Joy colored the depths of Jiang Jin's eyes. "Quick, let him in."
Soon, Sun Yishui strode in with large steps. "My Lord, I did not disappoint. We found the iron ore!"
As he spoke, he opened a burlap sack in his hand and poured out several reddish-brown stones of various sizes.
Jiang Jin picked one up and examined it. Judging by the color, it was actually hematite!
This was a raw material perfectly suited for iron smelting.
She hurriedly asked, "Where did you find it? How is the quantity?"
Sun Yishui replied, "Right in Gefeng's Changshu Village. Several connected mountains there are full of this iron ore."
It took Jiang Jin a moment to recall that Changshu Village was a remote little hamlet about twenty li away from the Gefeng county town.
Jiang Jin wished she could go see it immediately, but checking the time, it was already past two in the afternoon. She could only go tomorrow.
"Does anyone still live in the village?" she could not help but ask.
She had occupied Gefeng for only a little over ten days and had not had the time to investigate the situations of the various villages and regions within it.
She could only grasp a general idea of Gefeng County through the records left in the county office and by word of mouth from the city's commoners.
Sun Yishui shook his head. "No more. That village is remote and originally only had a few households. I don't know if they fled from famine or..."
Jiang Jin sighed, having roughly guessed the outcome in her heart. "You did very well. You've worked hard these past few days. Tomorrow morning, we will head to Changshu Village."
The next day, greeting the morning light, Jiang Jin led her people straight to Changshu Village.
A distance of over twenty li was just over ten kilometers. Riding at full speed, they arrived in less than half an hour.
After passing a long stretch of weed-choked trail, they saw sparse, low, collapsed houses in the distance. Those should be the former homes of the villagers.
They walked for another fifteen minutes or so. Just as Jiang Jin felt they were running out of road, they finally arrived.
Looking at the geographical location surrounded by mountains, Jiang Jin sighed with emotion, thinking it was no wonder no one had discovered iron ore here.
Her discovery was not due to good luck, but rather because her current territory was too small. She could only search around Gefeng County, which meant she had to turn the entire area upside down to find this hidden mountain nook.
She dismounted and looked at the densely vegetated mountainous terrain. However, perhaps due to the iron ore, most of the trees here were not very tall, forming thickets of short, scrubby trees.
Sun Yishui led the way. After leaving a few people behind to watch the horses, Jiang Jin led the rest and quickly followed.
Before long, they arrived at the spot where Sun Yishui had previously dug up the iron ore. He brushed aside the dead leaves he had placed yesterday for camouflage. "My Lady, take a look."
Beneath was the ground he had dug open, and sure enough, reddish-brown stones could be seen.
A smile appeared on Jiang Jin's face. She looked at the surrounding mountains. "With this mountain and this soil quality, it should be easy to dig, right?"
Sun Yishui nodded. "I asked Quan De, Mo Qi, and the others. They said it would be easy to dig."
Quan De, Mo Qi, and Meng Ping were all slaves Jiang Jin had purchased. They had been captured and forced to mine in the past, so they were very experienced. Naturally, Sun Yishui brought these three along when prospecting for ore.
"We took a look around earlier and confirmed that this entire mountain area is full of iron ore. The quantity is massive." He pointed to the surrounding mountains.
Jiang Jin's smile deepened. "Very good. Have a look now and see where it would be best to start digging."
She then turned to Han Yi and Lu Ping. "You two go look around and see where it would be suitable to build houses."
Han Yi was one of the bricklayers she had bought earlier. Since Guo Li was busy with the barbican and Kang Sheng was busy with the city's internal construction, she could only pull Han Yi over.
Since they were going to mine here, housing for the miners, warehouses, kitchens, and the like had to be built.
At the same time, soldiers needed to be stationed here for guard duty, so she called Lu Ping over to temporarily take charge of security.
Jiang Jin took Yun Chengxuan wandering through the mountains, spending the better part of an hour to thoroughly explore the area.
Meanwhile, Lu Ping and Han Yi had selected a site for building the houses.
Jiang Jin took a look and saw that the location was indeed well-chosen. It was right on the back side of the mountain, making it very difficult for anyone entering from the outside to spot.
Han Yi hesitated slightly and asked, "My Lady, what materials are we planning to use to build these houses?"
This place had neither clay nor yellow mud, so making adobe bricks was out of the question.
Jiang Jin thought for a moment and said, "Let's build wooden cabins first. Source the materials locally, and make it quick."
The winters in Gefeng were very cold, and they definitely wouldn't be able to mine then. She had to strive to dig up as much iron ore as possible within the next two months.
Han Yi nodded. Building simple wooden cabins would indeed be much faster, and the trees chopped down to clear the mountain could be put to good use.
With the plan finalized, Han Yi immediately led his men to start working. Some chopped trees, some hoed the earth, and some rammed the soil...
Lu Ping, meanwhile, began leading men to scout the surrounding terrain and determine the locations for several sentry posts.
Jiang Jin reminded him, "In addition to open sentries, you must also set up hidden sentries. This iron mine is extremely important to us."
She currently had a total of over seven hundred soldiers on hand. The weapons she had collected were basically enough for now, but once she recruited more people in the future, it wouldn't be sufficient.
Besides weapons, she also needed various agricultural tools and iron daily necessities, such as woks. She felt like it had been a long time since she had eaten a stir-fried dish.
They stayed busy until mid-afternoon before Jiang Jin led her people back, planning to bring more people over tomorrow to start the heavy work.
On the other side, the Mei clan was heading toward Gefeng with a large number of slaves.
This time, not only had Mei Sheng and Mei Ren teamed up, but they had also called upon one of their clan uncles, Mei Cai.
Seeing that they were about to reach Gefeng County, the three of them were somewhat worried.
Mei Cai sighed. "Business is too hard to do nowadays, otherwise I wouldn't have even been willing to make this trip."
He had slaves on hand but could never find a buyer. Slaves weren't inanimate objects you could just leave sitting there; they needed to eat. Every extra day he held onto them added to the cost, and day by day, he worried until his hair turned white.
He hadn't expected these two youngsters, Mei Ren and Mei Sheng, to say they had a buyer and invite him to join in.
He thought about it and agreed, figuring it was a good chance to offload all the slaves on hand and have a good New Year.
Mei Sheng also sighed along with him. "Tell me about it. Let's just hope things go smoothly this time."
Mei Ren was also a bit concerned. "We have already entered Gefeng territory. Another half hour of walking and we should reach the county town. I hope the Lady is in the city, otherwise..."
The three of them had brought a full four hundred slaves this time. The travel expenses alone were not low.
As the three were talking, over twenty burly men suddenly leaped out from the dense woods by the roadside ahead, blocking their path.
The burly man standing at the front roared, "Halt! If you want to pass this road, leave your toll money!"
The captain of the guard walking at the front hurriedly pulled his reins to stop his horse, looking at the bandits blocking the road ahead.
At this moment, another seventy or eighty bandits darted out from the roadside, completely surrounding the merchant caravan.
