Rebirth: Making a Fortune in Ancient Times

Hearing his son's call, Zhang Youtie carried the bucket over, put it on the ground, and sat down in front of the bowl of wontons. "Heh, these wontons are good. They look delicious."

"Dad, did you take all the shrimp we brought?" Changyun couldn't help but ask his father.

"They kept them all. We originally ordered ten catties, but after draining the water and weighing them, they weighed twelve catties and eight taels. So the shopkeeper decided to keep them all. However, I gave them the one catty or so of shrimp that we had left over from selling earlier."

"Well, let's give them away. Xiaxia said there are still plenty of shrimp in the pond, and we might need to deal with them again in the future."

"That's what I thought too. I think the shopkeeper is honest; he didn't ask for the price to be rounded down when he sold them by weight. We even give away one or two shrimp for free when we sell them in bulk. Since they wanted so many, we just poured all the shrimp from the bucket into the basin."

"Okay, hurry up and eat. You can talk when you get home. The wonton wrappers will break if you wait any longer."

After finishing their meal and paying the bill, the family went to the general store. It had a wide variety of items, arranged fairly neatly, including soy sauce, vinegar, brown sugar, needles and thread, baskets, winnowing baskets, and other everyday necessities. In short, it seemed to sell almost everything one might need in daily life.

Xia Yu picked out four chairs and a small table, the kind made of woven rattan, which looked quite unique. The chairs cost twenty-five coins each, and the table thirty-five coins. Liu bought everyone a new toothbrush and also bought a jar of green salt for brushing teeth. Xia Yu carefully examined the toothbrush. Before coming here, she had always thought that ancient people brushed their teeth with willow twigs. The bristles on the toothbrush at home were almost all gone, and she had never been able to figure out what it was made of. Now that she saw the new one, she couldn't help but want to study it.

"Xiaxia, what are you looking at?" Changyun saw his younger sister holding a toothbrush and looking at it carefully, and didn't understand what was so interesting about it.

"Brother, what's that hair on top?"

"Pig bristles? Aren't toothbrushes made of that stuff?" Changyun asked, somewhat confused as to why her sister would ask such a question.

"I hadn't thought about this before, but I just realized it."

"Stop looking around, think about what else you need to buy, or we'll have to pay and leave soon."

Xia Yu went over and rummaged through the things her parents had bought, then asked the shopkeeper to buy a pound of soy sauce. After browsing around again and finding nothing else she needed, she paid. The total was 182 copper coins, but the shopkeeper, seeing they had bought a lot, waived two coins, charging her 180. The most expensive item was the table and chair set Xia Yu had bought. Among the pile of goods were items Liu had asked her daughter-in-law to buy for her. Zhang Youtie stuffed all the miscellaneous items into a wooden bucket, then had Xia Yu secretly put them into her spatial storage when no one was looking. However, the table and chairs couldn't be done that way, so Zhang Youtie asked the shopkeeper to help him put them on the oxcart, clearly explaining where to park the oxcart and its license plate number, before confidently leaving with his wife and child.

"Dad, they didn't send us the wrong thing, did they?" Xia Yu asked with some concern.

"Don't worry, it won't happen. The innkeeper will keep it for us. We'll need this number to get our things back. It won't be wrong." As he spoke, Zhang Youtie took out a metal tag from his pocket and showed it to his daughter and son.

Surprisingly, the service was quite good. She thought only grain stores offered this service; it seemed many stores did. After leaving the grocery store, Zhang Youtie led his men to another restaurant. Xia Yu had heard that the back was large and had private rooms. The main hall was for individual diners. This time, as before, Liu Shi waited outside with the children while Zhang Youtie carried a bucket containing a pound of large shrimp. Zhang Youtie spoke a few words to a waiter who approached, and was then led inside. Liu Shi and the others could no longer see what happened behind them.

Just a few minutes later, Zhang Youtie ran out and whispered to his daughter, "Get out twenty jin (10 kg)."

"Why so much?" Xia Yu asked, somewhat puzzled.

"Just now, when I was showing our shrimp to the shopkeeper, the steward of the Liu family in town came out of the back room with some people. He saw the big shrimp in my hand and asked me how many we had left, as he wanted to buy some for his master. I immediately said that we had twenty catties left, and he immediately asked for ten catties, and also asked for ten catties from the shop."

Upon hearing this, Xia Yu quickly calculated in her mind, then took out about twenty-two or twenty-three jin (approximately 10-15 kg) of water from her spatial storage and whispered a few words in her father's ear. She also reminded him not to forget to divide the water in the bucket between the two families.

Seeing him carrying the bucket alone, Liu told her son to come along so he could help his father. The mother and son found a shady spot by the roadside and waited for them.

The streets were less crowded than in the morning. Xia Yu approached Liu Shi and told her about her idea of ​​buying land in the village and digging a pond to raise shrimp: "Mom, what my brother said just now reminded me. We have so many shrimp in our space, we can't just use one excuse to take them out and sell them. Why don't we buy land in the village, dig a pond, and raise shrimp ourselves? That way, we'll have an excuse to take the shrimp out of our space later."

“I also thought of what your brother said earlier. Let’s discuss it as a family when we get home tonight. If your uncle passes the provincial examination this time, he will be applying to become an academician next year. He may need even more money then. Is it really appropriate for us to buy land now?”

“Mom, we bought land and dug ponds to raise shrimp so that we can earn more money and do more when Uncle needs financial assistance from the family.”

After listening to Xia Yu's words, Liu pondered for a few minutes and felt that her daughter's words made sense, but she still decided to go home and discuss it together.

Over there, Zhang Youtie had happily returned with his son, carrying two empty buckets, and walked up to the mother and son.

"Let's go buy some more things. We can talk about it at home."

As they passed a pastry shop, Zhang Youtie went in to buy a pound of mung bean cakes for his mother and children. Xia Yu followed, wanting to see what an ancient pastry shop was like. However, as soon as she entered, she heard the price of the mung bean cakes was twenty-five coins a pound. She immediately stopped her father from taking out the money, saying she didn't like them. She pulled her father out, explaining that mung beans were so cheap; she could make them herself. She could go to the grain store to buy some mung beans and sugar, and then start making them at home.

When Zhang Youtie was pulled out, he was still confused, thinking that Xia Yu's daughter really didn't like mung bean cakes. As she left, she was still saying that she didn't like mung bean cakes but there were other flavors. Seeing Liu's surprised look, Xia Yu told her her idea. Liu was also very interested in making mung bean cakes at home. If she could really make them, they would be a great gift for visiting relatives during festivals.