Ji An's efficiency was very high, and before lunchtime, he had already returned with cotton to restore his life.

"Young master, all of them have been harvested, and there are three hundred and twenty plants in total. It's just that they say that there are no seeds to sell at this time. Ji An returned Qian Zhuang's seal letter to Chu Ji, and his tone was a little depressed.

Chu Ji nodded, cotton is generally sown in April and bears flocculation in September, of course, no seeds can be found in this June. It's just that Chu Ji didn't give up in the end, and told Ji An one more sentence.

According to the yield of cotton, there is about four or five hundred catties of yield per mu, but now this cotton variety is unknown, and if it is conservatively estimated, the yield per mu should be about three hundred catties. Three hundred and twenty cotton plants are only about one cent of the amount of land, that is, they can produce about 30 catties of cotton.

Although there are not many of them, the good news is that the seeds produced will be able to plant a few acres of land in the coming year.

"Did you ask where you came from?" Chu Ji asked.

"Uh-huh, I asked. Sure enough, they are called 'Jibei', probably a few years ago, a foreigner from the desert north of Pingcheng fainted in a village outside Pingcheng. After being rescued by the local villagers, he left the seed, saying that it was worth a thousand gold. But everyone found that the things grown were useless at all, but the advantage was that the flowers grew peculiarly and the names were auspicious, so they would buy one or two pots and put them in the shop or home. Ji An's eyebrows fluttered and he told the story, without panting, but he was much more clever than when he was asked to read the account book.

When Chu Ji heard this, he also laughed and said, "What that person said is right, it is indeed more expensive than a thousand gold. ”

"Huh?" Ji An's eyes suddenly burst into a fine light. He knows the young master's ability to make money, and the young master said that if it can be worth a thousand gold, he will definitely be able to.

Chu Ji looked at the light in Ji An's eyes, and shook his head funny, this little money fan is no longer the person who sold soap in Shengjing and trembled with fear when he looked at the account books.

He took the seal letter, and gently touched Ji An's bun face with the tassel underneath, and his tone was a little serious: "But I want it to fly into the homes of ordinary people." ”

If he could have discovered cotton earlier, why did he need to think of a way to save the people of Cangzhou from the cold. Thinking of this, Chu Ji asked again: "Have you knocked the steward of the money bank?" ”

Chu Ji established a money bank, first, for the convenience of exchanging silver tickets, second, for money to make money, and third, it is the most important. In the troubled times, he can't be a deaf and blind person, and the sixteen states in the world need to have his eyes and ears. And Jiyue Qianzhuang, which is all over Dayong and controls the world's money exchanges, is the best intelligence collection office.

Therefore, the stewards in the money village are all Chu Ji's henchmen. Some were born slaves of the Chu family, and some were brought down from Qifeng Mountain. They all have one thing in common, the whole family is in Chu Ji's hands. Thus, absolute loyalty is guaranteed.

It's not that no one covets the business of the bank, and there are many people who want to hear about the truth of the bank. But Chu Ji came up with a heart of iron and stone, and thunderous means, directly let the three brothers of the Kuai family, wearing masks, lead the elite soldiers on the village, like a divine soldier descending from the sky, the first warning, the second small punishment, and the second time is not more than three.

But this time, Qian Zhuang failed to report the cotton, although he also had his own faults, but he probably described it at the beginning. The people of Pingcheng Qianzhuang are not bright enough to do things. If you don't admonish it, you may be able to do something bad one day.

"I pretended to be a big customer who took a million taels of silver, and when I entered the box, the shopkeeper personally came to greet me. After confirming his identity, he showed the young master's seal, which frightened him. Ji An's eyes narrowed with a smile, and he continued: "Then I lectured the young master and fined him half a year's monthly money. If there is any more wrongdoing, it will not be forgiven. ”

"Yes, now I have such an idea."

"Hehe, it's all taught well by the young master~"

*

They rested in the inn for another night, and the next morning the original procession of ten carriages was enlarged to twenty, and the new carriages were neatly stacked with three hundred and twenty cotton plants. The team looks mighty, and it is more like a rich and noble son.

