Chapter Thirteen: Learning is Everywhere in Life

  "Father, how did you feel when you were in Antung Fortress these few days?" Yang Bo didn't want to bring up the matter again and changed the subject.

  Bi Fangji stroked his beard, nodded and said: "Not bad, these few days have been idle and carefree. Every day I just wander around the city, and after reading a few local gazettes, I have some feelings. This place is both an important sea defense location and a prosperous trading port. It borders Qingzhou, Junzhou, Huai'an, and Dengzhou, and controls the sea route to Goryeo and other countries. The transportation by land and sea is convenient, with shops lining up inside and outside the city. Goods from all over the country are flowing in continuously. It can be said that this is a place where merchants gather, with hundreds of boats competing to flow in, and people crowding like a market. In the early years of Jiajing, there were only markets on the 3rd and 8th days of each month on West Avenue, and on the 1st and 6th days of each month on North Avenue. But now, every day is a market day, which shows how prosperous business is today. What a pity..."

  "What a pity?" Yang Bo asked strangely.

  "An Dongwei's three places, only the Shizui place is isolated outside, has never been valued before, unfortunately, I happened to come here, alas..."

  Yang Bo laughed and said "Of course I will go to Andong Weicheng, it's just that the timing isn't right yet"

  As they talked, they had already arrived at the big house of Yuan Baohu.

  Bi Fang looked at the grain on the cow cart behind him and asked inexplicably, "Zhi Xian, why did you buy so much grain? Are you planning to have me live next to a granary?"

  Yang Bo was whispering in Xiao Mo's ear, after hearing Bi Fangji's words, Yang Bo patted Xiao Mo on the shoulder, and the latter nodded and walked away.

  "On the way, I asked Mo Xiu, but he hesitated and didn't want to say. There must be several dozen kilograms of rice here, what's the point of buying so much rice?" Bi Fangji found it strange, is there a famine here? He hadn't heard about it."

  "Ah, Father doesn't know good people's hearts, this is the gift I prepared for you to win people over..." Yang Bo replied with a smile.

  "Winning people's hearts?" Bi Fangji excitedly grabbed Yang Bo's hand: "Zhi Xian is preparing..."

  Yang Bo nodded "Yes, you also knew the welcoming gesture when you got off the car earlier. If you want them to accept you, apart from my guidance, it's not possible if you don't make some sacrifices yourself"

  "What's 'shedding blood' supposed to mean?" Bi Fangji couldn't quite understand some of the new terms Yang Bo occasionally came up with.

  "It means that all the rice is on your account, and soon a little girl will come to settle accounts with you for silver..." Yang Bo found it funny and couldn't help but laugh out loud.

  "It turns out that knowing leisure is a comfort for others...". Bi Fangji shook his head, feeling somewhat depressed.

  While the dog and others were busy finding a place to settle down, the two of them took a stroll along the nearby riverbank. The name of this river was quite impressive, with locals calling it the Jade Dragon River. In reality, however, it was just a small stream that would dry up completely if there wasn't any rain for several days in a row. Along both banks of the river were scattered some dilapidated mud huts and some flat areas where many irregularly-shaped fields lay abandoned, overgrown with weeds.

  Seeing this situation, Bi Fangji couldn't help but shake his head repeatedly. Along the way, he had also learned a lot about the difficult lives of local soldiers.

  "Isn't the soil here unsuitable for farming? Why are these fields all abandoned?" Bi Fangji squatted down, picked up a clod of earth and crushed it in his palm to examine it.

  "It's not that it's not suitable for farming, but there are a few difficulties." Yang Bo shook his head and said, "The fields in Majiatun Village are scarce, and the good land near the banks of the Dalian River has been divided up long ago. To be honest, I, as a trial hundred household, also have 100 mu of thin land, while ordinary military households have at most five mu, and most don't even have that. Even if they wanted to farm, there's no land to farm. And besides, those military households are busy cutting wood and boiling salt, where do they have the leisure to take care of the fields? The fields being abandoned is also normal..."

  "What's on your mind, Idle?" Bi Fangji patted his hand and looked at Yang Bo.

  "Ideas are there, just some obstacles" Yang Bo nodded and shared his idea of promoting salt production. In his previous life, he had no experience with these things, although he knew about salt wells and salt pans, but specifically how to dry salt, he was completely in the dark. He also tried several times, until now, the seawater placed in the courtyard for drying is still seawater, and has not become salt at all. He even suspected that the salinity of the seawater was not enough, if it was really as he thought, then from now on, Ma Jia Tun could only continue to use the inefficient method of boiling seawater with firewood.

