tonic
"Miss...Miss, wait for me!"
After finally catching up with Zhao Mingyan, who had stormed out of Mingyuezhai, Xiaozhu quickly grabbed her and advised earnestly, "You've finally come back, why are you being so angry with Madam? Madam is worried too. If you still can't get pregnant, others will only think it's your fault and will never blame your son-in-law, even if they know he's in poor health."
Zhao Mingyan slowed down her pace, and the anger in her heart gradually dissipated with the bustling crowd and the lanterns passing overhead, but her mother's words just now still lingered in her mind, making her feel suffocated.
Just as Xiaozhu said, she finally got the chance to go out and visit the shop, and she also shared her joy with her mother, but her mother only cared about whether she was pregnant or not, and blamed her for not showing up in public. After all, she was married to another man and was no longer the daughter of Mingyuezhai.
"Why am I not the daughter of Mingyuezhai? My last name is Zhao! And I'm the heir of Mingyuezhai!"
Zhao Mingyan couldn't help but complain out loud, and her peach-like face turned red, as if it was ripe.
Xiaozhu saw it but didn't know how to comfort her. She felt that the young lady was right and the lady was right too, it was just that they had different views and could not understand each other.
"My second cousin and his men must have come and whispered a lot of rumors into my mother's ears while I was away!" Zhao Mingyan said angrily again.
"Miss...eh?"
Xiao Zhu was just about to drag her to a street vendor to buy some snacks to cool down when she saw a familiar figure and asked, "Miss, is that the Second Master?"
"Hmm?"
Zhao Mingyan immediately looked in the direction she pointed, then waved and shouted, "Uncle!"
Hearing her voice, the other party was obviously stunned for a moment, then turned around reluctantly, "Yan'er?"
After seeing clearly that it was Zhao Mingyan, Tan Mozhu immediately winked at A Tong beside him, and then quickly walked towards Zhao Mingyan.
A Tong retreated quickly and soon disappeared into the crowd.
Neither Zhao Mingyan nor Xiaozhu noticed him. They stepped forward and bowed to Tan Mozhu.
"Uncle."
"Second Master."
Tan Mozhu smiled warmly, "Yan'er, are you back to visit your mother?"
"It's not that I came back on purpose. After I came out of the Chastity Hall, I saw that it was still early, so I asked Master Gu to drop me off." Zhao Mingyan said cautiously.
"Oh! Brother Gu is now settled here."
Tan Mozhu nodded and smiled, "Since it's still early, why don't you go to a nearby teahouse and then take my carriage back."
"Are you here to do business, uncle?" Zhao Mingyan asked curiously.
One is Tan Linshuang and the other is Tan Mozhu. They are not involved in the affairs of the company, but they seem to be busy all day long. However, Tan Linshuang stays in the study to review and prepare for the exam, while Tan Mozhu runs out every few days. No one knows what they are busy with.
Tan Mozhu led her and Xiaozhu towards a nearby teahouse, saying with a smile, "I'm a lazy guy, how can I have any serious work to do? If I'm not wandering around, I'm making friends."
He was quite open about his idleness, which made Zhao Mingyan feel at ease.
On second thought, wasn't he helping the Tan family expand their network by making friends? Moreover, he had a close relationship with the prefect, and this couldn't be achieved by just one or two drinks.
Zhao Mingyan laughed, "Uncle is being modest."
"My uncle has many good friends. I wonder if there are any Jinhu people you know?"
Zhao Mingyan suddenly thought that Tan Mozhu could even make friends with the prefect, so if he wanted to make friends with a mere Jinhu, would he be stumped?
Tan Mozhu naturally understood her implication. He took her and Xiaozhu into a teahouse and sat them down before saying, "Since you have taken over the weaving room of Zhenjietang in your aunt's place, you should really make friends with some brocade dealers and sell your Shu brocade through them, rather than going to Jinguanyi to sell it to merchants from other places yourself."
This is exactly what Zhao Mingyan meant.
Although she had previously vowed to Aunt Zhuang and the others that she would open their own Shu brocade shop in Jinguanyi sooner or later, it was not easy to open a shop in Jinguanyi. It would be better to first reach a cooperation with one or two brocade merchants, sell Shu brocade to them, and then consider opening a shop after accumulating a certain amount of funds.
She guessed that this was probably what was done when Mrs. Gu was still alive, so the business went smoothly and secretly, and was not discovered by the Tan family in time.
Tan Mozhu said, "My friends are quite diverse. I do know one or two people in Jinhu, but we're not close friends, just acquaintances. Next time we meet, I'll help you find out what they're saying."
"You know, your aunt's previous behavior angered many brocade dealers. I'm sure they will be resistant to the Shu brocade produced by the Chastity Hall."
"I understand, I understand."
Zhao Mingyan nodded, "But it's never too late to mend the fence after the sheep have been lost."
"Well said!"
Tan Mozhu clapped his hands, picked up the teacup filled with tea by Xiaozhu, took a sip, and turned to the storyteller who was telling the story of "Romance of the Three Kingdoms".
"But Kong Ming returned to the ship and said to Lu Su, 'Each ship has about five or six thousand arrows. Without spending a fraction of the effort of the Jiangdong people, we have already obtained over a hundred thousand arrows. Tomorrow we will attack Cao's army, but it will be very inconvenient!'"
Hearing this, he took out a small porcelain bottle from his arms and handed it to Zhao Mingyan, "Yan'er, this is a tonic I often take. It can help with sex."
Zhao Mingyan was stunned and her face turned red.
Xiaozhu, who was serving by the side, was so embarrassed that she dared not look up, and her hands were twisted together under her sleeves.
Tan Mozhu smiled calmly, "I know my nephew well. Not only is he weak, but he's also boring."
