Follow General Cao to mix the Three Kingdoms

Chapter 28 Energy
A long line of officials waited on both sides of the east gate of Xu Capital City. Cao always showed enough face to Chen Deng. He not only mobilized the officials to see him off, but also went out of the city to see him off. After a clean Chen Deng, Ambassador Chen bowed slowly and solemnly to Prime Minister Cao, who was wrapped in a down jacket in the cold and snowy weather, and then slowly boarded the BMW that Prime Minister Cao had given him.

But before entering the carriage, this guy still didn't forget to smile at Wang Hou, who was standing in the line of seeing off officials, and brushed off the down coat of the same style as Shan Cheng, before he lowered his head and entered. The sad old face turned bitter.

move!The next one is finally mine!
More than a dozen knights opened the way, and Chen Deng's carriage gradually disappeared in the snowy mist. His walk, like a fuse burning forward, faintly ignited the gunpowder smoke over Xuzhou.

But that was the turn of the Chinese New Year. The farewell party was over. As the leader, Prime Minister Cao rode back to the city first. The dozen or so colleagues around him were walking away holding their noses like the God of Plague. Wang Hou couldn't help being stunned, and then shook his head with a wry smile, and walked towards the place where his carriage was parked with his arms folded.

This is what happened to the offending nobles. Wherever he went, there were many officials in the capital pointing at his back and making irresponsible remarks with contempt on his face, and some people deliberately pinched their noses with a mocking look.

Both Guo Jia and Cao Hongjie went to drive with the prime minister, and Chen Deng returned home, leaving him alone. This situation is really lonely.

But it's better to be lonely than the Yi tribe!Reassuring himself, Wang Hou walked towards his carriage in a listless manner.

Let the master wilt, and the servants should follow suit. It is estimated that Wang Ganzi and the others also suffered setbacks from other servants, and they also looked listless, with their heads drooping all the way.

However, after wandering back to Cangcao Mansion, Wang Hou was in a better mood. After a month of tossing around, the place is at least somewhat homely. High-legged sofas, stools, and tables were also knocked out one by one. At any rate, you don’t need to kneel to eat when you eat at home, and you can sit comfortably.

What's more important is that Wang Houyao's large oak bathtub has been built. There is nothing more comfortable than taking a hot bath in the cold weather. Anyway, I don't have to go to the prime minister's mansion to go to work. Jumping up and down, Wang Hou directly slapped Wang Fu who came out to greet him.

"Boil the water, my lord, I want to take a rest!"

"Little obedience!"

…………

Water in the morning and water in the afternoon. As an otaku, Wang Hou is extraordinarily careful about his own three-acre land. In the renovation project of the palace, he just solved the problem of the servants’ accommodation on the heating kang, and immediately made a move here. hands.

The entire bathroom was raised by about [-] centimeters, and the bathroom floor of about ten square meters was completely paved with a low kang. Porcelain in this era was not yet developed, let alone tiles, so the bathtub was still made of cypress wood. On the inner wall, there is a water injection port on the wall. The maid injects the hot water from the boiler room through the pottery hole, and the whole bathroom quickly becomes steamy. As soon as the clothes are hung on the outer screen, Wang Hou jumps comfortably. After entering the bathtub, leaning on the specially built slope, I rolled my eyes so comfortably.

Soaking in the warm water, Wang Hou's mind became restless again.

He is now living on his laurels, and the money and food to support the operation of the entire palace are all from the group he tricked Chen Deng into paying tribute to the Emperor of the Han Dynasty. The only income left is the four hundred shi salary given by Prime Minister Cao. The money is short of food, and the four hundred shi were given to him directly in the form of land. The five hundred acres of land under his name on the Funiu Mountains are equivalent to his salary for more than ten years. All the fertilizers have been monopolized, and next year's harvest will definitely be more than four hundred shi, but that will also be next autumn.

This is the troubled times at the end of the Han Dynasty, and there are too many variables that can happen in a year.

There is also Cao Hongjie. On the night in Xuzhou, Wang Hou had already crossed off the list of "female secretaries" who were "close to Mr. Cao" by Mr. Cao, but she followed Mr. Cao every day. She was either Mr. Cao's adopted daughter, or Mr. Cao The chief niece, niece and other relatives of the Cao family, they are all like that, Wang Hou always has an explanation for Cao Hongjie, but with his current reputation, wealth, and social status, he asked Mr. Cao to marry Cao Hongjie He seems to be really difficult.

Then you have to toss!

But where to start tossing it?In the past, when I read novels, those time-traveling gods made their fortunes by doing business. Now Wang Hou has a lot of goods that can be sold as commodities, because in this era, there is no such thing as the most ready-made ones. He hasn’t worn them yet. The down jacket and the hot pot that Chen Deng almost bit his tongue on, but in just a blink of an eye, Wang Hou gave up these two things again.

On the one hand, those who have money to change into thick clothes these days are all high-ranking officials and nobles, at least they are gentry. He offended both the Taiyuan Wang family and Hongnong Yang family, the bosses of the gentry, and on the other hand, he is in the camp of Mr. Cao's meritorious service. It is still a small shrimp, and the markets on both sides seem to be extremely difficult to develop.

