Chapter 9: Selling Candy in Town

The next day, Zhao Hu and his father Zhao Dalang, along with a few others, were already waiting with an ox cart outside the village chief’s courtyard early in the morning.

Unexpectedly, another person showed up—Wang Zhengyi.

After leaving Granny Liu’s house the day before, Xiaojiu had thought it over and went to Auntie Wang’s house to ask Wang Zhengyi to accompany them to town. First, because Wang Zhengyi studied in town and was definitely more familiar with it than the others. Second, Xiaojiu also wanted to pry some information out of him—maybe it would help her complete a system task.

Da Yan and A’dou were each carrying the tiger and rabbit backpacks made by Auntie Liu the day before. Zhao Hu stood to the side, staring at the two of them—and at the identical big fabric pouch the village chief was wearing—with eyes burning red with jealousy.

Pointing at them, then pointing at the village chief’s cloth bag, he huffed, “When we come back from town, I’m gonna tell my mom to make me one too! Mine’s gonna be a lion—it’ll be a hundred times cooler than your tiger.”

A’dou retorted, not backing down, “Well, yours won’t look as good as my tiger! Mine’s invincible!”

Neither boy was willing to concede, and the argument quickly grew louder and fiercer.

“You two still want to go or not?” Xiaojiu snapped.

The two immediately shut up and obediently climbed onto the ox cart.

They glared at each other, sparks practically flying from their eyes. But the moment the village chief turned around to look at them, they both instantly averted their gazes and sat quietly.

Wang Zhengyi silently got on the cart as well, not saying a single word from beginning to end. If it hadn’t been for the fact that he’d spoken while getting beaten by his mother yesterday, Xiaojiu would’ve thought he was mute.

The ox cart jolted along the road for quite a while before they finally reached the town.

Along the way, Xiaojiu had asked Liu Dazhu about the best spots. He told her the liveliest part of the street was near Yongfu Restaurant, where all sorts of street stalls gathered and where foot traffic was the heaviest.

Xiaojiu pulled some candies out of her cloth bag and placed them into Da Yan and A’dou’s backpacks.

“We’ll sell these near Yongfu Restaurant. Five copper coins each.”

Then she turned to Zhao Hu and Wang Zhengyi. “You two help collect the money and hand out the candy to customers.”

Everyone responded with a unified, “Got it!”

“Village Chief, can we really sell them for five coins each?” Da Yan asked with some concern. “The malt candy in town is only two coins apiece.”

“Of course we can. My candy is different. It looks better and tastes better.” Xiaojiu replied confidently.

“Village Chief, I believe in you! We’re definitely going to make a lot of money!”

“Yeah, I believe in you too!” Zhao Hu quickly echoed, not wanting to be outdone by A’dou.

Liu Dazhu watched the group of kids enthusiastically planning their candy business and couldn’t help but get excited too. He listened with great interest.

When they reached the busiest street in town, the sight of the kids immediately attracted the attention of a crowd of children. And it wasn’t because of the candy—they were all captivated by the adorable panda, rabbit, and tiger backpacks.

A group of children ran over and pointed at the backpacks, asking, “Where did you get those bags?”

“My mom made it for me! She’s super talented!” A’dou puffed up his little chest and replied proudly.

Then he pulled out a candy wrapped in the same tiger design as his backpack and showed it off to the kids who had just asked, saying, “See? My backpack matches the tiger on this candy wrapper. Cool, huh? I’m telling you, this candy is delicious. You’ve never had anything like it!”

“Really?” The kids looked skeptical. After all, they lived in town and had eaten plenty of candy—how good could this new one really be?

Xiaojiu took out a few candies and handed them to several children, saying, “Here, you can try them. If you don’t like them, you don’t have to buy.”

After tasting them, the kids realized they had never had anything like it before—it was even better than any candy they’d had before.

One chubby boy noticed for the first time that the candy wrappers had animal pictures on them, and the taste was even better than the sweets his mother had brought back from the capital. He hurriedly asked, “Do you sell these?”

“You want some? Five wen each,” Xiaojiu replied.

“Yes,” the chubby boy answered without hesitation.

“How many do you want? I’ll sell them to you.” Xiaojiu pulled out a variety of candies and continued, “I’ve got cats and dogs, tigers, lions, birds, rabbits, monkeys… Which one do you like?”

As Xiaojiu took them out one by one, the kids stared with wide eyes. Wow! So many little animals, and each one was so cute!

The chubby boy declared boldly, “I want all the ones in your backpack!”

Then he pointed at the little tiger backpack A’dou was wearing and asked, “Can I buy your tiger bag too? You can just ask your mother to make another one when you get home.”

A’dou looked at Xiaojiu and whispered, “Village Chief, I want to sell this one and ask my mom to make me another. How much are we selling the backpacks for?”

Xiaojiu figured the backpacks were handmade, so they should be more valuable. After thinking for a bit, she said, “Let’s sell the backpacks for 200 wen each.”

She felt around the bag and added, “I only have 200 candies left. Do you want them all?”

“All of them. I’ve got lots of people at home,” the chubby boy said.

It was clear he was the pampered son of a wealthy family, and he immediately told his servant to bring the money.

Seeing the chubby boy buying everything, the other kids quickly spoke up:

“I want some too! Do you have more? I want 10.”

“I want 20.”

“I want 5.”

“I want 30.”

“I want that rabbit backpack.”

“I want your panda backpack.”

“I want the rabbit one too!”

…

A’dou and Da Ya quickly took out the candies from their backpacks and handed them to Wang Zhengyi, who had studied at the town’s academy for a few years and was good at counting and math. He immediately sorted the candies and handed them out to the kids, while collecting the money.

As for the backpacks the little girls wanted, Xiaojiu could only give them to the ones who asked first. For the rest, she took pre-orders and promised to bring more to town in a few days. She also told them they could choose the animal pictures they liked from the candy wrappers to be used on the backpacks.

The little girls were thrilled and hurried to pick their favorite designs, while those who already got their backpacks couldn’t wait to put them on.

The chubby boy, especially, just wanted to rush home with his backpack and candies to show off to his cousins.

This candy-selling trip to town turned out to be a surprising success. Xiaojiu took the copper coins from Liu Dazhu and began counting the money.

They earned 2 taels and 200 wen from selling candy, and 600 wen from the backpacks.

Zhao Dalang and Liu Dazhu were stunned. Was money really this easy to make? Were the kids in town this rich?

Xiaojiu began calculating wages for the others. She gave each of them 100 wen. The 600 wen from the backpack sales would go to Aunt Liu for making them, and Xiaojiu herself was left with 1,700 wen.

The others tried to refuse the wages, saying they hadn’t really done much to help the village chief in town. But Xiaojiu said if they didn’t take it this time, she wouldn’t bring them next time—so they quickly accepted.

After finishing the sales, Xiaojiu remembered the system task and decided to visit Wang Zhengyi’s school.

She turned to the group and asked, “Wang Zhengyi, which academy were you studying at before?”