Prince Li You of the Great Tang Dynasty begs the noble families to their deaths!

Li You was about to ask more questions when Yan Hongxin ran over.

"My lord, we found more than 70 women in a nearby cave; they must be this man's wives and concubines."

"More than 70, all by him?"

"good."

"...Call all those women over here."

A group of ragged women were led over, seven or eight of whom were still breastfeeding.

Upon seeing these women, the subdued bandits' eyes gleamed with greed.

When Ren Zongyang saw this, his eyes turned unusually fierce.

Li You looked at the women, then at Ren Zongyang and his men, and couldn't help but shake his head in amazement.

"Ren Zongyang, you're something else! You're hoarding all the spoils like this, and your men still won't rebel against you?"

Ren Zongyang chuckled: "This is a rule set by our previous leader: whoever is the strongest fighter gets to have all the women!"

"Where is your previous leader now?"

"I killed him!"

Li You also laughed. This guy in front of him seemed to be mentally immature and was very savage.

He doesn't resemble "Zhong Kui" as much as "Li Kui," and he's a lecherous Li Kui at that.

"Nowadays, the rules of the bandit camp have changed. You can't keep so many women to yourself; you have to distribute them to your subordinates."

"What? Why should I?"

"I could kill you right now!"

The sudden display of murderous aura from Li You instilled a sense of fear in Ren Zongyang.

The person in front of me, like myself, must have killed people before, and quite a lot of them.

"Hongxin, go and test these bandits. Pick the honest and hardworking ones and have them marry these women."

"promise!"

"etc!"

"Do you have a problem with that?"

"Could I keep those women who have given birth?"

Li You thought for a moment and said, "Alright, but from now on you must obey my orders, understand?"

Ren Zongyang thought about it and finally agreed.

After dealing with the bandits, it was getting late, so Li You and his men decided to rest for the night in the mountain stronghold.

At night, the hungry bandits, who hadn't seen women in a long time, made the mountains wail and howl like ghosts, as if it were a prehistoric world.

The next morning, Li You led his team deeper into the mountains in search of traces of the copper miners.

Li You left twenty soldiers to guard this mountain stronghold, in order to manage these hundreds of bandits, who might come in handy later.

As for Ren Zongyang, the leader of this group, he was kept by Li You's side.

Firstly, to act as a guide, and secondly, to prevent this fellow from harboring resentment and causing trouble in the camp.

After another day of walking, guided by Ren Zongyang, Li You finally met the copper miners in the mountains.

This was a small group of about fifty people, and they all seemed very afraid when they saw Ren Zongyang.

Judging from the looks of it, the bandits in these mountains have been bullying the copper miners quite a bit.

Upon learning that the mountain stronghold below had changed hands, the copper miners became excited.

"My lord, shall we continue to pay the tribute at the previous price?"

"Well... let's talk about the tribute issue separately. Where are you from, and why are you mining copper in the mountains?"

"Is the young master a newcomer from out of town?"

"Indeed, we are in business and need a lot of copper ingots. We heard there is copper in these mountains, so we came to inspect it."

"Huh? A group of people came to ask us about this a couple of months ago. There seem to be more and more strangers in these mountains."

"What did those people look like?"

"They were tall and burly, carrying weapons, and looked quite intimidating."

Upon hearing this, Li You was already seven or eight parts certain that the group of people the copper miner was referring to must be the fifty assassins he had sent a few days ago.

Compared to these copper miners from the south, the assassins from the north were indeed a head taller.

"Old man, do you know where they went?"

"He should be wandering around these mountains, looking for copper mines."

Li You nodded: "Old man, where are you from, and why are you mining copper in these mountains?"

"We are all from Yiyang County. We farm at home during the week and come to the mountains to mine copper in our spare time to earn some money."

"Do you also sell the copper ingots you mine to merchants from outside?"

"good."

"What was the price you listed when you sold it to them?"

"In good times, ten catties of copper can be exchanged for a bolt of cloth; in bad times, only fifteen catties can be exchanged for a bolt of cloth."

At such a price, Li You was at a loss for words.

You don't even need to do the math to know it's a huge profit.

However, these copper miners had rudimentary equipment, and the copper they mined contained many impurities. It needed further processing and smelting before it could finally flow into the two mints established by the Tang Dynasty in Chang'an and Luoyang for the final minting of copper coins.

During the Zhenguan era, there were only two mints in the entire country: Chang'an and Luoyang.

Of course, a considerable portion of the crude copper also ended up in the hands of merchants who made copperware for profit.

Next, Li You looked at the mine shaft where they were mining.

The mine is about 30 meters deep, and the walls are reinforced with wood to prevent collapse.

This depth of copper ore is shallow, which is a characteristic of ancient copper mines. Only shallow ore could be mined by ancient people. Going deeper was beyond the reach of both technology and manpower, and the mine shafts were very prone to collapse. If people were to perish, what copper could be mined?

The ore mined by miners initially has some bluish-green oxide bands on it, which contains copper.

After the ore was transported from the mine, the copper miners would break it up and burn it in their kilns to obtain raw copper ingots.

They sold these roughly processed copper ingots to merchants down the mountain.

"Old man, how many small mining groups like yours are there in the mountains?"

"Not many, only a dozen or so. The mines here don't produce much. The good mines are occupied by people from Changcheng County, and we can't get them."

Changcheng County and Yiyang County were both counties under Raozhou.

Even small industries hidden deep in the mountains face internal competition.

"Old man, have you ever encountered silver in the mines you've been mining?"

"We have silver, but it's worthless. People in the south use silver; we don't need it here."

Raozhou is located in the south.

In the context of the Tang Dynasty, the southernmost part of the south referred to the Lingnan region, where silver did indeed circulate.

Seeing that Li You was interested in the silver, the old man used a fire poker to stir the slag next to him and finally found a few dark, murky things.

Li You used a knife to split the thing open, revealing the white surface inside.

This is silver.

Silver is an element that can only be produced after a supernova explosion in the universe, and it was also the monetary metal that dominated for many years afterward.

However, in the Tang Dynasty, silver was only second to none, while copper coins were used more widely.

Copper is also a product of supernova explosions, because nuclear fusion inside a stable star can only produce iron, while only the neutron capture produced during a supernova explosion can produce copper and silver.

The production of gold, platinum, and uranium requires even more intense neutron star mergers.

Finally, Li You and the old man who answered his question negotiated a very favorable price for the "tribute".

The copper miners of Yiyang County were moved to tears. The old man even wanted to give Li You a grand salute, but Li You stopped him.

From now on, we'll all be family. There's really no need for such a grand ceremony.