Chapter 161: Red Ocean

Inside a food shop in Mazi Er Dun, several off-duty Killer Squad soldiers were drinking, led by Zhong Laosi.

Zhong Laosi's eyes were bloodshot. He slammed a palm on the table. "Damn it, I don't want to spend every day stuck with pus."

Zhou Shao'er lifted a cup of wine, took a sip, and lazily advised, "Captain, those are called farmer-soldiers. Our whole squad only has twelve men, but those farmer-soldiers number over two hundred."

"Soldiers my ass. I went to see the test unit at Mazi Er Dun. They're all wearing farming clothes, carrying a long spear and a bird gun and they call that a soldier. Just looking at them gives me a headache."

Chen Ying coughed, glanced around at the people in the wine shop, and said quietly, "Captain, the Squad Leader is right. You need to fix this habit of complaining. Maybe Huang Yuan transferred you to oversee farmer-soldiers precisely because you talk too much."

Zhong Laosi glared hard at Chen Ying. This Dongjiang soldier seemed to have completely changed after killing eight Tatars; he talked much more now, and after returning to Weihai he had even asked Zhong Laosi to help him find a wife. Zhong Laosi was in no mood to bother with Chen Ying right now. His own arm had been wounded at Luanzhou — the injury wasn't serious, but it left a knife scar on his face, and he'd been worrying it would hurt his chances of finding a wife.

They had originally belonged to the First Company Headquarters and had been temporarily reassigned to the Second Battalion to rush back to Weihai. Not long after returning, Zhong Laosi received the order to go to the farmer-soldier test unit.

He recalled the farmer-soldiers he'd seen that morning, and fury surged up. "That bunch of farmer-soldiers — our squad could take on a hundred of them."

Another burly man beside him said, "Captain, why not go talk to Company Commander Lu? We're under Lord Dai's command now, but we're still men of the First Battalion. How can the Second Battalion just transfer us around as they please?" This burly man was Liu Yue, a mountain man from Dengzhou, the blade-and-staff fighter in their squad — the one who had killed a man and his horse together at Luanzhou.

Zhong Laosi held it in for a long while, then suddenly deflated and said, "The order was approved by Lord Chen."

The other three shook their heads in unison and said together, "Then what are you complaining about?"

Zhong Laosi gulped down several mouthfuls of wine and went on complaining: "I started out as a long-blade man. Then they said no more long blades, so I switched to training with blade and staff, then got promoted to captain and switched to the flag spear. Now this — they've got me leading farmer-soldiers to drill with firelocks. I've used half the weapons in the Wendeng Camp arsenal. And right, those farmer-soldiers still use long spears — I might have to practice the long spear too."

Zhou Shao'er laughed. "It's exactly a versatile talent like you that Lord Chen values. After you became captain, Huang Yuan even forced you to train with firelocks. You know every weapon — he must have recommended you to Lord Chen."

"That dog. At Luanzhou, if they'd fought the way I do, how could those men at the Guandi Temple have died?"

Liu Yue hurriedly picked up a piece of meat and put it in Zhong Laosi's bowl, saying quietly, "Captain, you mustn't say that carelessly. Lord Chen and Company Commander Lu both praised Huang Yuan for acting decisively. If you talk like that, you're implying Company Commander Lu and Lord Chen were wrong too. Be careful you don't end up with not even farmer-soldiers to lead."

Zhong Laosi chewed furiously with his head down for a while, then said loudly to the three of them, "I've been your captain all this time, and not one of you can come up with a single idea. What damn use are you? To hell with what kind of soldiers I lead, as long as the monthly pay keeps coming. I'm settling down right here in Mazi Er Dun, and I'm not bothering about finding wives for you lot anymore."

Chen Ying stared at Zhong Laosi, dumbfounded. He had been counting on Zhong Laosi to help arrange things. Chen Ying had always been a closed-mouthed gourd who didn't know many people. Just as he was about to plead with Zhong Laosi, Zhou Shao'er laughed beside him: "Who needs you? Zhao Xuan already agreed to help. That mouth of his can talk the dead alive — he'll definitely talk us up for three wives and four concubines."

Chen Ying burst out laughing at that and stopped begging Zhong Laosi. He asked Zhou Shao'er, "Really? My monthly pay adds up to ten taels, and I heard the combat reward this time totals twenty taels. Thirty taels of silver should be enough to build a courtyard."

Liu Yue also started counting on his fingers, his face full of delighted surprise. "Mine's enough too. A single brick-and-tile room only costs four taels. I'll build a single-entry courtyard, six rooms, and bring my parents and younger brother to live here."

"Dream on — prices have gone up," Zhong Laosi said, wiping wine from his mouth. "I asked around yesterday. A single brick-and-tile room is nearly five taels now. I heard all the masons from Weihai have rushed over here, waiting to make money off our silver. If you ask me, don't bother looking for masons. Go build over by the old Wendeng Camp. There are more dun households there, and plenty of them have experience building barracks — the price will be much lower. There are more dun households there too, and the combat battalion camp is there as well. Why are you all rushing to Weihai to join the excitement?"

Liu Yue scratched his head and said, "I just feel Weihai is clean, and everyone looks quite spirited."

Zhong Laosi cursed impatiently, "The Weihai dun households all got land. The ones who didn't get land are reclaiming wasteland on regular days, and their families all do odd jobs in the workshops to earn money, or raise pigs and chickens. Of course they look spirited when they have silver. Think about how pathetic you looked when you first came down from the mountain — so poor you clanked, never even seen a steamed cake. What spirit was there? If you look for a wife and settle down here, you still need them to take a liking to you. Besides, training is all at Wendeng Camp — you can only come back once a year. Settling down just outside the camp area would be much better. If I were a Company Commander, I could send you out on an errand at night for half a shichen, and you could go sleep with your wife."

