Discussion

The Chinese were by nature people of orthodox means. Even in history, characters like Song Jiang and Zheng Zhilong who were outlaws of their times had made use of the opportunity to receive political amnesty. Wen Baoguo had extended this means and absorbed a number of small powers around him, and this was the reason why he successfully rose in strength enough to be able to contend with Peng Mingde.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Song_Jiang

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zheng_Zhilong

Seeing that Yue Zhong had turned him down, Wen Baoguo did not have too big a reaction. He simply smiled and said: "Since you're uninterested, it's fine. Yue Zhong, I would like to purchase 5000 tonnes of rations from you and I want to use 5000 tonnes of steel to exchange with you."

After the apocalypse, steel was an extremely useful resource as well, it could be used to manufacture blades, spears, arrows, steel barbed wires, steel lines, etc that were helpful in the fight against zombies.