fireplaces.

As for liquor, we have to wait.

Not to mention, Xuanzhou Commerce and Trade should maintain a high-end image, and the coal stove sold is not used for the kitchen, one is made into a fireplace, which can burn firewood and honeycomb briquettes, and needs to be equipped with a flue, which can be placed in the living room or study; The other is a simple honeycomb coal stove, with white glaze painted on the surface, which can make tea or warm hands, and burn up to two briquettes at the same time.

The high-end porcelain also complements the tea making method, with small and exquisite teapots, delicate tea cups and tea filters, and low-key and luxurious tea making tables, so that the eyes of many tea enthusiasts are straight.

For seven consecutive days, Xuanzhou Commerce and Trade opened at 9 o'clock in the morning (midnight), and before the time of application arrived in the afternoon, it had to be temporarily closed, because there was really nothing to sell, and the production capacity could not keep up. Even for furniture, Daqiang Wood's orders have been received softly and have been discharged for several months.

Li Congyi didn't expect it to be so popular, but he underestimated the purchasing power of the landlords who hid the silver in the cellar in recent years. A piece of two-tael soap, packed in a beautifully made box, lined with silk, even counting all kinds of costs, the total cost will not exceed 200 Wen, Xuanzhou Commerce and Trade sells two taels of silver. It can't be said that it is not expensive, but two taels of silver can be used to happily pretend to be something, who can't afford it if you Xuanzhou business bully?

Tea is even more popular. One bud and one leaf (the new sprouts and young leaves of new tea every year), the shape is complete, the size is symmetrical, the color is light green, and Xuanzhou business is called the special grade; As for the single bud (without young leaves), it is called the best Biluochun. In Xuanzhou trade only sells the best and special grade, all of which are packaged in porcelain jars made of Xuanzhou, and each or two packages of the best are a small can, and the grade is packed as a can for every half catty.

Although there is a lot of tea in stock, there is not enough stock of porcelain pots. Without a box, Li Congyi would never sell tea alone. Without this porcelain jar, the brand pattern will be less than half, which is not good!