Chapter 72 The God Pool, Horse Thief

November 27, 1590.

"This divine pool is really desolate."

It was snowing in the sky and the weather became colder. Huang Laifu and his group entered Shenchi Fortress after entering Lijiaping, Wuzhai Fortress. Huang Laifu couldn't help but sigh.

Later generations described Shenchi's drought for ten years, with strong winds and heavy sand, and a wind blowing from spring to winter. When the cold wind blows towards him, Huang Laifu thought that this was true.

Walking in Shenchi, I saw mountains, ravines, sparse rivers, sparse populations, and compared with Wuzhai Fort, which are mostly watery and flat, the boundaries are really clear. Although Shenchi Fort was opened in the seventh year of Hongwu in the Ming Dynasty, it was not established until the third year of Yongzheng in the Qing Dynasty. It usually exists as a military important place, so there are few villages and towns along the way. Only when passing by some small rivers can I see some poor households, farming some barren land, and when I see Huang Laifu and others passing by, they all look at the group with awe.

In addition to these locals, Huang Laifu and others also saw some refugees who left their hometowns, with their families and carrying shabby private loads on their shoulders, walking on the rugged roads. It can be seen that these people’s target is Wuzhai Fort. Walking outside in this cold weather has also made these refugees suffer, but seeing that these people are full of hope, although they think that they can survive well when they arrive at Wuzhai Fort.

The plan to develop the Shenchi Pond and Baji was planned as early as September when Huang Laifu got married. After he got married, he sent a team to investigate local terrain resources in various parts of Shenchi.

However, after the court's official documents came out a few days ago, it was determined that Huang Laifu was the governing ambassador of Wuzhai Fort, Shenchi Fort and Bajiao Fort. Huang Laifu had to pay 100,000 taels of silver in the three places every year. Huang Laifu did not pay attention to this. A survey team could not meet future needs. Therefore, today, he personally led the team to Shenchi Fort to inspect.

At this time, Huang Laifu was following two small flag servants who were guarding him, led by Jiang Dazhong, and they were all riding horses. They were all covered in armor, fully armed, carrying bows and arrows, and hand guns. In addition, there were also merchants in the queue.

Among these people are Qu Yuanrui, Qu Liangwan brothers, and a few Li families in Pingyao. Jiexiu Hou family, Wanrong Pan family, Yangcheng Yang family and other family merchants who set up shops in Wuzhaibao, as well as some of their servants. They all followed Huang Laifu to Shenchi to check the terrain. A few days ago, they bleed a lot for the expansion of Wuzhaibao's city wall, so naturally they won the right to cooperate with Huang Laifu in Shenchibao and other places.

Among these big merchants, there is also a shopkeeper in the Cao family of Taigu. The business atmosphere in Taigu has always been very strong. The merchants in Taigu were the first merchants in the Ming Dynasty to go to Macau to do business. This year, through the developed residence system of the Ming Dynasty, they learned about the changes in Wuzhai Fort, so they naturally would not have issued this new business opportunity. Therefore, when Wuzhai Fort repaired the city wall a few days ago, the Cao family also paid thousands of taels of silver, gained the favor of Huang Laifu, and obtained the right to develop the Shenchi Fort.

After hearing Huang Laifu's words, the shopkeeper surnamed Cao smiled and said, "This Shenchi Castle is indeed desolate. But I believe that after being managed by the garrison, it will be as prosperous as the Five Village Fort for at most two years."

All the merchants all followed suit and flattered them.

Huang Laifu smiled slightly, saying that, but it is not that easy to develop the divine pool. Based on the information he collected, he also came to the realm of this divine pool himself. The governance of this divine pool castle is probably not that simple.

The Shenchi has been cold for many years, with arid and windy spring. There are only several seasonal rivers in the territory, including Zhujiahe, Xianchuanhe, Wildzhukouhe and Jiankouhe. Although the total arable land area is more than that of Wuzhaibao, it is fragmented and has a small amount of water, so it is not suitable for farming in large farms.

However, Huang Laifu is not planning to engage in agriculture here. He invests heavily in agriculture here, and the harvest is small, and the gains are not worth the loss. Huang Laifu only plans to plant some oil and cash crops here, and then focus on coal and iron ore mining industries. Huang Laifu came this time for the coal and iron of Shenchi.

When the group was about to reach a place called Taipingzhuang in the local area, they suddenly heard a few whistles on the opposite hillside, and then many people came out, all of them riding fast horses, afraid that there would be hundreds of people, so they waved their long swords in their hands, and it seemed that they were not kind-hearted.

"Horse thief...protect the adults!"

Jiang Dazhong shouted, and immediately twenty servants dismounted, surrounded Huang Laifu, and took out bows, arrows and muskets. The merchants also quickly dismounted, and under the protection of their servants, they were all trembling.

Huang Laifu also got off the horse, with a calm expression, thinking to himself that the public security of this Shenchi Castle is too bad. Wuzhai Castle is not far from here, and there are many officials in the Shenchi Castle Castle, whose third brother-in-law Tian Dafu, are they so arrogant? It seems that the matter of suppressing bandits is on the agenda. It just so happened that their recruits could see the blood.

