Chapter Thirty-Three: Stealing Heaven and Replacing Day

  As the saying goes, "a cunning rabbit has three burrows", if a cunning rabbit is like this, let alone humans. Sima, who has always followed the principle of being cautious and prudent in doing things, naturally needs to be so.

  Soon after discovering this anomaly in the space-time continuum, Sima slowly registered dozens of virtual trading companies and wholesalers under a false identity, with the purpose of concealing his massive purchases of various complex materials.

  In order to conceal the destination of these goods as much as possible, Sima even fabricated fake delivery notes for these companies. The goods were purchased through a fictitious trading company and then, after they had been transported into the warehouse, a false delivery record was created. At the same time, on the account books of this trading company, it was shown that these goods had already been sold to more than ten retailers.

  And in the retail merchant's paper records, these materials were bought by hundreds of people within a short period. In order to be like an ordinary businessman, these materials were also sold without ever appearing on the invoice records.

  On the invoice, there are always some small items that are split up into smaller ones to avoid taxes through fake invoicing, which is a common tactic used by ordinary businessmen. It's not a problem for Sima to use them, anyway, neither the tax authorities nor individuals pay attention to these things.

  Although the warehouse now belongs to the Deep Blue Trading Company, which exists only on paper and is owned by Sima, it's much safer than in the past. However, while solving old troubles, new problems have emerged.

  Before buying this warehouse, the six warehouses of various sizes were rented by Sima except for Warehouse No. 3, which was the most confidential one. The other five warehouses were rented by several companies respectively.

  It's precisely because of the existence of these companies that there are trucks loading and unloading cargo in and out of the warehouse every day, which makes it seem a bit chaotic, but successfully conceals the fact that Warehouse No. 3 only has goods entering the warehouse, but not even one box of goods leaving the warehouse. Although on paper, all the goods in Warehouse No. 3 are transported out of the warehouse after 10 pm.

  However, according to the contract, after Deep Blue Company buys this warehouse, the warehouses rented by these companies will also be transferred and relocated to a new warehouse. The new warehouse is managed by Director Fang.

  In other words, Mr. Fang continued to fulfill his contracts with these companies elsewhere, and he had another old warehouse in another area, so there was no need for him to leave his customers to Deep Blue Trading.

  As a result, the warehouse that Sima bought was empty, and with the departure of these companies, it is inevitable that a problem will arise.

  If no solution is found to this problem, the warehouse that Sima has just purchased will probably forever be a place where goods only come in but never go out. Of course, this problem would not have been apparent at an early stage, and nobody would notice that a warehouse was constantly receiving goods but never shipping any out.

  If time goes on, who dares to guarantee that there won't be a few overly curious people discovering this secret? At that time, it's likely that even if they want to cover it up, they won't be able to. What will happen at that time is clearly not something Sima would like to see.

  Simma couldn't help but feel a headache thinking about this. In fact, solving this problem is quite simple, just need to put up an ad on TV, and then rent out the warehouse at a good price, but every day, the drivers responsible for loading and unloading goods at the warehouse...

  These complicated components going in and out of the warehouse are obviously also inappropriate. That is no different from renting a warehouse in the past.

  Slowly falling into thought, Sima discovered that this problem actually exists universally in both modern society and the society of 1915. To know that in the modern warehouse, goods are constantly being stored but never shipped out, while in the 1915 space warehouse, goods are constantly being moved out of the warehouse, but none are ever brought in.

  It's strange if two people don't attract attention after a long time. Now, no one notices because the amount is not large, so it hasn't attracted anyone's attention, but what about in the future?

  It's actually not a big problem to cover up this shortcoming, if some goods can be transported from the space-time of 1915 AD to the No. 3 warehouse in the de-industrialized society for sale, it can solve the problem very simply.

  However, transporting goods from a modern society with unprecedentedly developed productive forces to the past would mostly be profitable, but if it were transported from the 1915 society where productive forces were not well-developed to the present, it would be very difficult to make a profit, let alone in today's fiercely competitive market.

  Whether the goods transported from 1915 have competitiveness, if it is only to cover up secrets and directly sell the goods transported at a low price, it can also be accepted.

  However, the only problem is who will handle these supplies. Now it's just for purchasing and transporting all kinds of materials needed there, Sima feels that he himself is already busy enough to spare no effort, let alone add so many more things.

  Moreover, when choosing what kind of goods to transport from 1915, careful selection is needed. Absolutely cannot choose those goods that are easy to accumulate and not easy to digest, and commodities with relatively high prices. The former will waste time and effort in handling, while the latter will tie up funds in handling.

