Distant Mountain Battle Song

Chapter 111 wasn't as good as I imagined.
Yun Ce had a thousand reasons not to go to Tiewei Pass, because he was not a beneficiary of the Han Dynasty's vested interests at all.

He was captured from Earth by a dragon and casually dumped here like trash.

He was unwilling to begin with, and after he crawled out of the ancient forest of Tianzhu Mountain, he basically never had a good life. He was either robbing or killing people all day long. How could he have any peace and joy?

Eji glared at Zhang Min fiercely, then dragged Yun Ce back to the room to discuss how to deal with that mountain of excrement.

In Eji's opinion, no matter how good Tiewei Pass was, she would not go there. Ideally, Yun Ce could stay there forever, accompany her forever, and watch her give birth to seven or eight sons.

Zhang Min was different. She believed that a true man should go to the Iron Enclosure Pass to display his might on the battlefield, slaughter the Gui Fang people, causing their heads to roll and their blood to flow like rivers, and expand the territory northward for thousands of miles. Then, in the Gui Fang royal court, he should see the iron pillar and inscribe a stone as a record.

The Yun family's manor was actually quite shabby. This place was originally built as housing for stewards, servants, and slaves. Apart from a few rooms that provided some shelter from the wind and rain, the rest of the houses were drafty and hot in summer and cold in winter.

Fortunately, Yun Ce has already sent Feng An and Liang Kun to lead people to fire bricks and tiles. It is believed that it will not be long before the manor will be transformed into a completely different place.

When she first arrived in Jingzhao, Eji was still dreaming of living in Chang'an. However, after Zhang Min explained the situation in Chang'an, Eji immediately backed down.

Gu Kuang, a man from the Tang Dynasty, once said to Bai Juyi: "Rice is expensive in Chang'an, and it is not easy to live here." That was only a relatively objective statement.

This Chang'an is truly a place where living is not easy.

It becomes clear when you think about it: when Chang'an was at its peak during the Tang Dynasty, the city housed no fewer than a million people.

This place, Chang'an, had a population ten times that of Chang'an during the Tang Dynasty. However, in this vast city of Chang'an, only 300,000 people lived.

Of course, this number of 300,000 people does not include servants and slaves.

People who rely on nomadic herding and gathering as their main mode of production are not suited to living in a huge city. Fortunately, Chang'an's commerce was extremely developed, which miraculously supported the great city of Chang'an.

Of the thirty million people in Jingzhao, only about three hundred thousand could enter Chang'an.

Therefore, Yun Ce was unable to enter Chang'an, and was not even qualified to enter Chang'an.

In the days since arriving in Chang'an, Yun Ce's heart had actually settled down. He decided not to go to Chang'an, lest he discover that other people lived excessively luxurious lives and thus develop ill intentions.

"Let me tell you, you better keep that chicken-dung mountain safe for me. It's a treasure mountain, a treasure that can't be bought with gold."

Hearing Yun Ce say this, E Ji said somewhat embarrassedly, "I know I was wrong. If you're still angry, my lord, just hit me a couple of times."

Seeing that Eji had turned her buttocks up, Yun Ce touched them and then laughed, "I don't have time to talk back to you. I'm saying that chicken shit mountain is a treasure. It is a treasure mountain, and I will use it for a long time."

Seeing that Yun Ce didn't seem to be coaxing her, E Ji quickly said, "Let's raise chickens too, and make the dung mountain even bigger."

"Yes, we'll definitely have to raise chickens in the future. You love eggs so much. These days, we have too little land, less than a thousand acres. It's not even enough for Lao Chou and his gang to take care of."

"Hey, what are you going to do, young master?"

"What for? To farm, of course!"

"It's not easy to grow, and it's not good to grow. You'd better give up on this idea." Zhang Min's voice came from outside the door.

"We're talking as husband and wife, why are you eavesdropping?" Eji opened the door and caught Zhang Min red-handed.

Zhang Min curled her lips and said, "What else do you two do in the house besides talk and sleep? Farming? Do you think no one in the Han Dynasty has ever had such an idea?"

As things stand, aside from growing a little wheat and beans, things like your favorite baby beans simply won't survive and will attract insects.

Besides, if you want to farm, the land first needs to be fertile, and there needs to be water. Look at the estate your wife bought; it's all black soil. Can you farm there?

Yun Ce didn't want to pay attention to Zhang Min, this farming idiot. The land here was covered with a thick layer of volcanic ash. In such a place, let alone farming, even elephants would grow into a bunch of elephants.

The reason the people here dislike farming is mainly because their slash-and-burn agriculture practice has killed many. Not to mention, after thousands of years, they haven't even developed suitable farming tools, so how can they possibly cultivate the land?

From land reclamation, fertilization, irrigation, sowing, thinning, pest control, fertilization again, irrigation again, harvesting, and finally storage, every step involves a high level of expertise.

