Mu Jiu's mind works quickly.
He knew very well in his heart that when the people from Haihun City came, the first thing they would do was to squeeze out his Alchemist Association.
The alchemists over there are more in number and of better quality than his, and they have strong support, so they can easily crush the City of Tears.
Lin Qinghen is irreplaceable, he will be fine. The Yin family is in charge, so it will not be possible to move forward in a short period of time, but I am not sure.
The Tear City Alchemist Association's foundation is not that deep.
"Master Lin, if I have done anything to make you unhappy in the past, I hope you can forgive me. If there is still something that I cannot get over, please just tell me. I will do my best to help you."
Mu Jiu reacted very quickly, he lowered his head immediately, his tone was full of sincerity: "But you have seen in the past three months that no one in the Alchemist Association disobeys Die Meng's words.
It is considered that you have corrected your mistakes. Since we are partners, please help me since we are both from Tear City. The people of Sea Soul City are eyeing us covetously and are not so easy to deal with."
In addition to asking for help, he was also expressing his attitude, telling Lin Qinghen that he was a more stable partner, and not to be dazzled by outsiders, and he was also playing the emotional card.
He knew in his heart that Lin Qinghen really had feelings for Leicheng.
"I know, why is President Mu so panicked?" Lin Qinghen glanced at him, "If I didn't care about you, would I have called you here today and reminded you so much?"
He did have moments when he was dissatisfied with the Alchemist Association. He still remembered that Mu Jiu stood by and watched a few days before the oath was pushed. But he did perform well afterwards, and Lin Qinghen was not that vindictive.
There was something he hadn't told Mu Jiu, and it coincided with Mu Jiu's guess.
The Haihun City Chamber of Commerce has many approaches, some covert and some overt.
In fact, a few days ago, he received a letter from the Chamber of Commerce and even met someone from there.
The letter was delivered directly from the shop by someone, who came to the door in a very swaggering manner.
They knew that Lin Qinghen would never sell the secret recipe, which was the foundation of his life, and they were unwilling to be middlemen. The gist of the letter was that they had studied Lin Qinghen's oath, and felt that what the Tear City Alchemist Association could do, they could do as well. They suggested that he kick out the Tear City Alchemist Association and cooperate with them, as the Sea Soul City Chamber of Commerce could give him greater benefits.
The oath signed by Lin Qinghen and the people was signed on schedule, and once the harvest was achieved, it had to be signed again. Oaths in the spiritual world are rarely permanent, and it is normal for them to have a clear end time point.
This means that if Lin Qinghen wants to change his partner, he can indeed do it.
It sounds good, but Lin Qinghen never thought about it.
He knew very well that with Diemeng's current size, it would be like courting disaster if they tried to make a deal with Haihun City. They talked about cooperation, but it was hard to say who would be in the lead. Their real intentions were not as simple as what was written in the letter.
Compared to those trivial matters, Lin Qinghen would rather have the final say, but the Haihun City Chamber of Commerce, which was rejected by him, did not mean to give up. After receiving the rejection, the Haihun City representative who came here to negotiate with him was a little rude and said immediately: "Young Master, don't regret it."
Lin Qinghen: “Oh.”
He waved back, indicating that the guest should be seen off.
The City of Tears is easy to defend but difficult to attack, and although there is a gap in strength between the two, there may be minor frictions, but there will not be a large-scale fight from the beginning.
First, neither side is so reckless. Secondly, people can see that the big guys of the Haihun City Chamber of Commerce who are above five-star heavenly rank have not shown up yet.
After all, this is just a yellow-grade elixir, not enough to make those people above the other side spend a lot of effort, and Tear City is still somewhat looked down upon by the other side.
Without resorting to force, which he was not good at, Lin Qinghen was quite looking forward to what moves the opponent would use. Anyway, he could play both black and white. He wanted to see whether Haihun City could fleece him or he could get a piece of skin from the opponent.
Lin Qinghen didn't tell anyone about this, but after he said a few words, Mu Jiu suddenly calmed down a lot.
"So what is Young Master Lin going to do?"
"First, gather the medicine shops in the association and tell them that if they want our help, they have to follow Die Meng from now on," Lin Qinghen said. "I'm not kidding. The outside force is fierce. If we don't unite as one, everyone will be in trouble. If I can't guarantee that Die Meng can get away safely, you will be unsure."
Lin Qinghen didn't want the Tear City Alchemist Association to be really squeezed out. If that happened, he would have to face the Sea Soul City Chamber of Commerce directly, and the pressure could be imagined.
But this is not a completely bad thing. On the way here, Lin Qinghen told Yin Jiuxiao that there are two kinds of power in this world that can make people really obedient. The first is benefit, and the second is threat.
The City of Tears didn't pose enough of a threat before, but it does now.
After all, for Lin Qinghen, the three-way balance of power between the Diemeng and Yin Family Alchemist Association was just a stopgap measure when he did not have enough power. His real idea, of course, was for him to be the one who had the final say in the entire Tears City.
Then he asked Mu Jiu to come over and whispered a few words in his ear. After giving him a few simple instructions, Mu Jiu was stunned and replied, "That's it? Is it okay? Shouldn't we do something more?"
"Why are you in such a hurry?" Lin Qinghen glared at him. "They haven't made a move yet, just respond accordingly. Why are you so anxious?"
But there was no point in panicking at this time, as the opponent's movements were faster than ever before.
Yin Hengxie knew about this a long time ago. On the afternoon when Lin Qinghen and Mu Jiu met, an uninvited guest came to the Yin family.