  To be honest, in modern society, it's really hard to find any goods that are not easy to stockpile. The production capacity of today's society is indeed too advanced, and the market competition is too fierce. If you blindly import some goods from there, you may face the dilemma of inventory piling up in the warehouse.

  However, after a few days, Sima found a seemingly good option. It is precisely because the productive forces of modern society are too developed that such a market has been formed, namely raw materials. Modern society's demand for raw materials for various industrial products is the largest and can never be satisfied.

  Of course, transporting raw materials like steel from that time and space would likely cause Sima to lose even his pants. Modern steel costs only a few thousand yuan per ton, but in the space of 1915, one ton of steel required more than 130 taels of silver. If transported to modern society for sale, one ton of steel would require a loss of nearly 100 taels of silver, which Sima would not accept.

  Copper production is high in modern society, but it also requires a larger quantity. China is still a country with a severe shortage of copper resources, and the annual demand is very high, so we have to import a large amount of copper from abroad every year to meet domestic demand.

  It can be said that to a certain extent, the high international copper price is closely related to the high demand in China every year. When supply cannot meet demand, prices naturally remain high. Since 2010, the price has even exceeded 65,000 yuan per ton, a sky-high price.

  China has never been a major copper-producing country, and as early as the Qing dynasty, it needed to import large quantities of foreign copper to meet domestic coin-making needs. When the provinces began producing large amounts of copper coins in the early Republican era, they also had to import large quantities of foreign copper, which was mainly South American Hualulu purple copper at that time.

  Although the demand for Hu Ru purple copper suddenly increased a lot due to the war, the demand for bullets and shells still only accounts for a small part of its output.

  Although having a large output, the price of Huahulu purple copper has also grown to nearly double, but it is only 580 taels of silver per ton. (Historically, Huahulu purple copper was only 36 taels per ton in 1922.)

  One ton of copper and over 500 taels of white silver, converted to RMB is almost around 60,000 yuan per ton. If calculated at the current market price, not only will Sima not lose money for each ton, but he can also make a profit of several thousand yuan.

  In 1915, Tianjin purchased phosphor bronze through foreign trade, then packed it in large wooden boxes without identification, with each box containing several hundred kilograms. They were transported to warehouses outside the port and after being opened at an unusual time, these wooden boxes were transported to modern times and sold there.

  The goods purchased from modern procurement are also packed in wooden boxes of the same size and transported away through abnormal points. Although it seems complicated, it easily solved the problem of having no entry or exit in the warehouse, and to outsiders, the goods in the warehouse seem to be entering and leaving every day, just like a normal warehouse, without anything out of the ordinary.

  "Bang... Bang"

  On the shooting range, Sima lay on a blanket spread over the gravel ground, holding a Type 38 rifle and aiming at the target to satisfy his craving for guns. Since the establishment of this guard team, every time Sima came here, he finally had a leisure place, which was to shoot guns on the shooting range.

  Although it's just a backward legend of the 38 rifle, as a man, there are few who don't like guns. However, in a domestic environment where even watermelon knives are strictly controlled, ordinary people wanting to touch a gun is simply a pipe dream.

  In Sima's memory, he had touched real guns during military training in school and a few times at an open shooting range where he fired a five-yuan bullet. For Sima, who spent only over ten yuan on daily expenses at that time, it was a luxury to play with such expensive things.

  "Master, good marksmanship! Every shot hits the bullseye."

  After getting the news, Ma Si said sincerely that his master's marksmanship was really good, and it wasn't even inferior to his own, who had been a soldier for over ten years.

  Thinking of the poor shooting skills of the dozens of men under his command, Ma Si got a headache. There was no way around it - shooting skills were not something that could be mastered in just one or two days. The men under him couldn't even recognize a single character, and it had taken them over ten days to learn how to read the sights and aim properly. A bunch of idiots.

  "Hehe! So-so. Still addicted to playing games here."

  Put down the gun and stood up from the ground, Si Xiao said with a smile, although he said so, but in his heart, he was thrilled!

  These shooting skills were all practiced with the five-yuan bullets back then, when five yuan was almost a day's worth of food for me. I could only afford to fire one shot at a time, and even that was after aiming carefully for a while. Gradually, my marksmanship became quite decent.

  However, at that time, Sima spent almost two months' living expenses on this. That year, in order to practice shooting, he even went to the shooting range on Sunday afternoons without eating lunch, and just ate instant noodles brought from the city. There was no choice, as the food at the shooting range was really expensive. With that money, it was better to shoot more guns instead of eating.

  It's still enjoyable to shoot with the homemade gun, although it's not an automatic gun, just a Type 38 rifle. The good thing is that you can shoot as much as you want, but in the future, how many people will be able to enjoy this treatment?