Fall In Love with the Technology Tree

Chapter 87: New South Island

    The cold winter and twelfth lunar month, a vocabulary invented by the Central Plains, to Hainan Island, no matter how cold the winter is, it will be more than ten degrees Celsius. There is no heavy snow and no dripping water into ice. December in the South Island is the season for sugar cane harvesting.

    The manager of the third sugarcane plantation is A Man, a young man in his twenties. He doesn't have much in the way of management, so he personally brings strong laborers to carry knives to harvest. After the sugarcane is cut down, it will be lined up along the fields. After a while, two ropes can be pulled into piles.

    Women have been waiting on the field ridges for a long time. After simple screening and processing, these sugar canes will be transported to the nearby sugar mills, and finally turned into brown sugar and white sugar.

    After five days of work, only scattered sugarcane leaves were left on the vast land. Some will be picked up by greedy children to chew on the taste, and more will be collected into the shredder and become part of the cattle feed.

    "Insect pests were found in sugarcane forests this year." Aman, who was free, sat on the ridge chewing green sugarcane, and talked to Zheng Xuan, who came to collect the wind, "This land will be replanted next year. Rice is available. The application for Mu Niu has been submitted, and it is said that it will be three days later. The roots and stems in the ground must be turned out and burned, and vegetables, rice and wheat can be planted for two years before the cane worms in the soil can be starved to death. Live here It's been three years, and I'm really reluctant to leave."

    Sugar cane plantations are mobile.

    Zheng Xuan took some sugarcane, put it in his mouth and chewed it slowly, the fragrance and sweetness slowly rippling. "It looks like a caretaker, but Li Min?"

    It was a little overcast, although occasionally a few rays of sunlight leaked through the gaps in the clouds.

    "Li? With this name, it is indeed a cultural person. Our branch is relatively early, and it is the first group to cultivate on the island." Aman seems to be aroused by something bad He suddenly stood up, "Forget it, it's all over."

    In the fall of this year, there was a riot of dozens of people, which was just suppressed.

    Seeing that Aman was leaving, Zheng Xuan hurriedly kept him. "It's a slip of the tongue. I don't intend to test it, it's..."

    Aman sat down again: "I didn't study well in the culture class at the time, and I can't explain it to you. If you ask the group of rioters - I will say so. Come on. It’s been more than ten years, and those who want to take revenge have already avenged it. Those who didn’t take revenge were also willing to stay because the Lord treated us well. Now if we make trouble again, hum, it’s either being bought off or being greedy enough to throw us all away. s face!"

    When it comes to the treatment, Zheng Xuan also sighed: "The elderly can eat meat, they don't need to spend money to see a doctor, the disabled can be supported, and the poorest people can barely get enough food and clothing. That's it. It's no wonder that the young master is so high-spirited that he looks down on the officials of the Han family."

     Smoke billows from the chimney of the sugar factory. The hydraulic machinery creaked, the workers sweated like rain, and the result of the cooperation of manpower and material resources was a mountain of sugar, a sea ship full of loads going north, a panic buying and extravagance in the Central Plains, and countless copper coins returning to the Cao family.

    In the blink of an eye, on December 30, the sugar factory was shut down. The biggest festival in the South Island is here.

    "It was originally a New Year's festival, and I hoped to promote the festival of Yanhuang. However, because there are many children in the South Island, now the name of Gan Festival is more common." Bags of sugar were distributed to the small squad leaders who came to line up.

    Everyone has a crystal clear candy, which is the perk of the South Island children. Today's kids like to drill holes in candy cubes and hang them around their necks with colorful braided straps. There are also some families who love their children and worship their ancestors with rock candy drilled in a hole, praying for their children to grow up safely. In the past two years, there have even been folk artists who can carve sugar cubes into the shape of the Chinese zodiac. On the morning of the first day of the first lunar month tomorrow, canteens at all levels will cook sweet and fluffy egg red jujube cakes for children's breakfast.