Liu Yue chuckled foolishly. Zhou Shao'er and Chen Ying, hearing the start of Zhong Laosi's words, also grew a bit hesitant. Weihai was the first place they had stayed; they felt a fondness for it and instinctively wanted to settle their families near Mazi Dun. Outside Wendeng Camp, shacks sprawled everywhere and the environment was poor — only the military camp itself was somewhat cleaner. But after Zhong Laosi's speech, they felt that the Wendeng Camp side might indeed be more convenient.

Zhong Laosi muttered to himself, "Too bad I can't make Company Commander. Leading farmer-soldiers is fine too — off duty, I can just hug my wife and sleep."

"The Wendeng Camp area is designated for military farming and the army. The Baolong River has abundant water, and it's close to the Rushan stockade. Two officials from Ninghai Department have iron mines there, so raw materials are more convenient. The weapons workshops will gradually shift over there. For the weapons workshops and the army, having some depth is also better for defense. Weihai is designated for trade and commerce. Copper coins and commercial products will be produced here for now. In addition, we'll build one port each at Chengshan and Jinghai, supported by mutual-aid dun forts. This way, with Wendeng Camp as the center, there will be ports on the north, east, and south sides, all of which can serve as transshipment ports for maritime trade and southern goods. Then we sell through our commercial network — at minimum, we monopolize the southern goods market in Wendeng, and through wholesale, capture a portion of the southern goods market in Deng-Lai. This way, we can use southern goods to first lay out our commercial network across Deng-Lai."

Chen Xin was discussing the commercial network with Liu Minyou over a map. Liu Minyou listened, then said, "Right now, both Weihai and Wendeng Camp have quite a few shops, mostly run by the gentry and officials, each selling just one type of goods. In the future, we'll build comprehensive retail stores inside our own dun forts, but I only plan to sell essential daily goods — grain, ready-made clothes, salt, tea, sugar, shredded tobacco, and ironware. We won't sell other products, so as not to cut off the merchants' livelihoods."

Chen Xin took notes as he spoke. "Grain is a must. Once my naval force is built, every Jiangnan tribute grain boat will have to leave us some of their smuggled grain, which can serve as our reserve grain. Shredded tobacco will definitely sell well, but I figure sugar and tea won't sell much. Which dun household is willing to spend money on that stuff?"

"In the dun forts where land has been distributed, it's feasible. Each household gets twenty mu, producing over one shi per mu. After handing over two dou to us, they'll still have some spare cash. Income from workshops and livestock is also quite good, so they have spending power. Plus, once soldiers settle down and start families, military pay will flow into the market in large amounts. So sugar and tea can find a market in the better dun forts. But recently, we've issued a bit too much silver, and prices are trending upward. Hold off a bit on your second batch of combat rewards until other goods flow in to regulate things, so those merchants don't just profit off us for nothing."

Chen Xin thought for a moment, then nodded slightly. "Then tell the soldiers they'll get it all together at year's end."

"If you stop those tribute boats, what if someone reports you?"

Without even raising his head, Chen Xin sneered, "I'm not robbing them. Whatever price Yang Yunong pays, I'll pay the same. Why would they report me? They're all carrying smuggled goods — equally unable to see the light. If anyone actually dares to report, next time I'll just sink them outright. Right, why do we need to sell ironware ourselves?"

"Ironware mainly means farming tools and kitchen pots. Once we start building dun forts on a large scale, the demand will be huge. Our workshops need the output to sustain their workers. Even if the profit margin is low, it's fine — the main goal is to nurture the workshops and the iron-smelting industry. We'll start with low-price dumping to drive other ironware out of Wendeng."

Chen Xin asked, "Can we stop buying Fujian iron?"

"We still have to buy Fujian iron for forging weapons. Not just Fujian iron — we also buy steel from Dengzhou. Our own iron-smelting workshop's steel output has always been very low. Now we're using steel in more and more places, mainly for weapon edges and tool blades. If you want to make bayonets, I'll be heartbroken over the silver."

Chen Xin also rubbed his forehead. His biggest problem right now was the single source of income. Although he had military pay funds, they were only enough to cover the regular soldiers' monthly wages. Equipment and training costs all came out of his own pocket — a single suit of iron armor for the Killer Squad cost dozens of taels. The farmer-soldiers also required some expenditure, even if they were only a reserve force. His finances had always relied heavily on maritime trade. If anything happened to Li Guozhu, he'd be left with only military farms and military pay, which wouldn't nearly cover his expenses. After thinking it over, the only solution was to earn more profit from domestic commerce — one route was the sea route to Jiangnan, the other was along the Grand Canal. That was why this trip to Nanjing to meet Xu Xinsu was all the more important.

Liu Minyou looked at him and shook his head. "The canal business is a game of competing fathers — pure Red Ocean competition. Even with Xu Xinsu's help, we don't have much of an advantage. The sea route is slightly better, but the area we can reach is limited to the vicinity of Dengzhou. Most importantly, we don't have…"

"Core competitiveness. The goods all belong to other people. No matter how hard we scheme, we're just earning a bit of a middleman's fee, and there are plenty of people doing it. State-owned monopolies are so much better — the electric tigers, oil tigers, money tigers — they can squeeze as much out of you as they want."

Liu Minyou laughed at that. "That's why their service and products are always the worst. Southern goods are only enough to keep our shops afloat. If we want to make real money, we'll have to rely on new products."

"Mm. Let's quickly wrap up the matters at hand. In a few more days, we'll set off for Jiangnan."