The brine mist of the Gupu salt warehouse was wrapped in silver frost as Shen Xitang’s black boots crushed the charred scrolls of the *Records of Lingnan Salt Levies*. Xiao Heng’s Xiuchun Saber cleaved through a clay tablet of Eblaite salt contracts, and the bundles of cuneiform tax ledgers suddenly erupted in a burst of subterranean fire—beside the royal Eblaite emblem dated "39th year of Yongli," a secret note in Yi script read "transshipment for ancient Syrian caravans," concealing a covert network of salt routes along the Euphrates!
"Lord Thousand-Householder, examine this salt shovel." Her fingertips traced the star-and-moon pattern on the bronze tool. "This ‘Seven Mansions Pulse-Setting’ mining technique was custom-made during Zhu Wan’s anti-piracy campaigns in the Jiajing era; how could it be mixed with the sacred tree motif of an Eblaite temple?"
Camel bells suddenly echoed along the salt path. Twenty Syrian salt merchants, disguised as salt-field workers, sprang from a dark channel. The forged patterns on the bronze scales in their hands were identical to the Jurchen military payroll ledgers seized by Wang Zhi during his raid on Jianzhou in the Chenghua era. Shen Xitang’s silver threads shredded a clay tablet, revealing a scrap of the *Eblaite Secret Accounts*—next to an official document claiming "ninety percent reporting of salt levies," an annotation in ancient Syriac read: "resold to the gold caravans of the Mali Empire!"
Chapter 172