Chapter 370 Entering the Demon Country for the First Time
Catching May's little tail, the Shimen caravan stepped into the territory of Bega Kingdom.
The sky is crisp and clear, and the fields around us stretch as far as the eye can see. The crops are green and the farmers are bent over and busy weeding.
He Lingchuan is looking at these crops.
It’s not rice, it’s not wheat, it’s not even tea. “What is growing in this land?”
It's hard to say that he doesn't know how to distinguish between crops. When he helped his father explore the counties around Dunyu, he ran around in the fields and took a look.
But he had never seen this kind of plant before. It was at least dozens of hectares in size and was very spectacular. They walked for more than an hour and still hadn't seen the second crop.
Master Shi Er is by his side: "Tobacco leaves."
"Huh? Is this tobacco leaf?" This answer surprised He Lingchuan, "The land is so flat, I thought they would grow crops."
"It's not good to grow crops on this kind of red land. However, regardless of whether it's good or bad, this large area of land on the border is planted with tobacco leaves." Shi Congshan said with a smile, "Almost every demon king will grow tobacco leaves in their territory.
This thing is much more expensive than food."
"Then do they still grow food?"
"Grow, of course. The territory of the Demon Kingdom is so vast and there are countless fertile fields. Are you still worried that the food they grow will not be enough to eat?" Shi Congshan said with a smile, "Don't worry about them."
He Lingchuan looked at the tobacco fields around him and suddenly remembered the chewing tobacco that He Chunhua distributed to his subordinates before he entered Xiazhou.
Exquisite, delicious, compulsorily imported.
"Does the Fu Kingdom also want to buy this thing?" He remembered the helplessness on He Chunhua's face. The Yuan Kingdom and the Bejia Kingdom had signed an agreement, and it was not enough not to buy it.
"Of course." Shi Congshan said, "But the people of Fu country like chewing tobacco. There is no need to share it. All the chambers of commerce are rushing to do this business." He pointed to the caravan behind him, "We do it too."
An important business of Shimen Merchant is to provide "cage beads", which are the balls plugged into the bamboo tubes, to the jade bamboos in the south of the treasure tree.
After his explanation, He Lingchuan realized that the quality and packaging of the same chewing tobacco produced in each demon king's kingdom were different. The chewing tobacco in the southern part of the Baoshu Kingdom must be sealed with agarwood, which not only prevents the smoke from leaking out, but also seals the chewing tobacco.
Yes, in addition to being moisture-proof, the cloudwood itself has a special aroma. If it is brewed in a bamboo tube for a long time, it will add a new flavor to the chewing tobacco.
Over time, this has become a very important feature.
However, the distribution of rosewood in Bejia is very small, but it is common in Fu State. Therefore, the latter opened up the rosewood forest farm to provide processed rosewood beads, also known as "cage beads", as accessories to Baoshu's southern border.
They really wanted to name it "Dragon Ball", but they had to avoid it.
The Shi brothers worked hard for many years before spending a lot of money to contract two forest farms. They carefully maintained, harvested and processed the trees, and supplied Baoshu South Territory three times a year.
Don't underestimate these inconspicuous wooden beads, they have supported many chambers of commerce in Fu country.
This is just an industry under the demon king of Bega Kingdom, not even a pillar.
Along the way, the Shimen Chamber of Commerce crossed the border along the outer edge of the Demon Nest Swamp and entered the territory of Baoshu King, one of the Thirteen Demon Kings, which is the Baoshu Kingdom. With the care of the Chamber of Commerce, He Lingchuan passed the customs smoothly without encountering any obstacles.
In fact, the checkpoints are very loose. The customs declarers sitting there are a few ape monsters, not as tall as a human, with their mouths a little white, and they yawn all the time. They are obviously old. After collecting the toll, they compare the figures and characters.
The goods were stamped and released without even looking at them carefully.
After passing the border, He Lingchuan asked Shi Congshan: "Even the border is so perfunctory?"
The border inspections of Yuan Kingdom are extremely strict, especially if you don't tell Brother Kong Fang, you don't know how much trouble you will face.
"When passing customs, you have to pay attention to efficiency." Shi Congshan pointed back, "Do you think there are many teams here, can you afford it? Besides, the Bejia National Road has very little tax revenue, so why is there any need to block people?"
In the past on Hongya Road, He Chunhua was the person who bought the tolls, but he only had an official status. So He Lingchuan knew very well that the toll tax on Hongya Road and Heishui City was very high, and the businessmen and travelers who came in and out of the country were always charged.
Call it, for example, Liu Baobao's family always tries to find ways to leak things. Now when he asked, Baoshu Kingdom actually only charged one-fifth of the travel fee!
Master Shi Er laughed again and said: "Although the road tax is low, some checkpoints will collect taxes under clever names, which are more severe than the original road tax. After the current Taifu came to power, he cracked down hard and arrested tens of thousands of people and sent them to jail.
It’s much clearer now.”
No wonder this commercial road is bustling with people, even busier than the main road outside Shihuan City.
He Lingchuan even noticed that the road behind the pass was the smoothest and widest official road he had ever seen, enough to accommodate seven carriages side by side.
Although this wilderness is flat and roads can be built at will, most countries don't spend so much effort.
After walking for another two hours, the outline of a town appeared in front of us. There were no longer tobacco fields on the roadside, and there were finally some normal crops.
"Hey, monster?"
