choke element

Around the Dragon Boat Festival, the Southern Maritime Merchant Team led by Zhou Keshan, the commercial system of the Qun Mu Institute under the charge of Li Yun, the various ports in Shandong supervised by Wang Shixian, and even a group of merchants Du Shisheng was familiar with in Shandong all confirmed the news , the Great Song Dynasty will take measures, and the grain trade will be unsustainable.

Regarding this, the Zhongdu side responded quickly, asking responsible officials from various places to send competent subordinates to report to Zhongdu specifically to count the gaps in supplies.

The order from the central capital was transmitted to the south, and it was inevitable that there would be delays.When the envoy arrived in Jiaoxi, Mizhou, Zhou Keshan just boarded a boat and left the market, and went to Qingyuan Mansion, Mingzhou, Zhang Kai's hometown, intending to use the power of the local clan to inquire about the situation of the Shipbuilding Department.

At this moment, the veteran Ding Naval officer, Zhao Bin, and the seven or eight ships and sailors they gathered one after another gathered in the sea.

The wind and frost at sea hit people, Zhao Bin was older than two years ago, but his actions were much more powerful.After all, he is not the leader of a small team, but the leader of the guards of the big merchants on the sea. He secretly leads the Dinghai's administrative duties, and there are at least 800 men who are rampant in the sea and murderous men under his command.

At that time, the three of them started their business with a boat of [-] boats left by Zhang Kai's father and grandfather. At this time, there were only two large ships of [-] boats and four medium-sized boats of [-] boats just resting in the market. ship.

Zhao Bin led the order from the commander-in-chief's mansion and did not dare to be negligent. He immediately selected two competent leaders from the subordinates of the fleet and the caravan who were more familiar with the figures of material in and out, and counted the records of material in and out in previous years overnight, and finally called his own Two hundred of the confidants of the king came and asked him to take ten elite soldiers to accompany him to the central capital.

As a result, at night, the two leaders came to visit at night, carefully asking Zhao Bin for advice, asking Marshal Guo about his temper and what taboos he had to say.

After a while, the two said again, after all, since Marshal Guo entered Zhongdu, his status is different from ordinary nobles, and we are recruited from outside, so if we meet for the first time, if we speak impolitely, it will be very bad.As for Wang Erbai, his sea skills are very solid, but his verbal skills are very problematic.With him leading guards, he always felt that sooner or later something would happen.

Zhao Bin couldn't help but laugh at this.He himself is an old soldier who followed Guo Ning at the Feijunhe camp. In his impression, Guo Ning was always the elite young man.

But they were worried about Wang Erbai... After thinking about it carefully, Zhao Bin felt that it was not unreasonable.

Simply, it is the beginning of May, the monsoon has not yet blown, and the offshore merchant ships are fine, and the season for long-distance ocean voyages and even murder and robbery has not yet arrived.Zhao Bin made a decision on the spot, and went out by himself, accompanying the two leaders.

The next day, he chose a multi-oared boat for coastal use, and took his subordinates straight to Guzhai.

The sea trip took six days, and I went to Zhigu Village to show the official documents and change the proof, and then the boat entered Lushui from Xin'an Haiyan, all the way north.Along the way, they saw boats of all sizes coming and going, and they were familiar with several flags.On the other hand, the tow trackers by the waterside and the mules and horses helped to vacate the warehouse so that they could cross the camel caravan in the shallow water area. Among its members, it could be seen that there were many surrendered soldiers under supervision, and there were also many Mongolians mixed in.

The weather in May has already started to heat up. Under the sun, these soldiers were sweating profusely, and everyone's robes were soaked.When unloading excess supplies and reducing the draft of the first large ship, the Mongols were particularly agile.

Seeing this scene, everyone couldn't help but sigh with emotion.

The ship arrived in Tongzhou three days later, then transferred to the post station, and arrived in Zhongdu on the same day.Zhao Bin naturally pointed and pointed along the way, telling his partners about his family's battle in Zhongdu.

A group of people entered the city through Fengyi Gate, delivered documents to the Marshal's Mansion, which was shaped like a huge fortress next to the Wengcheng, and transferred into the building.As soon as the luggage was put down, and the chair was not warm, someone rushed to deliver an order, and the marshal summoned him.

The place where he was summoned was in the backyard of the Marshal's Mansion.

A group of people found out after bypassing two gates that this backyard is almost equivalent to the school ground where the guards practice martial arts every day.Around the school grounds, there are heavily armed guards standing guard.These core guards are almost all old soldiers from Hebei's defeated army, and each of them has been battle-tested and murderous.Zhao Bin recognized a few of them, but he insisted on not daring to say hello, instead he followed the lead of the waiter at the front and bowed his head forward.

