xymnovel Chapter 56 Don't you deserve to die?
Chapter 56 Don't you deserve to die?
Li Shoujie took a bath at Tongfu Inn and asked the waiter to empty the bathwater. He was about to ask the waiter for recommendations and order some food when there was a light knock at the door. When he opened the door, he saw Xiao Tao standing there.
"Why are you back? Did you not get selected? Is Wang Lu that picky?"
Xiao Tao then spoke up slightly, "Esteemed guest, my young master wishes to invite you to dinner in the private room to discuss business matters. I wonder if you are available and would be so kind as to grace us with your presence?"
Li Shoujie was taken aback. He pulled Xiao Tao inside, closed the door, and asked in a low voice, "What's going on? Do you suspect me? Why did you invite me to dinner?"
"I don't know either, they said they needed to buy alum."
"Buy alum?"
Li Shoujie was taken aback. He had brought alum over to use as bait, but he didn't expect someone to take the bait so quickly, and the one who took the bait was Wang Lu, whom he valued highly.
"Are you sure you don't suspect me, and this isn't a test?"
"It shouldn't be. The innkeeper casually mentioned to him that you had stored a large amount of alum at the warehouse today and asked if you could resell it. Wang Lu suddenly said that he was actually looking to buy alum and asked the innkeeper to help introduce you. He said he wanted to treat you to a meal, but I volunteered and said I would come directly to treat you."
"He wants to buy alum? Why would someone who runs an inn need alum?"
"That's hard to say. Could it be that they're planning to sell it?"
"The items are kept at their own inn. I gave them a full 30% commission as a middleman. Rather than reselling them themselves, they'd rather introduce them to me. Strange, very strange. Never mind, I won't think about it anymore. He'll find out when he meets me."
Immediately, Li Shoujie took off his clothes in front of Xiao Tao. Xiao Tao was not shy at all, but instead took out new clothes from her bundle and gave them to Li Shoujie to change into.
"By the way, young master, Wang Lu just mentioned that the imperial court is very likely to conscript you again, and you may also be going to the battlefield. I wonder if you will be going with the Third Prince."
"Zhao Kuangyin still wants to conquer his father?" Li Shoujie's eyebrows furrowed into a deep frown, and he let out a long sigh.
Xiao Tao led Li Shoujie into the private room, where some dishes were already laid out on the table. Wang Lu was also taken aback when he saw the newcomer.
Then he clasped his hands in a fist and said, "This must be Brother Li. Master Li is much younger than I thought. Please sit down, please sit down."
"The shop owner is truly a young and promising individual; it's quite surprising."
"Hey, I'm not young, I'm obviously just a kid. Come, come, sit down, have a taste of the dishes at our Tongfu Inn. I personally trained the chef for a couple of days, and his skills are pretty good."
"After only two days of training, it's already the number one delicacy in Kaifeng. If it were trained for a few more days, what would become of it?"
"What's difficult for some is easy for others. I have secret recipes for all my dishes, and those recipes are more important than the skill itself."
Li Shoujie sat down calmly, curiously took a bite of a large meat bun, and then his eyes lit up unconsciously: "So soft, so white, how can it be so soft? Good, good, really delicious! This can't be achieved by just adding alum. What's the secret recipe?"
"What are you saying? If I could tell you, would it still be called a secret recipe?"
"Ha, that's true."
"Master, let's get down to business. How much is your alum?"
How much do you want?
How much do you have?
"How many do you want, I have?"
"Yes, I'll take as much as you have, but where is your alum from? I wouldn't dare take it if it's from the Northern Han Dynasty. As long as it's not from the Northern Han Dynasty, I'll take as much as you have."
"I have as many as you want."
Wang Lu does indeed need a large amount of alum now, but it's not that he needs it, it's that Wang Jun needs it.
This means handing over the brick and tile factory to Han Wei. Actually, the bricks themselves don't require much technology; the real technology lies in the tiles.
The acid and alkali both played a significant role in Wang Jun's ability to fire glazed tiles so well at low temperatures.
Now that the factory is to be handed over to Han Wei, Wang Jun will naturally have to teach him how to make tiles. However, Wang Jun does not want to actually teach Han Wei how to make acids and alkalis. That is his skill as a transmigrator, his trump card.
So Wang Jun thought of alum.
The so-called alum is actually potassium aluminum sulfate. According to Wang Jun, as long as he has alum, he can use sulfuric acid and alum to make aluminum hydroxide, which, when applied to the tiles, will produce better results when fired.
