15 Setting up stalls at Luojin Bridge

◎ No matter how good something is, it should be shown to others.◎

Song Jinyi steamed the prepared ingredients over medium-low heat for a quarter of an hour, then turned off the heat and waited for them to simmer thoroughly. She lowered her head, fiddling with the ingredients in her hands, and asked, "Why can't we just cook it for ourselves?"

Without waiting for Xu Ruolan to answer, she turned around and asked, "Sister Ruolan, do you want red beans?"

Xu Ruolan approached and looked at the freshly baked bingsulai. It was as smooth as a piece of milky white tofu. She pressed the surface lightly with a spoon, and it made a popping sound.

She scooped a spoonful of red beans herself, nodded, and asked, "Would it be better if we added a little acacia honey?"

Song Jinyi handed her the honey jar and said, "Originally, this ice cream is better when it's chilled, but conditions are limited right now. Sister Ruolan, try it first and see how it tastes."

Xu Ruolan spread a layer of honey evenly on the surface of the ice cream and praised it highly after tasting it.

This icy pancake is even more tender and smoother than freshly made tender tofu, with a light sweetness. When you chew it carefully, you can taste the aroma of rice wine, and the faint aroma of wine lingers on the tip of your tongue.

It tastes great even before being chilled. If it were chilled, it might even taste better than the popular lactose-infused dessert.

As she ate, she said, “I told you before that I don’t eat much at night, but once I encounter the food you cook, even if I’m not hungry, I will eat seven or eight bowls of it.

It tastes really good. If you opened a store and sold this, I would have a bowl every day."

Xu Ruolan looked up and saw Song Jinyi's eyes flickering, as if two bright fireworks had suddenly bloomed. She took the handkerchief and slowly wiped her mouth, guessing, "Are you planning to sell this?"

When Song Jinyi saw that she had guessed it, a look of surprise flashed across her face, and then she praised: "Sister Ruolan is really smart."

"Don't be so poor." Xu Ruolan scolded him with a smile, and asked seriously, "How are you going to sell it?"

Running a business is no joke. It requires not only the ingredients for making snacks, but also the shop and location. The most important thing is where do you get the capital to do all this?

Song Jinyi smiled sweetly, took Xu Ruolan's arm and said, "Of course, with Sister Ruolan, we'll go sell it together. I've thought about it carefully before.

A shop is not a big problem. We are a small business and don’t need a shop. We don’t even need to set up a stall with cloth.

We'll just take two bamboo baskets and act like porters. As for the location, we'll go out and check it out later. Ingredients aren't a big problem either.

I've calculated that I still have a little left after redeeming Xie Wuyang, enough to buy food for one day. As long as I can buy it all on the first day, not only can I make back my investment, but I can also make enough for food for the next two or three days. The longer I spend, the more I'll earn."

Xu Ruolan thought about it carefully and felt that this plan was feasible, so she agreed to go sell snacks with Song Jinyi.

After finishing the Bing Su Lao, the three of them went out to Xi Luohua Street together. Before leaving, Xu Ruolan suddenly turned back to the house to get a scarf, which she had made from old clothes. She handed it to Xie Wuyang and asked him to wear it when he went out.

Song Jinyi then realized that Xie Wuyang's undisguised exit would really attract attention. If seen by someone with ulterior motives, it might cause some trouble.

She was too careless.

"Thanks to Sister Ruolan's attentiveness, I hadn't even thought of this."

Song Jinyi and Xu Ruolan walked side by side. Xu Ruolan glanced at Xie Wuyang who was following behind them, not too close nor too far away.

She lowered her voice and said to Song Jinyi, "You brought this child back, and his injuries are almost healed. Have you thought about what to do next?"

"..." To be honest, Song Jinyi had never thought that bringing Xie Wuyang back was just a temporary measure. How to deal with him was indeed a big problem. If Xu Ruolan hadn't mentioned it, she would have been too lazy to think about it. Now that Xu Ruolan mentioned it, she had to face this problem.

Song Jinyi looked at the bustling streets, seeing the endless prosperity, and said softly, "Xie Wuyang is a grown man. Although he doesn't eat much, he is still the burden of one more person.

Besides, I didn't save him willingly back then, and I can't support him forever. But he's not Chinese, and he doesn't speak Chinese fluently, and he can't go out and find a job on his own. Besides, he still owes me fifty taels, so... "

Xu Ruolan looked at her quietly, waiting for what to happen next.

"Or I can sell him to a rich lady as a concubine. Although now--Ouch!" Before Song Jinyi could finish her words, Xu Ruolan hit her on the head.

"Stop making trouble and be serious."

Song Jinyi covered her head and said innocently, "But I think I'm talking about the problem seriously."

Xu Ruolan said, "You're just being hard on the outside but soft on the inside. If you don't take him seriously, why would you make an extra portion just for him when you cook?"

Song Jinyi sighed deeply and said frankly, "But Sister Ruolan, I really don't know how to deal with him now. Besides... because my encounter with him was very unfriendly, I always feel uneasy about keeping him by my side."

"You said he was unscrupulous, but you also said you knew what would happen to him if he stayed there. You think he's a contradictory person, but from what I see, I just think he's a pitiful person.

He's stuck in the mud, clinging to you as best he can to survive, just like a creeper trying to cling to something else to spread and grow, but in the end the branches are soft and will break if you pull them off; it's just his survival instinct."

After hearing this, Song Jinyi wanted to refute but had nothing to say.

The two of them walked quite fast and arrived at Luojin Bridge in a quarter of an hour.

