Chapter 203: Family Wealth Breaks a Hundred

Yan Lao’er immediately got the hint and stuffed the silver into his pocket without even looking.

Yan Yu opened the bundle and handed over the fragrant soap inside.

The auntie stood on tiptoe to peek and sure enough, the bundle was packed full of fragrant soap.

She thought to herself: Looks like they weren’t lying about opening a shop—they really stocked up.

Since the Yan family’s fragrant soap had no outer packaging, Yan Yu had padded it with layers of poplar leaves above and below.

It looked fresh and charming.

The little girl wrapped it in a kerchief and turned to leave.

The auntie had just been about to close the door when Yan Lao’er called her back.

“Auntie, we’ve got our hands full at home, and who knows when we’ll be back in the city next. This is a little soap we made—keep it for yourself. If you find it works well and someone asks, please help spread the word.”

With a smile, Yan Lao’er stuffed over a thinner piece of soap—about a third of the regular size—that Yan Yu had asked Granny Rong to cut.

The auntie was delighted.

Who doesn’t love a freebie? Even if it’s smaller, it’ll last a while.

And when you think about it, it’s worth a few qian of silver!

“Don’t worry, I’ll help you talk it up with the neighbors when I have time,” she promised.

Once they had walked a little farther, Yan Lao’er took the silver out to count it carefully.

Yan Yu leaned in to look as well.

Thanks to handling silver more often, the father and daughter had grown increasingly familiar with the weight of money.

There was a five-tael silver ingot and a piece of broken silver weighing one tael.

Yan Yu said, “The money’s just right, so why did she keep giving you looks? Did you quote the boss a higher price?”

“That’s normal,” Yan Lao’er said as he tucked the silver back away. “Servants in these rich households—few are truly honest. And even the honest ones don’t get a say in procurement. Getting a sale at one tael and two qian is already pretty good. Hopefully, that auntie will help spread the word on account of the silver. Selling directly to customers always earns more than selling to merchants.”

“Then why didn’t you leave some behind for her to sell? It’d save us the trouble,” Yan Yu asked.

Yan Lao’er shook his head. “I thought about that too. First, she’s not free—her contract belongs to her master. It’s fine for her to refer us, but acting as a middleman and actually selling the stuff—that’s not good.

“Second, pricing becomes tricky. We don’t know whether she’d sell it at one tael four qian or one tael five. Our fragrant soap has our mark on it—same goods, different prices, and if people find out, our reputation will take a hit.

“That’s why I’m saying—once we open a store, if we set the price at one tael four qian, it gives everyone a standard.

“We have to remember this: be consistent. We need to stay mindful about this fragrant soap—it’s still our most expensive product.”

Yan Lao’er and Yan Yu visited a few more households. Thanks to his regular upkeep of relationships, some took two or three pieces, others one—but they never left empty-handed.

Of course, they never forgot to leave a sample soap for people to try out.

This further strengthened their relationship with the customers.

In total, they sold seventeen pieces, earning twenty taels and four qian.

Then they rushed off to a few more shops.

As expected, the prices weren’t great. The lowest offer was seven qian, the highest nine.

And none of the shops bought much—one that offered seven qian took thirty pieces; the others took five or ten each.

Yan Lao’er didn’t hesitate. Gritting his teeth, he sold them all.

The unit price was low, but the volume was high.

Altogether, 110 bars of fragrant soap brought in eighty-five taels and one qian.

Adding the earlier sales, that made one hundred and five taels and five qian.

Yan Yu marveled inwardly: Money really does come fast!

Maybe to the rich this wasn’t much, but to their family, it was a huge sum.

“Dad, didn’t you say selling the same goods at different prices would hurt our reputation? You sold it for just seven qian! Aren’t you worried they’ll resell it for eight or nine?”

“They can sell it for whatever they want—I just won’t acknowledge it,” Yan Lao’er replied shamelessly.

Yan Yu: …

Stunned.

“But I stamped it with our mark!”

“They’ll just fake it.”

“I added anti-counterfeiting.”

“No one will notice unless they point it out. And anyway, it’s just soap. Who’s going to hoard it to pass down to their kids? Crouching Tiger City is big—it’ll sell out before long.

“And once it gets wet, who cares about marks or anti-counterfeiting.”

Yan Yu looked at him with admiration. “Dad, you’re the only one I truly respect!”

Yan Lao’er laughed at her praise, though the smile didn’t last long.

…

Doctor An had finished getting ready. With him was a young assistant from Huimin Hall who helped carry the medicine chest.

“Young Master, be careful!” the old doctor reminded him worriedly.

Yan Yu heard it clearly and exchanged a look with her father.

So Doctor An was actually the young master of Huimin Hall.

The ox cart was piled with pork and offal—mostly offal—and the smell wasn’t great.

The assistant wrinkled his nose, clearly uncomfortable. Doctor An, on the other hand, was calm and composed.

Sanbao took the usual shortcut, scaring the assistant out of his wits.

“Where are you taking us? This isn’t the road to Crouching Tiger City!”

His panic was so vivid that Yan Yu had to stifle a laugh.

She patiently explained to him, “Big brother, this is a shortcut. It’s much closer. My dad and I take it all the time. Look at the ground—those are our ox cart’s wheel tracks.”

The assistant peeked out and saw the faint, uneven wheel marks on the road.

He pulled back, face slightly red but still wary.

He held onto the medicine chest with a death grip.

Yan Yu: …

Seriously? It’s just one adult and one kid on our side. You’ve got two as well. We’re evenly matched! You’re older and bigger too—clearly your side has the upper hand. What are you so scared of?

To ease his nerves—and mostly to brief Doctor An—Yan Yu cleared her throat and spoke seriously:

“Our family’s surname is Yan. My eldest uncle is a scholar. A high official from Crouching Tiger City invited him to temporarily serve as a household registrar. A few days ago, he came back and said everything was fine. But today, when my dad took big brother to visit him, they found that Crouching Tiger had locked down.

“They said a refugee from Gu Feng brought a disease and it’s started to spread…”

Doctor An’s expression turned grave as soon as she mentioned the epidemic.

The assistant, hearing her mention their family and connections, finally relaxed.

A scholar and a household registrar—those were verifiable. At least he no longer feared this unfamiliar father-daughter pair were luring them somewhere shady.

Yan Yu gave all the info she had—fever, vomiting, and Crouching Tiger City’s response.

She also explained their own precaution:

Wearing masks.

She pulled out her spare mask to show Doctor An.

Finally, the young master of Huimin Hall showed a different reaction.

“These ear loops are cleverly made.”

The assistant scoffed. “I thought it was something special. It’s just a cloth mask like ours.”

Still, not bad—we’ve finally hit a small, tiny milestone~

——

The Yan family just earned their first hundred taels~ confetti toss ヽ(°▽°)ノ

As for how long they’ll be able to hold onto it—let’s wait and see~ (#^.^#)~

(End of Chapter)