Since the split of Yingzhou into the Northern and Southern Dynasties, several clashes broke out on the border between the two sides almost every day, which naturally produced a large number of prisoners, and the use of captives for slave work was also a local custom.

Many of these captives would be sent to the mines, and after realizing that the Southern Dynasties needed enough wealth to support the war, the Great Song explored for them and directed them to develop a series of mines to produce precious metals. ap.

The mines include a series of important minerals such as Besko Copper Mine, Iwami Ginzan, Okayo Ginzan, Shigetsu Ginzan, Heisa Kaneyama, Kagayama Kaneyama, Nagashino Kanezan, and Koharan Suwa Kanzan.

After learning about the survey of the Yingzhou Mine for the first time, the Great Song Dynasty Political Affairs Hall had a protracted discussion on how to use the Yingzhou Mine in the next step.

On this issue, the political affairs hall is divided into two factions: one group believes that these mines should be occupied and mined by themselves, while the other group believes that the people of Yingzhou should be allowed to mine by themselves, and they only need to trade to obtain them.

The reason for the occupation faction was that the ore taste and reserves of these mines were much higher than those of similar mines in China, because the location near the sea and the convenient transportation, coupled with the weak army of Yingzhou, could completely take the mines for themselves.

The traders, on the other hand, believed that, with the exception of a few items, almost all of Yingzhou's goods could not compete with the products of the Great Song Dynasty, and that in this case, it was cheaper to obtain wealth through trade, and there was no need to consume additional costs for this.

After five years of debate and observation, the trade view prevailed, and most of those who were inclined to occupy the mines turned to favor the use of trade to obtain the gold, silver, and copper needed.

Because everyone realizes that if they occupy the mines, not only will they need to wage an endless law and order war in a land that hates them, but they will also need to constantly capture labor and deploy heavy troops to prevent them from resisting, so that the cost of mining will skyrocket.

What's more, after five years of experiments, everyone also realized that when trade obtains Yingzhou products, it can not only profit from trade, but also drive more local people to profit from it in organizing production, which is more conducive to the enhancement of national strength.

Since then, the ash blowing method has been introduced to Yingzhou from the Great Song Dynasty, and at the same time, a series of special plants that can adsorb heavy metals, sulfur, phosphorus, etc., cultivated by the Chinese mountain ghosts. Recycle resources and increase profits while eliminating pollution as much as possible.

With the blessing of these items and knowledge, the production of non-ferrous metals such as gold and silver in Yingzhou continued to rise, and soon, the country's flagship products were added to gold, silver and copper and other metal ingots.

This is also the reason why Kusunoki Masahide's small vault can take out 5,000 taels of gold at one time, but even so, he needs to make up the remaining 5,000 taels with something else.

In order to make up for the gap of up to 5,000 taels of gold, Kusunoki Masahide listed almost all his goods, but Liang En was all interested, and in desperation, he thought of another fist product he mastered - slaves.

He had never said that it was because the Great Song Dynasty forbade all forms of slavery, and then he thought that Liang En was a pioneer, and the pioneer only did not allow Song people to be slaves, but he did not object to foreign slaves.

However, in addition to allowing barbarians to be used as real slaves, the pioneers imposed many restrictions on civilized biological slaves, and their requirements were closer to those of 18th-century Russian serfs, and even more freedom and security.

For example, these serfs had the right to marry freely, to keep a portion of their wealth, and their masters were not allowed to kill or sell them at will.

For example, the owner of a serf was allowed to sell serfs, but it was forbidden to sell the family separately, and the sale of serfs must be accompanied by a corresponding share of land, and it was forbidden to sell them separately.

In addition to this, a series of rules set the minimum living conditions for serfs, and at the same time encouraged the pioneers to convert these serfs into wage laborers through taxation.

But even so, the use of serfs was still a lucrative business, especially in the early days of the wilderness development, which greatly reduced the casualty rate of real settlers.

After discovering that Liang En was interested in slaves, Kusunoki Masahide suddenly became excited, and he quickly asked his attendant to fetch a document, and then pointed to the contents of the document and said it to him.

"These captives were in northern Yamato ten days ago

There were about 2,000 people caught in the retaliation operation, and more than 300 were finally distributed to us."

"According to the previous price, one Ding Zhuang is 20 taels of silver, or 4 taels of gold." Masahide Kusunoki quoted to the text on the booklet, "Half for women, a quarter for children, and if there is a craftsman, it needs to be priced individually."

"There are 378 people here, of which only 117 are young and strong, and the rest are women and children, and there are 86 families in total. I think for a pioneer like you, Bachelor, someone with a stable family should be what you need, right?"

"Yes, but it also means that at least 1/3 of the people I recruit don't have any labor, and the other 1/3 can only be considered weak."

After listening to the other party's words, Liang En spread his hands and said, after all, this money was obtained by a group of enemies after he spent a lot of effort, and even a copper plate could not be spent indiscriminately, so it was natural to bargain as much as possible.

"You're right, there is a shortage of strong men among them." "Although there are no high-level craftsmen among them, there are some ordinary blacksmiths and carpenters who will help you build your territory quickly—"

"Okay, let's give me a total price." Liang En, who was a little tired after pulling for more than ten minutes, said that he had already explained his reasons and roughly calculated how much it was, so he wanted to see the other party's offer.

"These people can be worth 865 taels of gold, but for the sake of your face, I decided to sell you 820 cars of gold."

"It's too expensive!" Liang En shook his head, "I agree with you to use your goods to offset the money owed to me, but that doesn't mean that I can accept a price that is obviously too high."

"So I think they can deduct 750~760 taels of gold at most, if it is higher, it is a bit too much, after all, when you get them, you didn't spend a copper plate."

"Go higher, Your Excellency." Kusunoki Masahide lowered his posture, "If the price that can be exchanged is too low, I really don't know how to explain it to my family."

"That's 780 taels of gold."

Liang En's price was raised to a point higher than the normal wholesale price, but far lower than the retail price, and he made up his mind that if the other party wanted to increase the price again, he would not do it.

As for the reason for this price, it is also very simple, in his future development, it is estimated that he will need to pay a lot of money to this country, so it is not a bad thing to leave a favor.

"Master Liang, you've cut a little too much outside of this bargaining-but who asked me to meet you like this! That's your price!"

For this leader of the new generation of the Nanmu family, Liang En's current price makes him almost no benefit at all. However, considering that this is something used to pay off debts, Liang En's price is also acceptable.

But even so, there was still a difference of 4,220 taels of gold between the two sides, and even if Liang En bought some materials for development, he only spent twenty taels of gold.

"What now?" Looking at this arrears that were not less than the annual income of some minor lords, Liang En frowned.

Although he is not short of money at all, he definitely can't accept that others owe him so much money all of a sudden.

"Please give me some time." After finding that he couldn't make up the payment, Kusunoki Masahide, who was kneeling face-to-face with Liang En, took over a job, and then temporarily retired to the back.

A few minutes later, he walked over from outside and sat down directly on the ground, speaking loudly.

"I'm very sorry, but I assure you in my honor and in my family's honor that we'll do our best to scrape together all the gold you need, and pay you the next time you come here, with interest."

And just as he said this, Liang En could clearly feel that this sentence triggered a resonance of some kind of power in the underworld, that is, if he didn't do it in the future, he and his family would inevitably get a backlash.