"You're newlyweds now, and your relationship is still strong. If you don't seize the opportunity, it will be even harder to conceive next year or the year after..."
He spoke sincerely, but he didn't understand the real situation.
Zhao Mingyan sneered in her heart: What do you mean by strong feelings? It’s obvious that they are only 70% familiar with each other.
but……
Looking at this white porcelain bottle, which contained something unknown, Zhao Mingyan felt unsure.
Tan Mozhu saw her concerns, pulled out the cork, and poured a black pill not much bigger than a booger into his teacup. Soon, the pill was dissolved in the tea, and the black color quickly turned into the color of the tea, leaving no trace of its existence.
"What kind of pill is this?" Zhao Mingyan was surprised.
Xiaozhu also blinked curiously.
Tan Mozhu smiled mysteriously, "Rejuvenation Pills."
"What medicines does it contain?" Zhao Mingyan asked again.
Tan Mozhu counted on his fingers and said, "Morinda officinalis, Actinolite, Cuscuta australis... are all used to strengthen yang and will not harm the body. Of course, one pill at a time, once a day is enough. Eating too much will harm your body."
After saying that, he picked up the teacup and drank it all in one gulp.
Seeing that he felt refreshed after drinking, Zhao Mingyan hesitantly put away the small porcelain bottle.
Tan Linshuang suffers from depression, accompanied by cough and qi deficiency. It should be okay for her to take this aphrodisiac and yang-strengthening drug, right?
During dinner, before starting to eat, Zhao Mingyan reported to Fan Wenlan about the handover at the Chastity Hall today.
She omitted most of the details, saying only that although the chaste women had some resistance, they eventually accepted her, and emphasized, "In the future, I will use my uncle's connections to get to know some brocade dealers and sell them the Shu brocade produced by the Chastity Hall."
"oh?"
Fan Wenlan immediately looked at Tan Mozhu.
Tan Linshuang looked at Zhao Mingyan calmly.
Tan Mozhu smiled casually, but what he said was thought-provoking.
"Yan'er is not Ah Xiang. I will do my best."
Tan Linshuang narrowed her eyes slightly.
Noticing Tan Linshuang's inquiring eyes, and thinking of the small porcelain bottle still in his arms, Zhao Mingyan couldn't help feeling guilty and subconsciously turned away to look at his face.
After the meal, she hurried away with Xiaozhu and went to the back garden for a walk to digest her food.
"Miss, why are you hiding from your son-in-law?" Xiaozhu was puzzled.
Zhao Mingyan frowned, unable to explain herself clearly.
"Um?"
Suddenly, she heard a burst of laughter coming from the rockery not far away, so she looked in the direction of the sound and vaguely saw the figure of Tan Mozhu.
"Second Master...Second Master, you can't do that. We're outside!"
Then, another woman's panicked shouting was heard.
"Isn't this Sister Azhu?" Xiaozhu recognized the other person's voice.
Zhao Mingyan widened her eyes. Wasn’t Ah Zhu the second-class maid in her grandmother’s room?
"Ah... Second Master, please be gentle... Hmm..."
Just when Zhao Mingyan and Xiaozhu were still in shock, Ah Zhu's resistance turned into wanting to speak but not speaking, which made them blush.
"Hey! Miss, I think the medicine that the second master gave works very quickly." Xiaozhu said blushingly, rubbing her nose.
Zhao Mingyan's face turned even redder, with a mixture of shyness and an irrepressible surge of passion.
Then, she took Xiaozhu away from this place of secret love and returned to the north yard.
"Thank you for your hard work today, my lady."
As soon as he returned to the house, Tan Linshuang, who was supposed to stay in the study, suddenly came in. Zhao Mingyan pretended to be calm and asked Xiaozhu to undress. Xiaozhu took the small porcelain bottle, quickly poured out a pill, and dissolved it in the tea that Tan Linshuang had just brewed.
Zhao Mingyan glanced at him and replied calmly, "It was quite hard, and I got a bit of a blow."
"Did the chaste women give you a hard time?" Tan Linshuang asked with concern.
Zhao Mingyan then told Tan Linshuang what they had omitted at the dinner table, and added, "That Hall Master Gu also said that if I were to become a widow, he would personally build a chastity archway for me."
"Next time I see him, I must thank him properly." Tan Linshuang smiled.
Zhao Mingyan chuckled.
"What else?" Tan Linshuang asked.
His eyes suddenly became sharp, "It seems that my wife came back in my uncle's carriage."
Zhao Mingyan scratched his cheek and said truthfully, "I went to Mingyuezhai and ran into my uncle when I came out. We even sat in the teahouse for a while."
"Oh...what a coincidence!"
Tan Linshuang's eyes flashed, she turned around, took the teacup handed to her by Xiaozhu, and took two sips.
"What did you talk about?"
Zhao Mingyan also told the truth.
"Tonic? What tonic?" Tan Linshuang's pupils shrank.
Zhao Mingyan pointed at the teacup in his hand and said, "This is the tonic you are drinking now."
Tan Linshuang paused while drinking tea, lowered her eyes to look at the tea in the teacup, and did not find anything unusual.
Zhao Mingyan rubbed his hands and said, "The medicine will dissolve in water."
Tan Linshuang's pupils suddenly dilated, and she spat out the tea that she had not yet swallowed. She then threw the teacup to the ground with force. With a "pop" sound, fragments flew everywhere, and the tea flowed all over the floor.
Zhao Mingyan and Xiaozhu were both stunned.
"Blood?"
Xiaozhu, who was about to bend down to clean up the mess, suddenly saw a drop of blood falling from above. She looked up suddenly, her face pale, "Uncle...Uncle is vomiting blood!"
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