In the early years of the Safavid Dynasty, there were frequent wars and economic collapse, and there was basically no large-scale infrastructure construction. It was not until the accession of the great Abbas the Great that the Safavid dynasty entered the peak of infrastructure construction with the end of large-scale foreign wars and the restoration of domestic political stability, with an unprecedented increase in the number of post stations, roads, and ports.

According to various documents, more than 1,000 caravans were built during the reign of Abbas I alone. Except for a few of these post stations located in large and medium-sized cities such as Isfahan, Tabriz, Kerman, and Neshapur, most of them are mainly concentrated in the center of the inland plateau and the edge of the Kavir Desert and the Lut Desert in the southeast.

More importantly, Abbas I also connected the main industrial and commercial cities, the main agricultural production areas, military fortifications, border trading centers, and coastal ports on the basis of the numerous post stations scattered throughout the country. In addition to Bandar Abbas, the ports of Rasht and Astra on the coast of the Caspian Sea, as well as the ports of Kun, Jask and Chabahar on the coast of the Gulf (Persian Gulf), have been developed and utilized one after another.

In addition, Abbas I ordered the establishment of a special road safety maintainer, and if any merchant, traveler or resident was robbed, the governor of the region was responsible for recovering the damage for him, or compensating him with his own money.

However, more than 100 years passed, and the once powerful Safavid Empire began to decline. The administrative system of the entire dynasty was designed by the authoritarian Shah like Abbas the Great during its heyday, and although there were other power sides, such as the governors who had a certain degree of independent autonomy, the center of power of the state was still the Shah, and the Shah had to have a firm, cruel, and arbitrary character in order to keep the functions of the government functioning normally.

During the reign of Abbas II (1642-1666), there were brief signs of revival of the Safavid dynasty, but with the reign of Suleiman I and the current Shah Sudan. During Hussein's reign, since there were no serious external threats and internal challenges to the entire dynasty, they indulged in endless pleasures and adopted laissez-faire behavior, paying less and less attention to the running of the government, and placing all the blame and burden on the Grand Viqi and other important ministers.

There is no doubt that there is no shortage of capable officials among them, but the sight that their efforts are not respected and praised by the Shah at all, while other officials and courtiers ignore the interests of the country and only enrich their own pockets will undoubtedly make people pessimistic and discouraged. Inefficiency and sabotage gradually corroded the administrative system of the entire dynasty.

From the port of Bushehr to the small town of Borazjan, 50 kilometres away, the road is unusually smooth, with several post stations for passers-by and travelers to rest, and a team of elite cavalry patrolling to and fro to deter possible bandits. But after passing the small town of Borazjan, the road is extremely dilapidated, there is almost no smooth pavement, full of potholes, crushed by passing vehicles, the thickness of more than ten or twenty centimeters, on sunny days, the sky is full of dust, rainy days are full of mud, impassable.

The road between the port of Bushehr and Borazjan was built and managed by Qi merchants, mainly to facilitate the towns and farms in the hinterland, and to transport grain, vegetables, and other daily necessities to the port.

Twenty years ago, Qi had planned to work with the local government of Persia to build a high-quality road to Shiraz. In this way, goods arriving at the port can be transported directly to this large city with a population of hundreds of thousands, speeding up the flow of people, business and logistics, thereby facilitating trade between the two places.

Well, to put it bluntly, it's more quick to get money out of the pockets of the Persians.

However, the local government of the Safavid Dynasty was not enthusiastic about this, to be precise, did not want to contribute to the construction of the road at all. In their opinion, it is too cost-effective and wasteful to take a large sum of money from the local treasury in financial distress and scatter it on the ground in vain. The Governor, the Chancellor, the Qadi (the Religious Judge of the True God), the Generals, and the thousands of soldiers who were fed up, none of them had empty pockets and needed to be filled with vast quantities of gold and silver.

As for building roads, whoever you love will go, you Qi people have a lot of money, so let's complete the construction of this "Golden Strip" that is more than 150 kilometers long.

As a result, after the Persian trading company of Qi State built more than 50 kilometers on its own, and spent all the road construction money raised, it looked up, hey, the Persians really didn't build a single meter of road, and they were counting on them to build this road all the way to Shiraz. The people of Qi immediately blew up, why, Lao Tzu came to your Persia to make money, but not to build for you. Immediately, the Persian trading company also put aside its picks and stopped continuing to invest, and finally made this planned "traffic artery" fall into disuse halfway.

In fact, if the Safavid Dynasty could promise to hand over several kilometers of land on both sides of the road to Qi for development free of charge, as Egypt did, the Persian trading community would not be unable to consider investing a large amount of money to build the road. After all, in addition to collecting some tolls, you can also get a lot of income through land development, and no matter what, you can also make up for the cost of road construction.

