Zhenniang: The Three of Us (Twenty-Eight)
Five years later, convoys of trucks came and went from a complex of buildings hidden among crops but constructed entirely of stone.
The village of Zhao is no longer called Zhao Village; it is now called Zhao Fort.
The stone wall buildings are clustered together, intricate yet interconnected.
Most of the shops along the street have two floors and sell all kinds of things. The best location is the Zailai Goods Store.
Further in, in a winding and quiet place, there is a group of two-story stacked bungalows, which are the newly built school, orphanage and nursing home of Zhao Family Fort.
After the villages were merged, there were many more people.
In chaotic times, the more money you have, the greater the potential for disaster. In between her busy work at the factory, Zhao Zhenniang also took the opportunity to discuss with several villages she was cooperating with the idea of merging the villages and jointly building a collective defensive structure.
People need to be gathered together for better defense. As a result, the construction just wouldn't stop. They wanted residential areas, they wanted commercial districts, and finally they thought, "We've already built this much, let's just build a small town instead."
Ultimately, it became the new economic center for the surrounding area.
Since ancient times, people in the construction industry have been superstitious about feng shui, and this is no exception when building cities.
While others consult feng shui masters for construction projects, people in Zhao Family Village directly invite immortals to build their homes.
When Ye Xiqing was in Dengzhou, the coastal areas of Dengzhou were frequently harassed by pirates. In order to resist the pirates, the people of Dengzhou invented a kind of building that combined offense and defense called "Yuancheng".
Built entirely of stone, the complex is encased in a circular wall, and its interior layout follows ancient formation methods.
While it's called a formation, it doesn't have the fantastical functions of those in historical novels; it actually just utilizes visual illusions.
The alleyways are intricate and complex, with each alley entrance designed exactly the same, distinguished only by some distinctive decorations.
When the enemy enters, the markers are removed. Familiar people can find their way by using special memory points, but the enemy can only wander around aimlessly, unable to distinguish east from west.
Arrow towers and gun emplacements were designed on the city walls, and secret passages were built inside the city.
Even if the first line of defense is breached, we can retreat into the city to fight in the streets. Stone City is not afraid of fire, so we can reduce our losses.
In the later period, Dengzhou built many of these small circular fortresses to deal with bandits. Although it was a rigid, immobile tactic, it was really effective.
This type of defensive structure basically lost its invincible status after airplanes and artillery came into existence.
However, it was still useful against basic bandits and robbers; Ye Xiqing provided a building plan.
The maze-like alleyways have a surprising effect on commerce; people going to the market can walk around and browse all the shops in no time, effectively increasing customer retention.
Building such a massive complex must have cost a fortune, but in Dengzhou, the infrastructure was supported by the Dengzhou government's finances, and now it is supported by modern industry.
The alkali-making factory that Zhao Zhenniang and her partners built indeed made a lot of money as soon as it was built.
Alkali is a basic raw material in many chemical industries. Even factories using the old alkali production method can make money, not to mention those that have improved it.
The new alkaline process not only improves the efficiency of alkaline production, but also has a significant advantage: the raw materials can be reused, which not only saves costs and reduces pollution, but also allows the by-products to be used as fertilizer.
Chemical fertilizers have a huge effect on increasing crop yields. Modern people consider pollution-free planting, but people at this time only consider yield, and by-products are also valuable commodities.
The alkali factory made a lot of money, but because it attracted a lot of investment at the beginning, Zhao Zhenniang gave up a lot of shares, so she didn't get much in hand. But it didn't matter, because the benefits of attracting investment had become apparent.
With this boost, Zhao Zhenniang found it easier to find investment, and she was elected as the new president of the Business Alliance without any controversy.
After she became president, she began to build factories everywhere.
Cement plants, brick factories, quarries, glass factories, soap factories, paper mills, steel mills, farm implement factories, bicycle factories, automobile factories, feed mills, livestock farms, pharmaceutical factories—build them all!
With so many factories built, there will inevitably be some that make a profit and some that lose money. Some will generate immediate profits, while others will require maintenance to generate income.
Zhao Zhenniang then proposed establishing a Chinese Businessmen Fund, in which people from all walks of life in all factories would invest together, make money together, and share the risks.
As industrialization progresses to this stage, it will inevitably extend into the financial sector.
Financial activities such as stocks are nothing new in industrialized countries with developed financial systems, but they are novel in the small city of Ping An, attracting a large amount of money in an instant.
That's the power of information asymmetry; sometimes, it's just that one first-mover advantage that matters.
In such a time of war, engaging in financial activities is quite risky. Jian Yu'an does not support investing heavily in such risky stocks, as the factory might go bankrupt at any time, and all the invested money would be lost.
Losing investors' money during this period would be unbearable, so she prefers a more stable fund model.
Stocks directly invest in an industry, which is highly dependent on the industry's performance, while funds buy a little bit of every egg in the basket.
If you lose money here, you make some money there, and when you put it all together, you make up for the loss.
It's hard to be so unlucky as to have all your investments lose money, especially with such profitable alkali and pharmaceutical factories standing there now.
Since penicillin still has value today, it's natural that pharmaceutical factories will be built.
The Chinese Businessmen Alliance Fund is a joint venture fund led by Zhao Zhenniang and comprised of all Chinese businessmen in Ping'an City, investing in all of their physical factories.
With an alkali factory established, soap factories would naturally follow. Soap making from alkali oil is no secret even now; Zhao Family Village actually started out relying on sesame oil.
It was impossible for soap factories to install machines, and oil factories still used donkeys to grind grain. Those food products that were processed from grains were combined into a sideline food factory, which produced not only sesame oil but also all kinds of edible oils.
Expired cooking oil can still be recycled to soap factories to make soap, and recycled glass bottles can also be processed by glass bottle factories.