He Lingchuan saw at a glance that the cattle in the field were different. Not only did they have two tails, but they were also extremely strong. They were two times larger than ordinary buffaloes and weighed at least five or six thousand kilograms. They looked like dwarfs that could move.
house.
When humans stand next to them, they look very small.
He Lingchuan had hunted this thing in the Chipa Plateau. As long as it went crazy, the whole village could be demolished. In the past two months just after the Emperor's Ooze, the patrols often encountered these savage bull monsters.
But in front of me, these bull monsters were actually plowing and plowing the fields.
Of course, the plows they are equipped with are very large, each with four plowshares. The ox walks in front, and two or three people support it behind. In the end, it will automatically turn around, so the efficiency of plowing the ground is very high.
Judging from their skillful movements and tacit cooperation, these bull demons must have been doing farm work for a long time.
Seeing his unblinking gaze, Shi Congshan smiled and said, "Everyone who comes to Demon Kingdom for the first time has this expression on his face."
He Lingchuan looked away: "It's because I am ignorant."
His medicine ape can make elixirs, the octopus in Panlong City's Promotion Department can detect people's meridians, and the ape monster sitting in the checkpoint just now can declare customs, so it's not surprising at all that monsters do things for people.
This chapter is not over yet, please click on the next page to continue reading! There is at most one hour before sunset, and the caravan decided to settle in the town and continue moving forward tomorrow morning.
He Lingchuan was very surprised and looked around. However, this town was no different from the one in Yuan Kingdom in terms of scale. It was also dominated by human residents, with more than 1,300 local residents settled there, including more than 70 monster residents.
In addition, there are more than 400 foreign merchants.
It's not far from the border. It's obvious that the town is used to the coming and going of tourists, and there are plenty of restaurants, blacksmith shops, inns and hotels.
There seems to be a market today.
They were already very familiar with this road. After Mr. Shi Er arranged various chores, he would invite He Lingchuan to have a drink.
As soon as he finished speaking, the sound of gongs was heard in the center of the town, and someone shouted: "The execution at the street entrance has begun!"
Master Shi Er sighed: "It's such a coincidence that we caught up with the execution of a death row prisoner today? I have walked this road more than thirty times, and I have only encountered it twice today."
He Lingchuan shook his head: "What kind of good thing is this?"
As soon as he said this, a six or seven-year-old girl ran past him, her face was flushed, she was beautiful and cute.
She giggled and pulled her mother forward: "Quick, quick, this time we want to grab the front row!"
"Slow down..." Mother stumbled.
Her daughter complained to her: "Last time, Adong was the first to watch and told us later that blood was splattered on his face."
He Lingchuan looked at the townspeople gathered around him. They were all laughing and chatting with each other.
It's as lively as a festival.
When he looked at the execution table in front of him, it was different from other places.
In other places where criminals are executed, a high platform is built with wood, and the prisoner is brought up to hang or behead him.
There is a huge pit at the street corner of this town, which is about half a foot lower than the ground. I don't know if it was originally a fish pond, but there are stains on the bottom.
He knew at a glance that these were dried blood stains.
Now a lot of people had gathered around the pit. No wonder the little girl said she couldn't see clearly if she didn't grab the front row. It turned out that the execution was going to be done from below.
At this time, the police officer also came out with two prisoners with shackled hands and feet. The prisoner pronounced him guilty of serious crimes, and the divine grace sentenced him to "suffer the punishment of being bitten."
He Lingchuan heard it as "stoning" and thought it was stoned to death. After all, the execution platform was sinking, making it easier for heavy objects to be thrown. Stone punishment is also a very ancient punishment.
When the two prisoners heard this, they trembled like chaff and turned pale.
One man suddenly became wet, and the audience pointed at him and yelled: "I peed!"
At this time, someone outside shouted: "The executioner is coming, everyone, give way!"
The crowd of onlookers all made way for a passage, not daring to delay at all.
Only two shocking roars were heard, and two huge shadows walked through the crowd and walked in as if there was no one else around.
These are two huge tiger-like creatures. They are similar in body shape to tigers, but the forearms are longer and thicker, and the hind limbs are slightly shorter. Their shoulder height is four feet away, and their body shape is stronger than ordinary tigers. They have only striped stripes.
Distributed on the back.
The paws pressed against the ground alone are three times the size of an adult man's hand.
He Lingchuan had never seen this kind of monster in the Kite Kingdom, but he seemed to have seen the drawing in some travel journal, and knew that this animal was called "Tiger Mimic" and that it liked to hunt rhinos, elephants and other giant beasts.
However, they don't seem to reject human flesh. Just look at the way they stare at the prisoner, which is truly called a tiger's gaze.
He Lingchuan finally understood that this "biting punishment" was the "biting" of biting.
Xianghu licked his lips, and a prisoner immediately collapsed to the ground.
The officer pulled him and found that he had passed out.
Although the other prisoner was also trembling, he took advantage of the officer's lowered head to grit his teeth and hit the pillar with a "bang" sound.
The sound is very loud.
He Lingchuan heard a "click" and could tell based on experience that the man's brain was cracked. He fell down as soon as he was hit, and the blood quickly stained the ground red.
The officer quickly bent down to check his jugular vein, and after a while he said to the prison guard: "He's dead."
The surrounding townspeople booed.
Without a living person, the excitement of this show will be greatly reduced.