Without these technologies and suitable farming tools, farming is out of the question. Not to mention this group of big men, even Africans, who are also human beings on Earth, simply don't know how to farm.

Fortunately, the dog is a very good comrade. Back on Earth, when it was training its mind, some programmer must have implanted a complete set of crop cultivation techniques into its head. Now, it's all thanks to Yun Ce.

Even though the plants here are very different from those on Earth, Yun Ce believes that with a few more trials, he will definitely have a good harvest.

Even if the yield here isn't as good as in the wild... It's a lie to say that, but Yun Ce is confident he can produce a good result. The reason Chang'an only has 300,000 permanent residents is because of its high prices. Even if the yield of what Yun Ce grows here isn't high, the cost will definitely be higher than gathering from the wild, not to mention the transportation costs for caravans.

Yun Ce observed that a day here is longer than on Earth, meaning that even in the hot month of He Yue, there are still many crops that can be grown.

For example, the kind of beans that Eji really likes to eat, and the wheat that Yun Ce has been craving for a long time; he has been wanting to eat a bowl of oily, hot noodles for a long time.

Of course, the first thing to do now is to make the paper. We don't know how the court will react yet. He must take advantage of the time he still has and use the scarcity of paper to first obtain a mid-level noble title, and then get some money that matches his title.

Yun Ce knew long ago that money has its limits for any one person, and that having a limited amount of money is the kind of wealth that satisfies everyone.

The money of someone who is richer than a country is actually no longer relevant to them. No normal country would allow someone to be so rich that they can rival the country.

Because once you have a lot of this stuff, it's no longer money, but weapons.

Just like before, the soap that Yun Ce took out was easy for others to snatch away. But it's different when he takes out the papermaking technique. The people who use this thing the most are the imperial court and scholars all over the country.

The imperial court would not allow any one person or family to control this thing, because it relates to the state's control over its mouthpiece.

Upon arriving at the simple papermaking workshop, Feng An and Liang Kun looked at Yun Ce as if he were a god.

Yun Ce wasn't concerned about the white paper on the drying board. Compared to the white paper, the paper he could put indoors to dry was what truly saved his life.

Tear off a large piece of paper from the drying board and crumple it in your hand; the paper is both very tough and soft.

So, while everyone else was wondering what he was going to do, Yun Ce, clutching a handful of papers, plunged into the newly built outhouse.

It's all a story of hardship and tears. When Yun Ce was in the Tianzhu Mountain forest, he could only use leaves to clean up his body after his death. Later, the leaves became too fragile and would hurt his hands, so he used the inner bark. Until one time, he used poisonous bark...

When I arrived at Hekou Village, I found cloth woven from the fibers of the yew tree, but after using it too much, I felt a deep sense of guilt.

Now, Yun Ce feels that there's finally something right about his life.

As I emerged from the outhouse, feeling refreshed, I was met with a large group of resentful eyes.

Feng An was about to speak when Yun Ce stopped him, pointing to the papers on the drying board and saying, "You can take those papers to record the profound words and wise sayings of various sages and great gods."

After saying that, he pointed to the paper drying in the room and said, "That belongs to me, you'd better not touch it."

"Finally, let me tell you something else. Paper, to put it simply, is a product made by grinding up the fibers of the paper tree, adding lime, and then bleaching it."

This thing is for writing, it's for using. Don't sanctify a product, and don't sanctify myself just because I invented paper.

Eji didn't care what Yun Ce said. She carefully tore off a lot of white paper from the drying board, and finally watched with heartache as Lao Chou folded the paper and trimmed the edges with a huge curved knife.

She always felt that Lao Qiu was too ruthless, cutting off too many usable parts.

"Paper, do you only intend to offer it to His Majesty?" Zhang Min's words carried a hint of resentment.

"The person behind you can't even catch a broken bar of soap, how can you expect to catch something like paper?" Yun Ce said with disdain in the face of Zhang Min's accusation.

"What if we could catch the soap?"

Yun Ce looked at Zhang Min and said, "I don't care how you play, just give me a thousand taels of gold and I'll give you the secret recipe."

Zhang Min's mouth moved a few times, and finally she whispered, "What if I wanted it?"

Before she could finish speaking, Eji slapped Zhang Min on the head and angrily said, "How dare a concubine ask for the family's secret recipe?"

Zhang Min was stunned by Eji's slap, and finally looked at Yun Ce with red eyes and said, "Am I a concubine?"

Yun Ce pretended not to hear and hid to the side to discuss with Feng An and Liang Kun how to continue to improve the papermaking equipment at home, how to increase labor efficiency, and how to make the paper whiter, more resilient, and smoother to write on.

These are all pressing issues that need to be addressed immediately, and none of them can be ignored.

As for the question Zhang Min asked, Yun Ce thought it was very simple. As long as she didn't come near this family, she would still be a spy for Panxing Tower, arrogant and domineering.

(End of this chapter)