Zhao Ming frowned, "Is it in Xiping County? Why have I never heard of iron ore in the county?"
"There are so many minerals in the world, how can you still know about them all?"
Zhao Ming thought about it and asked, "Where is the iron mine?"
"It's in a wilderness, where there are fields that have been abandoned for several years, and the fields are somewhat barren. If the enemy army might not move north from there, I would not even think of setting up a settlement there."
"After talking so much, you still haven't said where you are."
"Well, because it is wild there, there is no place name, and the mountain has no name, so I named the settlement site Wushan, because at noon, the sun shines particularly well there..."
Zhao Ming squinted his eyes and recited the word Wushan twice in his mind. It was in the north again. He pursed his lips and asked, "Is this Wushan very close to Wuyang?"
Zhao Hanzhang pinched his fingers and said: "A little closer."
Zhao Ming's face was extremely dark, "Isn't the iron mine located in Wuyang County?"
Zhao Hanzhang smiled at him.
Zhao Ming turned around and left. He was really confused. Why on earth did he stop and listen to her?
Zhao Hanzhang hurriedly caught up and babbled behind him, "Uncle, the mountain is not entirely on their side, but part of it is on our side. Really, I have asked about it. In the past, there were villages there, and there were people there." The land is at the foot of that mountain..."
"The divisions between counties are blurry except for the boundary markers. I had people go check it out. Wuyang County has also left that area uncultivated." Zhao Hanzhang said: "If we go mining, no one will know about it."
Zhao Ming stopped, frowned and asked, "Then why are you telling me?"
If you want to mine, then go do it secretly. Why should you tell him?
Do you want him to stop it or not?
Zhao Hanzhang said: "But graphite is needed to make iron."
She looked at Zhao Ming eagerly.
It turned out that he was interested in the graphite mine in the clan.
Of course, this graphite is not that graphite.
The ancients called coal graphite, but what later generations considered graphite was called black edge here.
So the graphite mine in Zhao's hands is actually a coal mine.
Zhao Ming also simply said: "You want to buy graphite from the clan? I will call the person in charge of this matter later, and you can talk to him."
"Can it be cheaper?" Zhao Hanzhang asked: "When I refine the iron, I will sell it to the clan at a cheaper price."
Zhao Ming began to think deeply. Zhao Hanzhang saw that there was something going on and kept up his efforts, "And to be honest with my uncle, we have newly refined iron with better quality, which we call steel. Although the output is also very low, the weapons we create can be called It is a magic weapon. It is impossible for me to sell such a unique thing to outsiders. I can only sell it to the clan."
Zhao Ming pondered, glanced at her and said, "Let's go home and talk."
Zhao Hanzhang followed happily.
How can talking with others be as refreshing as talking with Zhao Ming?
They both know what kind of person they are and what kind of person the other person is, so Zhao Hanzhang can push the price down without any worries.
The coal mine does not belong to Zhao Ming, but to the Zhao family. But it is him, no, it should be said that it is his father who is in charge of the family affairs, so he can make some decisions.
I don’t know what Zhao Ming was thinking, but he agreed to reduce the price without asking Zhao Hanzhang to work harder and sold the coal to her at a very favorable price.
Zhao Ming also wanted to see what step Zhao Hanzhang could achieve.
If she is really allowed to control the entire Yuzhou, then the Zhao family's Wubao is in the hinterland of Yuzhou. As long as Yuzhou is not broken down in the future, the Zhao family will be the safest.
Based on this, Zhao Ming is willing to help her wherever he can.
Ji Yuan was overjoyed when he found out that Zhao Hanzhang had bought the coal, "This way, we will not be controlled by others in terms of weapons."
Zhao Hanzhang took in so many refugees. Of course, not all of them were soldiers, but more of them were long-term workers.
There are only 1,200 people who are actually trained by her as soldiers, but these people also need a lot of weapons.
The remaining people also have to do some military training in their spare time, which is equivalent to the militia. They work in the fields during busy farming and go to the battlefield during war.
They also need some weapons.
What's more, she now needs a lot of farm tools.
These all require iron, and the iron ore in Yuzhou is either in the hands of the Yamen or the governor.
In fact, being exposed under the eyes of Governor He, and buying iron from him, isn't it equivalent to exposing one's own situation and ambitions?
Therefore, Ji Yuan always wanted to go beyond He Governor and buy ironware outside Yuzhou; Zhao Hanzhang was more straightforward and wanted to find iron mines by herself.
Yuzhou has a lot of mineral resources. Although she can't remember the specific place, since there are coal mines in Xiping County, there should be iron mines nearby.
If not in Xiping, it will be in the next county.
So Zhao Hanzhang has always attracted people's attention.
Finding the iron ore in Wushan was purely accidental. Zhao Hanzhang had bought a batch of iron ore before and sent the stones to the team leaders and captains to see and ask them to note down their appearance. If similar stones were found in the wild, they would immediately report them.
Report.
A team leader took his assigned tribesmen to the resettlement site. Because of the cold weather, the firewood they had stored before was not enough, so they walked a little further to cut firewood, and accidentally discovered Wushan Mountain.
It was a very short hill with a few trees growing on the edge, but it was protected from the wind, so they hid there during their breaks and it didn't feel so cold anymore.
Then they touched a stone. As soon as they exerted force, the stone fell apart and turned into a pile of sand and gravel. The color was very similar to the iron ore that Zhao Hanzhang showed to the chiefs.
So the chief picked up a bag and took it with him when the Wushan resettlement team leader returned to the county town to report on the situation.
Zhao Hanzhang did not expect that whatever he thought would come to him, he felt quite like he was the son of destiny.
Fortunately, things did not go so smoothly, so her feeling was weakened, because Wushan Mountain was a bit far away from the resettlement site. According to everyone's detailed research, they determined that the unnamed mountain named Wushan Mountain by Zhao Hanzhang had already left Xiping.
The county scope belongs to Wuyang County next door.
Because of this, Zhao Hanzhang was very unhappy. After being depressed for a whole night, he decided to send an additional team to the Wushan settlement site. Both teams quietly moved the settlement site not far from the foot of the mountain.
Fortunately, the population loss in Wuyang County across the street is also serious, and the trees there are much denser than here, which means that there are no villages or even cultivated land near the Wushan Mountain.
So they can occupy it quietly for the time being and wait until they are discovered.
Oh, by the way, there is another question, private mining of iron ore is illegal.
However, Zhao Hanzhang didn't really care about the precedent of being a governor, but she was still weak and helpless, so she had to keep it under wraps and couldn't talk about it outside.
Therefore, the people who knew about this matter were the confidants of Zhao Hanzhang and Fu Tinghan.