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Ger Yan’ continued to nod. “Lin-dage, you’re right.”
Although he suffered some grievances from Li Yue’e, Ger Yan’s heart became more steady. He was anxious and panicked before, questioning all day if he should tell them or not. He was afraid that if he told them, they would misunderstand his cousin-in-law. And if he didn’t tell them, he was really afraid that Zhao Qingqing really did have an affair behind his cousin’s back. Now that he told mother what he saw, it all depended on her on how she would handle it.
“Look how red your eyes are. Are you going to cry?” Lin Lixuan touched his head with his left hand and gently stroked the corner of his eye with his right hand.
Ger Yan was depressed while he was alone, but he didn’t really feel anything. But now that Lin Lixuan had asked him this, he couldn’t help but say everything out loud. All kinds of emotions came from his heart. He felt aggrieved, sniffed, and said embarrassedly, “I’m not.”
“Alright, alright. Stop thinking about your cousin’s matter. If your cousin-in-law really did cheat on your cousin, he’ll do it again in the future. If we don’t catch him again, then someone else will…” Thinking of this, Lin Lixuan was also depressed. It wasn’t easy for him to go on a date with Ger Yan, and they just had to bump into another couple.
“Mn.”
“Come here and let’s see what the store is missing.”
On the seventh day of November, it was the grand opening for Lin’s Restaurant. Lin’s Restaurant lit a string of red firecrackers and uncovered the red cloth from the plaque with a crackling sound as a background.
The family of three came to the county town early this morning. As soon as the store opened, it attracted a lot of attention. Of course, the main point of attraction was the piece of white paper Lin Lixuan had pasted on the side of the pillar. On it, the words “buy one get one free” were written in large letters. He’d even underlined the word “one”.
There were a lot of people who knew these simple words. It didn’t take long for someone to come up and ask if their shop really was doing buy one get one free. Lin Lixuan explained with a smile, “Today is our store’s grand opening, so we are indeed doing a buy one get one free. As long as you buy one thing in our small store, we’ll give you a boy of soy milk for free.”
Some people left in disappointment after listening to his explanation. They thought they could take advantage of their store, but they were only giving away a bowl of soy milk. It didn’t meet their expectations. They felt the store was being too stingy. Meanwhile, other people thought that during a store’s grand opening, it was fun to join in the fun. If they bought something to eat, they could get a free bowl of soy milk.
The restaurant mainly sold Mandarin rolls, xiaolongbao, tofu pudding, and tangyuan. These items were delicate and rare and couldn’t be found anywhere else. Ger Yan had good skills and made everything well.
“Give me a basket of xiaolongbao!”
“I want two Mandarin rolls.”
Some of these people were old customers from the tofu pudding stall. Knowing that they opened a shop, they called out, “Give me a bowl of tofu pudding with no green onions.”
Of course, some people noticed the milky white snow skin mooncakes and the other small and delicate pastries, such as the red bean cakes, that were on the counter. “What is this? It looks so beautiful.”
“Oh, that’s a mooncake,” Lin Lixuan replied with a smile. When he first arrived in this world and set up a little stall to sell vegetables, he was even afraid to hawk. But now, he could talk to customers without any hesitation.
“Mooncake. Does the name have an origin?”
“Origin?” Lin Lixuan’s eyes swept over the guests. “Of course it does. Mooncake has the word moon in it because it’s related to the moon in the sky. Do you see this round shape like a jade plate? Doesn’t it resemble a full moon…?” Making up stories was Lin Lixuan’s strength. He wrote novels on normal days and even told stories to Ger Yan. He had already accumulated a lot of experience. If he was pulled to be a storyteller now, he could do it.
Lin Lixuan pointed to the mooncake. From the descendants of the sun to the immortal elixir to the immortal Chang’e running to the moon, he told a story filled with ups and downs in the plot. The row of people watching the scene were stunned. Eight or nine people had gathered inside the store to listen to his story. The passersby who watched the group were curious and even joined in.
Even passersby who previously thought the store was being stingy were lured back.
After telling the story, Lin Lixuan took a sip of soy milk to moisten his throat. Zhao Liniang had also just brought out the freshly made soft tofu. Lin Lixuan saw that it was a good situation now, so he hurriedly did some promoting and pulled the people who hadn’t dispersed yet to talk about how soft and tender the soft tofu was. He explained they should eat it by mixing it with shallots or making mapo tofu, crucian carp tofu… There were many methods, and he used all sorts of words to describe how delicious the taste was. The audience was drooling. Those who weren’t originally hungry became hungry after listening. They quickly took out their money bags and brought some food from the shop to fill their stomach.
Ger Yan, who was kneading dough in the back, listened to Lin Lixuan’s nonsense with a smile on his face.
By the end of the day, the three had been busy nonstop. There had been a great turnover. Lin Lixuan’s voice was hoarse, and little blisters had formed in the corners of his mouth. When they returned to the village at night, the three of them counted the silver they had earned today. After subtracting the cost, they had earned more than three, almost four taels of silver. They had almost earned back their monthly rent just on the first day.
Zhao Liniang was ecstatic. She originally thought that making a few hundred wen a day selling tofu pudding was already a lot. She never expected to actually be able to earn this much. “The people in the county town are rich…”
“…” Lin Lixuan wanted to say something, but he was unable to say anything. Ger Yan hurriedly handed him the freshly brewed tea. After he finished drinking the tea, Ger Yan helped him smear medicine on the little blisters on the corners of his mouth. “It hurts. Be gentler…”
Lin Lixuan knew that earning so much today was unusual. It was because of the freshness and having just opened. Plus, a rich person had purchased a basket of mooncakes from them. It was hard to say how much they could earn in the future…
However, they were off to a good start.
