Chapter 112: Merchant Caravan

When the younger generation of the Zhao Family grouped together to acquire land and build houses in Jingxing Fang, the brothers of the Shen Family were furious upon hearing the news; unable to question Wen Gu, Lady Shen sent people to issue a warning first.

Consequently, within a few days, a group of young people from the Zhao Family in Zhaohui Fang and the young people of the Shen Family in Xianghui Fang got into another fight, and both sides proclaimed themselves the winners.

At the same time, both sides were holding back their frustration, and whenever they met on a daily basis, they would trade a few barbs.

The Shen Family people: "Our first phase of Wanfu Garden will definitely be completed first. So what if you bought land? Can you make money? Just follow behind us and eat dust!"

The Zhao Family: "We just want to buy land, we just want to occupy a piece! It doesn't matter if I make money or not, I just love watching you look at me with 'you can't stand me but you can't get rid of me' expressions!"

Subsequently, the refined scholars of the Shen Family sent two more supervisors to Jingxing Ward, claiming it was to oversee the construction site, but in reality, it was to monitor the movements of the Zhao Family.

As for the Zhao Family, after pondering it privately, they also sent people to station themselves there! The construction site could not be started immediately, and of course, there was no need to send supervisors, but they still had to go through the motions; they could not lose in this regard!

Soon, the small office where Zhao Han and the others drew had an extra workstation for an adult. Every day, young people from the Zhao Family took turns coming by to make their presence felt, and incidentally, they helped the younger brothers and sisters with some manual labor; they couldn't just sit there doing nothing.

Wen Gu did not pay any attention to the squabbles between the two groups of foolish youths from the Zhao and Shen families.

Before the merchant caravan arrived, the picture books were finally printed.

On the pages of the picture book unrelated to the plot, there was an illustration. When Zhao Han was drawing, he smuggled in some personal preferences; one of the character designs for the protagonist of the Spirit Fire Exorcism story was wearing the standard uniform of the Patrol Guard Division!

In the eyes of children like Zhao Han, among the three major military institutions of Xinzhou—the Patrol Guard Division, the Xianshou Army, and the City Defense Army—the Patrol Guard Division was still the coolest. Therefore, when drawing, he went through all kinds of majestic martial uniforms and armor in his mind, and finally chose to reference the Patrol Guard Division.

Regardless, this personal preference passed the review of Zhao Shaozhu and was ultimately printed.

The hardcover version, which included color pages and was expensive, was supplied to the great noble families. Of course, this "expensive" was only relative to ordinary people; after the wealthy families read the trial copies, they all bought five or ten volumes at a time, and more than half of them would entrust merchants to take them to other provinces.

However, those sent away were likely the abridged versions—the kind where the pages with the smuggled illustrations had been cut out.

Another few days passed.

There had been no more snow recently, the temperature had risen slightly, and the merchant caravan finally showed signs of movement.

Incoming merchant caravans needed to be quarantined for at least one day at designated locations in the Outer City District of Xinzhou City.

As soon as the caravan arrived, Wen Gu received the news.

The first to arrive was the merchant caravan of the Sheng family.

"There are mainly two people in the generation currently in power in the Sheng family, Sheng Feng and Sheng Ren. It is said that both are shrewd, capable, and decisive people, and they have now defected to the Dong Clan."

Wen Gu recalled the information about the Sheng family and also asked Cheng Zhi and He Xiaodi to learn more.

He Xiaodi, who was busy transcribing documents, stopped his brush and said: "A bountiful harvest? Could they be grain merchants who sell grain?"

"Shenghe Grain Shop, have you heard of it?" Wen Gu asked.

He Xiaodi shook his head.

Cheng Zhi quickly found it in his memory: "We have one there! There was a Shenghe Grain Shop in the city where the academy was located, and there was also one in the town where my hometown is!"

The small town in his hometown was adjacent to a river, and many cargo ships came and went, sometimes stopping there. Transporting grain was, of course, also convenient.

