Allure of a Country Maiden

The emperor is in a good mood recently, he has never been better since he came to the throne!

The treasury is empty? A large gold mine was delivered to him.

Are there droughts or floods in various places year after year, resulting in food harvest losses? Rice yielding thousands of kilograms per mu appeared! From now on, one year will produce three years’ worth of food!

A bad omen? In the blink of an eye, good luck will shine!

And all of this is inseparable from the Shengpinghou family.

"I heard that Marquis Shengping and his family are going back to their hometown to celebrate the New Year?" the emperor asked Shangguan Xuanyi during the early court.

"Go back to my father. I heard that we will leave the day after tomorrow."

I really can't bear to let them go, the emperor thought to himself.

All the civil and military officials looked at each other in confusion. It was nothing for a marquis with no real power to return to his hometown for the New Year. How could this be worthy of the emperor's attention? He was still mentioning it in the morning.

"After this disaster, Shengpinghou's family has made great contributions again. The ministers think that they should give Shengpinghou some reward."

Are you going to reward Marquis Shengping again? Ministers, look at me, I can see this in your eyes: Didn’t your family donate anything during the earthquake in Qingping County? Why did the emperor only promote the Pinghou family? !

"Marquis Shengping is a prince conferred by the emperor. He enjoys the royal title and is a member of the imperial court. It is appropriate to do something for the people. The money and materials donated by all of us are natural and should not be rewarded by the emperor." Prime Minister You came out. replied.

"Yes." Could it be that the emperor didn't understand what he meant? He meant that if you want to reward someone, you should reward them together, and you can't favor one over the other.

I accidentally attracted some hatred to Marquis Shengping.

Yi'er said that Marquis Shengping and County Lord Ruian didn't want people to know that she was the one who told them about the earthquake.

He could understand that a family with no roots really needed to keep a low profile when operating in this intertwined imperial capital.

The Shengpinghou family is very transparent, and if they don't want to be in the limelight, he will make it happen.

He hasn't rewarded them about the gold mine yet, and he can't reward them about the earthquake either, so just remember to wait until next time.

The emperor just said yes and then talked about other political matters.

Seeing the emperor like this, all the officials in the hall thought that the emperor wanted to reward Shengpinghou on purpose. In fact, the drunkard didn't care about the wine. The real purpose was not to reward them and let them speak on their own.

They missed a great opportunity!

The emperor's thoughts are really unpredictable! Bai Guan thought.

―――

The weather is fine today and Xiaoer's family can finally go home!

This time half of the journey was by water, which saved a lot of time.

It happened to be evening when we returned home. After Xiaoer's family had a good rest, they began to deal with housework and shop and Zhuangzi matters early the next morning.

While Mrs. Liu was taking care of the housework, Shen Chengyao went to the fields and Zhuangzi early in the morning to see how the winter wheat was being planted.

Xiaoer asked the housekeeper to notify the shopkeepers of each shop to report on the situation in the shops this month.

First, the shopkeeper of the Four Seasons Restaurant in the town came. After reporting on the business situation, he talked about one thing.

"Uncle Shen and Young Master Shen often come to the restaurant to eat." The shopkeeper felt a little uneasy when he said this and didn't know if he was doing the right thing.

Xiaoer took a sip of tea and motioned for him to continue.

"The first time they came to eat, they didn't give me any money. Then when they came to eat the next day, I asked the uncle and the others to give yesterday's money before serving the food. The uncle and the others..." The shopkeeper was a little hard to say. After all, Shen Chengguang was Isn't he the eldest brother of the boss?

"Are you scolding me? Are you scolding me harshly?" Xiaoer knew the reason for his hesitation and spoke directly for him.

Seeing Xiaoer's normal look, the shopkeeper was no longer nervous.

"No, I came here to eat almost every day or two after that. When I asked the waiter to do the cashier, he started yelling at me in the restaurant."

"Have you received the money?"

"Yes." He only served the food after receiving money, so he scolded him.

But he didn't dare not accept it. One of the employee rules was that no one was allowed to eat without giving money, including the boss and several young masters and ladies.

The accounts and the money must match. If they don't, the responsibility will be deducted from the person's monthly money.

"Well done, you don't have to worry about whether he scolds or not when he comes, just pay for the food." He comes here to eat every day, but scolds them every day. Do you want to blackmail their family and ruin the business of the shop? If you really think that all people are dead and indifferent to right from wrong, you will see people's hearts over time.

Whoever opens a shop will have a relative who comes to eat every day and refuses to give money, and will scold him for accepting money! I don’t owe him anything!

People come here to eat every day, but the restaurant can’t open yet!

"But it's not good for the shop's business if he always behaves like this."

"Is the shop's business bad?"

"It's gone now. At first, he was scolding him in the lobby. The guests complained and said it was too noisy. Later, we arranged him to the most remote private room."

"Then it's over! Don't worry, he won't be able to scold him for long. He is now a regular customer, and the one who gives the money is the uncle. Just treat him well." She didn't believe that he would be willing to keep giving money to come to her restaurant to eat. .

After reporting the work, Xiaoer gave the prepared annual gift and bonus to the shopkeeper, and he left with a smile on his face and a generous annual gift and fifty-tael bonus.

Then the manager came up to report that everything was going well.

The last steward came up and talked about signing a contract with the villagers for the supply of vegetables for the next year. More than a dozen families asked for an extra two cents per kilogram of vegetables.

"Why do they need to pay more?"

"They said that Uncle Shen's grocery store will also collect vegetables next year, and they will charge one penny more per catty than our shop. If our shop doesn't charge two cents, they won't sell to us. They also said..." The shopkeeper's Some dare not say anything.

"Uncle Xie said it doesn't matter." It was Shen Chengguang again, and she wanted to see how much trouble he would cause because their family was not at home!

"They also said that our shop charges low prices for their vegetables but sells them at sky-high prices. We make money by sucking their blood and eating their meat. They asked for an extra two cents per catty, which is considered too little. .”

"Uncle Xie, what do you think about this matter?" Xiaoer asked calmly.

Alas, there are no tigers in the mountains, and the monkeys all want to be kings.

"Personally, I don't think it should be added. There are so many people who know how to grow vegetables in the world, and there are more than a dozen of them. Their vegetables later turned out to be getting worse and worse. There were a lot of rotten leaves hidden in the middle of each bundle. , yellow leaves.”

Originally, I didn't earn much money from the food I brought in, so it was even more of a loss.

"Has the shopkeeper found a suitable vegetable farmer?"

"Not yet, but these days, who among the women in the village can't grow vegetables? If we spread the news to other villages, many people will come."

"Indeed!" Xiaoer nodded, "The reason why I wanted to collect food from people in the village was to help the villagers live a better life. Otherwise, a supermarket in the town and my own Zhuangzi can also supply it. Now. Now Since they think my family is sucking their blood and sweat, forget it, these dozen families will make a note of it and never sign contracts with them again."

The shopkeeper nodded. Those people were not worthy of pity. To be honest, missing their boss must be the biggest loss in their lives.