xymnovel Chapter 50: Business Acumen That Was Like Getting Your Butt Burning, and the First Circuit Breaker i
Chapter 50: Business Acumen That Was Like Getting Your Butt Burning, and the First Circuit Breaker i
Inside the canyon of Devil City, the heatwave was like a pair of invisible giant hands, tightly gripping everyone's throat.
The withered poplar trees on both sides crackled and popped as the oil fueled their flames, as if demons from hell were reveling in the spectacle. Thick smoke, following the canyon's contours, was whipped by the gale into a black dragon that swirled and roared across the narrow sky.
"Cough cough... Old Liu! My beard is burnt!"
Fan Kuai emerged from the smoke, waving a damp cloth in his hand. His already dark face looked even more as if he had just been dug out of a coal pile, with only the whites of his eyes and teeth remaining white.
Liu Bang hid behind a huge Yardang landform, having long since thrown away the peacock feather fan he used to fan—that thing only produced hot air. He was covering his mouth and nose with a piece of silk soaked in urine, his eyes watering from the smoke.
"Stop howling! A burnt beard can grow back, but a burnt life is gone!" Liu Bang cursed, kicking a box beside him. "These Hun barbarians, they don't even check the wind direction when they set fires! With such a strong wind, aren't they afraid of burning themselves to death?"
"They are not afraid."
A cold, hard voice rang out. Xiang Yu, carrying his massive, door-like sword, strode out from the dust. The leather armor he wore was scorched and curled at the edges, but his double pupils remained terrifyingly calm, even carrying a hint of excitement.
"Because the wind is blowing this way. This is called 'the fire borrowing the wind's power'." Xiang Yu glanced at the thick smoke overhead, which looked like a lid. "Moreover, this canyon is a windy spot. The fire is like adding firewood to a stove, and we are the meat in the pot."
"What do we do then? Charge out?" Fan Kuai pulled out two butcher knives. "Let's fight them!"
"Fight my ass." Liu Bang grabbed him. "There are archers everywhere outside, and they're poisoned too. If you rush out now, you'll just be delivering kebabs to them—the kind that's crispy on the outside and tender on the inside."
Liu Bang turned to look at Xiang Yu, a shrewd glint in his eyes.
"Old Xiang, you're strong and smart. Look at this terrain, doesn't it look like... a chimney?"
Xiang Yu was taken aback, then looked up at the steep cliffs on both sides and then at the narrow wind gap in front of him.
"It's like this. The wind is blowing in from the front, and the fire is burning from the back. We're stuck in the middle, completely drained of our breath."
"Right!" Liu Bang snapped his fingers. "Since it's a chimney, let's block up the chimney opening!"
"Block it up?" Fan Kuai's eyes widened. "Brother, that's a wind gap dozens of meters wide! What are we going to use to block it? Fill it with our lives?"
Liu Bang chuckled and pointed to the "enhanced version of the thunderbolts" that were carried on the backs of the camels behind him, which were originally intended to be used to blow up the walls of the Loulan royal palace.
"We don't have stones, but we have explosives."
"I've checked the cliff ahead; it's a wind-eroded, precarious rock, already teetering on the brink of collapse. All we need is a quick, decisive strike..."
Liu Bang made an explosion gesture.
"Boom! The rocks collapsed, blocking the air vent. Without wind, the fire will weaken. And..."
A ruthless glint flashed in Liu Bang's eyes.
"The archers lying in ambush there will also get a taste of what it's like to be a 'homemade plane'."
Xiang Yu understood.
He looked at Liu Bang, a rare hint of admiration appearing on his lips.
"Liu Ji, although you are a scoundrel, this 'dirty trick' is really effective."
"I'll go." Xiang Yu grabbed a bundle of thunderclaps as easily as carrying a bunch of grapes. "You guys find a good place to hide. It might make quite a commotion later."
……
Above the canyon, at the edge of the cliff.
Zhao Cheng was lying behind a rock, holding a crude telescope in his hand, a cruel smile on his lips.
"Burn them! Burn them! Burn all these Qin people to ashes!"
"Ying Zheng, you ruined my future, so I will destroy your elite troops."
Beside him, Modu sat on his horse, his brow slightly furrowed.
"Mr. Zhao, isn't the fire too big? I still need those horses. If all the horses burn to death, how will I build a cavalry?"
"Rest assured, Great Chanyu," Zhao Cheng said ominously. "The Qin people will protect the horses in the middle. Once the fire is out, we'll collect the spoils..."
Before he could finish speaking...
Suddenly, a black figure burst out of the smoke below.
