Xu Sangluo squatted down and carried the things from the basket into the room.
This time, she hadn’t bought many ingredients, so that the Qin family wouldn’t feel too burdened.
Most of what she bought were her own things, along with a little food.
In the courtyard, several girls were holding peach crisp pastries, carefully sniffing them but reluctant to eat them.
They occasionally stole glances toward Xu Sangluo’s room.
The girl who had spoken earlier leaned toward Qin Zhiyu and whispered, “Xiaoyu, your sister-in-law is really beautiful. I’ve never seen anyone that pretty before.”
“Yeah, yeah! And she’s so friendly. She doesn’t seem like a city person at all.”
“How is she not? She clearly looks like one—she’s so fair.”
“That’s not what I mean. I mean she’s easy to approach. She doesn’t have that attitude of looking down on people with her chin raised.”
“Oh, right! I remember when a teacher from the county came for a home visit. She wouldn’t even step inside the house and looked disgusted the whole time. She spoke so rudely—and she wasn’t even as pretty as your sister-in-law.”
“And your sister-in-law is really skillful with her hands.”
“Exactly!”
Qin Zhiyu bit into her peach crisp, lifting her chin proudly.
“Of course! My Sister Sangluo is amazing. She even got admitted to—”
At that moment, Qin Zhiyu abruptly stopped herself.
She had almost let her pride run away with her.
Her big brother had specifically told her not to casually mention that Sister Sangluo had been admitted to university.
Mainly because it might lead people to ask about the trafficking incident.
Although Sister Sangluo had been rescued halfway, many commune members loved gossiping. They wouldn’t care whether she had actually been sold or not.
If the story spread, it would surely invite all kinds of rumors.
Unless one day Sister Sangluo chose to talk about it herself.
In any case, they absolutely couldn’t cause trouble for her.
“Admitted to what?” her friends asked, waiting for her to finish, only to see her stop mid-sentence.
Qin Zhiyu quickly recovered.
“I mean Sister Sangluo could live very well even just relying on herself.”
“That’s true!” the girls nodded in agreement.
They had already heard from Qin Zhiyu that she cooked incredibly delicious food, could treat leg injuries, and could braid such beautiful hairstyles.
Speaking of braids, one girl couldn’t help but whisper, “Xiaoyu, could you ask your sister-in-law to teach us how to braid your hairstyle?”
It was just too pretty.
They had never realized Qin Zhiyu could look this beautiful.
She seemed to be glowing—completely different from her usual self.
Qin Zhiyu frowned slightly and glanced toward the room.
“I’ll ask Sister Sangluo later if she can teach me. If I learn it, I’ll teach you.”
“Okay!” everyone said excitedly.
Qin Zhiyu curled her lips. “Don’t get too excited yet. I can’t promise anything. Skills like that are valuable. Even if Sister Sangluo doesn’t agree, that’s normal. And if she does agree, you can’t learn it for free. Even masters in the city charge tuition when they teach apprentices.”
The girls didn’t mind at all and nodded eagerly.
“Of course! Of course! We definitely won’t learn for free. But… I don’t really have anything valuable. I don’t know what your sister-in-law might like.”
“You’ll have to figure that out yourselves,” Qin Zhiyu replied. “But you’ll still need to wait for my news first.”
“Mm-hmm, we know.”
The group of girls continued chatting quietly among themselves.
After little Qin Yan delivered the peach crisp to his grandma, he ran back and leaned against Xu Sangluo’s door, watching her work.
His little eyes darted around curiously.
The room was really too small, so Xu Sangluo could only place the things on the bed first.
When Qin Zhiyu came in, she saw the bed covered with scraps of cloth.
Xu Sangluo was sitting at the edge of the bed, sorting through the scraps—throwing some back into a bag and tossing others onto the other side of the bed.
Little Qin Yan was sitting in that pile of cloth scraps, happily playing.
“Sister Sangluo, do you need help?” Qin Zhiyu asked. “I know how to make quilts.”
Although Xu Sangluo hadn’t said it outright, bringing back scraps of cloth usually meant making quilts or pillows—there was no other use for them.
So Qin Zhiyu naturally assumed that Xu Sangluo planned to make a quilt.
Xu Sangluo looked up. “Where are your friends?”
“They already went home.”
Xu Sangluo nodded. “Perfect. Come help me pick out some good-looking cloth scraps.”
Qin Zhiyu carefully stepped around the things scattered on the floor and walked inside, puzzled.
“Sister Sangluo, why do we need to pick the scraps? Aren’t they all the same if they’re just sewn inside a quilt?”
Xu Sangluo chuckled softly and handed her something.
“What do you think of this?”
Qin Zhiyu took it, and her eyes immediately lit up.
It was a hair tie.
A black nylon band decorated with a blue-and-white bow, shaped a bit like little bunny ears. It looked very pretty.
Qin Zhiyu fell in love with it at first glance.
“Sister Sangluo, you bought another hair tie? It’s so pretty—it suits you so well.”
Xu Sangluo smiled. “Don’t you think the bow on it looks a bit like these cloth scraps?”
“Huh?” Qin Zhiyu froze, turning her head to look at the messy pile of cloth scraps, then back at the beautiful hair tie.
How could they look alike? Even though both were made of cloth, the hair tie looked so delicate.
Xu Sangluo said, “I made this just now using a strip of scrap cloth.”
Hearing that, Qin Zhiyu’s eyes widened instantly.
“W-what? Just now? Made from scraps? This one?”
She held up the pretty hair tie in disbelief.
The hair tie was so delicate and neat that there wasn’t even the slightest rough edge visible.
“Yes.” Xu Sangluo casually picked up two irregular pieces of leftover cloth.
No one knew exactly how she did it—her fingers simply moved deftly in a quick twist.
In the blink of an eye, another hair tie appeared. It had a different style, but it was just as pretty.
This time Qin Zhiyu had seen the whole process with her own eyes, and she was momentarily stunned.
Xu Sangluo handed the new hair tie to her and smiled.
“Xiaoyu, do you think girls would like this kind of hair tie?”
Qin Zhiyu didn’t even need to think before blurting out an answer.
“Of course they would! It’s so pretty. I’ve never seen hair ties this nice before.”
It wasn’t exactly that the hair tie was extraordinarily beautiful.
But Xu Sangluo had a good eye for design and nimble hands. In her previous life, she had seen plenty of similar accessories.
So these hair ties had the advantage of novelty and clever color combinations, making them instantly eye-catching.
She continued, “Then do you think we could sell them if we took them to the market?”
Qin Zhiyu opened her mouth, but this time she didn’t answer so quickly.
Everyone would definitely like them—but whether they could afford them was another matter.
Hair ties this pretty surely wouldn’t be cheap.
Wait!
She suddenly realized what Xu Sangluo had meant.
Looking at her in surprise, she asked, “Sister Sangluo, you want to make these hair ties to sell?”
Xu Sangluo smiled lightly. “We will.”
Qin Zhiyu froze again, then finally understood, immediately becoming a little flustered.
“W-we?”
“Yes. I do want to make some small accessories to sell. But once something like this becomes popular in the market, others will imitate it immediately. That means we need to sell as much as possible in the shortest time. In other words, we’ll need to make a lot of them quickly.”
She spread her hands.
“I definitely can’t make that many by myself. Otherwise we’d just be letting others profit from it. So I was thinking we could make them together, then take them to town or the county to sell. When we earn money, we’ll split it half and half.”
Qin Zhiyu unconsciously tightened her grip on the hair tie in her hand.
“H-how can that be? Th-that won’t work.”