On the east side of the courtyard, there are several houses, stables and a tower.A group of peasants are busy there, it seems that they want to build a wall to separate the school yard from the house, and some people use carts to bring some flowers and trees in, as if they want to make a little decoration.

The main body of the courtyard is covered with fine sand, and several archery targets are hung along the high wall, as well as rows of thick human-shaped wooden targets, which should be targets for chopping with knives.The wooden target has been chipped unevenly and is out of shape.

The tall Guo Ning was shirtless, standing in front of a wooden target, and casually threw a straight knife on the weapon rack.You Gangshou had a sharp eye, and immediately saw that the famous iron bone flower was placed on the shelf.

Because of the high-intensity training just now, Guo Ning was covered in sweat, stained with a lot of fine sawdust, and the muscles of his waist and back were obviously stretched, like copper cast iron.

When Zhao Bin was at sea, he often told his subordinates the stories of the fights in the past, so as to win people's hearts.He is a senior military officer with means. When he talked about it, he mainly praised the interests of the Ding Navy. He occasionally mentioned inadvertently how he met Marshal Guo in Changzhou; and how he fought and retreated in the pursuit of the Mongolians. In the end, how did they fight side by side in Zhongdu, so they got the position of fleet leader.

This kind of side self-promotion is much more useful than serious bragging, so now the leaders of the fleet almost all regard Zhao Bin as an old friend of Guo Ning.

At this moment, Zhao Bin did not dare to be rude when he formally met. He solemnly bowed down and signed up from a long distance away, and the two leaders also knelt down quickly.

And Guo Ning strode up, grabbed Zhao Bin, and refused to let him kowtow. He laughed and said, "I was overjoyed when I saw the document! Why don't you hurry up? Haha, haha, old Zhao! We have to I haven't seen you for two years!"

Having said that, Guo Ning hugged Zhao Bin hard, and thumped his back violently.

Zhao Bin also laughed non-stop.He subconsciously wanted to hug Guo Ning, but he really didn't dare.Because the top of the left arm was not a palm but an iron hook, he was afraid that the iron hook would touch Guo Ning, so he had to hold it high.

Seeing Guo Ning and Zhao Bin being so intimate, the first two leaders couldn't help being surprised.First of all, I was so surprised that my family really had a deep friendship with the Marshal, this sea thigh, we hugged it right, and we will hug it tightly in the future.Secondly, I never thought that the powerful warlord who drove thousands of people to sweep the vast territory of Dajin and hundreds of military states in a short period of time turned out to be such a young warrior with no airs!

"Come on, come and sit down."

Guo Ning put on a round-neck short robe, and beckoned for the attendants to bring tables and chairs, and set out tea.He was sitting next to the wooden target, and began to ask Zhao Bin and others about the details of importing materials by sea.

He was obviously not familiar with the climate and hydrology at sea. Sometimes he asked a question, and everyone had to explain it carefully, and then he simply sketched on the gravel ground.However, he has obviously done his homework on the establishment, scale and route setting of the fleet, and he is very familiar with it.

When Zhao Bin introduced the two leaders, he immediately talked about some deeds of the two leaders after joining the fleet and praised them.And when the leaders were reporting on the material transactions, he listened with interest and asked a few questions from time to time. The leaders had to check the account books quickly to understand.

Everyone chatted for a while, seeing the shadow of the sun getting longer, Guo Ning got up unsatisfied: "I basically understand. That is to say, in the previous half month, six fleets that were scheduled to go to Jiaoxi have missed their schedules. The corresponding total amount of grain is around [-] shi. After the Dragon Boat Festival, the south wind is approaching, which is the time for the fleet to arrive in large numbers. However, there are very few grain ships in Qingyuan Prefecture and Pingjiang Prefecture, so it is estimated that from Dragon Boat Festival to Ten During the month, the import of grain by sea will be reduced by [-]%.”

"exactly."

Guo Ning nodded: "Okay, that's it."

He smiled and said to Zhao Bin and the others: "I have other business duties, you go and rest. However, it is very rare for heroes from the sea to come here. I will treat you to dinner tonight!"

Zhao Bin and the others were flattered, they agreed repeatedly, and exited the backyard.

It wasn't until they were no longer in sight that Guo Ning sighed heavily and his face darkened.

The next moment, he picked up Tieguduo with his backhand and swung it hard.The heavy wooden target in front of him was hit by a huge force, shook violently a few times, and snapped into two pieces.