However, the "diligent king" Governor Fars rejected the suggestion of the Qi people. It is said that it would be better for the people of Qi to lease the port of a deserted seaside fishing village, after all, there will be fewer land disputes and religious disputes there. However, once it goes deep into the interior, countless farmlands and people will be involved, and perhaps some major incidents will occur, which will then affect the friendly exchanges between the two countries for decades.

However, considering that there are more horses and camels in Dopersia, and there is no need to worry about the animal power to pull carts to transport goods, although the roads are a little rotten, they can barely support the basic requirements of cargo transportation.

Qi profits tens of millions of yuan from Persia every year, and it is definitely one of the most important markets in the Indian Ocean trade circle. With the country's population size of less than 10 million (only 9 million-10 million at the peak of the Safavid Dynasty), the market capacity is naturally absolutely inferior to India and the Ottomans, but due to the particularity of the geographical location of Persia, between the east and the west, between the north and south of the Eurasian hinterland, the logistics of goods is difficult to sustain through Persia, so in a long historical period, the transit trade is extremely developed, and the ancient post stations all over the plateau are the historical witnesses of the prosperity of transit trade in the era of land transportation, and the Safavid period is of course no exception.

In the early days of the rise of the global market, transit trade through Persia was particularly important. During this period, the number of transit trade centers in Persia was larger, and Isfahan, Kandahar, Tabriz and Bandar Abbas were all important transit and distribution centers for international trade by sea and land at that time, and Isfahan was a typical representative of the land transit trade center.

The largest foreign trading partner of the eastern Safavid Empire was the Mughals, who had a larger economy, stronger production capacity, and a richer country compared to the Safavid Empire, whose exports were mainly handmade goods, including cotton, indigo, saltpeter, spices, opium, sugar, silk cloth, yarn, salt, beads, borax, turmeric, shellac, sealing wax, and various medicines.

As one of the most important economies in the East at the time, the Mughal Empire's exports to the west had to transit through Persia by sea and land, and then travel west to Aleppo, a trading port in the eastern Mediterranean, where they could trade with European merchants.

If Isfahan was the most important hub for transit trade during the Safavid period, then the burgeoning port of Bushehr was one of the most important transit points for international maritime trade in the entire East-West trade network. It is not only the traditional trade center in the western part of the Indian Ocean, but also the central node connecting the Qi Kingdom, the Qin State, the Nanyang Domains and the Indian Ocean Trade Circle.

After a large caravan set out from the port of Bushehr, it traveled all the way north, with more than 70 wagons, more than 100 pack horses and camels, stretching for nearly two miles in front and back, and the dust kicked up by the wheels and hooves flew high.

Li Yanliang rode on a camel, his whole head was tightly wrapped in a traditional Persian floral turban, and as the camel moved, his body also rose and fell, and he looked even more groggy under the warm sunlight.

The port of Bushehr is about 460 kilometers away from Isfahan, and it is planned to arrive in 25 days. However, in view of the dilapidated roads in Persia and the possibility of rainy weather, the chief treasurer of the caravan kept the daily distance to twenty kilometers as much as possible.

The two infantry companies of the 3rd Mixed Battalion also disguised themselves as the trading company's escort and accompanying men, and followed the trading caravan to Isfahan. Except for the battalion commander and a few intelligence staff officers who knew the real purpose of the trip, the remaining 200 officers and men only knew how to go to the capital of the Persians to escort the family of the minister of Qi and a batch of important supplies back to Bushehr Port.

As for why the Persian army was not entrusted with this escort mission, the officers and soldiers privately speculated that they might not be able to trust the Persian troops with large turbans on their heads. A huge dynasty can't even quell the tribal rebels in the border areas, and it also makes people invade the country again and again, conquering cities, such combat power is really worrying!

"Alert! Alert! ”

"Stop moving forward and form a formation!"

"All officers and soldiers lined up!"

“……”

Li Yanliang flipped off the camel with a bone, held the musket, quickly gathered more than 30 of his subordinates together, and then formed three horizontal lines with the other rows to block the front of the convoy.

Squinting his eyes and looking in the direction of the smoke and dust, there was a vague cavalry force of hundreds of horses. As for their identity, it may be that they were patrolling the Persian army, but it is more likely that they were horse bandits active in the nearby mountains.

Li Yanliang glanced back, the horsemen and men of the caravan were struggling to surround the carriages into a simple car formation, and more than 100 officers and soldiers of the other company were also arranged in three horizontal columns in front of the right side of the convoy, covering the entire caravan with them on the left and right.