    All kinds of Gan festival customs are slowly taking shape.

    The last little class leader who received the candy was a boy of about seven years old, with anxiety and curiosity on his dark face. He gave Ah Sheng a stumbling salute: "The master is on top, the master will give us candy."

    A Sheng asked him to sign the roster, and then carefully placed the last bag of candy into his arms. "Can you move it?"

    The little boy shook his body, hugged the sugar bag tightly, and grinned at Ah Sheng, revealing the black hole in the front teeth. Cravings for sweetness can bring infinite power.

    "Go, be careful on the road." Ah Sheng said goodbye to the children, and it was the end of today's work.

    Yan Wen was on duty today and brought her sugarcane soup. There are also a few pieces of green cane in the clear sugar water.

    "Cane soup clears heat, Mr. Zheng can also use some with me."

    Zheng Xuan took it with a trembling hand and took a sip: "This bowl is worth a family of five in the Central Plains for half a year."

    "The South Island is the origin of sucrose, and the price is naturally low. The price of the Central Plains is high, which is high in the transportation of preservatives and in short supply."

    "It's still higher than the son's monopoly."

    A Sheng glanced at him: "Zheng Gong studied economics so fast, it makes me embarrassed."

    Zheng Xuan also looked at Ah Sheng's unpretentious Tsing Yi: "When Xiao He built the Weiyang Palace for Emperor Gaozu of the Han Dynasty, it was extremely luxurious, saying: 'It is not magnificent without great power.' How do you get 100,000 people to obey? Is it okay to be a master without establishing prestige?"

    "Using tall buildings to intimidate the world and show national strength is to deal with ignorant people. If everyone reads books and knows etiquette, they will only be grateful for the simplicity of the ruler. Times change , the rules of the Central Plains in the early Han Dynasty, let me not implement them in the South Island."

    "The son's picture is very big."

    "The people's heart is the wall, and nature is great." After drinking the sugarcane soup, Ah Sheng stood up and patted the ashes on his robe, "Zheng Gong inspected the sugar factory and the cloth factory, and went deep into the fields, presumably You already have a good understanding of the plains."

    Zheng Xuan stood up with her: "My son has lived countless victims, and he has built a paradise on earth, which is an achievement far beyond Xuan's."

    "When the 15th day of the first lunar month is over, we will go into the mountains." Let's go and see the real core of the South Island - smelting factories and machinery production bases.

    Unfortunately, there is no moonlight except for the New Year's Eve. However, the Cao's Manor in Zhuya is brightly lit and dazzling.

    Bamboo knots were thrown into the fire, making a crackling sound, this is a real firecracker. Ah Sheng didn't take out the fireworks, because she didn't want gunpowder to be used as an entertainment product, carrying the smiles of ignorant human beings.

    The hot weapon is Pandora's box.

    After tonight, the fifteen-day vacation begins. Except for a few departments such as the espionage department and the guards who are still on duty, most people are free to enjoy the festival. Former orphans have started to form families, and the most common on the streets is couples playing with young children.

    The temporary shops of Cao’s family opened one after another, selling special products from all over the country, in addition to the local fruits, flowers, cakes, hardware, paper and pen, books, and products from the Central Plains: from desert From cattle and sheep in the north to apples in Weihai.

    There are also polite students in the tea shop reading the official newspaper to the visiting guests. At this time, the newspapers in the South Island had just appeared, but under the direct guidance of Ah Sheng, the content was already quite rich:

    The local section involves this year's harvest, the performance of major factories, the results of the rebellion, the guidance for next year's labor, possible disaster warning, the planning of new policies, etc.;

    The field section talks about the change of the harem of the Central Plains dynasty, which areas were affected by the disaster and how many victims are expected to arrive, and Jiaozhou has changed its officers.

    There is no shortage of Han immigrants who burst into tears.