On the other hand, Xudu really does not have such a business environment. This is the political capital specially built by Mr. Cao to welcome Emperor Xiandi of the Han Dynasty. The government office is the mansion where the dignitaries live, basically leaving no environment for commerce, and outside the city are also farms of big families. In the feudal era, each farm was an independent economy, cloth, food, iron utensils, pottery Medicinal materials and so on are all produced from the farm, and the serfs who farm for the nobles in the farm are also poor and only have a suit of clothes left. You let them eat hot pot?forget it!
If you want to do business, you have to get some necessities that are indispensable for people in this era!What are the must-haves?food?The more than 4000 millet seeds in the warehouse must be necessities. If I sell them, I will eat them, and I dare not sell them for emergency!salt?Naturally, the economics of that thing will definitely not be able to be produced. With the relationship with Chen Deng, it is not impossible to pull a little bit more. The problem is that Mr. Cao also counts on this thing to make a fortune!Wang Hou didn't want to make trouble with his head yet.

What else?Chai, rice, oil, salt, soy sauce, vinegar and tea, people's desires are so low in this era, it seems that more than half of them are not necessities!What else is there to get rich on?
Pao's head was dizzy, and he was holding on to the side wall of the bathtub. He wanted to climb out, but at this moment, a burst of dissenting voices at the door came to his ears.

The person who spoke was Wang Ganzi and Wang Fu, father and son, their tone was full of complaints, Wang Ganzi whimpered sourly like a complaining woman: "Father, you should always persuade the head of the family! Our family is also a noble family. Famous family, go to someone else's house to collect Yexiang! Now people call us Yexiang Mansion, and when we meet when we go out, the family members of other houses laugh at us, and the children can't hold their heads up. How can we live like this!"

But Wang Fu, who has always been good-tempered, was very irritable this time, and he slapped his strong son on the back of the head in a fit of anger.

"How did this old man teach you? You must keep your duty! Is it your duty to talk about the master's family behind your back? If others say you, you can't hold your head up? In such a huge Xudu, which mansion suddenly has corn and has corn? Broth? The servants of Honglu Mansion and Diannong Mansion did not have charcoal fires to keep warm, and more than a dozen of them froze to death. As soon as the Patriarch came back, he built a kang for you, so why don’t you say that you can sleep warmly at night? You heartless thing!"

With a creak and a burst of heat, Wang Hou hurriedly opened the door in a robe, and asked excitedly, "What's the matter? What's the matter? Why did Da Honglu and Diannong Duwei's family freeze to death?"

Shocked, the two father and son almost fell to the ground at the door, full of grief, Wang Fu kowtowed and kowtowed back tremblingly.

"Master, this year, the weather in Xudu is extremely cold. In addition, the mountains have been almost cut down in the past two years. There are many people in several houses in Xudu. The carbon fire cannot be allocated, and many people have froze to death!"

"Thanks to the kindness of the master, our house didn't freeze to death. This beast is not grateful. The old man beat you to death!"

As he said that, Wang Fu slapped Wang Ganzi on the back of the head angrily again, and the silly, thick, black fellow shrank his neck, but Wang Hou was waving his hands anxiously after watching this scene. .

"Okay, okay, don't act! There is really no firewood on the mountain?"

"Back to the master, there is really no firewood!"

…………

Before the crossing, Wang Hou went out with his old mother, and his old mother still sighed, now that there are so many straws, weeds and dry branches, no one picks them up, what a waste, if in the early years, they would have been picked up by others to burn firewood. I haven't felt anything yet, and now he believes it.

Xuchang is not far from Funiu Mountain, and most of the whole territory is plains. My good guy, it was finally close to hills and forests. It was chopped down like Uncle Ge's forehead, and there was almost no grass left!The whole mountain and the whole ridge are bare there!
Not to mention weeds and shrubs, the forests that should have been dense were also cut down, and Mr. Cao took them to build a palace for Emperor Xiandi of the Han Dynasty. Even the roots of the trees were dug out and burned for the common people. No wonder In later generations, only the Northeast has virgin forests. According to the speed at which humans plunder nature, how many virgin forests have to be cut down.

Firewood, rice, oil, salt, soy sauce, vinegar tea, firewood ranks first, and Wang Hou, who is either natural gas or gas tanks, only now realizes the importance of this thing. No wonder Jiang Ziya’s apprentice in Fengshen Romance has to confess his identity as a woodcutter , and the Water Margin also mentioned many times that the heroes of Liangshan carried firewood in the past. In this era, fuel is also a scarce product, and it is also an indispensable means of production for ordinary people's life, which is closely related to the life at that time.

Looking at this bare mountain, feeling the suffering in the world, Wang Hou's sympathetic eyes were as bright as a light bulb for the hardworking people who were suffering from the cold, and like a husky released from home, he ran half the hillside, full of people. Hastily grabbed the panting Old Wang Fu by the shoulders, and asked excitedly.

"Wang Fu, last time you said that the woodcutter found the pile of carbon, where is it?"

(End of this chapter)