silence!
Deathly silence!
Faced with the young prince who was not tall but clamored to try "whether the sword is sharp", the merchants' expressions changed.
Nowadays, His Majesty does not like merchants, and everyone knows. Although the Ming Dynasty did not divide the people into three, six or nine classes like the Yuan Dynasty. However, the status of merchants at the official level is indeed the lowest in history.
At this time, the Jiangnan merchants were only slightly mature, and were far from being able to manipulate Chao Gang as they would a few decades later.
Otherwise, Ru Taisu and Wei Guan would not have closed their shops and acted rogue to force merchants to "donate" as soon as they were short of food.
With the prince on one side and the merchants on the other, no one doubted that Zhu Su's threat was only verbal. Didn’t you see that this prince was so careless and careless? Who dares to bet on whether this person is a stupid young man who will seriously draw a sword at the slightest disagreement?
To sum up, naturally, no one dares to reply "My sword is not bad". They also can't explain whether their family is a loser or a monster, so they have to keep their heads down and act like quails.
Even the salt merchant Ma Yuanwai, who openly said "Your Highness is young" but kept saying "Your Highness doesn't know", remained silent at this time.
It's just...where did His Highness King Wu get the precise amounts of grain stored by each family?
"Aren't you going to quibble? It can be said that this number is purely false."
"With you guys like this, I don't have much sense of accomplishment."
Zhu Su naturally would not explain his source of information to them. Seeing that everyone was silent, he only crossed his legs again and leaned on the back of the seat above. His eyes swept across the crowd, almost wherever Zhu Su saw the merchants, they shrank, as if they were afraid of being called out by Zhu Su.
It can be seen from this atmosphere that the data of each company in this account book is accurate. Why do you want us to quibble?
Do you have an excuse to scare the monkeys?
"It seems that everyone has acquiesced." Zhu Su sneered. "Now, let me ask you one more question."
"Who is willing to join the imperial court in this shipping business?"
"If you are willing, you can bid with rice and grain. The amount of rice and grain donated will determine the size of the shipping space in the future!"
"This is doing business with you, you guys, don't tell me that I am taking advantage of you?"
They say it's not about plundering, but the merchants underneath don't understand? This young prince just wants to take advantage of him! I just want to care about the royal face and find a fig leaf!
There is no mention of shipping military rations, not to mention the size of the cabin. Maybe with so many people present, there was only one cabin left?
But they also understood that this was the only chance the prince in front of them gave them to borrow the donkey from Poxia! The county magistrate who broke his family and the governor who killed his family would have no difficulty in destroying their nine clans, let alone just seizing some food! This guy is so anxious that he will tear off that layer of skin. When the time comes, the long sword will be added to the neck, and the family's food depot will be freely available to his soldiers to take whatever they want!
Didn't you listen to him? He wanted to try the sword to see if it was sharp!
"Your Highness! Our Shen family is willing to contribute another ten thousand dan to join your Highness's business!"
To Zhu Su's expectation, the first person to appear was Shen Wang of the Shen family. Zhu Su was stunned and said with a smile: "Second Uncle Shen, didn't your Shen family already donate 80,000 shi to the imperial court yesterday?"
"Why, your Shen family still has food hidden? You have a very deep background." Zhu Su's eyes glowed with evil.
"How dare you deceive Your Highness? All the food of the Shen family has been sent to the mansion long ago." A half-flattery, half-bitter smile appeared on Shen Wang's fat face. Yesterday, I watched with my own eyes as the grains were transported one by one into the bottomless pit of the Suzhou Preparatory Warehouse. It almost made him and the shopkeepers pout in distress.
But now that the food is gone, it is gone, and it is time to consider how to better benefit the Shen family. At this time, the greatest benefit for the Shen family is to regain the trust of His Highness King Wu. Therefore, Shen Wang continued: "Although our Shen family has no food now, your highness's affairs are naturally our Shen family's affairs."
"His Highness wants to start a shipping business, why should I, the Shen family, not support it?"
"Fortunately, our Shen family still has very little wealth. We can sell some of our property and raise another ten thousand dan for His Highness. I can still do it with gritted teeth."
"Everyone here, if anyone is willing to sell me, the Shen family, 10,000 dan, I, the Shen family, are willing to pay an additional 10% above the current market price to enhance the reputation of His Highness!"
At the end of the sentence, Shen Wang turned around and started buying food on the spot for many of his colleagues behind him. Zhu Su was also stunned by his operation, but he already understood in his heart that Shen Wang was once again begging for his forgiveness for Shen Hai's hoarding.
Adding another 10% to today's food prices is already the same as when food prices were at their highest. Even for the Shen family, such an acquisition would be very taxing. What's more, if you say it in public, there is no room for regret at all?
His gesture also made many businessmen look shocked. The Shen family was actually willing to pay such a price just to get a share in that shipping business... No one knew that the Shen family and this young prince had worn the same pair of pants before. Could it be that he knew some inside information when he spent so much money?
Could it be that this shipping business really has unimaginable benefits?
"Your Highness! I, Zhao Yunyan, am willing to use 85,000 dan of grain to get a seat on the sea transport!" Below, the businessman surnamed Zhao with a Chinese character face stood up for the second time and shouted.
"Your Highness, I, Hong Benxiao, am willing to provide 40,000 dan of food!"
"Your Highness, I, Shi Daoyuan..."
"Your Highness..."
The scene finally became lively. A group of businessmen, either sincerely wanting to try investing, or simply wanting to calm down Zhu Su's anger, finally let go of their mouths that could only go in and out, and spit out the stored grain. .
Zhu Su finally regained his smile, called Luo Guanzhong, who was acting as a scribe, and recorded the amount of investment these merchants were willing to make on the spot. Since they dare to speak out, they are not afraid of regrets. In the early Ming Dynasty, when the legal system was not strict and they were hoarding, there might not be any law that could justifiably arrest them.
But if they dared to deceive Wang Jia in public, then even if Zhu Su went on a killing spree in anger, even Yushitai would not be able to say anything.
As each merchant reported the amount and recorded it, General Luo Guanzhong handed Zhu Su's thick account book recording the amount of the merchants' "shareholdings".
Zhu Su looked through the data in the "criminal evidence" account book and found that most of the merchants had "vomited" a large portion of the grain stored at home. Most of these merchants are still aware of current affairs and no longer dare to test the bottom line of their "powerful dragon" as a local snake.
However, there are exceptions. Zhu Su couldn't help but smile coldly in his heart when he looked at the particularly eye-catching "one hundred stones" and "two hundred and fifty stones" in the account book. I thought there was no chance to kill the chickens to scare the monkeys, but no matter what, there are always some "chickens" jumping up and down trying to commit suicide.
"Ma Fengsun... Ma is a salt merchant, right?"
"You and several other salt merchants donated one hundred and two hundred and fifty dan, are you just perfunctory to me?"
Zhu Su said.
"How dare common people pervert His Highness?" The cavalry member who talked the most went out. "Really, there is really no money left at home."
"If His Highness really wants to take all this food away...not to mention what happens to the shipping in the future, our Ma family will be bankrupt in an instant!"
The salt merchant named Ma Fengsun kept begging for mercy.
(End of chapter)