    "It is difficult to have a family in the South Island." Zheng Xuan also took his son to listen to the news in the tea shop, "These children have lived in the school since they were young, and only go home once a month. Men gather to study Wu, women gather weaving, not only for force and property, but also to break the family's control over the population. Everyone hears about the world's major events directly from the government, and everyone is registered in the official government directly by virtue of their talent. The flow of population is unprecedented. But because of this, Cao Sheng is the only lord of the South Island, and it is difficult for anyone or family to divide her authority. Compared with this kind of stable rule, it is worth paying money and food, what a genius. "

    Zheng Yi seems to be still forming three views: "Zhou Li and Confucianism, there is no ten in the South Island."

    Zheng Xuan can only sigh, although this child is not stupid, but compared with his own learning ability, he is still far worse, not so easy to turn. "I'm going to live in the South Island for a long time. I'm busy with official business. I'm afraid I don't have time to teach you. How about sending you to school?"

    Zheng Yi respectfully said, "Listen to father's orders."

    Lychee, longan, coconut, guava, mangosteen... Behind the tropical fruit forest, there is a road paved with cement and gravel. The hard road is open to traffic, much faster than the dirt road, not to mention that after walking for less than two hours, they changed trains and got on the rails. The rolling friction is lower than the sliding friction, and the same horse-drawn cart is twice as fast on the rails.

    The woods separated from both sides, and gradually, the roof of the factory appeared in front.

    A Sheng knelt on the board of the car and introduced to Zheng Xuan, who was in the same car: "Paper making, weaving, flour, and sugar refining are all light industries, so you can manage them in Zhuya. Heavy industry, high temperature and high pressure, accidents will happen if you are not careful, so it must be strictly controlled.”

    In the South Island Industrial Zone, connected with the South Island Iron Mine, it mainly consists of iron furnaces, weapons workshops, machinery workshops, ceramic glass kilns, cement workshops and chemical laboratories.

    The most labor-intensive and large-scale project is a small reservoir nearby. It took three years and five years to build a cement dam less than 20 meters long before it was completed. This is a satellite project, and there is still a long way to go to promote it. The main function is to store water and prevent fire, and to provide hydraulic power at the same time.

    Of course, chemistry and electromagnetism at the groping stage are still experimental factories for gifted children. But just the mass-produced steel knives and rails made Zheng Xuan stunned.

    "Young master brought me here, what do you want me to do?"

    "These, just take a look." Ah Sheng's eyes stayed on those assembly lines for less than ten seconds, she was a layman and could only look at the test data, "The reason why Duke Zheng came here is because of the south side. the new factory."

    Zheng Xuan's liver trembled: "New factory?"

    "Well, I finally got the ink, so I built a printing factory."

    A Sheng took people out of the arsenal, leaving the high temperature area where no grass grows, and came to the tree-lined hydraulic area. The water of the reservoir flows down from the scupper, driving the axles in the water, and the huge steel power system makes the speed of mechanical printing surpass the times.

    “Nowadays, only newspapers, textbooks and pharmacopoeia are printed here. If you talk about traditional classics, Zheng Gong has to worry about it. I was worried that the Central Plains would be in chaos and many classics would be lost, so I ordered people to copy a lot. But it's complicated and I can't manage it by myself."

    Zheng Xuan stood for a long time before slowly knelt down and gave Cao Sheng a big gift. "My lord, this is Qianqiu's work."

    "Debate with Cao Gongzi", this magnificent masterpiece, which is called the collision of Confucianism and Cao's thought, began its birth process on the small South Island.

    The author has something to say: the so-called electricity is still in the stage of playing with magnets.

    The so-called chemistry is still in the stage of refining sulfur and saltpeter.

    The so-called business is still in the stage of hoarding, and banknotes will not be released for the time being.

    The so-called railway track is because there is no shortage of iron in the South Island, and it is only convenient for transportation in industrial areas.

    Don't overdo it.

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