Chapter 252: Heading to Shilu

"Changhua is famous for raising goats," Xiong Buyou said—he knew Hainan's famous delicacies like the back of his hand. "Just as famous as Lingao suckling pigs." He smacked his lips, looking greedily at the small goats nibbling on shrubs. The coastal dunes of Changhua were dense with shrubs and rich in natural herbs and grasses, all high in minerals and salt. The famous Changhua goats grew up eating such natural feed, so one could imagine their flavor.

"How about we shoot one to break our fast?" Huang Zhuazi was already eager to try.

"They look like they're raised by farmers. Shooting them isn't good; if you want to eat, just buy one."

"You talk a big game, but who knows how to slaughter a goat?"

"Slaughtering a goat is a piece of cake," Huang Zhuazi said confidently. "I've dressed wild rabbits before."

Discussing whether the slaughtering experience between wild rabbits and goats was interchangeable, the group arrived outside the gates of Changhua County. The official name of the county seat was the Changhua Battalion Fortress—from this name, everyone understood that the county government was merely borrowing space for its office, and the Ming army was the true master of this city.

The city wasn't large, about the same scale as Lingao. The walls appeared to be three meters high and were completely brick-faced—the Ming Dynasty's urban defense construction was still quite solid in terms of hardware. In software, it was lacking: the city gates stood wide open, and apart from two figures sitting at the gate who might be considered bailiffs or sentries, there were no other security measures.

Xiong Buyou looked up at the gate, which was named "Zhenhai" (Suppressing the Sea). He smiled and said to everyone, "This name is quite fitting. It's welcoming us."

After giving the gatekeepers a few copper coins, the group entered the city smoothly. Inside, it was even more desolate than Lingao. The entire Changhua County had only a little over six hundred households, half of which were military households. There were fewer than two hundred households in the county seat itself. The so-called county seat was merely a large village of farmers holding military titles. Naturally, there was no commercial climate to speak of—only a blacksmith shop repairing farm tools and two general stores. Although everyone already knew roughly what Hainan's urban commerce looked like from Lingao, seeing such a desolate county seat still left them feeling bored.

"It's so unfair," Ye Yuming muttered.

"?" Others were puzzled.

"How come other transmigrators can easily earn hundreds of thousands of silver taels from a county seat? But us—" He pointed at the Changhua County street, full of dust and garbage. "This place doesn't even have a hundred copper coins!"

The poker-faced Fang Jinghan said, "This place gives me the feeling of watching a Western." He actually had a tape recorder in his luggage, claiming he was prepared to do field research.

Xiong Buyou tried to communicate with the locals but found his linguistic talents completely useless. They spoke neither the Cantonese-family Hainanese nor the Minnan dialect spoken by the Fujian settlers, nor the Lingao dialect he was most proficient in. It was a rather strange dialect.

"This is Junhua!" Fang Jinghan listened for a while and realized. "The languages in Changhua are very mixed, and one major dialect is Junhua."

So the task of communication was handed to him. However, Fang Jinghan could generally understand what the other party meant but couldn't speak it, so he could only gesture for communication.

Finally, with the locals pointing the way, they found a relatively large shop on the county main street. It was a trading post, and the sign indicated it was from Guangzhou.

What business were Guangzhou merchants doing here? Xiong Buyou inquired at the counter. The shopkeeper was a genuine Cantonese named Qian. He was suffering from loneliness in this remote small town, with few people to talk to. Suddenly seeing a group of strange merchants who could speak Cantonese, he instantly cheered up, dragging everyone to chat and ordering a young assistant to serve herbal tea. The group was tired from walking, so it was a good opportunity to rest and gather information.

It turned out this trading post specialized in purchasing local soap beans, medicinal herbs, and goats. Many wealthy families in Guangzhou City liked the local goats, and seeing the business was good, the boss sent someone to station here specifically for purchasing.

Xiong Buyou pretended to be a small merchant visiting Changhua for the first time, planning to go to the Li districts to trade goods, and asked about the situation.

Shopkeeper Qian said it was fairly peaceful here. Pirates rarely came ashore in Changhua; at most, they would get some water and rob a few goats by the shore. The paddy fields around the county seat belonged to the Battalion. Although the Battalion was dilapidated, it could still muster a force of two or three hundred men, so pirates generally didn't approach the county seat.

As for the Li districts, Shopkeeper Qian said the terrain was too rugged. There were many mountains and stones, and many vicious diseases; ordinary people were reluctant to go up there. The Li came in groups to sell local products in the city every half month or so. Overall, it was quite peaceful; he hadn't heard of any incidents of Han merchants being robbed or killed.

Shopkeeper Qian curiously asked where they were from. Hearing they were from Lingao, he showed no surprise—this gave the transmigrators a full appreciation of the slowness of information transmission in this era. They had made such a stir in Lingao, yet Changhua, less than two hundred kilometers away, knew nothing about it. Later, they learned that Shopkeeper Qian's boss only sent a ship from Guangzhou to Changhua once every six months.