The more the group walked to the northwest, the more they could feel the desolation, and the more depressed and dull the mood of the people felt. Finally, the team left Bingzhou and stopped in the wilderness of Cangzhou, which was only a hundred miles away.

After everyone settled down on the spot, Chu Ji ordered Kuaimin and Kuaixin to leave first.

Qin Zong stared at the backs of the two leaving, and secretly thought to himself, there must be a fierce battle in Cangzhou, why did Chu Ji let the general leave at this time?

Before he could think clearly, he saw Chu Ji walking straight over and said softly: "Don't worry, after arriving in Cangzhou City, I will talk to you in detail." ”

Qin Zong's eyebrows sank, turned his head away, and did not speak.

Who's worried about you anymore?

After waiting for about an hour, there was a sound of horses' hooves in the distance.

At the foreground was a young man in a white robe with arrow sleeves, straddling a white horse and holding a silver spear. When he arrived in front of Chu Ji, he turned over and dismounted, knelt on one knee, and saluted Chu Ji.

There were about three hundred people behind him, all dressed in the same clothes as the guards in the palace, and they also saluted Chu Ji.

Chu Ji nodded and asked them all to get up. Then, he introduced to Qin Zong beside him: "This is Xue Zheng." ”

Xue Zhenglu was excited, and his hands clenched into fists: "General Qin, I have admired my name for a long time." ”

Qin Zong looked at the person in front of him, a look of surprise flashed in his eyes. This Xue Zheng does not have a trace of gangsterism on his body, and he looks more like a young general trained by a family of military generals.

It's just the Xue family, he searched all the memories in his mind, but he didn't think of which military general in Dayong was surnamed Xue.

Before Qin Zong could think clearly, Xue Zheng knelt on the ground again, bowed to Chu Ji, smacked his forehead on the ground, and let out a bang: "Thank you, sir, for saving General Qin." ”

Chu Ji shook his head, helplessly stretched out his hand, and helped Xue Zheng up, seeing that his eyes were already red and bloodshot, Chu Ji turned his head to look at Qin Zong, and said, "There is no need to be like this, I already have a heart for General Qin." ”

Later, he explained to Qin Zong: "Your father has a life-saving grace for their mother and son. ”

Qin Zong originally just thought about Xue Zheng's origin with an expressionless face. It wasn't until I heard Chu Ji say the word "father" that there was a trace of fluctuation on his face.

Xue Zheng got Chu Ji's permission and went to Qin Zong to catch up. Qin Zong may be because of his father, but it is rare that he did not reject people thousands of miles away.

Chu Ji sat aside, looking at the figures of the two people, and his thoughts couldn't help but drift back to the plot of the original book.

Xue was the son of Huo Lang, the general of the auxiliary state. Twenty years ago, Huo Lang was suspected by the first emperor and was convicted of rebellion, and more than 200 people of the whole clan were beheaded. At that time, Huo Lang's wife Xue Congxue was already pregnant, and Huo Lang did not want to see his wife and unborn child, so he went to Huangquan with him, and secretly asked Qin Yi, who returned to Beijing to report on his work. Qin Yi never shirked, and after many operations, he replaced Xue Congxue with a death row prisoner.

Xue Zheng is Huo Lang's widow. Xue Congxue was afraid that his background would be exposed, so he let him take his mother's surname.

According to the development of the plot of the original book, after Xue Zheng's mother died, he would join the rebel army under Cai Kuang. Until Qin Zong returned to Nanxi, killed the lord of Nanxi, and established himself as the king, Xue Zheng resolutely gave up his original military status and surrendered to Qin Zong.

But after he crossed over, he arranged for Jiang Mu to cure Xue Congxue's illness. So, Xue Zheng officially joined his command and secretly trained soldiers and horses for him.

Chu Ji knew his ability.

He had been hesitating in the Colosseum at the beginning, whether to kill Qin Zong or not, and there were also reasons for Xue Zheng.