The man wasn't on horseback; he was running on foot. He leaped among the rocks like a nimble cheetah, the large bundle he carried looking particularly glaring in the firelight.
"Who is that?" Maodun exclaimed in surprise. "What does he want?"
Zhao Cheng adjusted the focus of the binoculars and got a clear look at the person's face.
"Xiang...Xiang Yu?!"
Before he could react, Xiang Yu had already rushed to the bottom of the cliff. He stopped abruptly, exerted force with his waist and abdomen, roared, and hurled the bundle of thunderbolts in his hand fiercely upwards toward the precipice beneath Zhao Cheng and the others.
"Oh no! Run!" Zhao Cheng screamed, scrambling backward as if he were crawling on the ground.
But it was too late.
It was an engineering explosive with an extremely short fuse, improved by the Imperial Household Department.
"BOOM—!!!"
A loud bang, as if the earth had cracked open.
A massive fireball shot into the air, and Zhao Cheng felt his feet sink into the ground, his entire body flying through the air along with the collapsing rocks. He flailed his arms and legs in mid-air, watching helplessly as his meticulously prepared ambush position vanished in an instant.
Thousands of tons of rock collapsed with a deafening roar, like a mountain collapsing and the earth splitting apart, crashing heavily into the entrance of the canyon amidst billowing dust.
The howling wind suddenly stopped.
It felt like being suddenly grabbed by the neck by an invisible hand.
Without the help of strong winds, the fire in the canyon quickly subsided, and the thick smoke, having lost its suction, began to swirl and settle in place.
"Cough cough cough..."
Liu Bang emerged from the sand and spat out a mouthful of dirt.
"It's done!"
"Old Xiang! You're not dead, are you?"
From the ruins, a large hand reached out and pushed aside a boulder. Xiang Yu, covered in dust, crawled out, shook his head, and shook off the dust.
"I won't die." Xiang Yu spat out a mouthful of blood, his eyes fierce. "However, those bastards up there should be almost all dead by now."
……
On the cliff top.
Maodun escaped the disaster because he was far away. However, his hundreds of personal guards, along with the unfortunate Zhao Cheng, all fell down with the landslide.
Maodun looked at the blocked entrance to the canyon and the Qin army crawling out of the ruins, his face turning ashen.
"Madmen...they're all madmen!"
"How dare they blast the mountain!"
He knew that the ambush had failed again. Without the advantage of terrain, his archers had no chance of winning against Xiang Yu and his "security guards" armed with repeating crossbows.
"withdraw!"
Maodun gritted his teeth.
"To Ferghana! Once I get the Ferghana horses, I'll definitely come back!"
……
The flames of war in the Western Regions are still burning, while in Xianyang, thousands of miles away, a war without gunpowder has also entered its climax.
Daqin Grain Exchange.
This building, located in the heart of the Epang Palace commercial street, is now the craziest place in all of Xianyang.
The huge blackboard was covered with densely written "futures prices" for various grains.
"Millet! One hundred coins!"
"Wheat! One hundred and twenty coins!"
A group of merchants dressed in silk robes were waving their credentials and shouting, their faces flushed.
"Buy! Buy 10,000 shi (a unit of dry measure) for me!"
"Prices have gone up! They've gone up again! I heard there's fighting in the west, and the demand for military rations has surged! Prices will definitely rise again next year!"
"I have inside information! Magistrate Liu has made a fortune in the Western Regions, bringing back hundreds of cartloads of gold! With so much money, how can grain prices not rise?"
This is the "futures market" created by Qin Shi Huang.
Originally intended to stabilize prices and allow merchants to share the risks, Ying Zheng underestimated human greed and the power of leverage.
Driven by speculators, this futures market has become a high-stakes gamble. Merchants only need to pay a 10% margin to buy and sell ten times the amount of grain.
At this moment, in a corner.
Several former nobles from the six kingdoms were gathered together, their faces bearing sinister smiles.
"Is everything arranged?"
"Don't worry. We've joined forces and bought up all the 'bullish' contracts on the market. If the price rises another 10%, that 'short-selling' Royal Grain Depot will go bankrupt!"
"Hmph, Ying Zheng wants to use this to extract money from us? We'll turn the tables and empty his treasury!"
They are trying to create a "short squeeze".
If prices keep rising, the imperial court, as the largest seller, will have to pay out huge sums for the price difference.
……
Inside the Qilin Hall.
Li Si held a document of data, his hands trembling like a leaf.
"Your Majesty! Something terrible has happened! Grain prices... grain prices have gone mad!"
