Chapter 10: Speculation

  Speculation

  After Wang's mother left, San Jie began to make her bed.

  Yao Fang's face turned red as she said, "Third sister, don't misunderstand me. I'll sleep by myself and won't need you to accompany me. It's just that there's only one bed, so would you mind not sleeping tonight and sitting at the edge of the bed to keep watch over me?"

  The third sister's face also turned red as she said: "Young master is a gentleman, I know."

  Yao Fan tilted his head and thought for a moment, feeling that San Jie's words were also reasonable.

  "Uh-huh, so I'll borrow your bed for tonight and you can sleep in tomorrow when I'm gone."

  Yao Fan has done a good deed, and now he's thinking about the business of crossing over. In this chaotic late Qing dynasty, only by becoming stronger can he continue to do good deeds.

  This bed was simply made, with only four pillars supporting a wooden board that had been painted red. Yao Feng leaned against the head of the bed and chatted with San Jie who sat on a round stool at the bedside until they fell asleep after half the night.

  After Yao Weng fell asleep, he began to dream. In his dream, it seemed as if he was captured by the Qing soldiers and taken to Caishikou to be executed by lingchi. He tried to activate his Blood Soul Transmigration technique, but for some reason, it didn't work. The small knives of the executioner cut into him one by one, causing him to grit his teeth in agony, and suddenly he was startled awake from his dream.

  The third sister was originally leaning on the table with her hands propping up her cheeks and dozing off, but she was also startled awake by Yao Fang's movements and hurriedly came over to ask.

  Yao Fang propped himself up, leaning against the headboard, and found that he was drenched in sweat from head to toe. Thinking of the nightmare just now made him feel even colder all over.

  The third sister said in a low voice: "Did Master Yao have a nightmare?"

  Yao Weng looked down and only then discovered that the quilt covering him was too thick, probably because his third sister feared he would catch a chill and had added another layer on top.

  Yao Feng pushed away the quilt and asked: "What time is it now, Third Sister?"

  Yao Weng took out his mobile phone and could no longer accurately grasp the time.

  "Master Yao, the rooster has crowed three times, it's already daylight."

  Yao Feng got out of bed as soon as he heard the news, and San Jie hurried to fetch water. Yao Feng washed his face and instructed San Jie that if anything happened, she should find a way to inform He Wan Nian, the shopkeeper of Wan Nian Dang. Since he had business dealings with He Wan Nian, he thought he could get some help from him.

  After seeing San Jie, Yao Fan left Chunmian Hall.

  The third sister saw him off to the door, gazing at Yao Fang's receding back, her lips moving slightly with a barely audible voice: "Young Master Yao, I'll wait for you."

  Yao Feng left Chunmian Hall and went straight to Hengli Jin Store. Although the name of this store is Jin Store, it doesn't sell gold and silver jewelry like modern gold stores, but rather a money house, roughly equivalent to a bank in the Qing Dynasty, with more miscellaneous business.

  It was just dawn, and there were not many pedestrians on the road. However, this Hengli Jin store on Xiangye Street had already opened its doors early. Chinese businessmen believe that the early bird gets the worm, and they have always been diligent.

  Yao Feng entered the gold shop with only one request, that is to exchange all the silver notes on him for gold. The current gold-silver ratio of Hengli is 1:16.59, plus a three percent fire expense.

  Leaving only a few silver coins as change, Yao Fan exchanged the remaining 1,400 or so taels of silver for 2.65 kilograms of gold. These gold ingots, gold sycees, gold bars and fragmented gold were packed into a small thick cotton bag by Hengli Gold Store and handed over to Yao Fan.

  Yao Fan took the gold and didn't dare to stay long, he just instructed the early market attendant of Heng Li to prepare more gold, and he would come back to exchange it in ten days.

  A small gold bag tied with a bundle of strings was stuffed into the western-style pocket of Yao Fan's horse coat, and he hurriedly rushed towards the city gate.

  At the city gate, I only saw that among the soldiers guarding the gate, there was one who was a personal soldier brought by Wei Guofu last night.

  Those guards recognized that it was Yao Fan, this traitor, and knew that he had a good relationship with Sun Zhoupan, Wei Shoubi and others. Last night they even went to drink and have fun together.

