Chapter 19: Bumping into a Porcelain

  Liu Shiyi hastily ran forward, and upon seeing the scene, he quickly rushed up to mediate, with a flattering smile on his face, nodding and bowing: "Sir, sir, please don't fight, there's no need for violence. The animal doesn't have eyes after all..."

  That fellow, with his neck stretched out, scolded: "Look at this donkey's eyes, they're really not long. If I don't whip it a few times, you won't know that the horse king has three eyes! Beat it, beat it until this donkey learns to bray for me!"

  At the shout of the officer, several prisoners who had just overturned a cart came rushing up like they had been injected with chicken blood, each one more ferocious than the last, beating Liu Eleven until he was rolling on the ground, wailing loudly.

  Chen Feng, Yang Ye and a few others saw the government officials looking like bandits, and the bandits looked like government officials. They were all fierce and intimidating, and everyone was too scared to get close. Ding Yuluo rushed over in a hurry, and when she saw that they had already overturned three horse carts, grain was scattered all over the street, and they were still fighting and smashing things. Suddenly, a fire broke out. Her eyebrows furrowed, and she scolded loudly: "Stop it for me!"

  "Hey, I said it sounded like a girl, and indeed it's a big girl."

  That bailiff saw that the young man was a beautiful girl dressed as a boy, and his eyes suddenly curved into a sly smile: "Little girl, this old master is escorting prisoners to Shallow Mouth Prison, which is an important official business. Your mule being startled doesn't matter, but look, not only did it hurt my men, but also damaged so many salted vegetable jars. If the prisoners don't have anything to eat and accidentally start a riot, what can be done about it?"

  Ding Yuluo suppressed her anger and said, "This official, our cart collided with your carriage. I, a humble woman, apologize to you here. Someone was injured, I will pay the medical expenses; the salted vegetable jar was broken, I will also compensate for it. Does the official think my handling of this matter is proper?"

  "Haha, little girl, what you said is really easy-going, and it's so easy to get rid of us?" The man had a face full of rascal air, as if the four big characters "I am a hooligan" were written on his forehead.

  Ding Yuluo said sternly: "What should be done according to official rules?"

  Before the official could speak, a prisoner nearby shouted: "Do you need to ask? As long as this little wife of yours accompanies our lord for one night, everything will be fine."

  "Hahaha……" The four bailiffs and prisoners all burst out laughing. When had Ding Yulou ever suffered such humiliation, heard such coarse language? Her face turned red with rage, almost to the point of bleeding, she shouted: "Are you officials or bandits? In broad daylight, under the clear sky, do you still want to extort and blackmail?"

  That rascal smiled and said: "Little girl, you really said it, your husband is indeed a bandit in official uniform. How about that? Was it you who provoked me or was I the one who provoked you? You knocked me down, dropped two silver ingots, patted my butt and thought you could just walk away? Is there such logic in this world?"

  These northwest region's escorts for exiled prisoners have little to gain from their duties, which are complicated and heavy, with meager pay. It is difficult to make a living solely on the pay, and gradually they become tainted by the corrupt atmosphere of local government offices. Many people think of ways to make money after completing their duties. They often use "碰瓷" (a tactic to extort money) on small merchants who pass through.

  After the autumn assizes every year, these runners would collude with prisoners who had been sentenced to severe punishment, promising them preferential treatment in prison. Then, taking advantage of the opportunity of transferring prisons, they would intentionally create trouble during transportation and extort money from others. If the other party dared to resist or disobey, the runner would instruct a group of desperate people to rob and murder. In the vast and sparsely populated northwest region, those merchants were not locals, and where could they afford to spend time and effort on lawsuits? If they really wanted to investigate, the runners would shift all the blame onto the prisoners, and this lawsuit would drag on endlessly.

  Moreover, in general, if the person who was robbed did not have a prominent background, local officials were also unwilling to investigate further. As a result, the "碰瓷" (extortion) trend became more and more rampant, and after repeated successes, the escorts became increasingly arrogant and lawless, without any scruples. Today, seeing that the Ding family's convoy was very large, these escorts had not yet intended to extort them, but now that the Ding family has clashed with them first, it is only logical that these thugs would ruthlessly demand a sum of money from them.

  Miss Ding was slender and elegant, with eyebrows and eyes like a painting. Every frown and smile had its own unique charm. It was rare for someone to see such a beautiful young woman, and the more he looked, the more his heart itched. He knew he might not have the qualifications to flirt with such a beauty, but taking advantage of the situation and speaking smoothly made him feel good anyway. The angrier Ding Yulou became, the more pleased he was.