There was only one glass factory that specialized in producing various glass bottles; most of the glass produced was architectural glass commonly used in Western-style buildings.
The buildings in Zhao Family Fort were luxuriously constructed using a lot of glass that was clear, colorful, and allowed good light to pass through.
A glass mirror would be even easier to handle.
Of course, there are even more profitable industries, such as banks, pawnshops, and military factories.
The first two industries can be operated openly and legally, the latter is debatable, but if I apply for the qualification to manufacture cannons, you know exactly what I am producing.
Firearms require some technical skill, but hand grenades, homemade mines, and homemade cannons are really simple.
Zhao Zhenniang sold homemade guns and cannons to others, while importing the most advanced ones herself.
In Zhao Family Fort, every household now has several guns, and she has not trained any special militia.
But in Zhao Family Fortress, whether it's the elderly or children, anyone who picks up a gun will start shooting.
In the event of any incident, everyone is a soldier.
Alkali factories, pharmaceutical factories, and military factories are all factories that can generate quick profits once opened.
Steel mills, bicycle factories, and automobile factories, however, require huge investments and take a long time to see returns.
Bicycles were the first luxury industrial product that the people of Zhao Village came into contact with, so they had a deep emotional attachment to them. Given the opportunity to build a large factory, they were determined to build a bicycle factory.
Actually, if I could build a car factory, I would like to build a car factory, but the components of a car are too complicated, while a bicycle is simpler.
Zhao Zhenniang opened a steel mill and hired a group of people to specialize in car components, initially focusing on importing cars.
Zhao Zhenmei no longer drives; instead, she is now in charge of transporting goods between different countries.
Even if you can just import cars, you can still make money by smuggling them in; you can import them through her anyway.
She refused to believe that they couldn't replicate such a simple structure!
Everything was just beginning, everything was thriving, but Zhao Zhenniang still couldn't smile, because in this era, business could not be unaffected by the political situation.
Zhao Zhenniang and the Chinese Merchants Alliance, relying on that cheap warlord, expanded rapidly for five years.
Then, five years later, the army from the south attacked, and the largest warlord who occupied a province next to Heian City was killed.
Without a word, their warlords absconded with all the money they could carry, and she even arranged for the escape ship.
Firstly, after so many years of feigned affection, some genuine feelings might have developed. Secondly, Zhao Zhenniang accepted the real estate that he couldn't take with him.
The merchant alliance in Ping'an City, which had finally achieved a three-way balance of power with the government and warlords under Zhao Zhenniang's leadership, has now been completely overtaken.
The members of the business alliance rushed to Zhao Family Fort to ask the chairman for advice.
The business alliance has a mansion for its directors, but Zhao Zhenniang still prefers to stay at home.
The newly built buildings in Zhao Family Fort were equipped with sewers during construction and a generator for their own use, with access to water and electricity. Although it is a town within a village, it is quite advanced.
Zhao Zhenniang usually works from home. When Aunt Wang feels that the nursing home is impersonal, she will come back. After staying for a while, she will see that Zhao Zhenniang is bored and then go to play cards with her old friends.
But for such an important event as today, she certainly couldn't be absent. Granny Wang and everyone else watched Zhao Zhenniang, and she stopped smoking her pipe and started wiping her gold pipe holder.
After so many years of trials and tribulations, Zhao Zhenniang has developed a composed demeanor.
He raised his head, showing no sign of panic.
"Don't worry, if things change again, who have we honest and law-abiding businessmen offended?"
"Don't stop the factory, continue production as usual."
"Even an emperor needs to eat and live. Let the factories do what they're supposed to do."
No matter what problems arise, Zhao Zhenniang will always be the first to say, "Don't worry."
And indeed, she led the business alliance through countless storms. Seeing her so calm, everyone felt half at ease.
After dismissing the business alliance members, Zhao Zhenniang was not as calm as she appeared. She called Zhang Ying and asked her to find out about the situation of the Southern government.
Zhang Ying was initially recommended by Zhao Zhenniang to join the Economic Bureau. She was originally a junior staff member, but later, under the strong influence of the Chinese Businessmen Alliance, she was promoted to deputy director. Although she was only a deputy, she basically controlled the actual power of the Economic Bureau.
With such significant political changes, she naturally paid attention and, through continuous efforts, managed to find out: "There's not much I know, but I heard that the southern government sent a special envoy, someone from our area."
Hearing that she was a local, Zhao Zhenniang breathed a slight sigh of relief; people from the same hometown feel a sense of kinship when they meet.
Even if someone suffers injustice and runs away to another place, determined to come back and seek revenge, they won't be able to take it out on her.
A few years ago, she was just a poor village girl and had no ability to commit crimes.
Before the arrival of the special envoy, more and more information about him was being disseminated.
When she got off the car, no one was surprised to learn that the special envoy was a woman.
The merchant alliance represented by Zhao Zhenniang is the rightful local power in Ping'an City, so it is only natural that they would come to pay a visit to the newly established government.
Before meeting the special envoy, Zhao Zhenniang was quite excited, eager to know who this extraordinary woman in their area was, possessing such great abilities.
After the special envoy got out of the car, he was about to smile and welcome her when he suddenly froze on the spot: Huh?
Zhang Ying followed behind Zhao Zhenniang and saw her suddenly stop, almost stepping on her shoes.
Just as I was wondering what Zhao Zhenniang was doing, my gaze fell on the special clerk's face, and I suddenly stopped: Ah!
Eight years have passed, and many things have changed. If you only see his back on the street, no one would recognize him.
But when you face each other, the old times come rushing back.
Lan Shuyan, dressed in military uniform, looked at the two with a smile and greeted them casually, just like countless times before: "Hi."
Zhao Zhenniang: ...
Zhang Ying: ……
ah!
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