  He hastily came up to kowtow and said with a sweet mouth: "Bai Daguishen gives greetings to Master Yao."

  Yao Feng smiled and helped him up, then took out ten taels of silver from his sleeve pocket and handed it to him: "Dagu brothers, take this money to buy wine for your brothers. Today I'm going outside the city to find the old site of my family's ancestral home."

  Bai Dagu was overjoyed and personally escorted Yao Fang out of the city for more than two miles, telling him about his master Wei Guofu's prestige in Qingdao along the way. It seemed that this prestige also belonged to him. Before leaving, Bai Dagu repeatedly reminded Yao Fang to be careful on the road, and if he saw bandits or anyone who looked like a thug, he should run away immediately without hesitation.

  Yao Fan nodded and with a few words sent Bai Dagui back to the city, while he himself ran towards the vicinity of the Daqing Mountain where he had crossed over from the other day.

  Yao Fan arrived at the end of the road and made a blood sacrifice to cross back into 2011. He easily found his QQ, which was still parked safely on the side of the highway. Yao Fan started the car and sped straight back to Qingdao city.

  After a series of twists and turns, Yao Fan sold the Qing dynasty's low-purity gold in 7 gold shops. The current price of gold is over 300 yuan per gram. Yao Fan's gold has a low purity, and he exchanged 2.65 kg for more than 760,000 cash. Adding this to his original savings of over 50,000, he now has over 800,000 as capital for doing business.

  Yao Fan hasn't bought a house yet and lives with his parents. He doesn't dare sell the car, who knows when his special ability will disappear, if he encounters some unexpected situation, at least leave himself a way out.

  After getting the money, Yao was extremely excited. He could make 760,000 yuan just by swindling people! If he worked a regular job and saved 2,000 yuan per month, who knows how long it would take to earn that much?

  While excited, he pondered: "What's good to exchange for in the Qing dynasty? Can't just exchange it directly for silver and then take it back to exchange for gold? That's too stupid! According to market prices, 800,000 RMB is only less than 5,000 taels of silver! This is the price of gold that I exchanged with 1,400 taels of silver myself. It's really too foolish, earning only 300% at a time?

  It's better to have industrial products made in Qing Dynasty, if they can't be produced domestically, then the price will naturally be expensive.

  "Hmm... must not offend the government... need to make a big profit... and it has to be something that the Qing dynasty really needs, with good sales prospects... best if it can also improve the social civilization of the Qing people... okay, this point can be ignored..."

  Yao Fan first listed a plan on paper, carefully deleting and revising it before putting it on Alibaba, and after fighting for an entire afternoon, he finally settled all the purchases.

  Then Yao Fan bought five packs of Chinese cigarettes and distributed them to the security guards at the factory gate and the warehouse management department, and after greeting them, he waited for the goods to arrive.

  About a week later, Yao Fan's goods were all piled up in the warehouse of the factory. Yao Fan didn't dare to delay and immediately took a long leave, hired a local logistics company to transport all the goods to a place near Laoshan Mountain, which was not far from Qingdao City in his impression, where there were no surveillance cameras, and unloaded them on an empty land that couldn't be seen.

  The logistics company's staff were puzzled that so many boxes of goods had been transported here overnight, but since the owner had requested it, they just followed through.

  By dawn, Yao Fan's goods had all been unloaded and stacked in an empty lot by the side of the road, with boxes piled on top of each other as high as a person.

  Yao Fan looked around and saw no one, immediately followed the orders of the Blood Soul, cut his fingers and drew a blood sacrifice array around the cardboard box, then activated the blood sacrifice to cross over to 1875.

  After coming over, Yao Fan found that this was a slope with a mess of weeds growing wildly. Not far from the grassland, there were traces of livestock grazing.

  "This is getting a bit troublesome, we need to hurry up and transport the goods away, otherwise I'm afraid they'll be stolen by those early-rising sheep herders." Yao Fang thought.

  He didn't care about the slight dizziness after losing blood, and he immediately rushed into Jiaozhou City.

  After entering the city, Yao Fan ran non-stop to find Wan Nian and asked him to find people and horses to help transport his goods.

  "Brother Wan, hurry up and gather as many vehicles as possible, the more the better. My goods are piled up outside the city, a total of 1011 boxes." Yao Fang panted heavily.