The person who came was no ordinary person. He was the elder of the Haihun City Chamber of Commerce, ranked seventh, and his name was Jiang Fushen.
As Lin Qinghen guessed, the elders at the top would not end up like the City of Tears.
This person had some friendship with Yin Hengxie before, and they could be considered acquaintances. When they were young, they could even be considered friends, but of course they were just drinking buddies.
After all, the City of Tears was originally the soul city of Beizhou. Almost all the existing Heavenly Ranks in Beizhou had been here, and even a large number of them had stayed and studied in the Yin family’s area.
But both of them are not young anymore. Elder Jiang came to the Yin family under the pretext of meeting old friends, but what he actually said was not friendly. This elder, who was actually three stars in the Heavenly Rank, put on a fake smile and got down to business after just a few polite words.
"The Sea Soul City Chamber of Commerce is opening a business in the City of Tears," he said, "and cities should be able to exchange what they have with each other. The City of Tears has had a good harvest of medicinal herbs recently, and I'm just worried that you won't be able to digest them, so I want to help you out. Let's do some business, by the way, you don't have any objections to this, right?"
It is said that Elder Jiang is in charge of the pharmacy section in the Chamber of Commerce, so it is obvious what he is here for.
Yin Hengxie knew what he was thinking. He actually wanted these people with ulterior motives to stay away from the City of Tears, but as Lin Qinghen said, this was inevitable after the opening.
There was no reason for the City of Tears not to allow people to open shops, and it was even more impossible for him to break off relations with them on the surface. Lin Qinghen had expected all of this and had discussed it with him, so Yin Hengxie was not surprised at all.
"Open a shop if you want, I naturally have no objection," Yin Heng replied, "But Elder Jiang, we will always find a way to deal with the medicinal materials, and now the City of Tears is not as simple as you think. If you can't adapt to the local climate, you can't blame me, your old friend."
There is a hint of sarcasm in Yin Hengxie's words now, and he is not behind anyone just by talking.
The two of them exchanged a few words with fake smiles, and after they finished talking, they turned around, their faces were gloomy.
But this matter cannot be just lip service.
After sending this person away, Yin Hengxie specifically ordered to strengthen the defenses of several plantations and not let any strange people in. He then added: "Add more people to Qinghen and Jiuxiao, especially Qinghen, and tell him to be careful."
He wished that Lin Qinghen would not go out recently, but Lin Qinghen did not listen to him and still ran outside every day, dragging Yin Jiuxiao with her.
He might have lived a peaceful life for too long in the past few months, so he was not afraid of anything and was even a little excited when encountering troubles. Yin Jiuxiao indulged him.
They were the ones who received the news the fastest.
Mu Jiu had just had a detailed talk with the pharmacy under his command, telling everyone to unite and listen to Lin Qinghen at this time, but the next day he received the bad news.
—Alchemists from several pharmacies have started to run away.
I don’t know where they received the news from, but they knew that the Haihun City Chamber of Commerce was coming, and they also received an olive branch from the other party.
The business there hasn't even been set up yet, they just bought a big shop in the city and hung up a magnificent sign, but the first thing they did was to poach employees.
Mu Jiu really hadn't been bullied for too long, and he was still thinking about how to make the people obedient and keep the materials in his hands, while the other side started to cut off the source of his trouble.
Originally, the Tear City Alchemist Association didn't have many members, just over a hundred. In the past few months, the number has increased a bit, and it has finally reached two hundred.
Mu Jiu was quite complacent at that time and didn't understand why Lin Qinghen didn't want these people. Although he was not as good as Lin Yunsi of Diemeng, he was still an alchemist!
"These people can't sign long-term contracts. They just run away when something happens. It's boring," Lin Qinghen reminded him at that time, "Be careful."
His words came true. Compared to the Tear City Alchemist Association, the Sea Soul City Chamber of Commerce was certainly a better place to go. He didn't have this opportunity before, but now that it came, he ran away faster than anyone else.
In just a few days, the number of people in the Tear City Alchemist Association was reduced by half, from about 200 people to double digits. All major pharmacies suffered heavy losses and came to him to complain. There were even some small pharmacies that did not have a single alchemist left and were about to close down.
Forget about the other people. When Mu Jiu was hurt the most, several of his disciples who had followed him for many years and whom he had personally trained all ran away.
The so-called friendship can be put aside in the face of huge interests. I don’t know how many promises Haihun City has made.
The pharmacy came to him, what could he do? He could only go to find Lin Qinghen with a pale face.
Lin Qinghen was not panicked at all. He leaned in Yin Jiuxiao's arms, looking calm and composed. He ate fruit from a plate, eating by himself and occasionally raising his hand to feed Yin Jiuxiao. He smiled when he saw Mu Jiulai, and after listening to him, he said, "Is this the first time President Mu knows that you alchemists can run away?"
He thought that it seemed like Diemeng had been cut off from her financial support by Xu Yaoyang only a few months ago, so how come her memory was still not so good
"Young Master, please stop making sarcastic remarks at this time," Mu Jiu's face drooped, "We will receive the first batch tomorrow. Everyone is upset about this incident at the pharmacy."
Lin Qinghen saw that he looked much more haggard these days. After all, he was an old man. In line with the concept of respecting the old and loving the young, he did not mock him, but comforted him: "It's not bad to have half of your body left. It's unexpected. It's common to be content."
He even grabbed a handful of fruit from his own fruit plate and gave it to Mu Jiu, motioning him to eat a little and stop looking so gloomy.
Mu Jiu: “…”
He looked at Lin Qinghen resentfully, indicating that he was not comforted.