Volume 3: Dragon and Snake Movement Chapter 301: Price Gouging, Salted Fish
Unlike the Jingdong Guild Hall, which was specially set up to receive those officials with the title of Imperial Envoy from the capital, and which had a bit of the capital's wealth and elegance, Zhang Chen, who went by the alias Wang Shen, stayed in a small building that was definitely full of the flavor of a nouveau riche.
As the most luxurious inn in Shunde Prefecture, the cost of staying here for one night starts from one tael, which is enough for a middle-class family to live for a month. However, Xingtai is not on the canal, nor is it a port near the sea, so there are not many wealthy merchants coming here from Jiangnan. Usually, most of the rooms are empty. Now Zhang Chen is enjoying the treatment of renting the whole place. After returning from the capital, he has been having fun every day.
However, Young Master Zhang was also a prominent figure among the playboys in the capital. He had seen the Twelve Rains of Tingyu Villa countless times, and now had long forgotten his initial thoughts of having a romantic encounter. His drinking and having fun were purely for the enjoyment of music, singing and dancing. None of those singing girls and dancers who threw themselves into his arms could succeed, and they gradually became obedient.
At this moment, thinking that Zhang Wu and Zhang Lu would be overjoyed after the money was delivered, Zhang Chen squinted his eyes and took another sip, then tapped the table with his fingers in a happy rhythm. At this moment, he felt someone approaching behind him, and just as his body tensed up, he heard a voice.
"Sir, the people are here."
Zhang Chen realized that he was no longer alone and weak as when he first came out. No matter what his father was thinking, the people he gave him were indeed useful. However, no matter how satisfied he was, he looked arrogant and reserved at this moment. He raised his hand slightly and made a gesture, as if he was immersed in the singing, dancing and music again.
Soon, a voice with a hint of flattery came from outside: "Master Wang, Mr. Zheng and others want to see you."
"Didn't I just see them last night? What are you doing here again?" Zhang Chen raised his eyebrows in obvious impatience, and then said unhappily, "They are not beautiful beauties. They keep hanging around in front of me. Are they trying to remind me that I owe them money? Tell them to come in, and everyone else go out!"
Zheng Yuanwai and others who were waiting outside the door did not change their faces when they heard these arrogant words. Having dealt with Wang Shen, who was said to be the confidant of the second prince, several times, most of them understood his character - arrogant and eccentric, daring... Otherwise, how could ordinary people dare to beat up the eldest prince's men casually? But it was precisely because of this that they decided to use this person to deal with the imperial envoy.
After all, among the four young masters over there, two are the future imperial consorts and grooms, and the other two are also children of officials - one of them is even related to Zheng Yuanwai himself. No one wants to offend the four to the point of desperation - even though they have already done quite too much.
At this moment, seeing that the music troupe and a group of singing and dancing girls had retreated, Mr. Zheng took the lead and entered the house.
Not only had his elder brother passed the imperial examination, he was also a student of the Prime Minister Jiang Ge Lao, and was now a Hanlin scholar, so he was also considered the top person among the families in Xingtai. Therefore, after he greeted "Wang Shen" with a smile, he glanced at the two guards behind him calmly.
This confidant of the Second Prince went to the capital, and when he came back, he was accompanied by several more people, all of whom were masters with great energy and vigor. With such a majestic presence, he naturally would not doubt the other party's identity. At this moment, he briefly explained what had just happened to Zhang Wu and Zhang Lu in the Jingdong Hall, and then lowered his voice.
"Master Wang, at this point, they have received full support from the eldest son of the Qin State in the capital. What should we do?"
"What should we do? Haha, they are rich and can buy houses and land and hire workers, but what about cotton?" Zhang Chen laughed and slapped the armrest heavily, "If I remember correctly, except for the cotton you kept for your own use, it seems that I have taken all the cotton in Shunde Prefecture, right?"
Hearing that "Wang Shen" was determined to fight to the end with Zhang Wu and Zhang Lu, Zheng Yuanwai and the others exchanged glances, all of them were overjoyed. Zheng Yuanwai smiled and said, "With what Master Wang said, we are relieved. As long as you don't sell cotton to them..."
"Why shouldn't I sell it?" Zhang Chen glanced at Mr. Zheng with a disdainful expression as if to say "Are you an idiot?"