  He Wannian stared at Yao Feng, who was panting heavily, and asked in a daze: "How did you get so many boxes of goods? Where did they come from?"

  "Now is not the time for explanations, I'll tell you in detail later. Old He, follow me! I guarantee you'll make a fortune!"

  After finishing speaking, Yao Fan looked at He Wannian's eyes. Indeed, his promise of wealth was effective, and He Wannian's eyes lit up. He ordered the shop assistants to go out and hire horse-drawn carriages, rickshaws, and laborers, one by one, giving instructions that were carried out in an orderly manner.

  Yao Fan told He Wan Nian the approximate location of the goods and did not follow him, but instead rushed straight to the Guardian Camp Government Office.

  Upon arriving at the gate, he inquired if Wei Guofu was inside. Yao Fan then handed over a full ten taels of silver to the doorman and rushed in without waiting for an announcement.

  The gatekeeper got a generous reward and didn't dare to block the way, but instead ran ahead of Yao Fang, shouting "Slow down, slow down, let me report!" As they passed through the courtyard to the back hall, the gatekeeper quickened his pace and rushed in to make his report.

  Yao Feng rushed into the back hall, and Wei Guofu also came out of the third room. He was adjusting his Batulu armor while curiously asking Yao Feng: "Brother Yao, what's so urgent?"

  Yao Wang glanced at the gate, and Wei Guofu said a word "go down" to that person, and drove the gate away.

  Yao Fan then told his fabricated story.

  "Brother Wei, I'm not capable, using a small boat to transport the goods from the sea wheel onto the shore, now they are piled up outside the city. There's too much cargo and I didn't dare take the usual pass, afraid that if things aren't kept secret, it will spread out and implicate the three nobles."

  Wei Guofu's spirit lifted at once: "Good, good! Is anyone keeping an eye on that stuff right now?"

  Yao Fan nodded and said, "I'm here for this matter. Behind the stone mountain by the sea, on the grassy slope, who knows if there will be any horse bandits? It's likely to take a whole day to transport it into the city, so please, sir, dispatch some trusted personal guards to keep watch. Also, please inform Liu, sir, to come and inspect the goods and calculate the taxes."

  Wei Guofu did not delay either. He chose fifteen of his personal guards and rode out with Yao Feng towards the city gate.

  Upon arriving at the cargo storage area, Yao Weng let out a sigh of relief. This desolate and remote wilderness was indeed rarely visited by others, except for He Wan Nian's dispatched logistics personnel, the boxes had not been touched by anyone else.

  Wei Guofu saw those modern cardboard boxes, one by one stacked squarely, and asked: "Brother Yao, what are these boxes made of?"

  "It's just rough paper."

  "Actually made of paper, Brother Yao's goods are really stylish, what kind of goods are inside?"

  Yao Fandao: "The goods are divided into four categories: rice, bicycles, watches and cloth."

  "What's it worth?"

  Yao Fandao: "Cotton cloth, 450 bolts, each bolt 100 meters, that's about three hundred feet, less than three pieces, calculated at the British white cloth price of 2.6 taels per piece for 40 yards, one bolt is less than 9 taels of silver, 450 bolts is approximately 4000 taels."

  Wei Guofu shook his head and said, "Brother Yao, the cloth you brought is a bit too little. I heard that those British merchants transport 5,000 to 6,000 pieces of cloth per ship, and they bring 7 or 8 ships to the port each time."

  Yao Fangxin said that this is not native cloth, but machine-made cloth, 60-count fine-spun cotton fabric even more delicate than British machine-made cloth. Not to mention its fineness, the width of the fabric is 1.5 meters, not 1.2 meters like foreign cloth. And as for colors and patterns, they are not plain white native cloth or plain white foreign cloth, but rather colorful printed fabrics that no country in the world, including Qing Dynasty China, can produce. As for how much to sell it for, I'll decide that myself.

  However, the Qing Dynasty civilians are most concerned about the price. Yao Fan doesn't know how his high-quality and expensive cotton cloth will sell. He decided to try it out, if it doesn't sell well, he'll just treat it as foreign white cloth and get rid of it, even then there's still more than five times the profit, but next time he won't resell this again.