"Oh oh oh..."
With the high-pitched crowing of roosters, Nanbao Town, the southernmost town in the Han District of Lingao County that has prospered due to mining and trade in Li District, began to gradually wake up. [Read the latest chapter] ＋＋＋ White smoke drifted from the chimney. The door panels of the small shop have been removed and preparations for the morning market have begun. The National Army soldiers on duty at night rubbed their red eyes and came down from the watchtower.
The National Army officer on duty came out of the duty room, holding the key in his hand. He yawned and opened the fence gate at the entrance of the town. This place is next to Li District and less than two kilometers away from the nearest Li Village. The conflict between Han and Li on Hainan Island was very acute in the Ming Dynasty. Large agricultural counties on the island like Lingao have always been the areas where the conflict between Han and Li is most acute. Several major civilian riots in the Ming Dynasty basically occurred in the Qiongbei area.
Although the Lemiao and Miao Affairs Office believes that it is unlikely that local people will riot again after the three-pronged infiltration of trade, missionary work, and cultural and educational security, necessary precautions are still necessary. After all, their grasp of Li District is still very weak and there is considerable uncertainty. Nanbao is not only the window for trade in Li District, but also has the important Nanbao Coal Mine. Although the quality of the coal mines here is not high, the lignite, stone and clay provided here are still in great demand in agriculture and construction.
Therefore, after the security war in Qiongbei, the General Military Affairs Court stationed a platoon of the National Army here to maintain a high level of alert.
As the town gate opened, some miners rushing to go to the morning shift and hawkers heading to Li District went out one after another, and the number of people on the street gradually increased.
Sima Qiudao climbed up from the bed where two tables were put together, wearing a patched robe. The sky was already turning white. It was getting late, and he had to get dressed quickly, otherwise the girls living upstairs wouldn't be able to come down to make breakfast.
The place where he lives is a two-story building along the street. This house is one of the many "shop houses" built by the cooperative in Nanbao. However, the cooperative obviously overestimated Nanbao's development potential. After the establishment of Nanbao Mining Company, the local area was very prosperous. However, as coal from Hongji and Qiongshan began to be continuously supplied by sea, Nanbao coal with low calorific value was basically simply used as a fertilizer raw material. If it weren't for the huge demand from the agricultural population, Nanbao's coal mines would be almost worthless.
Fortunately, the construction industry in Lingao has great demand, and the stone and clay mined by Nanbao Mining Company are still in a situation of booming production and sales. As a result, Nanbao Mining's production scale has not been further expanded - Nanbao's coal reserves are not large. As for stone and clay. The high transportation costs of building materials also make their sales limited. The originally planned phases 3 and 4 of Nanbao were canceled by the Planning Institute.
Without leading enterprises, Nanbao's population growth rate has dropped significantly. In recent years, although a number of small businesses such as rattan wood processing, Chinese herbal medicine processing, leather and kapok processing, etc., which specialize in deep processing of trade products in Li District, have been opened in Nanbao, the scale is small and the number of workers they can absorb is limited. The Planning Institute has not arranged a large number of immigrants here. As for the free immigrants. They prefer the prosperous banks of the Wenlan River, and no one is willing to go to the "border" area of Nanbao.
The development of Nanbao is not as good as expected, and naturally it cannot support too much business. The cooperatives built many shophouses back then and were reduced to rental housing. After Sima Qiudao and his party arrived at Lingao. The local coordinator arranged for them to come here.
The house has a two-story, three-bay facade, and a small courtyard at the back with several wing rooms. The street in front of the door is not busy, but it is adjacent to the main road. Going out the back door is a rather deserted small box. The transportation is very convenient. Huang Zhen, who was responsible for looking at the house, fell in love with this place at a glance.
Huang Zhenren is called "a copper pen and an iron abacus". He is rich and has the temperament of a businessman. This action is regarded as the "shopkeeper" who will do business in the coming high-opening business.
Nowadays, there are many businessmen who open shops in Lingao to do business, but most of them are in Dongmen City and Bopu, and very few are in Nanbao. Therefore, as soon as he arrived in Nanbao and showed his intention to "invest and open a store", the director of the local cooperative took him all over the town to look at houses, and finally Huang Zhen chose this place.
For Sima Qiudao, this house is quite good, clean and tidy, and quite comfortable to live in. The only drawback is that the house is a bit small compared to the number of people they came this time.
This time the Central Plains Wulin launched a large-scale campaign, and only seven or eight people, led by Huang Zhen and Sima Qiudao, came here early. More people are coming one after another.
Of course, it is not possible to ask these men and women from well-known families to shave their heads to "purify" and become civilians, but if they want to "employ themselves", they will look too conspicuous wherever they go. We can only arrange to hide them all in this so-called "shop".