"As long as they are willing to pay a high price, I am willing to sell it. Don't you understand the principle of hoarding and buying up, and the highest bidder wins? The Duke Qin's Mansion is very rich, but I don't believe that they will waste their money indefinitely! You should have asked around, right? How much money did the eldest son of the Duke Qin's Mansion, who was taken advantage of this time, give them?"
Zhang Chen called himself a sucker. It was the first time for him to get married, but after cursing, he felt strangely satisfied. Although he used to use money to bribe people in the capital, he never did it for real business. Now that he was doing it for real business, he felt comfortable in every pore of his internal organs.
His joy soon vanished with a word of agreement, because Mr. Zhao, who was under Zheng Yuanwai, immediately said with a smile on his face: "That's right. No matter how rich the son of Duke Qin is, can he move the entire mansion to support others? He just exchanged 8,000 strings of money from Fulong Bank. Besides, even if he is Duke Qin, he can't compare to the second prince, who is a royal family..."
Bullshit! Bullshit! How dare you compare the Second Prince, a coward who is always causing trouble but can’t do anything good with my father!
In his heart, Zhang Chen had already labeled Mr. Zhao a damned one, and then he said nonchalantly, "That's right, a powerful dragon cannot defeat a local snake. It's better to be rich... Haha, who's afraid of who? Let the word spread, and I'll increase the price of my cotton by four times, and see if those two guys can afford it!"
Zheng Yuanwai was immediately in high spirits, and the others were also delighted, and they all praised him. Soon after they returned, they soon learned the next step - Zhang Wu and Zhang Lu actually accepted the four-fold higher price, bought a lot of cotton, and summoned .
After a group of people discussed it, they decided to keep their troops in place. They still persuaded the weaving workshops that bought cotton yarn to weave cloth, but they still refused to buy the cotton yarn. Instead, they found a few people to pretend to be poor spinners and sent a large amount of cotton yarn to Zhang Wu, Zhang Lu and others to sell, intending to further consume their funds. After seven or eight days, everyone was shocked to learn that the Duke of Qin's Mansion had sent people to Fulong Bank to exchange money.
This time... another five thousand strings of cash!
At this point, even though Zheng Yuanwai's family was wealthy and the other families were also very rich, no one wanted to fight against the rich and powerful Duke Qin's Mansion. However, seeing that "Wang Shen" had raised the price of cotton to six times the original price, Zhang Wu and Zhang Lu relied on the financial resources of the Duke Qin's Mansion and still accepted the full price, and they immediately lost their patience.
Who could resist the temptation of making money with such a stupid person and lots of money? Spinning? What is that? How can you make more money than not hiring anyone and just selling cotton! If they had known this, even if "Wang Shen" was using the name of the second prince, they would never have lent money to people to collect cotton just because they were happy to see people secretly tripping up Zhang Wu and Zhang Lu.
This is simply giving money to "Wang Shen"... no, giving money to the second prince!
For a while, Zheng Yuanwai quietly sent people to nearby places, especially to Cangzhou, to buy large quantities of cotton - including those that were still in the fields and had not yet been harvested, and all of them were paid for in one go. He thought he was doing it secretly, but he didn't expect that after Master Zhao found out the truth, he actually sent people directly to Cangzhou and persuaded his relatives to buy a hundred acres of cotton fields.
The two men thought they were perfect, but there is no such thing as a wall that is impenetrable, and the news spread quickly. Everyone who had visited "Wang Shen" with them before hated these two guys who ate alone, and hurriedly joined the ranks of hoarding cotton. As for the smarter ones, like Mr. Zhao, they thought that the Qin Guogong Mansion might be involved in the textile industry, so they tried their best to hoard land.
Especially when they saw that "Wang Shen" directly raised the price of cotton tenfold, and Zhang Wu and Zhang Lu continued to buy it, and the Qin Mansion even sent a large sum of money, the local leaders of Xingtai, headed by Zheng Yuanwai, more than doubled their spending, and their hands reached even further into Cangzhou.
Therefore, on this day, when the eldest prince proudly accepted the invitation of an official, he received a piece of news that he had never expected.
"All the cotton on the market is gone? What a joke! How is this possible?"
"It's really gone." The attendant who answered was full of anxiety, and simply told the truth, "It's all because of something strange in Xingtai. I heard that in order to support Zhang Wu and Zhang Lu, Zhang Chen got a large sum of money from Duke Qin or Madam Qin, and gave it all to Zhang Wu and Zhang Lu. As a result, those two idiots got angry with the local big family and opened their own workshop."