Recalling the stories that had circulated in his town, Cheng Zhi said: "I heard that the owner of the Shenghe Grain Shop was only a farmer in his ancestry, yet in just a few decades, he became a major grain merchant! His luck was extremely good!"

Upon hearing this, He Xiaodi showed a look of admiration and envy.

In terms of status—scholar, farmer, artisan, merchant—the status of merchants was indeed a bit lower, but it also depended on who you were comparing them to!

Cheng Zhi and He Xiaodi, the two of them were supported by their families who worked themselves to the bone so they could study; they were far inferior to those wealthy families.

Wen Gu just smiled: "Just listen to folk rumors, don't take them too seriously."

When did the Shenghe Grain Shop appear?

It was when the imperial court's policies loosened and people from merchant families could take exams to become officials!

Before that, the Sheng family was not well-known, but in fact, their ancestors were not ordinary "farmers"; they were big landlords!

The Sheng family had been prosperous for far more than a hundred years!

When the merchant status was not allowed for imperial examinations, the Sheng family was "farmers."

Exploiting loopholes in household registration, bypassing the "status segregation" of the merchant class, and connecting with scholars to gain more power—perhaps they had been doing that for a long time!

And once the imperial court's policy toward merchants shifted from "comprehensive prohibition" to "limited opening," and the children of merchant families could take the exams, the Shenghe Grain Shops everywhere appeared openly and quickly occupied the market.

Their reputation was also managed well, and there were even inspirational stories circulating among the people about "ordinary farmers relying on their own hard work and luck to become big merchants, and their descendants entering officialdom through the imperial examinations."

This information about the Sheng family was all told to Wen Gu by his aunt, Lady Shen.

The Shen Family was also a merchant family with considerable wealth.

But!

The descendants of the Shen family could only look at other families with envy when it came to their aptitude for studying!

Even with the loosening of policies, no one took the exams.

Was it because they didn't want to?!

They dreamed of it!

It was just that they lacked talent in that area!

Never mind the imperial examinations, even the talent for doing business was not inherited by much of the next generation.

The late Old Master Shen, who was Wen Gu's maternal grandfather, had made several preparations back then; since the path of officialdom was a dead end, he would take the path of marriage!

He specifically chose to marry his children into families of poetry and books with potential, such as the Wen family. And, into fallen noble families with potential, such as the Beidi Zhao family.

Our Shen family descendants might not have the talent for studying, but our family has money!

It must be said that it was precisely because Old Master Shen had paved the way back then that the Shen family received the windfall that fell from the sky today!

Wen Gu recalled the information about the Sheng family and asked Cheng and He: "In our Xinzhou, are there any capable farmers or agricultural officials?"

After some searching, Cheng Zhi replied: "I don't know about capable farmers, but there are agricultural officials, there definitely are! Settling refugees, water conservancy management, and land reclamation—Xinzhou is doing all of these, and these all require officials who understand agriculture."

Wen Gu nodded.

These kinds of things had to be done by professionals. Regarding the grain needed for survival, of course, one could not rely solely on stockpiles; Uncle Zhao still attached great importance to agricultural affairs.

However, how the duties of those dispatched agricultural officials were practiced, and how much was reserved? Was there any perfunctoriness? That was another matter.

Anyway, as far as Wen Gu knew, the harvests of the several ordinary villages nearby that had dealings with their Jingxing Fang had not been very good over the past year.

On the other hand, the harvests of some farmland related to the powerful and influential were said to be passable.

The ways of the world are such that it is impossible to just grab those agricultural officials and have them teach the ordinary villagers how to farm, right?

Wen Gu does not yet have that much authority for the time being, not to mention that those agricultural officials are tied to many powerful families and nobles behind the scenes.

He pondered.

"The Sheng Family's merchant caravan... it seems like quite a lot of people came over this time..."

Wen Gu called He Da and Tao San over and assigned them some tasks.

"Our Jingxing Fang is a new ward, so merchant caravans from other places surely aren't familiar with us; we can host them warmly to increase our mutual understanding..."