Chapter 701: Lotus Silk

Because time was too tight, the Ministry of Works did not pull out suitable Artisans to follow the Xuanyuan Tribe to build the Matou; they could only arrange for people to go after carefully selecting personnel, and they also had to have the Xuanyuan Tribe send over the project funds first.

After the start of spring this year, Changle also requested Baifeng many times, wanting to go to the Xuanyuan Tribe; as for where to live, he would be fine even if he lived in a Tent, he just did not want to continue wasting time in Huaxia.

He used Baifeng's rhetoric: a person only lives for so long, a few years as a child, a few years as an old and weak person, and excluding the dark of night, there is not much time left to build one's own career, so he cherished this time now when he was young, strong, and at his most ambitious.

Sometimes Changle would also think that it was an excellent thing to have such a father; after all, he was truly learned and extremely capable, which was his honor, but he also felt some pain because he was controlled too much. In Huaxia, among men of his age, who would be kept under watch and unable to go explore the distance?

The sons of hunters might have already been to places that Changle had never reached, but a single phrase, "for the sake of safety," kept Changle tied down tight.

Changle even thought about whether to leave a letter for Baifeng and then directly sail a Boat to the Xuanyuan Tribe; as long as he didn't fall into the water on the way and there were no storms, there wouldn't be any danger. The probability of encountering rainstorms and floods in spring was too small, so even if Changle were alone, he had the courage; as long as he reached the Xuanyuan Tribe, he would fear nothing, believing that the people of the Xuanyuan Tribe would protect him well.

Baifeng did not know Changle's plan; he only felt that Changle might be a bit angry and anxious, as children in this age group would still have some rebellious psychology, but Baifeng really did not dare to let such a young child go out to struggle in the wilderness. He wanted to pave the entire road for his son; it was fine if he suffered a bit himself, but he really did not want anything to happen to his child.

The Tea Tree plantation that Huaxia helped the Xuanyuan Tribe plant had survived this year, but it had not yet reached the level for picking, and the Ministry of Agriculture, following Baifeng's guidance, had them prune the Tea Trees so that the trees in the entire plantation were the same height, suitable for people to stand and pick.

The plantation still needed to grow well for another year this year to see if it could be picked next year; this year, they could only pick the wild tea. It was almost time for what Baifeng called "pre-rain tea," but the people in the Ministry of Agriculture did not understand what pre-rain tea was, and the people of the Xuanyuan Tribe did not understand either.

Baifeng could only tell them it was the Tea Leaves before the spring rain, but this answer was indeed very absurd, as Baifeng could not calculate the Solar Term, and he did not know when the Grain Rain was either. Anyway, it was probably just the new tea during the time of spring rain when they were farming; the quality was very good.

Ever since the Xuanyuan Tribe discovered that the Tea Leaves had grown and could be picked, they immediately mobilized all the women to go pick the Tea Leaves, and the division of labor was different; they picked leaves from different parts, then after returning to the tribe, they packed them together uniformly, and finally, at the expected time, they underwent simple sun-drying to fix the color.

Because the enthusiasm of the Xuanyuan Tribe was high, the output of Tea Leaves was naturally higher; Huaxia's Tea Leaves last year were the most in these years, and this year it should exceed last year, and the quality would also be better.

However, the price of Tea Leaves did not drop. Before, there were few people in Huaxia, and if they just got some Tea Leaves, everyone could get a share; now the population of Huaxia was growing rapidly, but the output of Tea Leaves could not keep up at all, so the price of Tea Leaves not only did not drop, but those of slightly higher quality were still rising.

Huaxia was also actively looking for places where Tea Leaves could be planted. Baifeng knew that if they kept going south, there would be an area where Tea Leaves could be planted, but it was currently somewhat difficult for them to explore that place.

To reach that place, one would first have to cross the Qinling Mountains. The Qinling Mountains were currently too dangerous for Huaxia, so much so that even now, they had not done enough exploration of that territory; the changeable weather and the crazy, violent wild beasts were much stronger than the dangers they usually encountered.

So even if Baifeng knew that there were places there that could grow tea, and even that grain could reach two harvests a year or three harvests every two years, he still did not dare to let his Soldiers take the risk. Moreover, giant pandas also lived in that area; if they could encounter one and raise it, they could learn from Chiyou.

Dahong returned to the Xuanyuan Tribe with the contract and good news. After seeing Xuanyuan, he first had Cangjie, who knew Huaxia characters, read the content of the contract. After confirming that it was the same as what was said during the negotiations, Xuanyuan signed his name and stamped his seal.

Ever since he saw Baifeng's method when signing the contract with Huaxia last time, Xuanyuan had returned and asked Cangjie to write out his name, and then he learned it, becoming able to write the two characters "Xuanyuan" of his name; Cangjie then had no intention of changing these two characters again.

They also made a seal; an Artisan selected a piece of good-looking jade, and then, through the same method as Huaxia, carved out the seal belonging to Xuanyuan. Afterward, Baifeng gave Xuanyuan a box of ink paste.

Xuanyuan did not want to accept it for nothing, so he thought about trading for this ink paste with Baifeng. After Baifeng thought about it, he felt that there was not much profit to be had from this ink paste; after all, in a country as large as Huaxia, there were not many people who could use ink paste, and one box of ink paste could be used for half a year or even a year.

Lotus-silk ink paste could be considered precious, but mugwort-fiber ink paste was nothing. Now, only Xuanyuan in the Xuanyuan Tribe was using ink paste, and according to their office situation, that box of ink paste would last for who knows how many years.

So Baifeng simply said, "Ink paste is actually not very precious; it is just very troublesome to make. If you want to trade, you can, but I don't want grain, and I don't want anything else; I want something that might seem strange to you."

Xuanyuan asked, "What thing? As long as we have it, I can trade with you."

Baifeng said very straightforwardly, "Lotus silk, the silk pulled out after the lotus stem is broken. I need that thing; that is the material for making ink paste. Although this thing can be seen everywhere, it is too labor-intensive, and we in Huaxia haven't produced much in a year. If you can send me lotus silk, that would be best."

Xuanyuan looked at the ink paste in his hand and opened the box; he could not see any connection to lotus silk at all, but he felt he really did not need to think too much about this thing. Since Huaxia was willing to give it to him and clearly told him the raw material, it meant that this thing did not have much significance to delve into.

There were many lotuses in the Xuanyuan Tribe, but it was just a matter of asking people to break them; they couldn't be eaten or drunk, and they would just wither away every year. Since Huaxia wanted them, then give them to them.

So Xuanyuan said very generously, "Good, no problem. I don't know how much you need?"

Baifeng pointed to the box in Xuanyuan's hand and said, "Just a ball as big as that ink paste box will do."

Xuanyuan held it for a moment and felt it was really too small; it was a useless thing, so giving more wouldn't matter: "This is too little, I will give you ten balls of that size."