At the same time, I was wondering why I encountered horse thieves when I got to Shenchi Castle? To be honest, over the past year, Huang Laifu has lived a stable life in Wuzhai Castle and has forgotten the rise of horse thieves in the Ming Dynasty.

Huang Laifu didn't know that the mountains beside Wuzhaibao were called Kelan Mountain, which was the Luliang Mountain in later generations. The mountains of Luliang Mountain were undulating, with many ravines and ravines. There were very few large areas of arable land. In addition, there were famines in northwest Shanxi and famines, and the people often lived in poverty. They were hungry and cold and could not continue, so they often became bandits. These people robbed their families and did everything they could. Even if the local governments came to encircle and suppress them, as long as they fled into the Luliang Mountains, the officers and soldiers would be helpless. Moreover, these horse thieves had deep-rooted relationships with the local big families, which could be said to be invincible.

However, at this time, most of the horse thieves in Luliang Mountain were just moving in the east of Luliang Mountain, and they were harassing Jingle, Lan County and other prefectures, counties and towns. They had never been interested in the west of Luliang Mountain. First, they passed through the west of Luliang Mountain, with high mountains and deep roads, and the roads were difficult to walk on.

Second, there were few households in that area, not to mention the lack of fuel and water, but also military forts gathered. Most of them lived in military men and horse thieves, and there was less room for horse thieves to move around. At this time, the border army still had two combat power. Compared with horse thieves, they were equipped with better equipment. Muskets and artillery fields were annoying, which made the military men and the horse thieves who didn’t even have bows and arrows, and they would not have to take advantage of them.

But I don’t know why a horse thief ran to the Yuduan Di Shenchi in the northern part of Luliang Mountain today?

While on guard, I suddenly heard a whistle, and the horse thieves disappeared from the hillside again.

While everyone was relieved, after this twists and turns, Huang Laifu was also thinking: "It seems that it is not easy to develop this divine pool."

Soon, everyone arrived at Taipingzhuang, a folk fort located at the intersection of the mountain road. Several wealthy families in the local area built this folk fort. Not far from here is Shenchi Fort. Since Taipingzhuang is located near the various veins of the Shenchi Coal Mine, most of the people here are mining and mining coal. When passing by, most of the coolies in ragged clothes and black bodies are seen.

There are also many young and strong refugees who fled here, pushing coal here and asking for food. Recently, since Wuzhai Fort is developing the city wall, it seems that business in Taiping Village is very good, and many merchants are entering and leaving Taiping Village to buy coal.

Looking at Huang Laifu and his group of people wearing armor or wealthy, these coolies flashed to the side and looked at them with awe. However, when passing by the intersection of Taipingzhuang, Huang Laifu noticed that there were a few sneaky people looking at him with unfriendly eyes.  When Huang Laifu frowned, they disappeared again.   Huang Laifu had a feeling that the horse thieves just now had a close relationship with these people.

In the evening, Huang Laifu and his group arrived at Shenchi Castle.

This Shenchi Fort was built in the 18th year of Jiajing and was built with bricks and stones in the fourth year of Wanli. It was 10,000 miles per day, three feet high and eighteen fire road troughs were everywhere. Since the fort was 10,000 miles per day, there were more than 1,000 government troops inside, so many merchants set up shops to do business here. In addition, some refugees entered the fort to find food. As they could see, there were ragged people at the entrance of the fort.

Even the soldiers guarding the fort at the gate of the fort were all dressed in rags, shivering and trembling, looking listless. These people were still battalions, but compared with the current soldiers of Wuzhai Fort, one was in the sky and the other was underground. Even some of the servants brought by Huang Laifu now were all strong and covered in iron armor, which made the battalions envious.

Third brother-in-law Tian Dafu greeted Huang Laifu and his group with a smile on the south gate of the fort. He patted Huang Laifu on the shoulder and smiled: "Laifu, your brother-in-law has been thinking about when you will come. Today I finally waited for you." After glanced at Huang Laifu's servants, he couldn't hide his jealousy and said: "You are getting rich now!"

Since that day at Wuzhai Fort, Huang Laifu talked to him about the development of Shenchi Fort, Tian Dafu was very moved. When he heard that Huang Laifu was promoted to garrison, was commended by the emperor, and was appointed as the governor of the Three Forts, he was even more envious. He waited day and night, waiting for when Huang Laifu would cooperate with him, and finally arrived today.

Huang Laifu smiled and said, "Brother-in-law, Laifu is here today, but he will stay in Shenchi Castle for a few days."

Tian Dafu smiled and said, "Your brother-in-law is undecided."

The two of them exchanged a few greetings and entered the fort. They looked at them and saw that they were covered with thin-clothed and poor soldiers. The streets inside were bumpy and full of garbage, which made Huang Laifu, who was used to the cleanliness of Wuzhai Fort, was quite uncomfortable. The merchants who came with Huang Laifu also saw the difference between Shenchi Fort and Wuzhai Fort, and all started to talk in a low voice.

The third brother-in-law Tian Dafu smiled and said, "Laifu, have it been smooth along the way?"

Huang Laifu said: "I encountered some things." He said that he and his group met a horse thief.

Tian Dafu suddenly stopped and said with a gloomy face: "I'm afraid this matter is not that simple!"
Chapter completed!