"After what happened today, my junior brother will probably become famous in these major academies." Yan Fu said.
"But I'm afraid that Zhang Zijian and the others will secretly hold a grudge and take revenge on my junior brother. That's not a good thing." Yan Jingwen said.
Yan Fu listened and replied nonchalantly: "Then there's no need to be afraid. If they really dare to be arrogant in this Yangzhou city, my Yan family is not easy to bully. Besides, there is a master here, if they really want to If you use power to bully others, you may not be the unlucky one. However, junior brother, you should pay attention. They probably won’t use dirty tricks. They still have this kind of character, but if they meet in poetry or literary societies in the future, they will definitely have to Those who make things difficult for you in every possible way, just pay attention to yourself."
After hearing this, Li Hao smiled and said: "That's okay. If we compare poems and essays, these are nothing more than native chickens and wagyu, and can't be mentioned."
These words made Yan Fu look up to the sky and laugh, and said, "Junior brother, you are very proud and have a bad temper with me." On the other hand, Yan Jingwen next to him shook his head silently after hearing what the two of them said.
Then Li Hao asked: "By the way, senior brother, aren't you playing polo? Why are you here?"
Yan Fu said: "At first, those in our academy couldn't figure it out, so someone went to the front court to find me and asked me to come and have a look. As soon as they arrived, they saw my junior brother making a big show of himself."
After chatting for a while, because Li Hao's legs were still difficult to move, he did not go back to the front court and went directly back to the academy by carriage.
After the polo field ended, this matter spread among several major academies. The final result was that Li Hao's reputation in Qingtan Academy gradually improved. On ordinary days, there were always classmates from the academy who came to talk, which made Li Hao's life easier. Richer.
In the end, even Master Qin heard about it and warned Li Hao in class: "I have listened to the two poems you wrote on the polo field. They were indeed neatly written. But you must guard against arrogance and impetuosity. Only by studying hard can you achieve results. And in the imperial examination, poems and poems are not the main thing after all, the essence of the article is the foundation, do you understand."
"Yes, teacher, I will definitely study hard." Li Hao said.
After listening to Master Qin's follow-up, he assigned homework to the three of them and left. At that time, Li Hao thought that Master Qin didn't like him being in the limelight, but later he heard from his senior brother that in the next few days, Master made an appointment with the mountain chief and other teachers to drink and eat, and he drank more meat than usual, and he realized this. I am still proud of it, but I have never expressed it to my students.
After this incident, Li Hao's subsequent life became orderly again. I study and practice calligraphy in the academy, and occasionally go to polo clubs with my two senior brothers. However, when the provincial examination gradually approached, Yan Fu also began to study hard in seclusion at the request of Master Qin. After that, Li Hao never went to the polo club again.
However, Li Hao's side gradually stabilized, but Li Jian and Wei's side encountered a difficulty. It turned out that as the soap purchased here was getting better and better, in order to keep up with the production, the Wei family went to Yahang to buy people, and then built a new house behind their house.
At first, no one paid attention to the Li family's business, but then the commotion became louder, which aroused the curiosity of the villagers. After inquiring, they found out that the popular soap in the city was made by Li Jian and his wife. .
As a result, people from close families in the village came to ask if they could join in to help sell soap and earn some money. Wei discussed with Li Jianyi and was willing to let the villagers participate and earn some money. But the specific details still needed to be discussed, so he asked someone to go back first, saying that the couple would discuss it first and then tell them how to cooperate.
At this time, Li Jian actually couldn't come up with any ideas, so he wanted to go see Li Hao one day to see what he thought. But Wei did not want to disturb Li Hao about this matter, so she said: "As villagers, we should help each other. Now that we have a living, we can still bring them with us. In my opinion, the unified price should be based on 20 Wen came, and then asked them to go to the city to sell the goods. We didn’t care how they sold it. Anyway, we gave them two pennies if they didn’t sell a dollar. Now the two of us can sell hundreds of dollars every day, and they The more people we sell, the more we sell, so they can make money and we can make more money, isn’t that great?”