  Liu Shiyan saw his own young lady being humiliated, with a bruised face and standing aside, plucking up the courage to say: "This official, we are transporting grain to Guangyuan as military rations, if we delay, you will also be held responsible. We were at fault, so paying some silver is fine, but how can you bully people like this?"

  That official, upon hearing his words laced with threat, couldn't help but fly into a great rage, pointing and cursing: "You grain merchants are the most inhumane of all, buying at low prices and selling at high prices. There are those who have lost all sense of morality, who mix chaff and sand into the grain. Whenever there is a natural disaster or human catastrophe, they must hoard and speculate, using grains to extort thousands of gold, robbing people of their food and land. Even when selling grain to the government, it's all about cheating the top and deceiving the bottom, profiteering in between. Now you're even using the border army to bully me! I don't know which military officer is escorting this grain, take it back and let the head of the local government take a look!"

  Everyone scolded him, Liu Shi's face turned red with anger, and he was speechless for a moment.

  Grain merchants want to make a big profit, and hoarding is a necessary move. When the government purchases military rations, it implements a "temporary estimate" system at that time. Every ten days, the government will convene local guild merchants to jointly discuss and decide the purchase price. These merchants then collude with brokers, officials, and middlemen to set high prices, and deliberately do not accept goods from other grain merchants, forcing them to sell at low prices to local merchants.

  Many merchants, when encountering military affairs, are even more proud of their hoarded grain, accumulating and speculating, forcing the government to raise prices for procurement. If a natural disaster occurs, many families with surplus grain will immediately "close the granary", seal the warehouse and not move, driving up commodity prices, with the purpose of taking advantage of the disaster to annex the land of poor people.

  The Ding family was able to rise from poverty to wealth and nobility in just over twenty or thirty years, not only because the master of the Ding family, Ding Chengxun, was astute and had a keen eye for opportunity, but also because they received heavenly assistance. At the time when Ding Tingxun stored grain for sale, it coincided with a period of severe natural disasters and banditry, leaving thousands of miles of barren land, displaced people, and corpses everywhere. During the most severe disaster, two gold ingots could only be exchanged for three buns from those who had grain. The Ding family took advantage of this opportunity to rise to prominence, buying up tens of thousands of hectares of good land and becoming the richest man in Ba State.

  The original accumulation is bloody, Ding Tingxun is still a decent person, and others can be imagined. Later generations often lament that people's hearts are not as good as they used to be, but they don't know how much they really understand about the true behavior and moral standards of ancient people. They don't even know that although there were more righteous people in ancient times, who were recorded in history books, there were actually more unrighteous people, and because the system was more imperfect than it is now, the harm caused by ancient swindlers was even greater than that of modern swindlers.

  Ding Chengxun was well-versed in the many intricacies of grain transactions, and he traded with the border army on the principle of "no price increase, no price suppression", always transporting military rations at a fair price. The military authorities would advance funds for grain purchases, which they would then transport exclusively through contracted means. The leaders of the Guangyuan border army were tormented by corrupt officials who profited excessively from the middlemen, and as it was impossible to govern them effectively, they designated the Ding family, with their vast lands, as the exclusive grain merchants, reducing many intermediate links and saving a large amount of military expenses.

  Now the grain of Ding's family is to be transported to Guangyuan to sell to the military, but they only obtained the monopoly on grain operation through personal relationships with the border army leaders. The grain has not yet entered the official granary, so it is not considered official grain, let alone would the military send someone to escort them, and they do not have special privileges during transportation. Tao Tou is just a local underling, how could he not know the inside story? Liu Shiyi randomly brought up the name of military grain to scare people, but instead provoked him.

  Ding Yuluo raised an eyebrow and asked in a deep voice: "Then, Officer, how should this matter be resolved?"

  That was the first time she saw this big girl lightly scolding and thinning, charming and seductive, her whole body boneless and weightless. Under the teasing of her companions and the offenders, she actually took her hand to hook Ding Yu's chin, smiling and saying: "This old man was frightened by a mule, and for a moment he couldn't think of a suitable solution. Little girl, why don't you accompany this old man to have a couple of drinks? Let's sit down and talk slowly."

  Miss Ding was furious at his rudeness, and with a swish of her whip, she struck him on the back of his hand. The man was not dressed warmly and his blood circulation was poor, so when Miss Ding whipped him, he let out a cry of pain and his eyebrows shot up. Seeing their colleague being beaten, the other men immediately rushed forward and surrounded Miss Ding in a circle.