He can just give Hanwei aluminum hydroxide directly; there's no need to give him sulfuric acid. Besides, alum itself can be used as a raw material for producing sulfuric acid, so there's no waste.
Besides aluminum hydroxide, alum can be used to make quite a few other things. Wang Jun said he should give him some time to figure it out. Maybe he could use this stuff to produce aluminum on a small scale. Although, he didn't know what use producing aluminum on a small scale would be.
That's a good idea, but unfortunately, this stuff is extremely rare in Kaifeng, and you can't even buy it on the market. This is because the main production area for alum is in Hedong, and it's almost nonexistent elsewhere.
In the first two months, the Song Dynasty had just been founded, and merchants from other places didn't come much. This month, however, merchants did come, but Li Jun directly sent troops to occupy Tianjing Pass.
Alum was a controlled substance by the imperial court, and with Li Jun sending troops to lock it up, it was almost impossible for ordinary people to buy any. Wang Jun had been quite troubled by this matter these past few days.
It just so happens that we've run into this, so let's call this alum dealer over and ask him. But we still need to investigate a bit.
He wasn't worried that the person was a smuggler; at worst, he could just pay Zhang Mei the taxes later, and that would be fine. There was no middleman taking a cut. But he was a little afraid that it was alum from the Northern Han, which would be aiding the enemy.
"You can have as many as I want? You're just boasting, aren't you, big boss?"
"This is no exaggeration."
"I want 10,000 jin."
"have."
"One hundred thousand catties?"
"have."
"Two hundred thousand catties?"
"Yes."
"Two hundred thousand catties of smuggled alum without any documentation, you think you can transport it all out? Brother, aren't you afraid of biting off more than you can chew?"
"If the shop owner really wants it, you can pay after receiving the goods, without a deposit. You can pay after you see the goods, just consider it as making friends with the shop owner."
"Hiss~" Wang Lu gasped and said, "Big Boss, are you serious? Where exactly is this alum from?"
"Jinzhou alum, actually, you can get it if you want to."
"I heard the Zhaoyi Army has already sealed off Tianjing Pass. How is the Grand Master managing to get everything out? Did he take a detour?"
"The Zhaoyi Army... has only occupied Tianjing Pass, not blocked it. As long as you have some connections within the Zhaoyi Army, you can still get supplies out."
"What are you saying? There's going to be a war over there soon. It's dangerous and dangerous. Even if Li Jun is your father, you won't be able to transport it out. Your alum comes from Tianjing Pass."
"Then we've probably wasted our time talking. How about this, before a fight breaks out, hurry up and get me as much as you can. Let's do a one-off deal."
"Why does the shopkeeper say that? Li Taiwei, the military governor of Zhaoyi Army, has no intention of rebelling. He even sent his eldest son as a hostage to the capital! Is the court trying to make an example of him?"
"Why would Li Jun want to occupy Tianjing Pass if he didn't want to rebel? He could send troops to occupy Tianjing Pass on one hand, and send his son to the capital on the other hand as a sign of truce."
"Should he wait a few more months until winter, so he can unite with the Northern Han, or even lure the Khitans south, and repeat the story of Shi Jingtang?"
"How could Grand Commandant Li possibly follow the example of Shi Jingtang?"
"Why not? What is the Grand Master's relationship with Li Yun? You're a member of the Zhaoyi Army, I'm certain of you now. Can you swear to God that the Zhaoyi Army will never rebel?"
"I……"
Li Shoujie was momentarily speechless and had no words to reply. He could only say resentfully, "In this day and age, which warlord can guarantee they will never rebel? We, the Zhaoyi Army, are merely arrogant."
Of the more than twenty large and small warlords across the land, many are arrogant and self-reliant. What makes you so certain that Grand Commandant Li will rebel, and that the court will attack the Zhaoyi Army first? No matter how you look at it, Yuan Yan of the Baoyi Army is far more arrogant than Grand Commandant Li.
"What you're saying is ridiculous. Isn't Zhaoyi Army adjacent to Northern Han? And isn't Northern Han connected to Liao? Yuan Yan, at most he occupies Tongguan. Who can he collude with? Later Shu? We'd love for him to really collude with Later Shu, to lure the Later Shu army out and let them fight in Guanzhong. How can that be the same?"
Li Shoujie: "The Zhaoyi Army is close to the Northern Han, so they deserve to die."
"Isn't that because you're arrogant? You're so close to the Northern Han, yet you dare to be arrogant, even daring to send troops to occupy Tianjing Pass and act like you're holding onto your own power. Don't you deserve to die?"