Demons' anxious mood still did not relieve himself after he arrived in Huzhou. He saw more competitors here, not only his old friend Ryan, but also Ruthya, and some real strong men in Shanghai, including both Chinese and Western.

Although he claims to have assets of tens of millions, he knows very well that now, including him, Westerners in Shanghai have just started for a few years or more than ten years, and the amount of funds they can mobilize is very limited. There is only one real monster, that is HSBC.

Therefore, he had to consider how to borrow a batch of big money from HSBC, but he decided to show off the field first, so he quickly exchanged 1,000 taels of silver dollars from a money bank and dressed up himself.

Now, in addition to Westerners, Huzhou's silk merchants have also jumped out. They don't know what industry is or how to run a factory, but they know that Huzhou is already the territory of Hongjun and they should do something to establish a good relationship with Hongjun.

Now Hongjun decided to sell some factories. Although the price may not be favorable and may be thrown into the hands, they decided to spend money first to make the relationship better.

You should know that the silk industry in Huzhou alone is a big business of tens of millions of silver dollars. In addition, domestic sales can be said to be a super industry in China that is drooling. There are too many people who rely on the silk industry to make a living, so everyone has to consider how to establish a good relationship with Hongjun.

Although the Hongjun has not really taken action in Huzhou now, everyone knows that this is just a manifestation. When a real state regime uses its violent machine, no one can resist, even if they can have more assets.

Therefore, Demons encountered great obstacles when he asked to see Zhou Xiuying. Although he had a good relationship with the Hongjun, Zhou Xiuying was in a very busy situation now. She was responsible for both the military progress in the entire Anhui territory and the handling of the coal-iron battle.

Therefore, she had to meet dozens of people every day, and sometimes even had to meet sixty or seventy people alone, so that she could not sleep late at night. Even with her good relationship in the past, Demons only won fifteen minutes: "Mr. Demons, I know you are an old friend of our Hongjun and His Highness Yan King, but I'm very sorry. We must tell a long story and end our conversation within fifteen minutes!"

Demons was not angry about waiting for two hours. He knew clearly that there were more than a dozen soldiers and businessmen waiting behind him, and it was already a special treatment for him to get fifteen minutes. You should know that the one in front only stayed in it for seven or eight minutes and then retreated.

He also decided to say a long story short: "Dear Ms. Zhou Xiuying, I will notify you now. I am very interested in the metal processing plant you are about to sell and are willing to quote a reasonable price to purchase."

This metal processing factory has some machine tool equipment purchased by Hongjun, which can process bayonets, sabers and other simple metal equipment. In the original plan, this processing factory was part of the military factory, but after the blockade, Hongjun found that he had two such metal processing factories, so he decided to sell one of them to reduce waste of funds.

"Longyin Metal Processing Company?" Zhou Xiuying quickly found the information of the factory in a series of forms: "This factory has more than 170 employees and complete sets of equipment. We once invested 13,000 silver dollars in this factory. Now you only need 5,700 silver dollars to buy everything from this factory, including equipment, workers and factory buildings!"

"Thank you for your kindness!" Demons said with a smile: "I am old friends with Your Highness Yan, so I can't let Hongjun suffer such a big loss. I have a better suggestion. I will buy this factory for 7,000 silver dollars!"

Zhou Xiuying looked at Demons. She knew clearly that the Demons in front of her was a real old fox. She whispered: "Our order will last for a whole eighteen months, and there will still be enough military orders within eighteen months. Of course, you can also switch to a civilian factory. But I don't know why you have to increase the price of this factory to 7,000 silver dollars!"

"This is good for us, at least I can maintain a good relationship with you!"

Zhou Xiuying smiled: "It seems you are right. So I will increase the price of this factory by another 500 silver dollars. Do you have any objection?"

"No objection!" Demons said only with concern: "I just want to know how to better cooperate with your steel industry. Although the steel production is still small now, my metal processing plant will need a lot of steel."

"Hmm?" Zhou Xiuying is also concerned about the successor issues of the steel mill now: "What do you want to say?"

"I obtained the concession of the Huzhou-Hangzhou railway from His Highness King Yan. Although there have been many twists and turns, thanks to His Highness King Yan's great victory, our railway has completed the preliminary work and is ready to start construction in the near future?"

