Chapter 282 – We Can Start
After a wordless night, Zhao Hai started his operation right at the very next morning. They could not became overly obvious, so they just carried simple transactions with the surrounding beastmen, when they discover a good product, they would just trade according to a preferred price.
Zhao Hai has exactly one month to gather information, so naturally he wouldn’t be so impatient to complete it, what he needs to do now is to eliminate the wariness of the beastmen. How to eliminate wariness? For these beastmen, it is not talking to them nor helping them work, but instead selling them food at a discounted price.
So Zhao Hai did so, but since they need to be covert, every time they perform a transaction they try not to overly show that they want to curry favor with the beastmen, something unfitting for a merchant.
For the Bull clansmen monitoring Zhao Hai, they observed that his actions were just ordinary. There was nothing they could find suspect, and to make sure that there was no mistake, those who spied on Zhao Hai would ask those who have traded with him about their conversations. To their disappointment, Zhao Hai only focused on trading, and did not say many words.
After four days, those people lost their patience in monitoring Zhao Hai. Even the elder agreed that Beta should loosen his surveillance on Zhao Hai. Zhao Hai returned to his camp and through the screen he could see that the people gathering around and about their tent have lessened, this made Zhao Hai very relieved.
However he didn’t become impatient in gathering information, he continued his daily activities, but his activity range had grown in scope and is slowly heading towards the center of the camp.
On the fifth day after they arrived at West Wonder King’s camp, Wales’ blood hawk arrived. Zhao Hai wrote the current situation carefully and then handed the note over to the blood hawk to deliver the message to Wales.
He told Wales to not count on West Wonder King, and he fears that West Wonder King would ally with the Fighting Bull Tribe. The reason why Zhao Hai has still remained here is to monitor the situation of the Fighting Bulls community. He also wants to know about the 2nd and 3rd princesses’ situation, if the two are in a bad situation he will find ways to save them and have them reunite with Wales.
After sending the letter, Zhao Hai felt that a huge burden has been removed from the depths of his heart, at the same time, he also monitored the cargo’s progress. Tomorrow the caravan would arrive, along with it is nearly 3 million jin of grain, which is not a small number in any sense.
Zhao Hai saw the situation and immediately went to inform Beta. These days, the person Zhao Hai has the most interactions with is Beta. Although he knew that Beta was sent by the elder to monitor him, Zhao Hai has taken the initiative to interact with him often. This action would enable him to eliminate Beta’s wariness. And also, if he were to always dodge and hide from Beta, it would be impossible to have Beta’s surveillance on him relax in only these few days.
Beta is responsible for the security of the camp, therefore he doesn’t go and herd like other bulls. Everyday, he goes on to patrol around the camp, Zhao Hai could very easily find him.
In these past few days, due to Zhao Hai’s actions, Beta and Zhao Hai’s friends.h.i.+p has been very good. Therefore when he saw Zhao Hai, Beta immediately smiled and greeted, “Brother Zhao Hai, what are you busying with?”
Zhao Hai quickly responded, “Brother, I’ve been looking for you. I need your help on a matter.”
Beta stared surprised for a moment then replied. “Brother Zhao Hai, you’ve been very polite to me these past few days, tell me the matter you need help with, as long as I can lend a hand, I’ll help you.”
Zhao Hai nodded and said, “Brother Beta, our caravan will arrive at the camp tomorrow, this time they’ve brought a lot of grain. I need to find a place to unload the goods, you’ll have to find me a good place.”
Beta became stunned, and then he replied, “To be back so soon, Brother Hai, your men does things very quickly. How much grain did you bring this time?”
Zhao Hai showed a faint smile and said, “About 3 million jin.”
Beta stared, with a startled face he looked at Zhao Hai, “Brother Hai, did you say 3 million jin? Not 300,000 jin?”
Zhao Hai laughed and replied, “Brother, how can I possibly joke about his matter with you, 3 million jin is not wrong, therefore I need a very big place.”
Beta sees that Zhao Hai is serious, he hurriedly replied. “Brother Zhao Hai, go back to your tent and wait, I’ll immediately report to the elder, in a moment I’ll provide you with an answer.”
Zhao Hai showed a smile, gave Beta a salute and turned around to walk. Beta looked at Zhao Hai’s back, then immediately turned his cow around and headed towards the foreign affairs elder.
Outside the elder’s tent, Beta didn’t give any warning and broke into the tent directly. Fortunately, there are no other people inside the tent. Only the elder was inside shuffling around with some books. When Beta came in, the elder became dissatisfied, “Can’t you be more calm? Already an adult, but still rash and impatient.”
