Si Cheng just smiled and didn't say anything. If the old man hadn't been smiling, he might have believed it.
"Let's go back and discuss this further." Si Cheng felt that standing here was becoming unbearable, after all, the stench of snakes and the odor of wild boar excrement coming up from the trench was somewhat unacceptable.
Chief Wu naturally had no objections, after all, he had seen the experiments he was supposed to see, and now he was determined to get this batch of medicinal materials. The next step was to see the outcome of the discussion between the two sides.
On the short journey back to the village, Chief Wu had drafted many bargaining strategies in his mind, but when he arrived, he was completely dumbfounded.
"This is the exchange ratio of supplies we have with several surrounding villages. You can take a look for yourself. Our villages are treated equally." Si Cheng took out the list of supplies he had exchanged with several other villages and placed it in front of him.
With various exchange rates and a wide range of daily necessities and food included, Chief Wu did a simple mental calculation and realized that this was an extremely profitable business in Pinghe Village.
However, he did not expect that this was only a part of what was taken out, and it was also the latest exchange list.
"Don't be fooled by the high exchange rate, old man. You have to understand that these medicinal herbs take a long time to grow. They won't reach their full medicinal potential until they've been cultivated for a certain period of time. Some of them require much more care than growing crops," Si Cheng explained to him immediately upon seeing his reaction.
“That’s right. Even though I don’t know much about Chinese medicinal herbs, I know it’s definitely not simpler than growing crops. It’s just that we are in dire need of many of these things ourselves, so it’s impossible for us to exchange them.” Chief Wu also knew that his entire family’s assets were at most cattle and sheep, but these were important assets for them in the future. Of course, it would be good if they could negotiate a higher price.
"Let's not beat around the bush. Our village has our eye on your cattle, sheep, and horses, and we'd like to trade some medicinal herbs for them. Of course, we need a mix of males and females, since we also need to expand our livestock farming." Si Cheng knew that both sides were aware of the situation, so he got straight to the point.
As the two went back and forth, constantly testing and bargaining, Si Cheng traded one-tenth of the village's existing medicinal herbs for two horses and six cattle and sheep. Even so, Chief Wu's heart ached so much that he grinned from ear to ear.
Just as Chief Wu was about to leave, Si Cheng called out to him.
"Chief Wu, some villagers in our village would like to exchange goods with you for horses. Is that possible?"
"That won't do," Chief Wu quickly shook his head. "As you can see, our tribe only has a few horses, and we just replaced two with new ones."
The horses that have just come of age are for you; the rest, apart from a few in their prime, are all old horses.
Hearing this, Si Cheng stopped insisting. "How about other animals? We can have them exchange seeds for them."
Chief Wu was stunned. It seemed he was getting old; he had been so focused on exchanging medicinal herbs that he had completely forgotten about the seeds.
Looking at the young village chief in front of him, and noticing the smile that flashed in the corner of his eye, he knew that all of this was part of someone else's plan.
“Change it,” he gritted his teeth, “but we need more varieties of seeds, and if we have any farm tools, it would be best to bring some along.”
"Farm tools are indeed quite difficult to obtain. Didn't the army allocate any to you when you went to the countryside before?" Si Cheng knew that the pig iron dug out of the previous warehouse in the city was basically used to make farm tools.
"They did give them some, but the quantity was far too small; two or three families couldn't even get a set." Farm tools are the foundation of farming; they can't be expected to dig with their bare hands.
"To be honest, we wanted to exchange some farm tools this time, but we were refused. However, we do have some construction tools. I wonder if that's possible?"
"Building tools?" Chief Wu was also conflicted. After all, he had initially decided to build some wooden or thatched huts to make do. But since arriving in Pinghe Village, he was tempted by the neat and tidy houses.
"You didn't use cement to bond this house together, did you?" Chief Wu stood up and walked to the corner of the wall, carefully examining the mud layer between the bricks.
"This is a mixture of limestone and soil from the back mountain. It has good adhesion. The Xin San Village across the street built their wall using this mixture of limestone and soil and gravel. We saw it when we came over."
"Heaven really favors your side, as if everything has been arranged for you." Chief Wu was truly jealous this time.
"If that's the case, then you'll soon be the ones being favored too."
"I wonder what price we'll have to pay to obtain this limestone?" Chief Wu's heart began to bleed.
"Look at what you're saying, the limestone is just sitting on the back hill. Anyone who needs it can go and get it themselves. Our village doesn't get involved."
Si Cheng noticed that as soon as he finished speaking, Chief Wu's eyes lit up, and he suddenly felt that this old man was actually quite cute.
"How about this? Once I get to the mountains, I'll see the specific conditions and then decide whether or not to exchange this batch of tools with you." Chief Wu also wanted to determine the type of tools to exchange based on the conditions on the mountain.
"Of course you can, but speaking of which, I still suggest that if you can, each of you carry some limestone into the mountains tomorrow. After all, we need to do some defense work in the mountains, and this will save you from having to make several trips back and forth."
"Thanks for the reminder. Otherwise, we would all be completely clueless and wouldn't know where to start."
"Actually, there were some things that we didn't tell the military at the time, and we also kept them from you."
"?" Chief Wu looked at Si Cheng with a puzzled expression. They were almost there, so what was there to hide?
“Actually, it’s not a bad thing,” Si Cheng said, taking out the previous drawing paper and pointing to one of the spots. “This is the wild boars’ den. There are probably twenty or thirty large wild boars here. We have about ten small wild boars in our ditch, which we brought back from here.”
Chief Wu looked up and saw that the place they planned to settle down was not far away. He couldn't sit still anymore. "What should we do? I don't know if Captain Xiao and the others can clear it out. This is too dangerous. The main problem is that we still have so many poultry. It would be bad if they were frightened."
"Wild boars have rather thick hides, so long-range shooting might be difficult. I'm just wondering if you'd like to keep them to breed?"
The village chief was tempted by the wild boars raised in the ditches behind the mountain, but he quickly shook his head and refused.
"No, our village already has so many cattle and sheep, and this plain is what we value most. We'll have to find a way to get rid of these wild boars. We'll need to trouble Village Chief Si for help then." Since the other party was able to bring back so many wild boars right under the noses of so many wild boars, it meant they were quite capable. Now they could only rely on the other party to help them solve this problem.
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