Li Jian heard this and thought it made sense, so he agreed. So the next day Li Jian invited Li Zheng to act as guarantee and draw up the contract. However, a total of eleven families joined in this time. Each family first took 200 pieces of soap to sell, and then let them discuss and divide the areas to sell separately.
As a result, sales immediately increased greatly. Because there were enough manpower and the ability to make money, the enthusiasm of each company to make money increased sharply. As a result, the soap market was suddenly spread out of Yangzhou City, and many people came to the nearby market towns. Sell.
After arriving, almost everyone's delivery volume increased, which naturally made Wei and Li Jian extremely happy.
But just like that, it didn’t take long. Then two families sent people to the door of the Li family, leaving Li Jian and the Wei family in a difficult choice. It turned out that the soap was selling well, and it fell into the eyes of the Cheng family and the An family, the two big families in the village.
In fact, the two companies also knew about the soap business at the beginning, but at first because Li Jian and Wei only sold it themselves, the audience was limited and the sales volume was not very large, so the two companies did not pay much attention to it. But later, as the number of sales increased, It increased and expanded to surrounding towns. The two families sent people to visit the village to inquire, and then each calculated it, and they could roughly estimate how big the business was. Now the Li family transfers no less than fifty taels of silver every day, and one At the end of the year, it was nearly 20,000 taels of silver. And this is just Yangzhou. If they take over and sell it in various places, the income will be huge.
So I wanted to get involved. Zhang Hu came from the Cheng family, and his tone of voice was not bad. He only said that the family wanted to invite the two of them to meet to discuss whether they could cooperate. But the man from the An family was very rude and directly mentioned that he wanted to buy the soap formula. He asked the two of them to think about it carefully and come up with a price, saying that they would discuss it again in a few days.
Li Jian and the Wei family naturally refused to sell the formula, but the An family was powerful after all, and there were people in the big family who were serving as officials. He was born as a Jinshi and now served as the magistrate of Hongzhou on Jiangnan West Road. It was natural for someone in the court to do business. The Li family is far from being able to offend a small family now.
Therefore, compared with the An family, Li Jian and the Wei family thought that the Cheng family might be better off, and there was no other way, so just two days later, they asked Li Jian to go to the Cheng Mansion to see Cheng Shi to see what the Cheng family wanted. How to cooperate.
When I arrived at Decheng Mansion, I was greeted by Zhang Hu and walked into the lobby. I only saw the front door. When I entered the living room, I saw corridors on both sides. In the middle was the hallway. There was also a large marble screen with a red sandalwood frame in the middle. The screen is a small three-room hall. Behind the hall is the main courtyard at the back. The six upper rooms on the front are all carved with carved beams and painted beams. On both sides there are verandahs and wing rooms with various parrots, thrushes and other birds hanging on them.
The scenery along the way showed the wealth of the Cheng family, but Li Jian had no intention to take a closer look at this at this time.
After entering the main hall, Zhang Hu asked Li Jian to sit down on the side, and then went to find Cheng Shi to come out. When Cheng Shi came out of the inner courtyard, he saw that Mr. Cheng had a rich appearance, with a calmness and indifference accumulated by years of wind and rain between his brows. He was wearing a dark blue cardigan with wide sleeves, and he looked quite majestic.
After Cheng Shi came in, he didn't directly mention the soap thing. Instead, he first talked to Li Jian about trivial matters in the village, and also asked about Li Hao's current status in the academy.
Li Jianhou had no choice but to accompany him and answer them one by one. However, when he talked about Li Hao, he was in high spirits and his words were quite proud.
After hearing this, Cheng Shi also praised the young man for his own style and so on. However, after chatting for a while, they still didn't get to the point. This made Li Jian anxious. He really wanted to know what the Cheng family was planning.
Li Jian then asked directly: "Master Cheng, I don't know how you will cooperate with us on soap matters when you sent someone last time."
Seeing what Li Jian said, Cheng Shi understood that the Li family still had little confidence after all. It seemed that Li Hao's Jinshi teacher had no intention of helping, so he could open his mouth to discuss the business.
