Song Liyun hasn't even sorted out the industries in Suijin Town yet, and she hastily took over the hot potato that is Tianxianglou.
Moreover, having no experience managing a restaurant, he immediately felt overwhelmed.
However, there are also advantages to managing Tianxianglou first.
The shops in Broken Gold Town won't be renovated until after the autumn harvest. Since I'm idle now anyway, and I can't really stay home and learn embroidery, I might as well get to work.
Tianxianglou has everything you need. As soon as the store opens, business can start. And since I'm just the manager, I can learn from the experience.
So, Song Liyun prepared to start a commuting life that started at night and ended at night, riding a horse from Suijin Town to Qili County to manage her business, and then returning home in the evening.
The garrison is now well-staffed, and Tianxianglou is a business of the garrison, so Commander Luo told Song Liyun to select some men from the garrison and bring them along.
Song Liyun is constantly traveling back and forth, and her family needs protection. She can't keep Han Ming with her every day, so she directly appointed Zhou Xiaoqi and Lin Xiaoqi.
Zhou Xiang and Lin Tao were junior officers in the army, each leading a squad of ten men.
These two were the earliest to be associated with the Song family, and they were honest and kind, so Song Liyun felt they were trustworthy.
Zhou Xiang and Lin Tao were overjoyed to hear that they were to be assigned to work for Song Liyun.
Although the garrison is gradually being filled with manpower, the two who stay may be promoted to captains, and their ten-man squads will become fifty men. In addition to the reward for meritorious service, their regular pay will also increase from three hundred to five hundred coins.
When you're young and have no other options, joining the army is the only way out.
Now they are in their late twenties, and after ten years in the military, they have more to consider. It's no longer the time when they were carefree and only had one person to feed.
Getting married, having children, and supporting parents all require money.
Song Liyun is good at making money; by associating with her, you can save up some money early on.
The two had already discussed it and decided that once the weather turned cooler and the autumn harvest was over, they would bring their wife and children to stay with them for a while.
If all conditions are good, they might as well become military households and stay, so they can enjoy the life of having a wife and children and a warm bed.
Luo Baihu allocated ten slots to Song Liyun. Since they needed to take turns on duty, Zhou Xianglin and Tao each led four people to form two teams, one team going out and the other staying behind. In this way, the Song family could be protected in an orderly manner both inside and outside.
After being closed for more than three months, Tianxianglou has finally started to reopen.
When the constables tore off the seal on the shop door and unlocked the dusty lock, passersby on the street stopped to watch. In an instant, the crowd surged, packed three or four layers deep, and even passing carriages had to detour.
Those idlers who were in charge of running errands and gathering all sorts of information quickly spread the news of Tianxianglou's change of ownership to the ears of various wealthy patrons.
Suddenly, undercurrents began to stir in some places.
When Song Liyun led Zhou Xiang and his group to Tianxianglou, they opened the door to find a completely different scene.
The building had been sealed for quite some time, and was already covered in dust. The tables, chairs, and benches were scattered haphazardly on the ground because of the rude behavior of the officials who came to seal it up.
The grains, oils, rice, and flour in the kitchen had long been moved away, and many good pots, pans, and bowls were also lost.
The calligraphy and paintings on the wall are missing, and the decorative curtains are dirty. To repair them and restore them to their original state, it would cost at least a thousand taels of silver.
Song Liyun's brows furrowed into a knot. She looked around inside and said angrily, "I'm just a shopkeeper, not a scapegoat. Let whoever wants to clean up this mess take care of it."
She couldn't possibly spend money to cover these losses; besides, she currently had less than three hundred taels of silver in savings, so she couldn't possibly make up for it even if she wanted to.
Not to mention the garrison, Commander Luo and Military Supply Officer Wang were eagerly waiting for her to hand over the silver.
As the Shattered Gold Guards upgraded, their numbers increased from over a hundred to a full strength of five hundred.
With a large number of people, expenses are also high. Even though the Broken Gold Guard has been doing better in recent months, the Northern Garrison's pay has been consistently delayed, and the newly arrived brothers are still in debt.
If Commander Luo wanted to win people's hearts, he would give them money immediately!
"Let's go to the county government office and see what Magistrate Jiang has to say!"
What do you want to do?
Despite being off work today, Jiang Fengren still met with Song Liyun. He listened to Song Liyun complain that Tianxianglou had been ruined and was now just an empty shell, but he remained unmoved.
"What can I do? My lord, you said it in court: Tianxiang Tower is now owned by the military camp, and I'm to manage it..."
Seeing Jiang Feng's nonchalant demeanor, Song Liyun felt deceived, and her anger simmered even more.
Jiang Feng had no time to listen to her any further and served her tea, saying, "Miss Song, you've taken over a mess like this. How well you manage to do it is up to you."
Don't forget, for a woman from a military household to be able to take over a restaurant is your good fortune.
Managing a restaurant requires real skill; you can't achieve it by throwing tantrums and acting tough as you usually do.
Song Liyun was speechless with anger.
Having said that, she didn't leave, her eyes constantly glancing towards the back room.
Jiang Feng had already taken a sip of tea when the dark-faced servant stepped forward to shoo him away. Helpless, Song Liyun left the county government office carrying only a mahogany box.
Jiang Feng frowned as he watched Song Liyun leave indignantly: The Third Young Master said he would give her three years and that this woman could accomplish great things... She can't even handle this little thing, what can she do, fight with knives?
And... what is she still looking for here? Is she looking for the Third Young Master?
The Third Young Master should be heading to the Northern Army Commandery in Hecheng Town, as Qing'an Prefecture is already unable to hold out.
With chaos erupting on the border, the Marquis of Zhenbei has an opportunity, and so does the Crown Prince.
Once outside the county government office, Song Liyun remained calm: "Since everyone wants to back down, that makes things easier."
If you have money, you can do what you want; if you don't have money, you can do what you want.
When she returned to Tianxianglou, the crowd outside had dispersed, but there were still seventeen or eighteen men, women, and children standing inside, with the tables and chairs still overturned around them.
Upon seeing Song Liyun return, the soldiers who had stayed behind at the shop stepped forward and reported, "Miss Song, these are all former employees and kitchen staff of Tianxiang Restaurant. They have come to reclaim their contracts."
The dozen or so people swarmed over, their faces filled with anxiety: "Now that the owner has changed, our contract with Tianxiang Restaurant is invalid."
"Yes, young lady, please return the contract to us."
It turns out that when Tianxianglou was under Hong Jingtian's control, everyone signed a ten-year contract, and the head chef was not allowed to change jobs for life.
Tianxianglou was renowned, and as soon as Hong Jingtian fell from grace, surrounding restaurants and eateries immediately came to poach him.
These chefs all sought other ways to make a living, but their contracts had already been seized by the government. Now that Tianxiang Restaurant had opened, they wanted to come back, cancel their contracts, and leave cleanly and decisively.
Song Liyun had no intention of keeping them; this is exactly the situation described in the saying "when the tree falls, the monkeys scatter."
They were just employees at Tianxianglou, each with their own goals, and they couldn't possibly just stay there and die.
However, the fact that these people had this attitude on their very first day back from Tianxianglou made her very unhappy.
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