"Recently?" Zhou Xiuying discovered this sensitively: "What is it recently?"

As the head of the Huzhou-Hangzhou Railway, she has always had extraordinary concerns about the Huzhou and the coal-iron and iron battle. Although she didn't know what changes the railway would bring, she clearly knew from the mouths of Liu Chang and some foreigners that the railway would change everything.

The Huzhou-Hangzhou railway is already the first railway in China in the planned area, but she does not think that the construction of this railway will be implemented in the near future, because it is too luxurious for a country in war to spend huge amounts of money to build such a railway.

Demons obviously aroused Zhou Xiuying's interest. He smiled and said, "Fifteen minutes is not enough. I brought a full set of drawings!"

Zhou Xiuying agreed with him: "You are right. We have enough time to talk about this. How much time do you need?"

Demons did not answer Zhou Xiuying, but just opened the drawings he brought: "Do you think the current route planning is reasonable? This determines the fate of villages, towns, or even county towns along the route for a full hundred years."

For these villages or counties along the route, the direction of a railway can indeed determine their fate for a hundred years. Zhou Xiuying nodded first and then said, "Can you give me one? There are too many benefits in this."

There were indeed too many comedy and tragedies around the direction of Huzhou-Hangzhou Railway in the future. Some gentry organized protests because of fear of affecting the atmosphere, which made the entire town plummet, and some small villages became new county seats because of the establishment of stations. There were also the strong men who set up a premiere to kidnap engineers and demanded a change of line. Finally, the railway successfully set up a station in its own village.

Demons nodded and replied, "You may be subject to a lot of resistance?"

Zhou Xiuying returned to the original topic and asked, "You bought a metal processing factory for this?"

"We need a lot of railway facilities, especially railroad tracks!" Demons replied cleverly: "It would be even better if we could directly invest in the Steel Consortium!"

Zhou Xiuying is also worried about the next step of the steel consortium he runs. Although he already has considerable pig iron production capacity and has also produced the first furnace of molten steel, the high production cost forced Zhou Xiuying to consider the future of the steel consortium.

You should know that the steel produced by the steel consortium now has much lower quality than the steel shipped from Shanghai, and its cost price is twice that of the price from Shanghai to Hong Kong. It is completely a military need to maintain it now, but this is not a long-term solution.

But Chau Xiuying had to consider more: "That is the key to the military industry."

Demons continued to attack: "In fact, I am also interested in chemical plants, and I can raise a large amount of funds from Shanghai."

"It's not just your money?" Zhou Xiuying became serious: "But with your own strength, it's already the limit to building the Hangzhou-Huzhou railway. I'll answer my question. When is it the near future?"

Demons also knew that the Hangzhou-Huzhou railway was the key. Although he claimed to have completed the preliminary work, the fact was far from that. He had only completed the initial work. However, he told Zhou Xiuying: "If it goes well, the start-up ceremony can be held within this year!"

"When is the substantial start?" Zhou Xiuying had already grown up: "I must be responsible for His Highness Yan."

Faced with Chau Soo-young's question, Demons answered cleverly: "It is impossible to start work substantially before the New Year. You know that that is not economically appropriate."

Zhou Xiuying agrees with this view that the Chinese people have too strong concept of going home for the New Year. If construction starts before the New Year, it will soon usher in a considerable period of shutdown, which will bring great economic losses.

"What do you mean is that next year's Spring Festival will start substantially?" Zhou Xiuying replied: "If you are planning to adopt steel consortium products, then I can consider allowing you to invest."

"Thank you very much for your kindness." Demons's face smiled: "We will build the most advanced steel manufacturer in the world."

Although the industrial system in northern Zhejiang is not complete now, Demons believes that he will be the most glorious starting point for the entire Chinese industry, and being able to invest in the official monopoly military industry also represents huge profits.

"Don't hold it high too early." Zhou Xiuying said with a smile: "The steel joint enterprise, at least in a short period of time, will not see any hope of profit!"

Demons grabbed his hair, but replied with a smile: "That's it... Then can we continue to talk about our investment in the chemical joint enterprise? I have always been an old friend of His Highness Yan's Highness!" (To be continued)
Chapter completed!