The next few days really weren’t as busy as the first day, but it wasn’t bleak either. There were a lot of people who came by to purchase soft tofu. After eating the dishes made from soft tofu, countless people loved the taste. Especially when they were boiling fish, they would also buy a piece of soft tofu to add to it. They had a lot of old people who had bad teeth who also liked to buy it to cook.
There were also a lot of people who came to buy Mandarin rolls, especially the workers from the nearby dock. Some workers usually bought a few steamed buns for lunch, but Mandarin rolls weren’t much more expensive than steamed buns, and it was a lot softer than steamed buns when cooled. It was savory with green onions and meat. The boss also gave free soy milk when they purchased, so it was very suitable for these workers who sweated all day.
Although business wasn’t as good as the first day’s, they were still able to earn two taels of silver everyday. They were busy from morning to night. As soon as they lay in bed, they would fall asleep. Lin Lixuan thought that they couldn’t go on like this. They needed to hire a helper from the county town. It wouldn’t be worth it if they tired themselves out.
The people they knew from the county town, such as Huang Yuan and Chu Zihang, knew he had opened a store and came over to celebrate. Tian Yang, who had learned how to write from him along with Ger Yu before, also came over to help work. Lin Lixuan gave him 20 wen a day, but he knew that he couldn’t use child labor. He heard Tian Yang say that his mother was trying to find a way to make money and send him to school next spring.
Hiring someone was an urgent matter. Lin Lixuan planned to find someone who lived in the county town to watch the store, but how should he find someone? He wasn’t familiar with the people in the county town. He didn’t want to gain trouble because of bad character. So in order to hire someone, Lin Lixuan struggled for days.
Old Man Zhong, who rented the shop to them, heard that they were looking for help and enthusiastically recommended someone. “He’s my neighbor, and I watched him grow up… Ger Qiu is fast with his hands and feet. He won’t steal or play tricks.”
The people introduced by Old Man Zhong was called Chen Qiu. Everyone called him Ger Qiu. His parents had passed away early, so he lived with his grandmother. The two relied on each other. Old Man Zhong was full of praise for him, saying that he was an honest man. Lin Lixuan was unable to find anyone for days, so he decided to give Ger Qiu a try.
“Old Man Zhong, can you ask Ger Qiu to come to the store tomorrow for a trial? If he does a good job and we’re satisfied, we’ll hire him long-term. If not…then forget about it.”
Old Man Zhong stroked his beard with a smile. “Okay…okay. I’ll tell him in a bit. I’ll have him wait outside your shop tomorrow morning.”
The next morning, Lin Lixuan and Ger Yan saw the helper introduced by Old Man Zhong. They saw the back of a figure waiting in front of their shop door from a distance. Ger Yan was dark and had a muscular body. From behind, he looked like a manly man. If they weren’t aware that someone would be waiting outside their store today, they would have thought that someone had hired a thug to carry out some kind of revenge.
Wasn’t Ger Qiu a Shuang’er? In Lin Lixuan’s impression, most Shuang’er were tall and thin or small…
Lin Lixuan and Ger Yan looked at each other. Perhaps Ger Qiu’s brother had come instead?
They walked up. In the morning line, they saw that he really was a Shuang’er. Ger Qiu had dark skin, strong body, and sturdy bones. He wore a gray short sleeved shirt that showed off his set of strong, muscular arms. His face face was as sharp as a blade with thin lips and eyes as deep as a wolf’s. If it weren’t for the dark red cinnabar mole in between his eyebrows, they really wouldn’t have been able to tell that he was a Shuang’er.
He was a fashionable and cool Shuang’er…
Lin Lixuan later heard from Old Man Zhong that Ger Qiu used to move goods at the port along with the other men. Old Man Zhong and his grandmother had persuaded him not to work so hard, so they introduced him to Lin Lixuan’s shop.
Ger Qiu was very strong!
Ger Qiu was easily able to lift the grinding disc in the back of the store all by himself.
Ger Yan exclaimed, “Ger Qiu, you’re so strong!” Both he and Lin-dage together were barely able to lift the grinding disc.
Lin Lixuan: “…” Wow.
Ger Qiu was really diligent!
Ever since Ger Qiu came, Ger Yan and Lin Lixuan’s burden had lightened a lot. Ger Qiu was able to do two people’s work, no, three people’s work. Ger Qiu even told Lin Lixuan that there was no need to have the little donkey pull the disc in the future. It was better to have the donkey rest. He could just do it.
Ger Yan: “…No, no. Let the little donkey do it…”
Lin Lixuan decisively signed a long-term contract with him for 50 wen a day. They couldn’t lose such amazing talent.
Ger Qiu was indeed very diligent and honest. But since he came, Lin Lixuan had a faint sense of crisis. Whenever he saw Ger Qiu and Ger Yan together, he was a little unhappy. He had to keep telling himself: “They’re both Shuang’ers. They’re both Shuang’ers…” Later, he saw Ger Yan look pleased toward him, so he secretly scolded himself. And that was how he finally got through the initial period of adjustment.
Ger Yan and Ger Qiu weren’t aware of Lin Lixuan’s psychological journey. They had become “good girlfriends”.
“Brother-in-law, you were wrong in this matter. You opened a shop in the county town and needed help, so why didn’t you come find us brothers? Why would you hire an outsider…”