After crossing Luojin Bridge, walk west to Xiluohua Street. The night market starts from Luojin Bridge. The south side of the street sells jade, jewelry, silk and brocade, and the shops are gorgeously decorated.

Especially in the place where gold and silver are traded, the storefronts are wide and spacious, and the houses are brightly lit. The rest of the shops are mostly spices, calligraphy and paintings, and restaurants. Two intersections south along Xiluohua Street is Zui Liuxia.

But Song Jinyi didn't want to go there, so she just wandered around West Luohua Street. There were scattered small vendors setting up stalls all over the street, including barbecue stalls, meat jerky stalls, and fruit jerky stalls. There were also a few stalls selling wild foxes and badgers on the side of the restaurant.

Xu Ruolan said as she walked, "This West Luohua Street is the most central and bustling part of Yunzhou City. Even before the holidays, during the Mid-Autumn Festival or Lantern Festival, this street is packed with people. Someone once joked: 'During the festive season, when people are bustling around, a naughty child can find something by looking down. In just a quarter of an hour, he can get three thousand gold coins.'"

It means that there were too many people at the festival, and the jade pendants were squeezed out of the purses of the young men and women, and a short child picked them up in the chaos. As for the three thousand gold, it is naturally an exaggeration..."

"It's really lively." Song Jinyi looked at the shops on both sides eagerly. There were so many dazzling things that she couldn't take it all in. If her wallet was not empty, she would have wanted to stop and take a closer look and buy one or two small items.

A few meters further, I saw a stall selling seasonal delicacies: sugar-coated icy cold yuanzi, raw water-soaked papaya, lettuce, golden thread dang plum...

Xu Ruolan and Song Jinyi discussed, "What do you think of this place?"

Song Jinyi told Xu Ruolan her thoughts truthfully. When she saw these for the first time, she felt that they could not be displayed here. They were all selling similar summer desserts. Although they could attract customers' attention, the variety was too wide and dazzling.

It is not certain that the guests will end up staying at her house, so this is obviously not the best choice.

After shopping for two hours, they finally decided to open the store at Luojin Bridge.

One reason is that Luojin Bridge is where the night market starts, and people passing by will inevitably take a few glances, which is much more impressive than the various things inside.

Conversely, if people were still hungry when they came out, they would not go back and the last thing they saw would be her shop.

Now, her dessert stall is always the most eye-catching.

******

The next day.

Song Jinyi watched the last table of customers leave, and immediately changed the opening sign on the door to closing, and cleaned up the lobby with the waiter in a few seconds.

When they went to the back room, Xu Ruolan had already prepared the meal. After dinner, the two of them went about their respective duties.

Xu Ruolan and Xie Wuyang went to the ice shop to buy a bucket of ice, while Song Jinyi quickly prepared the yogurt. The ingredients were prepared in advance, and when Xu Ruolan came back, everything would be ready.

Spread the ice cubes evenly in the wooden barrel, put in the porcelain bowl of crispy pastry and cover the barrel with a quilt. Although there is not much in the barrel, the ice cubes and the quilt weigh at least ten pounds.

Song Jinyi couldn't lift it, and two people wouldn't be convenient, not to mention the wooden spoon and porcelain bowl that needed to be carried separately. Fortunately, there was Xie Wuyang, who, though frail, was quite strong, and with his veins flexed, he carried the barrel along.

When they were leaving, Song Jinyi and Xu Ruolan's eyes met, and they saw excitement and excitement in each other's eyes. They smiled at the same time and went to Luojin Bridge together.

Although Qiaoge Street is not far from Luojin Bridge, it is still difficult for Xie Wuyang, a half-grown child, to carry more than ten kilograms of things without even two taels of meat.

Song Jinyi changed for a while in the middle, and Xu Ruolan also gritted her teeth and carried a distance in the middle. After changing three waves, they finally arrived at Luojin Bridge.

The three of them hid under the shade of the trees. Although it was getting late and the sun had already set, the afterglow still transformed into a rosy glow when it shone on the scattered buildings, filling the sky with beauty.

The heat was still there. Song Jinyi touched the quilt, feeling a slight chill coming from inside, hoping that the ice would last until night.

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Xie Wuyang wiping the sweat from his head with his sleeve, his chest heaving violently as he held his breath. Xie Wuyang was wearing his original clothes, which had a few holes in them, but were still wearable.

I didn't think anything of it when I was staying in the yard before, but now that she came out, Song Jinyi felt that she was very conspicuous.

She withdrew her gaze, was silent for a moment, took out a small porcelain bowl, scooped a spoonful of ice cream and handed it to Xie Wuyang.

Xie Wuyang was stunned by Song Jinyi's sudden action. He neither took it immediately nor said anything. It was Xu Ruolan who patted his shoulder and said, "Hurry up and take it. Thank you, Sister Jinyi."

Xie Wuyang did as he was told. Song Jinyi only said, "Eat slowly." She didn't show it on her face, but she felt a little speechless inside. Was she being mean to him? Look how scared he was.

Turning around, she saw Xu Ruolan looking at her. She awkwardly turned her head away and looked at the people walking on the street. Xu Ruolan squatted beside her and said, "That child just didn't react because he was flattered. Don't be angry again."

Xu Ruolan really has a very smart mind. With just a quick glance, one can guess 70% to 80% of her thoughts. As for the remaining 23% of her thoughts, they are all about the bowl of ice cream in Xie Wuyang's hand. No matter how good the food is, it should be taken out for people to see.