On her way back, Xiao Qingyin looked out the window while pondering the matter of Zhilan Pavilion.
I happened to see the old lady who had come to buy the "Golden Jade Hall" item standing in a small alley by the roadside chatting with another old lady.
She thought for a moment and then asked the driver to stop the car.
After getting off the bus, she slowly walked into the alley.
The conversation between the two elderly women reached my ears.
"You didn't manage to buy it? That's such a pity. I just received news that the price of 'Golden Jade Hall' has risen to six hundred taels per bundle."
"Six hundred taels!"
The old lady slapped her thigh.
"I was just half an hour away from earning a hundred taels!"
"Go check again tomorrow, but the price might go up again tomorrow."
"I managed to scrape together five hundred taels of silver, where am I supposed to find the money?"
Another old lady lowered her voice: "You can borrow money from Lai Da, but he'll charge five percent interest."
Five points!
The old lady glared.
"Why doesn't he just rob it!"
“Hey, if you borrow a hundred taels, the interest rate is five percent, which is fifty taels. Wait until the price of Jin Yu Man Tang rises to eight or nine hundred taels before you sell it. You will still make a profit.”
"Let me think about it some more."
As the old lady hesitated, Xiao Qingyin walked up to them and smiled, "Hello, ladies. I just heard you talking about 'Golden Jade Abundance' and something like that. It seems like it can make money. Could you tell me about it?"
The two elderly women turned to look at her simultaneously, both staring at her warily.
Xiao Qingyin took out a silver ingot: "I won't take advantage of you for nothing, this silver is for you."
This is a ten-tael silver ingot.
The two elderly ladies were astonished by her extravagant gesture.
It's just common knowledge in the neighborhood anyway, so there's no harm in telling this girl.
They all nodded in unison: "Okay!"
Then Xiao Qingyin heard a story that was completely different from the one told by Ruan Lanruo.
Ruan Lanruo said that the price of tea was driven up by big players, and Zhilanxuan had no choice but to raise the price.
The two elderly ladies said, "Zhilanxuan will repurchase tea. At first, it would repurchase once a month, but later, as more people bought it, it would repurchase once every three months."
"Does the buyback mean buying it back at the current price?"
"Yes, of course you can resell it to someone else. That way you can make money without waiting three months. Anyway, the price of Zhilanxuan tea is rising every day. There are plenty of people who want to buy it, so you don't have to worry about losing money."
Xiao Qingyin's heart sank.
She remembered seeing the financial tea in the news in her past life.
"Tea is not easy to preserve. What if it gets damp and moldy? Will Zhilanxuan still want it?"
The two elderly ladies smiled at each other.
"After you buy the tea, Zhilanxuan will give you a delivery slip, which you can use to pick up the tea at any time. Many people just hold onto the delivery slip and don't pick it up, so you don't have to worry about the tea spoiling."
Xiao Qingyin: "..."
This is a case of getting something for nothing.
No wonder Zhilanxuan branches were able to open so quickly throughout Daxi.
"That way you don't have to worry about anything going wrong with the tea, but—aren't you worried that they'll run away with it?"
"What's there to worry about? The manager of Zhilan Pavilion is Princess Ping, who used to be the Crown Princess. She has a very wealthy family and spends a lot of money on charity every year. She wouldn't cheat us out of this little bit of money."
Xiao Qingyin: "..."
Do you know how much money "this little bit of silver" is?
At 500 taels per person, 100 people would be 50,000 taels, 10,000 people would be 5 million taels, and 100,000 people would be 50 million taels.
Even the national treasury doesn't have that much silver.
Yi Shuihan was extravagant; no amount of money could sustain his infrastructure projects.
However, she now understood why Ruan Lanruo was so enthusiastic about doing good deeds.
A prominent status coupled with a kind and helpful nature can easily deceive the people.
Does Ruan Lanruo know what she is doing?
I definitely know.
She simply didn't know.
She sighed.
"Grandmas, it's never as reassuring to put eggs in someone else's basket as it is to put them in your own. If you borrow a hen to lay eggs, and the hen flies away, it will be difficult to return it."
If everyone goes to Zhilanxuan to buy tea, where will Zhilanxuan get so much money to buy back tea?
What will happen to the delivery slips you have if they don't have the money to buy them back?
Even if the order can still be fulfilled, do you think anyone would buy your tea at a price higher than the purchase price?
The two elderly women looked at each other in bewilderment.
"If I buy now, Zhilanxuan should still have enough money to buy it back, right? Many people who want to buy haven't raised enough money yet."
Xiao Qingyin retorted, "Can you guarantee that Zhilan Pavilion will have money in its accounts in three months? Even if Manager Ruan doesn't abscond with the money, what if the silver is stolen?"
The two elderly women fell silent.
Thinking about it carefully, the risk is really too great.
It was borrowed money to begin with, what if it all goes down the drain...
They shivered.
They certainly won't survive.
After giving them her advice, Xiao Qingyin left.
She needed to inform Yi Shuihan as soon as possible to keep an eye on Ruan Lanruo and the managers of each branch of Zhilanxuan to prevent them from running away.
After listening to her analysis, Yi Shuihan immediately ordered people to take control of Ruan Lanruo and the others, and began to investigate the accounts of Zhilanxuan.
The ledgers are incomplete; most of them cannot be found.
But even this small portion of the statistics we found is alarming.
—In the past month alone, all of Zhilanxuan's branches have sold a total of 30,000 bundles of tea.
There wasn't much cash in the shop.
Zhilanxuan had no spare money in the accounts it opened at various banks.
Ruan Lanruo refused to reveal where the money went.
“We, Zhilanxuan, conduct business honestly and without violating any laws. You have no right to search Zhilanxuan’s property, nor do you have the right to restrict my personal freedom.”
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