Qin Zong has the heart to plot the world, if he is allowed to return to the sea, then he will not only have an extremely strong opponent, but also lose an extremely capable general.

But if he kills the son of Xue Zheng's savior, how will he face Xue Zheng in the future?

Chu Ji knew that it was safest to kill Qin Zong secretly. With his kindness to Xue Zheng, it was enough to make him die.

But he was afraid that in this chaotic world of cannibalism, he could kill the innocent Qin Zong in order to clear the obstacles, and he might not kill more innocent people because of something else in the future.

If he becomes like that, how much better can he be than Zhao Xie, who is sitting on the Jinluan Palace and is mediocre today?

Fortunately, although he thinks that he is not a compassionate saint, he has finally kept the bottom line and can't do such a ruthless thing.

Now it seems that it is not bad?

Qin Zong is cold and arrogant, and he is young, and he has always been not very close to his subordinates. Now that Xue Zheng is a bridge, it is an opportunity for Qin Zong to open his heart.

Chu Ji held a medicine bowl, furrowed his brows, immersed in his thoughts. Of course, he also missed Qin Zong's frequent gazes.

After thinking about things, Chu Ji took a sip of the medicine in the bowl. Jiang Mu Pharmaceutical has always been very bitter, it stands to reason that he has been drinking it for three years and has long been used to it.

However, during this time, he was out on the road, and his health was even worse, so Jiang Mu added a few more medicinal herbs to it, and his tongue was numb from the bitterness.

Putting down the medicine bowl, Chu Ji stood up: "Let's go, Cangzhou, it's about to arrive." ”

In the evening, on the official road outside Cangzhou City, a convoy of twenty carriages advanced in an orderly manner.

Twenty carriages lined up, barely in sight. A carriage at the front of the convoy was pulled by two horses at the same time, which looked noble and luxurious. On each side of the carriage was a guard riding a tall horse and holding a weapon, one black and one white, very imposing. Behind the two of them, there were hundreds of guards, disciplined followers, guarding the entire convoy.

After passing the city gate, it is Cangzhou City.

The road in Cangzhou City is much worse than that in Pingcheng. Even the main road in the city is the most common loess road, which is only slightly smoothed and used as the most important road in the city.

It had been raining a few times recently, and the convoy had been splashed with sticky mud as it passed, leaving deep and shallow ruts on the loess road.

Chu Ji, who was inside the carriage, felt the bumps in the road, so he stretched out his hand, lifted the curtain of the carriage, and looked at this city that was not just desolate.

The road is cold and bleak, and there are occasional pedestrians passing by, all of whom are yellow and thin, and skinny as wood.

As the administrative center, Cangzhou City is still like this, so those surrounding cities don't know what kind of tragic situation it is.

It stands to reason that this should not be the case.

There is a salt lake in Cangzhou, which is the sea area that Chu Ji said to Zhao Xie before. The people of this era uniformly called the waters that can produce salt as the sea, but in fact, the Cangzhou Sea is a large inland salt lake.

Salt production places have always been the least short of money. But outside Cangzhou City, less than a hundred miles away, there is a Luoxia Mountain. There are a large number of mountain bandits on the mountain, who are extremely vicious and do all kinds of evil. Every year, most of the salt produced by the Cangzhou salt plant is intercepted by them during transportation.

In the past, there were also state pastors who sent troops to suppress bandits. However, there are many mountain bandits, and they are a group of outlaws. Therefore, all the state pastors who went to Luoxia Mountain to suppress bandits did not survive.

The people in the streets did not know who it was. It was only in the window of the luxurious carriage that they saw a face that was extremely bright, and there was a pale in the show, like a flower about to bloom at the end of spring.

The good-looking young man in the carriage was obviously the owner of the team. They had never seen such a spectacular and vast spectacle. Even Qian Youcai, the biggest corrupt official in their city, has never had such a battle when his family travels.

However, what did they do when they came to a remote and barren place like Cangzhou?