  After listening to Yang Bo's words, Bi Fangji pondered for a moment and said: "It seems that we have found the right person. In the past, Xu Guangqi had submitted a memorial to the emperor, 'A Humble Memorial on the Rules for Irrigation and Saline Fields'. The fifth volume of which specifically discussed the matter of salt production by solar evaporation. I remember there were a few sentences: The seawater from Huai Bei and Hei Yang River is extremely salty, similar to brine, so it can be used for irrigation and then evaporated into salt, which is called 'raw salt'. And also said... 'granular salt pool'... I also recall that he mentioned Fuzhou, Zhangzhou and other prefectures in Fujian Province, although the seawater is not very salty, it can still be used to produce salt by solar evaporation.

  Yang Bo was overjoyed and grabbed Bi Fangji's hand "That is to say, the salinity of the seawater here is sufficient, right?"

  Bi Fangji was at a loss for words. "Xu Guangqi's memorial said that whether the seawater is salty or not, it can be used to make salt by solar evaporation. I am from Andong Wei, which is close to Huai'an Prefecture. The seawater in Huai North is no different from brine, and it is naturally extremely salty. Is it possible that you know nothing about this? The two Huai regions were originally the major salt-producing areas of our dynasty?"

  Yang Bo touched his head: "Not to deceive the priest, I have also drunk a lot of this sea water, didn't feel extremely salty, but rather bitter and astringent"

  Bi Fangji shook his head: "I'm afraid I've forgotten, it's been a long time. When Xu Guangqi wrote the five volumes of 'Treatise on Agriculture', I had read them too, but at that time I just took a quick look and many details are no longer clear in my mind... this method of drying salt will have to wait until I return home to think about it carefully..."

  Yang Bo knew that this matter couldn't be rushed, so he nodded and said "Father, don't worry, let's go take a look at the method of boiling salt tomorrow morning. Maybe we can gain some insight from it..."

  The next morning, Yang Bo led the group to set off towards the seaside. Today, in addition to the newly appointed Han Kou'er, General Han, there was also a General Yao from Majiatun who had arrived. He had been stationed at Andongwei previously and rushed over to pay his respects as soon as he heard that Baihu Daoren had taken office.

  Yao Zongqi was scared half to death as soon as he arrived, and when he saw Yang Bo, his face had turned pale, and even his hands were shaking.

  "Don't be too polite," Yang Bo nodded and thought to himself, "Is it necessary? Weren't they saying that Andongwei's roads are smooth and trade is flourishing? Why did General Yao look like he saw a ghost when he met this foreigner? It seems that this guy is also hard to get along with..."

  Yao Zongqi didn't know that Yang Bo had already mentally written him off. He fell behind alone, not even daring to get too close.

  Everyone first went to see the process of boiling salt, Bi Fangji didn't care about the terrified expression of the military dependents beside him, he carefully looked at each step, and even asked questions when he encountered something he didn't understand. If it weren't for Yang Da Guanren's majestic presence on the side, Bi Fangji was afraid that he would be tied up with stones and drowned in the sea by these conservative guys.

  "How?" Yang Bo asked.

  "Feasible!" Bi Fangji nodded affirmatively. "There were some unclear points earlier, but after comparing them with the method of boiling salt, I have basically understood it."

  Two people crouched on the beach, drawing in the sand with their fingers. Those soldiers saw that Yang Baihu was not eaten alive by the red barbarians either, and the two of them were still chatting and laughing, feeling slightly more at ease...

  "On the seaside, choose a place without obstacles, flat and even. Either dig a well or build a pool, or dig a ditch to build a pool. Choose ceramic pieces or tile pieces, or pad with bricks, and build with strong stones. There are also broken porcelain pieces, called salt pans. Then draw in seawater and dry it in the sun to make brine..."

  By this time, Yang Bo had already understood that he had previously neglected the process of making brine. He had experimented with his own hands but had not succeeded. Simply put, it was to use wind power and solar energy to evaporate the water from seawater, but after evaporation to a certain extent, the seawater would take a long time to turn into crystallized salt. At this point, the high-concentration seawater, also known as brine, should be concentrated together and dried out first to form salt crystals, then pour in seawater with a relatively lower concentration, so that the thicker the salt bed is, the faster the salt forms.

  "It's really true that life is full of lessons everywhere..." Yang Bo sighed, stood up and gazed at the vast sea in the distance, and the depression in his heart suddenly disappeared without a trace.