The eldest prince almost thought that there was something wrong with his ears. He asked in disbelief: "Opening a workshop by themselves? Did they think that they could marry the princess right away, so they lost their minds? Is it so easy to open a workshop? You need a place, you need to hire spinners, you need raw materials, and finally the cotton yarn you spin needs to be accepted by a weaving workshop!"
In contrast, he used both soft and hard tactics, using his status as a prince to seduce the big families to join forces to squeeze out the small workshops and individual spinners, and at the same time deal with the weaving workshops, and then take the shares and collect the profits. This was much safer than Zhang Chen's foolish approach.
Did that guy bring his arrogant attitude in Beijing to Xingtai? If he can't help Zhang Wu and Zhang Lu, he just throws money at them? Is this just too much money or something?
The eldest prince became more and more furious as he thought about it: "Why doesn't Qin Guogong Zhang Chuan take care of his own son? He has already broken his leg and is lying in bed, why can't he just be more quiet! He can go crazy with Zhang Wu and Zhang Lu, but he can't get in my way!"
Why doesn't he have a friend like Zhang Chen who is stupid and rich?
After a fit of rage, the eldest prince angrily ordered: "Since Zhang Chen wants to compete with others in terms of financial resources, you should go and talk to those families and buy more cotton from Jiangnan to sell to the two suckers in Xingtai..."
At this point, he suddenly remembered the five hundred acres of cotton fields in Cangzhou that he had paid for the prototype and blueprint of the new spinning machine from Lu Sanlang, and he was heartbroken again. If the five hundred acres of cotton fields were still in his hands, then as long as Zhang Chen was still such a prodigal son, he would be able to empty the Qin Guogong Mansion's assets when the new cotton was on the market, just in time for revenge!
"Since there is no cotton left, all the workshops should just stop working. One month's work now is equivalent to three to five months' work in the past. Anyway, they won't lose money! The losses now can be squeezed out of Qin Guogong Zhang's family in a blink of an eye!"
The eldest prince took a deep breath and watched the attendant agree to retreat. He thought of Wang Shen, the second prince's confidant who had beaten the people he had sent to Xingtai, and felt as sick as if he had swallowed a fly.
Although the second prince was beaten and is said to be unable to get out of bed, his men can still walk out of the capital and continue to oppose him, and his father does not care! And the queen mother is now imprisoned in Kunning Palace. The mother of a country is not as good as those concubines. And he, the eldest son of the royal family, is trapped in a small place like Cangzhou!
What kind of trouble was going on in Xingtai, how did it involve Cangzhou, and how upset the eldest prince was, none of this had anything to do with Zhu Er. He quietly set out from Haidian Zhaoyuan with a few guards, wanting to hide during the day and go out at night - but he was afraid of being mistaken for a scoundrel, so he had to disguise himself. When he arrived in Cangzhou, the people of Xingtai had just bought out all the cotton in Cangzhou.
He didn't care what the two sides were fighting about. When he arrived in Cangzhou, he didn't even bother to look for an inn and planned to go to the sea merchant shop. However, he was persuaded by several guards. Although they didn't know what the eldest lady and the second young master were doing without telling the rest of the family, they were more familiar with the market.
"Second Young Master, if you run over here in such a dusty state, people will immediately know that you are here to see him. They will not only tell you some lies to fool people, but they will also raise the price for the things you like. It would be best if you find an inn to stay in first, then change into a new outfit, and relax so that people will think we are just passers-by strolling along the way. That would be the best."
Therefore, Zhu Er had no choice but to choose a so-called century-old shop, and after taking a bath, he changed into a set of clothes that were not conspicuous, and then hurried out with a few guards. However, when he found the place according to the simple map drawn by Ah Liu, he saw that the inconspicuous shop on the maritime merchant street had closed down.
This time, Mr. Zhu was both shocked and angry. The huge disappointment and anger of trying so hard but still coming up empty-handed mixed together made his whole face twitch.
Fortunately, the guards around him were very smart. One of them went to the surrounding area to get information. After a while, he came back with a smile on his face: "Second Master, the owner of this shop specializes in selling seafood. Tianjin in the north, Denglai and Jiaozhou in the south are obviously better ports, but this guy likes to stay in Cangzhou and sell his weird things slowly."
"He didn't open the shop today because he went to play chess with someone. That old guy is not very active in business, so all the shops around him call him a salted fish behind his back."