Seeing the salt, white sugar, sewing needles, sweet potato spirit, and other small hardware sundries the transmigrators displayed, Shopkeeper Qian's eyes went straight. Luxury items like white sugar and strong liquor had been out of stock locally for a long time. He immediately requested to buy dozens of jin of white sugar and liquor. He exchanged them for hook knives and iron farm tools favored by the Li people.

The transmigrators took the opportunity to ask him to introduce a guide, and Shopkeeper Qian readily agreed.

"That's easy, I'll find someone for you."

After achieving their goal, the exploration team returned to the Zhenhai to report the situation. Another batch of goods for trade was unloaded from the ship.

Early the next morning, the fleet set sail to continue the journey.

The exploration team led by Cui Yunhong ate breakfast, gathered their equipment and goods, and went to the riverside to meet the guide. The guide Shopkeeper Qian found was an assistant in his trading post. Although the Li districts posed no threat from man-eating savages, the hills were high and the forests dense, with changeable weather, wild beasts, snakes, insects, and various miasmas; Han people often regarded traveling there as a perilous journey. Those going to the Li districts typically hired "Cooked Li" (civilized Li) as guides.

This assistant, though Han, had a mother who was a local Meifu Li. His surname was Wang. Changhua had long been a county with frequent Han-Li intermarriage, so mixed-blood people like him were common. The guide spoke fluent Meifu Li, and his uncle's family lived in the middle reaches of the Changhua River. He was familiar with the roads and customs—an extremely suitable candidate. Having been an apprentice and assistant since childhood, though only eighteen or nineteen, he was extremely worldly-wise. He opened conversations with a ready smile. Seeing this group of a dozen people, though dressed in Han clothes, all the men were bald, and there was even a Hia Li woman among them. Everyone carried a large basket, and most baskets had a long stick wrapped in cloth attached—he couldn't help but wonder.

The exploration team naturally couldn't say they were looking for iron ore, so they claimed they were going to the Li districts to buy medicinal herbs. Cui Yunhong wanted to pay the guide's wages first, but the guide said there was no need; payment could wait until they returned. He only asked for a jin of white sugar to take home for his family to taste—white sugar was a rare thing here.

With preparations complete, the group set off in the morning, heading upstream along the Changhua River.

After setting off, everyone realized how wise the decision to hire a guide had been. On this barren land, there were almost no objects that could serve as landmarks. The Changhua River had a huge difference in water level between dry and wet seasons, making it troublesome to find its true channel in the dry season. The channels washed out during the rainy season were not only wide but scattered. Pools and runoffs dotted the landscape everywhere.

Cui Yunhong constantly verified the team's direction with compass and map. Their first target was the Shilu River. This tributary of the Changhua River appeared on the map about forty kilometers upstream from the estuary. After finding this river, they would travel upstream for another twenty kilometers or so to reach the Shilu Mine.

Obviously, the journey would not be easy. Especially while carrying heavy equipment and a large amount of merchandise, this section of the journey was even more difficult. The only hope was that as they went further upstream, the water volume would increase, and being able to sail would make it easier—even without a boat, building a bamboo raft was an easy matter.

After walking more than ten li, they saw the water potential in the river slightly increase and the sand dunes becoming fewer. They knew they were nearing the inland area. The terrain became increasingly rugged. Both banks were mostly hills, undulating. The forest vegetation was not dense, and large areas of rock and sandstone were exposed in many places. Cui Yunhong saw that many of the hills here consisted of limestone containing a large amount of clay. This kind of limestone could be directly burned into high-quality cement without mixing ingredients, commonly known as "cement rock" or marl. He couldn't help but secretly rejoice; this place could be built into the cement industrial base of the Transmigrator nation.

Cui Yunhong didn't know that in another timeline, Hainan's high-grade cement was often produced using limestone from Changhua.

Between the hills and riverbanks, there were scattered flat lands, many of which had been reclaimed into paddy or dry fields. Those unreclaimed places were large patches of barren grassland. Scattered among them were some villages. The guide said these were all Han or Han-Li mixed villages. Seeing nothing special about these villages, Cui Yunhong just asked the survey team to mark their scale and location on the map.

The survey team walked and drew the route on the map, marking settlements and places where fresh water could be obtained. In places where the terrain changed significantly, they re-measured. These data were the basis for future road development.

Seeing that they weren't in a hurry, stopping to write and draw after walking for a while, with some people carrying poles and boxes running around everywhere, fiddling with something unknown, the guide felt strange. He said to Cui Yunhong, "Shopkeeper, walking like this, it will take several days to reach the Li stockade."

Cui Yunhong had to fabricate that they were looking for medicinal herbs. The young man naturally didn't quite believe these words. But being able to get out and wander around instead of working in that incredibly dull trading post was a rare rest, so he didn't mind walking for a few more days. He didn't ask any more questions.

(End of Chapter)