Chapter 354: No matter how powerful the salt bandits are, can they create food out of thin air?
As soon as the carriage stopped, people sitting or lying on the street gradually gathered around and their voices became louder.
Xu Yu got out of the car first, looked around calmly, reached out and lifted the car curtain: "Zhizhi, we're here."
Sang Zhixia got off the train and stood still. Before he could say anything, the waiter from the inn came out with a stick in his hand and yelled at the people who had gathered around him, "Get out!"
"Don't you all open your eyes and see what kind of place this is? Is this a place you can come to?"
"If you don't want to die, get out now!"
As soon as the shop assistant finished his roar, five or six muscular men rushed out of the shop, all of them looking ferocious.
The crowd, who were originally ready to make a move, fell silent for a moment and retreated one after another.
The shop assistant quickly bowed and smiled apologetically to the man who had gotten off the carriage: "We are so honored to have such a distinguished guest here. Today is a great day for us."
"The private rooms inside are already prepared, just waiting for our distinguished guests to arrive. Please follow me."
Xu Yu held Sang Zhixia's shoulders, hummed, and whispered, "Zhizhi, let's go."
Before being tricked by Xu Yu into planting tea trees with a hoe, Chen Jing'an was a real wanderer who could travel all over the world.
At first, Sang Zhixia mistakenly thought that Chen Jing'an opened shops everywhere just to make money, but after walking around and roughly figuring out the location of each shop, Sang Zhixia suddenly stopped thinking so.
Sang Zhixia and Xu Yu were welcomed into the private room by the waiter's hospitality. While they were waiting for tea to be poured, Sang Zhixia whispered, "Chen Jing'an's locations for these restaurants are quite clever."
From north to south, he can be seen everywhere, in the salt transport areas, ferry crossings and official roads.
These inconspicuous shops scattered everywhere not only make money, but also collect information from all over the world without leaving any trace.
How can this be considered a sincere store?
Xu Yu just smiled faintly when he heard this: "I can't help but look down when I'm on the elevated road. These little places scattered among the people are actually the key to victory or defeat."
If you are not well-informed and cannot predict the consequences in advance, it will be difficult to act and react in time.
The behemoths that the world sees are all made up of such details, which are also the key to their survival and immortality.
Before leaving, the old man reminded them that going out should not be just for eating, drinking and having fun. He asked Xu Yu to talk less and to make sure to take Sang Zhixia with him to see more.
What is understood through witnessing is far more beneficial than what is understood through hearing.
Xu Yu stopped talking at that point, and Sang Zhixia hummed thoughtfully.
When most of the dishes on the table were served, a few more guests came outside the door and a similar noise broke out in front of the door.
Sang Zhixia glanced out the window and said calmly, "What's going on with these people?"
The shopkeeper put down the wine jug in his hand and said with a wry smile, "Isn't it all caused by the salt bandits?"
"Salt bandits?"
"It can be said that they are the salt bandits."
The shopkeeper motioned for his assistant to greet the new customer and whispered, "The salt workers rioted a while ago, and the government executed quite a few of them."
"Perhaps it was out of sympathy for one's own kind. This incident caused a huge uproar among the salt workers. Now, all the salt fields, big and small, have stopped working. Even if a knife is put to their neck, no one will go to work."
"But these people have been salt workers for generations, doing the work in the salt fields. If they don't go to the salt fields for a few days, chaos will follow."
The shopkeeper sighed with mixed feelings and shook his head, saying, "They're fearless and have risen up in the mountains to become salt bandits. They've robbed the rich and given to the poor, causing chaos everywhere and causing panic among the people."
"The salt bandits, who were afraid of death and had no skills, looked down on us, but they didn't dare to risk going back to the salt fields to work. With no way to make a living and no food to eat, they all fled and became beggars."
Although they are called beggars, they are actually no different from robbers.
If the shop assistant hadn't rushed out to intimidate them, and if Xu Yu and his group hadn't looked very tough, they might have been beaten and robbed at the door before they even got to the store.
Where there is a dead end, order is lost.
Today, Shu is in chaos and has lost its prosperity for thousands of years.
Sang Zhixia was inexplicably startled after hearing this, and said delicately, "You don't dare to go back to the saltworks? Didn't the shopkeeper just say that he didn't want to go back? Where did you get the idea of not daring?"
"At first I didn't want to go back. I thought that with more people and more power, I could make a commotion and maybe find a way to survive. But now that the salt bandits have come out, there's no chance to go back even if I regret it."
Seeing that Sang Zhixia was truly unaware, the shopkeeper paused and lowered his voice, "You don't know, but the salt bandit leaders, Chen Anzhu and Meng Pei, have made a stern statement: Anyone who dares to return to the salt fields to work will be tantamount to defying the entire Qingcheng Mountain army. They will fight to the death and make the betrayer pay with blood."
"The salt bandits were so aggressive that even the government officials and soldiers who went to suppress them were beaten to a pulp."
"Everyone has only one head on their neck. No one dares to say that they are as capable as the officers and soldiers to fight against the salt bandits. Who would dare to go there?"
The imperial envoy from the court has arrived. The law does not punish everyone. Even if he insists on not going to the salt field, he will not be hanged.
But the salt bandits are different.
If you offend these vicious and cruel characters, no one in the family, young or old, will survive.
People who have nowhere to go and have lost their income wander around, stealing and robbing whatever they can, and those who dare not take action just watch and wait for another opportunity.
Sang Zhixia blinked speechlessly.
Xu Yu caught another key point: "Tens of thousands of people?"
"Are the salt bandits in Qingcheng Mountain already so powerful?"
A village has only a few hundred people, and an ordinary county town has at most five or six thousand people.
How can a mere Qingcheng Mountain accommodate tens of thousands of people?
A glimmer of understanding flashed in Sang Zhixia's eyes.
The shopkeeper laughed out loud: "Your words really confuse me."
"As for how many salt bandits there are in Qingcheng Mountain, I only heard about it from hearsay, so I can't really tell the exact number."
"However, since the imperial court sent people to suppress the rebellion, the situation in Shu has improved a lot. The chaos is only outside the city. As long as you don't leave the city rashly, you are safe for the time being."
Xu Yu gestured to Lingchu to give him a reward of ten taels of silver, sent the shopkeeper away, and raised an eyebrow at Sang Zhixia: "Zhizhi?"
Sang Zhixia tasted a radish soaked in Sichuan peppercorns and chili peppers and said cryptically, "It's hard to say how big Mount Qingcheng is, but feeding tens of thousands of people is not that easy."
The arable land in Shu had been abandoned for many years and there was not much grain stored.
The unrest was mainly caused by the salt workers' hard life and excessive deductions of their wages, making them unable to afford the rice sold by foreign grain merchants.
The problem is that people are not able to eat enough and cannot survive.
This situation is somewhat similar to the famine in Northwest China last year.
No matter how powerful the salt bandits in Qingcheng Mountain are, can they create food out of thin air?
Sang Zhixia probed Xu Yu under his smiling gaze, "It's true that there are over ten thousand salt workers, but we've seen quite a few along the way, plus those who are afraid to leave their homes. Where did tens of thousands of people come from in Qingcheng Mountain?"
"Are you trying to fool people?"
Xu Yu glanced at the table full of bright red peppers, feeling irritated by the sting. He picked up a dish of green vegetables, sprinkled with chopped green onions, and placed it in Sang Zhixia's bowl. He smiled and said, "That doesn't sound true to me."
"But Shen Anzhu and Meng Pei do sound interesting."
"Let's rest and stay here first, and let me find out more."
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