Heda did not stay in Suining for long. After communicating with Zhao Tai, he immediately returned to Xuzhou and then went to Kaifeng with Abra.
He worked hard all the way and saw Emperor Wanyan Shouxu of the Jin Kingdom in just three days.
Imperial Palace, Imperial Study Room.
After hearing Heda's words, Wanyan Shouxu couldn't help but became furious, "Zhao Tai refused the reward of becoming a marquis and demanded the military governor and the control rights of Suzhou and Sizhou! How brave he is!"
Heda waited for Wanyan Shouxu to finish venting, and said in a deep voice: "Your Majesty, looking at the situation in front of us, the imperial court is extremely dependent on the assistance of the Southern Song Dynasty. Zhao Tai is threatening the self-respect of the Song Dynasty, and I'm afraid it won't work if he doesn't seal it! Now the Guanhe defense line relies on the assistance of the Southern Song Dynasty. .”
Wanyan Shouxu said angrily: "He is taking advantage of the crisis of the imperial court to blackmail the imperial court."
Heda said: "I didn't expect Zhao Tai to be ambitious, but now the court can only appease him first."
Wanyan Shouxu had a gloomy face and exhaled heavily. He understood that Heda was right. The Kingdom of Jin now urgently needed the support of the Southern Song Dynasty.
Now Zhao Tai is like Han Xin who took over Qi and asked Liu Bang for the title of false king, but his situation is more critical than Liu Bang.
Wanyan Shouxu was silent for a long time, "Then we will add Zhao Tai as the military commander of the Loyalty Army, but we can only give him one of Suzhou and Sizhou. In addition, didn't he ask for the title of Wuxian? I will designate Wuxian as Su and Si." The two-state system establishes envoys.”
Heda understood what Wanyan Shouxu meant and deliberately created a gap between Zhao Tai and Wuxian.
"Your Majesty! Now that the Mongolian attack is imminent, I think it is better for the imperial court to be patient. After receiving assistance from the Song Dynasty, blocking the Mongolian attack and regaining a stable position, it will not be too late to deal with Zhao Tai. It is still not appropriate to offend him now." Da persuaded in a low voice.
Wanyan Shouxu looked at him with a sullen look on his face, "It was the Qing family who persuaded me to get rid of Zhao Tai. How can I help him today?"
Heda looked ashamed, "Your Majesty, I am incompetent. This is all due to the current situation!"
Wanyan Shouxu sighed. He actually understood that what Heda said was reasonable, but being threatened by Zhao Tai made him angry, so he vented his anger.
At this time, Wanyan Shouxu leaned back on his seat a little decadently. His whole body seemed to have had his backbone pulled away. He waved his hand tiredly, "According to Zhao Tai's wishes, Zhao Tai will be appointed as the military envoy of the Loyalty and Righteous Army to know the affairs of Suzhou and Sizhou." , and also give him the title of Marquis of Zhongyi."
After Heda heard this, he couldn't help but salute, "Your Majesty is wise. I will wait for you to get Song Yuan to block the Mongolian attack in winter. When the court calms down, there will be a way to control Zhao Tai."
Wanyan Shouxu waved his hand, "Go and do it!"
…
Outside Suining County, Zhao Tai asked Wang Wentong to organize the hungry people to launch multiple projects at the same time along the Suining River in order to provide a livelihood for the hungry people and resume production as soon as possible.
At this time, Suining City was like a large construction site. Temporary workshops were being set up one after another. An industrial park was being built and multiple handicraft workshops were being launched.
There are two main categories of these workshops. One is used for military production and is responsible for manufacturing equipment and military supplies. The other is used to produce goods and sell them to the Southern Song Dynasty to make money.
For some of these projects, raw materials can be found locally, such as wine making and soap, which have become Zhao Tai's recent focus in Guanzhong.
If these two projects are successfully implemented, they will not only provide employment opportunities for some hungry people, but also earn a lot of money for Zhao Tai.
