Chapter 459: Bottleneck

The old wooden gate of the manufacturing bureau had been replaced with a ten-meter square green stone gate. The two bronze lions on each side of the gate looked majestic and powerful, just like those lion statues that Yan Liqiang had seen at the entrance of those European castles in his previous life. There were gatehouses on both sides of the stone gate. The fortress wall connected to the entrance was half-complete. There was a vacant plot of land of a few dozen mu near the side of the gate that had already been leveled. In the near future, the manufacturing bureau would use it as carriage parking space. Artisans flattened the ground by using ox-drawn stone mills. Once the parking field was completed, it would resolve the situation of carriages queuing in front of the manufacturing bureau. The road from the Huanglong County public road which led to the manufacturing bureau had long been reconstructed to an avenue that could allow four carriages to pass through simultaneously.

Half a year went by, and the Gan Province Manufacturing Bureau also went through some major uplifts after generating profits. It slowly looked like what Yan Liqiang had in mind. The manufacturing bureau was still operating while upgrading their facility. In this half a year’s time, the artisans of the manufacturing bureau had already gotten used to such changes. Every one or two months, one or two workshops would be relocated to new workshops, along with the factories or artisans moving into new living quarters. The new workshops were spacious, bright, clean, tidy, and comfortable. Everything was a lot better compared to before. This lifted the artisans’ morale and everyone was fully devoted to their work.

The popularity of the four-wheeled carriages exceeded Yan Liqiang and Qian Su’s expectations. The production line of the four-wheeled carriage was now operating twenty-four hours non-stop across two working shifts. The monthly production of the four-wheeled carriages had already reached ninety units. Even with such a production rate, orders received from all over the Great Han Empire were placed on the waitlist which went up to three years.

The profits generated by the four-wheeled carriage for this year alone had already exceeded four million taels of silver.

This was a number that nobody had expected.

According to the manufacturing bureau, pre-orders needed to be paid in full and the carriages would be collected once completed. Due to this, the current funds in hand was over fifteen million taels of silver.

Yan Liqiang was shocked after learning how much money the manufacturing bureau had now. The accumulation of wealth at such a rate and scale was truly shocking. In his previous life, the accumulation of wealth at such a speed was only possible through those frauds by direct sales organizations. Of course, the manufacturing bureau was not a crowdfunding fraud — the success was all due to the four-wheeled carriage being such a unique and remarkable product. Another factor was because Yan Liqiang’s advertisement was a huge success.

Qian Su, who was in charge of the manufacturing bureau, was no longer worried about being broke. However, he felt anxious about having too much money and not knowing how to spend it properly. Since there was too much money in the manufacturing bureau, Qian Su had even instructed someone to dig an underground storage that was guarded with tight security to store all the silvers and silver promissory notes accumulated by the manufacturing bureau.

To Yan Liqiang, the huge and steady amount of cash flow contributed by the four-wheeled carriage production could be used to do big things. He had countless plans in mind, but all of them crumbled due to the fact that the Heavenly Stone was unable to create a human. The biggest problem he had to face now was no longer about the lack of money but rather not having enough manpower. This forced him to either stop or change his plans.

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In the blink of an eye, Yan Liqiang had left Liuhe Town for half a month.

For the past half month, he spent most of his time in Yuntao County, busy with the salt factories. The salt factories in Yuntao County were already in his hands. Yan Liqiang’s original plan was to create a group of loyal and reliable artisans to take control over the critical processes in the new salt factories with the Heavenly Stone after obtaining the salt factories. This was so that he could keep the secret of producing high-quality edible salt to himself for the long term. However, this plan had been foiled due to the current situation of the Heavenly Stone. Hence, Yan Liqiang was forced to make adjustments and compromise by collaborating with Lei Sitong.

What was the secret to producing high-quality edible salt from the brine mines? The answer was simple: through carbon removal. It only required some slight improvements to the traditional processing method of traditional salt. With the introduction of some simple equipment and adjustments to the procedure, low-quality earth salt could be transformed into high-quality salt. This was the so-called ‘turning stone into gold’.

Yan Liqiang originally wanted to keep the secret to himself, but the current situation forced him to share the secret with Lei Sitong. It was because the carbon removal method was very simple and one would be able to understand it with just a glance. Since it was a large scale production, a lot of people would be participating in the project. In order to prevent those involved from leaking the secret, a strong and powerful controlling technique needed to be in place. Since he was unable to create a human, only Lei Sitong had the ability to keep everything under control.

However, ‘expectations were far from reality’. Yan Liqiang once again experienced the meaning of this phrase.

For the salt factories in Yuntao County, the final decision that Yan Liqiang made was to promote a few artisans and stewards from the manufacturing bureau to take charge of the production process and financial affairs. At the same time, Qian Su would take up the role as the manager of the salt factory, managing both the salt factory and the manufacturing bureau. Luckily, the manufacturing bureau was already on the right track. There was nothing much for Qian Su to worry about so he would be able to attend to the salt factory in Yuntao County. The shortest amount of time required to go back and forth between the manufacturing bureau and the salt factory was less than two hours while riding on a rhinodrake steed and four hours on a four-wheeled carriage. The general production and safeguarding of the secret was handed over to Lei Sitong, and they were still splitting the profits fifty-fifty.

Yan Liqiang had no choice but to adjust and compromise. Lei Sitong, who did not know the reason behind all this, was very happy as he thought he had gained Yan Liqiang’s trust. In order to ensure there would be no impact to the salt business of Yuntao County, Lei Sitong immediately transferred a new Yuntao County Magistrate and stationed a garrison beside the salt factory. Hundreds of workers and supervisors who were involved in the critical stages of the production were all personally selected by him. Word had it that they were selected from the group of retired veterans from Lei Sitong’s personal troop and there were even a few competent ones among them. The entire salt factory was managed in a strict military-style that was even more strict than the manufacturing bureau.

It took more than ten days to finish setting up the salt factory in Yuntao County. After the first batch of salt was produced yesterday, Yan Liqiang parted with Lei Sitong in the evening and returned to the manufacturing bureau.

To Yan Liqiang, his return from Yuntao Country signified that he had settled all matters related to money-making and industry projects. Although there were still countless blueprints in Yan Liqiang’s mind, he had no choice but to take a break due to the current situation.

Upon his return from Yuntao County, Yan Liqiang realized that in order to do big things and make a breakthrough, he needed to establish his own group of people. However, there weren’t enough people for him to use right now. Due to that, the places he was truly in control were only the manufacturing bureau and Liuhe Town. Once he left those two places and went off to do something on his own, he wouldn’t be able to make ends meet. There was basically no one beside him. People were the fundamental factor, and only with someone beside him would he be able to tackle the situation in front of him and make a breakthrough. Without people, even if he made more money, it would only make him a mere wealthy man and a scrooge.

Early this morning, Yan Liqiang had Hu Haihe drive the four-wheeled carriage and brought Yu Qing along with him. Together, they left the manufacturing bureau and drove toward Pingxi City on the public road…