"The price of virtual grain on the exchange has now risen to 150 coins per shi! That's twice as expensive as the physical grain!"
"Those nobles are buying like crazy; they're forcing us to abdicate! If we can't produce that much grain or pay that much money by the delivery date, Qin's credibility will be ruined!"
Ying Zheng sat on the dragon throne, holding the purple clay teapot in his hand, but his expression was unusually calm.
"One hundred and fifty coins?"
"Tsk tsk, they really dare to hype this up."
Ying Zheng put down the teapot and looked at the light screen in his mind.
"Little G".
"Is this what you call a 'financial bubble'?"
Yes, Your Majesty.
This is a classic example of a "short squeeze." They used their financial advantage to artificially drive up prices.
This is indeed a difficult situation in a free market.
【but……】
[Your Majesty, this is the Great Qin Dynasty. You are not a participant in the market; you are the market's... administrator.]
Ying Zheng smiled.
He laughed like a cat watching a mouse fall into a rice jar.
"administrator?"
"No, I am the one who makes the rules."
Ying Zheng stood up, walked to the entrance of the main hall, and looked at the bustling exchange in the distance.
"Li Si".
"Your subject is here."
"Take my imperial sword and go to the stock exchange."
"What...what are you doing? Killing someone?" Li Si was startled.
"Killing people is too low-class." Ying Zheng shook his head. "Go, smash that big bronze gong that's used to open and close the market."
"Smashed...smashed?"
"Yes. That's what 'circuit breaker' means."
A hint of mockery flashed in Ying Zheng's eyes.
"Tell those crazy merchants that the exchange is suspending trading for three days due to a 'technical glitch'."
"Then, transport all the 'strategic grain reserves' you have in your hands, that is, the one million shi of new rice that was just transported from Sichuan and Lingnan, to the gates of Xianyang."
"Spread them out! Pile them up like a mountain!"
Listed price: Fifty coins per shi. In stock! No quantity limit!
Li Si was stunned.
One million shi? Fifty qian?
If this were released, the futures market...
"Your Majesty, are you going to... flip the table?"
"That's right," Ying Zheng said coldly. "They want to gamble, so I'll let them know that the house never loses."
"When there are plenty of readily available goods, the 'paper' they bought at high prices is just waste paper."
"This is called... 'dimensional reduction attack'."
……
The next day, in Xianyang City.
When the exchange's doors were locked and a wooden sign reading "System Upgrade, Trading Suspended" was hung up, all the frenzied merchants were dumbfounded.
Then, an even more explosive piece of news came.
At the city gate, dozens of grain mounds rose from the ground. The government posted a notice: New rice has arrived; buy as much as you like for fifty coins!
"What? Fifty coins?"
"Then what about the receipt I bought with 150 coins...?"
"It's over! It's all over!"
Those nobles who had attempted to force the government to open the gates, upon seeing the mountain of grain, fainted instantly.
Prices have collapsed.
Panic selling began. But the exchanges were closed, and they couldn't sell their shares even if they wanted to, forced to watch their wealth shrink to nothing.
Three days later, the exchange reopened.
Grain prices plummeted to their daily limit, returning to the normal level of sixty qian.
The imperial court not only did not lose money, but also confiscated all the margin deposits of those nobles who had suffered margin losses.
The national treasury is full again.
Ying Zheng sat in the Qilin Hall, listening to Li Si report the results of the battle, and took a sip of red tea in a pleasant mood.
"This financial war is more exciting than actual warfare."
"However, it's time to settle down."
Ying Zheng looked westward.
"Has news arrived from the west?"
Zhao Gao quickly presented a newly decoded optical signal telegram.
"Your Majesty, it was sent by Liu Bang."
"He and Xiang Yu have already broken out of the Devil City. And... they found a treasure in the ruins."
"baby?"
"It's a person. A... weirdo with blond hair, green eyes, and who can speak bird language."
Liu Bang said that the man claimed to be an explorer from the "Roman Republic" who had gotten lost and was captured by the Xiongnu as a slave.
Ying Zheng's hand suddenly stopped, and the water in the teacup splashed out.
The Romans.
Live.
"Quickly!" Ying Zheng stood up, his eyes gleaming with an unprecedented light.
"Tell Liu Bang to stop doing business! Tell Xiang Yu to stop killing people!"
"Bring this man back to me, safe and sound!"
"I want to see for myself what kind of empire that's as big as the Qin Dynasty really is!"
A confluence of events.
When the First Emperor of the East finally faced the visitors from the West, the wheels of history roared with their heaviest sound.
The Earth has shrunk.