At this time, Zhao Tai led several people to the soap workshop, which had begun to take shape. Everyone stood in the workshop, talking around a big pot.
"Pour all the oil into the pot!" Zhao Tai directed the workers, filling several cans of filtered oil into a large pot.
Wang Wentong and others looked at the pot full of oil, and they all had some doubts about Zhao Tai's income-generating plan.
Nowadays, ordinary people can't even afford food. Oil is an extremely precious thing to them. Who would use such a precious thing to make soap?
"Ms. sir! This pot of oil is worth a lot of money. Can the things produced be more valuable than the oil?" Wang Wentong admired Zhao Tai, but he couldn't help but worry that Zhao Tai would lose money.
Zhao Tai smiled slightly and said: "Everyone's clothes and quilts at home will become dirty after being used for a period of time. Women at home usually use soap locust, rice water or plant ash to clean the dirt. Not only is this troublesome, but also It’s difficult to clean, so the soap I made is an improvement on traditional soap. It’s easy to use and very effective, so I’m sure I won’t worry about sales!”
Soap originated very early. There was something similar in Chinese history very early. It was made of pig pancreas, lard and natural soap, and it was called "pancreas".
Zhao Tai planned to improve the production process and carry out large-scale mass production so that the citizens of the Southern Song Dynasty, as well as the royal palace and the rich, could use soap.
Wang Wentong was worried and said: "Mr. Sir, the cost of making soap, apart from other things, is just a pot of oil. I'm afraid the common people can't afford it!"
Wang Wentong had never been to the Southern Song Dynasty and did not understand that the commodity economy in the Southern Song Dynasty was quite developed and a relatively wealthy citizen class was formed.
Since ordinary people could not afford oil, Zhao Tai never thought of selling soap to the poor from the beginning, but took the high-end route.
After all, the production cost of this soap is not very high, and it must be sold at a high price to recover the cost.
Zhao Tai smiled and said: "These soaps will be priced very high, and the people here in the Jin Kingdom really cannot afford them. I plan to transport the soaps produced to Huainan and Jiangnan for sale. Part of the money earned will be used to purchase raw materials and expand Production, and part of it purchases food to solve our food supply and military expenditures!"
While talking, Zhao Tai instructs the craftsmen to add the soaking liquid of plant ash and alcohol, mix it, then pour it into clean water, and stir it thoroughly after there is no oil film.
The alcohol used by the craftsmen is extracted from another distillery owned by Zhao Taijian, which is considered one of the secrets of soap production.
At this time, the workers kept stirring, and everyone saw a magical scene, and found that light yellow sediment appeared in the pool.
"This is soap!" Zhao Tai said excitedly when he saw this: "Take them out, add some spices, then pour them into the mold and let them rest for a while."
Zhao Tai nodded with satisfaction as he watched the workers pour the sediment into molds of various shapes.
These molds were customized by Zhao Tai from a woodworker. In order to improve the quality, the molds were engraved with patterns.
Because each of these soaps has a carved pattern, the soap produced by Zhao Tai later was also called the carved plate.
Samples of the soap have now been produced, but it will take time for large-scale production.
During this period, Zhao Taiyi wanted to market the soap to let the people of the Southern Song Dynasty know about such a good thing. At the same time, he also had to establish a raw material supply system.
Plant ash is easy to solve, and distilled alcohol can also be produced by Zhao Tai. The key is that it is difficult to obtain a large amount of oil for production.
Zhao Tai was creating a demand out of thin air. If he made large-scale acquisitions in the Southern Song Dynasty, it would inevitably push up the price of oil and increase production costs.
However, Zhao Tai also had a solution for this. First, he sent people to cooperate with the slaughterhouses outside the big cities in the Southern Song Dynasty and purchased the useless pig pancreas after they had been slaughtered. Second, he also controlled Donghai Island opposite Haizhou, which could be used on Fishermen were recruited there to go out to sea to hunt whales.
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