It’s not bad that there are many people, there are also several “females” coming. Although they are all children of martial arts, after all, there are differences between men and women - and these masters are also respected elders in the martial arts world - we can't all sleep together in the same bunk. So two of the three rooms upstairs were given to them, and one was reserved for the main figure in this operation who had not yet arrived: Zhuo Yifan, a great disciple of the Wudang Sect. The rest of the people could only squeeze into the side room at the back, and even Huang Zhen could only rest in the small tent on the first floor.
Sima Qiudao felt that there were too many people and it was noisy, so he simply stayed in the shop. Two Eight Immortal tables were put together as a bed, which was quite comfortable.
He went to the well in the backyard to wash up and saw Huang Zhen already rinsing his mouth. He was in his fifties and looked like a businessman. He had an abacus under his arm and a writing brush stuck in his lower back. He looked very strange. Looking at his fat figure and slow movements, you can't tell the level of his martial arts skills.
Sima Qiudao knew that Huang Zhen was the chief disciple of the Huashan Sect. When it came to martial arts, only Zhuo Yifan was stronger than him here.
"Shopkeeper Huang." For the sake of concealment, they saw that they had changed their names, "You get up really early."
"It's Sima." Huang Zhen spat out the water in his mouth. "It's already late. People who do business can't sleep. It's said that at dawn, sweep the courtyard. Clean yourself and the shop. Guest officials Only when you come to the door do you feel happy, this business can be done well."
Sima Qiudao secretly thought: Stop pretending! Huang Zhen likes to behave like a businessman on weekdays. Sneaking into Lingao this time has put the shopkeeper's airs on full display.
However, in a martial arts world that values sect origin and seniority, Huang Zhen's status cannot be compared to that of a junior from the Qingcheng sect. Therefore, Sima Qiudao was still very respectful on the surface: "The shopkeeper is right."
As he was talking, a woman had already come out of the house. She was probably a little awake and still rubbing her eyes. Seeing Huang Zhen and Sima Qiudao both in the yard, they were busy doing a blessing.
"Miss Nan, you got up so early." Huang Zhen narrowed his eyes and greeted with a smile.
The woman called Miss Nan is no longer young by the standards of this time and space, and looks to be about twenty-five or six years old. Wearing a light green ruqi, covered with light red armor, a slender waist, elegant figure, a pair of sparkling black eyes, looking forward, extremely flexible, as if the eyes can speak, beautiful appearance , the corner of his mouth seems to be smiling but not smiling, making people feel close to him.
Women don't wash themselves on the well platform. Even the children of Jianghu have to maintain some respectability and respectability, and they can't be too unruly outside.
"It's still early. It will be bright in a while. If we don't cook for a while, everyone will have nothing to eat." Miss Nan pursed her lips and went to the kitchen to measure the rice.
Seeing her go in, he whispered to Huang Zhen: "Shopkeeper Huang, are we still hanging out like this these days?"
The smile disappeared from Huang Zhen's face: "Didn't Master Qi say that? Everything must be obeyed by his instructions. This place is not as dangerous as the Ming Dynasty."
The so-called Seventh Master is the person who handles them locally. They knew very little about this seventh master. They only knew that he was from Jinyiwei and had been lurking in Lingao for many years.
"Shi Weng said that this place is like a dragon's pond and a tiger's den. I went to their home base of Dongmen City yesterday to explore - it was nothing more than that."
"Zixiao, don't underestimate the Kun thief. Over the years, I have thought about the countless people in the green forest who have come to make money in Lingao, a newly prosperous place, but all of them have gone away never to return. They seem to have disappeared into the sea. Inside. Several of them are big thieves in two capitals and several provinces. It is said that they also lost their reputation in Lingao." Huang Zhen is older, so he is naturally much more mature. "Seventh Master said that there are many spies in the interview bureau here, and they are not Speaking of the rules of the world, we can’t tolerate this here, we must be very careful in every move we make, and never act rashly.”
"Yes, I understand." Sima Qiu said somewhat disapprovingly. Because he had just been to the junction between Dongmen City and Xinnachun a few days ago. Although he was shocked by the prosperity and clean street order of Dongmen City, it was not as he imagined. , a scene of heavy security.
When he was patrolling the streets of Dongmen City, he didn't even feel the slightest sense of danger. The number of false kuns that are easy to swallow is even more numerous. The Kun thieves are so good at winning over the people, no wonder they have occupied Lingao for many years and the court was helpless.
"Zixiao," Huang Zhen felt that his youth was too reckless, so he warned, "Shi Weng has tried his best to send us here this time, and even took out people like Master Qi who were in his pocket. We must We must live up to our high expectations and get to the bottom of this matter! Report it to the imperial court and save all the people!"
Sima Qiudao nodded, feeling a little more stressed. It has been more than a month since I sneaked into Lingao, and I have been like this all the time. Sometimes I really don’t know what I am doing here.
However, the purpose of this trip is only known by Zhuo Yifan, the leader of the Wudang Sect who has not yet arrived.
Even a person like Huang Zhen is just a front-line player. (To be continued...)
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