Beta didn’t even give a salute to the elder before he said, “Elder, Zhao Hai came to find me, he asked for help in preparing an area, tomorrow his first batch of grain is arriving carrying around 3 million jin in total.”
The elder stared, his eyes lit up and said, “So quick? He really has 3 million jin?”
Beta nodded and replied, “Yes, Zhao said he was very sure.”
The elder slowly closed his eyes as he muttered, “3 million jin of grain at half-price, this may save many matters for us. Go help him find a place, be sure to find a good area, when the grain arrives tomorrow, help him unload and see how good the grain is.”
Beta issued a acknowledging sound, then turned away. When Beta went out, the elder opened his eyes and said to himself, “To s.h.i.+p so quickly, does he have a transit station in the prairie?”
It is not uncommon for human merchants to build transit stations in the beastman prairie. Some big merchant companies would construct stations on beastmen communities. Generally these stopover stations are made with medium or large beastmen tribe’s cooperation. Human merchants place their station on the beastmen tribe territories and pay them commissions, this is so that they could move quickly and conveniently around the prairie whenever that wanted to transport.
The elder didn’t care about whether Zhao Hai has a transit station or not, he is thinking about Zhao Hai’s grain. To be honest, Zhao Hai’s grain is very cheap. Even those merchants who often supply them with food wouldn’t dare give the price that Zhao Hai is giving. These merchants would trade their grain at a price of 1000 jin for an Argali, but Zhao Hai’s grain’s price compared with these other merchants is a full half cheaper.
What does 50% cheaper grain represent in West Wonder Kings camp? It represents more food, this is a very good news for them.
At the very beginning, when Zhao Hai came to meet him, he still didn’t believe anything that Zhao Hai said. So he let Zhao Hai as well as other merchants to deliver grain, he didn’t think that Zhao Hai’s grain would arrive very fast.
The next morning, a huge convoy can be seen slowly approaching West Wonder King’s camp, getting closer and closer. Beta stood at the side of the camp, watching caravan after caravan. The convoy is composed of more than 1000 carts, in front of the convoy are 100 carts commonly used by the beastmen followed by the carts commonly used by human merchants.
Zhao Hai is standing on the ground outside, this time the team has some undead in it, but that isn’t something for Zhao Hai to worry about. At this time Beta is watching the grain convoy. Watching this long parade of carts, Zhao Hai’s heart is very excited, this convoy is his, how can he not be thrilled.
After the arrival of the convoy, Zhao Hai and Beta led the convoy to a vacant clearing. This is the area specially prepared to store Zhao Hai’s grain. Now that the prairie is heading towards winter, there is absolutely no chance of rain. So even if they store the grain in an open area like this, they didn’t have to worry about it being wet.
Beta has been paying close attention on the grain bags on the carts. The bags look ordinary, nothing special. Beta is carefully observing, he wonders what the quality of grain that Zhao Hai has delivered this time.
Quickly after they reached the open area, Zhao Hai wanted to command the undead to unload the grain. But he didn’t think that other beastmen would run to help, Zhao Hai is too embarra.s.sed to stop them, he can only a.s.sent.
When Beta picked up a bag of grain, he froze for a moment because the bag is too heavy. Not to say that he couldn’t move it, its just that the bag has more weight to it compared to other merchant’s bags of grain.
This made Beta stand still, his expression completely sunken. He has encountered this situation before, some grain merchants would put sand in the grain bags to make them heavier. This cheating method is the one that Beta disliked the most.
He picked up a few more bags of grain. The bags were so heavy that it made Beta’s face look unpleasant. After he picked up the bags, he pretended to handle it carelessly, and he ‘accidentally’ dropped a bag from his shoulders. The grain is placed inside cloth bags, but these cloth bags, after long periods of transportation they couldn’t possibly be able to retain their strength. After falling from Beta’s tall body, the bag split immediately.
Beta looked at the split bag of food, he wanted to mock Zhao Hai with a few words, but as he glanced at the grains, he was stunned, the content of the bag is the highest grade grain, the individual grains seem to s.h.i.+ne. If such grain cannot be called top grade, then the grain that they have been eating can only be inferior grain that hasn’t even matured. Most importantly, there has been no sand inside the bag, it is very pure.
Beta stared at the bag of grain, and other Fighting Bull people also gathered around, looking at the split bag, their amazed expression is the same as Beta.
This method of falling and breaking one bag, seemingly looking for trouble with human merchants, isn’t an uncommon deed for these Fighting Bull people. As long as there are problems with the food, they can seize the opportunity and purchase at a lower price. Looking at what Beta just did, everyone was ready to cause a disturbance, but when they saw the grains scattered on the ground, all of them have lost all their voices.
Zhao Hai looked at them and smiled. He knew, by looking at their expressions, that he can now carry on with his plans.