Chapter 122: Ship Model

Great Shun's maritime trade is very developed.

So much so that the Great Shun Emperor likes to use spices to fold salaries.

Before, when he wasn't an official and didn't eat imperial grain, he didn't feel anything, but now Liang Qu felt that this thing was truly wicked.

It's equivalent to you going to work, and suddenly the boss tells you that from today on, wages won't be paid, and everyone should take some inventory home from the warehouse.

The person doing this is the Emperor. You have to agree even if you don't want to, a typical forced sale.

For example, pepper is twenty taels for one hundred jin, and your monthly salary is twenty taels, so you are given ten taels of silver plus fifty jin of pepper.

If it were just like this, it would be fine; at most, it would take more effort to exchange it for money.

But the most pit-father thing is that when it is issued, it is indeed folded according to the market price, but when you take the folded pepper out to sell, you will find that the price of spices is no longer this price!

The cost price of spices is one tael for one hundred jin, and the profit difference is twenty times higher when folded to officials.

The existence of maritime trade has caused the supply of spices in the market to surge, and the market price has plummeted.

Maritime trade should have been a good thing that benefits the country and the people and promotes development.

But everyone pays the cost of maritime trade, and the money all goes into the royal family's pocket. Although I heard that this emperor is not bad and the money is used for proper business, it is really hard to hold back.

It is said that there is a lot of protest against maritime trade in the court and the public.

Liang Qu only hopes that when he receives his salary, he won't receive a large bag of spices that are not very valuable.

A ten-year-old girl who can't do anything costs four or five taels.

Those with skills and fair skin cost at least ten or twenty taels, and some cost over a hundred taels. It is simply not something he can consider at present.

It's better to hire a servant woman. A day of meals costs a few copper coins, and if you don't provide meals, you can get it for ten copper coins.

Cheap and easy to use.

Liang Qu calculated the expenses and income on paper, folded it up after calculating, took the dragon tendon and Sturgeon King meat, and went to the Jianghuai marshes to find the three beasts.

The weather wasn't hot, about ten degrees, and coupled with the fact that monster meat rots much slower, it was still very fresh after one night.

When the boat reached the lotus root, Liang Qu knocked on the oar. Cannot-Move and Fist-Sized Crab floated out of the water, and the Sky-Water Centipede A-Wei crawled down from his wrist, floating freely on the water.

I don't know if it's because of puberty, but Fist-Sized Crab has grown to a height of 1.4 or 1.5 meters now, very fierce, and its armor is harder than refined steel, completely capable

The downside is that Quan Tou can no longer get on the boat or stand at the bow; it is too wide and heavy, making it easy to weigh the bow down.

Liang Qu divided the sturgeon meat into four portions—one small, one medium, and two large—and distributed them according to size to Awei, Quan Tou, and Bu Neng Dong.

When he took out the last portion of fish meat and looked around, he did not see the fat catfish.

"Strange, why don't I see A-Fei?"

Liang Qu scratched his head and actively sensed the fat catfish's location in his mind, only to be stunned to discover that the fat catfish was extremely far away from him.

Is this location the center of the deep-water zone?

How did A-Fei get over there?

Crossing the territories of numerous spirit monsters, great spirit monsters, and demons, all the way to the core of the deep-water zone?

Most importantly, its vital signs were excellent!

Liang Qu truly couldn't figure it out. Just as he was about to contact the fat catfish, he discovered that it was rapidly leaving the deep-water zone and approaching the shallow-water zone, its entire movement speed terrifyingly fast!

Liang Qu: "???"

Is it flying?

More than a quarter of an hour later, having received Liang Qu's summons and bid farewell to Brother Toad, the fat catfish traversed the undercurrent channel once more, dizzy and disoriented as it plunged into the silt.

Pulling its head out of the water, the fat catfish swayed unsteadily for a while. Once it regained its senses and identified the direction, it quickly approached Liang Qu's position.

By the time the fat catfish neared the boat, nearly half an hour had passed.

Arcs of water surged on the surface, and a massive volume of water slid down the fat catfish's black back, turning into white foam.

As soon as it surfaced, without waiting for Liang Qu to ask, it poked its head onto the boat, dropped a fiery red feather, and then frantically flicked its catfish whiskers, sending a jumble of words through their mental link.

"Undercurrent."

"Brother Toad."

"Trade."

The term "Brother Toad" was too abstract; Liang Qu didn't react for a moment, especially while looking at that familiar fiery feather.

Isn't this a Redfire Mourning Feather?

How did another one appear?

Liang Qu furrowed his brows into a frown, his brain spinning wildly, trying his best to deduce the whole sequence of events from the fat catfish's limited vocabulary.

"You discovered an undercurrent, a channel, and after entering it, you were transported to the side of a giant toad?"

The fat catfish nodded.

"You acknowledged the toad as your big brother and promised to bring it complete boats, and in exchange, it gives you things?"

The fat catfish nodded vigorously.

Liang Qu stood alone at the bow of the boat, pacing in circles, and picked up the Redfire Mourning Feather to examine it again.

The heat was far less intense than the one he had seen last time, and the aura was not strong—it was very weak.

It was clear that this was not a Redfire Mourning Feather infused with the essence of a Redfire Bird, but just a very ordinary Redfire Bird feather. The material was decent and could be used to weave clothing to sell to wealthy ladies, but it couldn't be used to forge magic treasures.

Unbelievable, truly unbelievable.

The spherical black shadow that slaughtered the Redfire Bird was still vivid in Liang Qu's mind; he had almost been knocked over by the aftershock, which was truly awe-inspiring.

At the time, he had guessed it was a toad, but he hadn't expected it to actually be one.

Having seen the strength of the Sturgeon King, he could be certain that the toad's strength was definitely not that of an ordinary demon, but a great demon, and perhaps even one of the stronger ones among great demons!

From A-Fei's fragmented words, it was clear that the toad had extremely high intelligence, even possessing its own interests and aesthetics, and liked to collect beautiful boats.

Just in one night, how did a great demon and a small spirit monster become sworn brothers?

To the point of giving a Redfire Bird feather as a greeting gift?

Seeming to see Liang Qu's confusion.

The fat catfish patted its belly, indicating that the status of its newly acknowledged big brother in its heart was far from being as lofty as the Heavenly God.

Liang Qu: "..."

He took out the sturgeon meat, let the fat catfish eat first, and sat by the side of the boat to think.

As he saw it, the so-called exchange was trading things the toad didn't want for boat models.

That was a real great demon!

Things a great demon didn't want were still treasures!

The fat catfish hadn't been able to distinguish between an ordinary feather and a Redfire Mourning Feather this time, which was why it had brought the wrong one. If it had recognized it, wouldn't it have brought back a feather worth hundreds of gold?

One boat exchanged for a few feathers would be thousands of gold, tens of thousands of silver taels!

Only, where to find intact boats...

Liang Qu roughly guessed where the toad got its current boats; it was highly likely from the ancient battlefield before.

This meant the ancient battlefield was actually in the deep-water zone, so relying on digging up sunken ships wouldn't work.

Building a large ship wasn't cheap either. If he were to build a two-masted ship from scratch, it would cost several thousand taels—a deal that would neither lose nor gain money.

Could he scale it down and build a boat model?

A two-masted ship is dozens of meters long; if he made a scale replica of six or seven meters, spending a hundred taels of silver shouldn't be a problem, right?

Anyway, the toad isn't using it for transport, but for viewing. A miniature one could be made even more exquisite, perhaps carving flowers on the mast.

And besides boats, is the toad interested in other things?

Like a Luban lock or something...