Wei Nanxun couldn’t explain how those marks came about, so she could only blush and say they were insect bites. When she saw the replaced clothes and belt, she remembered something she had overlooked.
Even if these clothes were similar to hers, they weren’t her own. Her belt and undergarments were still in the palace.
Those weren’t ordinary clothes, but personal items. Her undergarments had orchids embroidered in the corner, along with the character “Xun,” unique to her.
It would be fine if they were burned or discarded, but if they were kept… she would be doomed.
Seeing Zhi Xia pick up the clothes from the ground, intending to take them out for the maids to wash, she quickly snatched them away, “These clothes are unlucky, don’t wash them. I’ll take them to burn later.”
The maids who served her would definitely recognize her clothes, and she couldn’t let them discover the difference.
She hastily rolled up the clothes, but felt a raised, hard object. Not wanting to be discovered, she secretly hid it in her sleeve.
Zhi Xia was simple-minded and thought everything her lady said was right, not noticing her little actions. She even asked if she wanted to step over a fire basin to ward off bad luck. Wei Nanxun forced a dry laugh and brushed it off.
If only everyone in the world were as easy to fool as Zhi Xia!
She didn’t have the habit of having someone keep watch at night. Once Zhi Xia closed the door and left, she took out the object from her sleeve.
It was a jade pendant with a smooth, lustrous surface and excellent quality. It didn’t have intricate carvings, but was engraved with a simple character “Ji” (寂), which seemed lonely and solitary.
She didn’t know the name of that young master, nor was she sure if it belonged to the Princess Royal’s residence. After thinking it over, she couldn’t bear to throw the jade pendant away, especially since the Princess Royal was leaving the capital soon, and she wouldn’t see her benefactor again.
Let it be her way of expressing gratitude and respect to her benefactor.
Thinking this, she took out the brocade box from under the bed, which contained things her mother had left her before her death: property deeds, land deeds, several shops, and a lot of silver notes.
Her mother had said to keep them safe, so they could be used for her dowry and her younger brother’s wedding in the future. She also told her never to give them to her father, and not to let her grandmother or anyone else know.
She was young then and didn’t understand her mother’s difficulties.
She grew up in the Wei family, and although she was a concubine’s daughter from the second branch, her father could earn money, and her mother’s family were merchants. Her maternal grandparents were generous to her, always giving her money whenever they met. She never remembered lacking money.
She was even very happy as a child. Her father doted on her, her mother was gentle, and her grandmother was strict but they didn’t meet often.
Until her mother had a difficult childbirth and fell ill, passing away a few years later. Her father started drinking every day, and his business was neglected.
Her grandmother was furious, blaming her mother for burdening her father, and even refusing to allow her mother’s remains to be buried in the Wei family’s ancestral grave. To resolve this, her father had to pull himself together.
After that, she and her younger brother were increasingly disliked by the elders in the family. Her maternal grandparents came to look for them, but were stopped by Wang Shi. Over time, she and her maternal family rarely interacted. She and her brother were like they had been abandoned by everyone.
It was then that Wei Mingzhao took the initiative to find her. Whether it was seeing guests or going out to play, she would think of her. That’s why she regarded Wei Mingzhao as her best older sister, and would give her anything rare and good that her father brought back from his travels.
Even when she got married, she felt that she couldn’t bring these things to the Eastern Palace, so she left them all to her younger brother, and in the end they all ended up in Wang Shi’s pocket.
Looking back now, Wei Mingzhao might have been particularly nice to her just because of these things, while also gaining a good reputation for treating her half-sister well.
She looked through the shops and land deeds, and found that many were prime locations in the capital. Next, she had to understand the family property in her hands and plan well for her future.
Wei Nanxun was a woman of action, and once she made up her mind, she didn’t hesitate to act.
The next day, she found Steward Qiu, who her father had left in the mansion. He was someone her father had saved when he was doing business in the west in his early years, and was extremely loyal and capable.
Originally, he was intended to manage the shops in the capital, but Wang Shi rejected him on the grounds that he wasn’t a house slave of the Wei family and had no experience. Now, he was temporarily managing a restaurant and matters on the estate.
When she was young, her mother had taught her how to calculate and manage accounts, but later she was disliked by her grandmother for being unpresentable. After her mother passed away, she gradually put it aside, but how could she forget what she had learned?
Her father habitually backed up every account and put it in the study. Wei Nanxun had seen it last night, and among the annual profits and losses of the businesses in the capital, Steward Qiu’s restaurant earned the most.
Using the excuse of buying gifts for her maternal grandparents, she summoned him and asked him in detail what kind of business was most suitable to do in the capital now.
Steward Qiu was taken aback at first, thinking that the young lady was just acting on a whim, but he still answered seriously.
“The most profitable businesses are naturally those related to food, clothing, and daily necessities, with teahouses and restaurants being the best, followed by cloth shops and jewelry stores, and the worst being stationery and painting shops.”
He had hit the nail on the head. Why was it that among so many shops in the mansion, the ones under his management were the most profitable, while the others were basically losing money? It was all because Wang Shi cared about face and wanted the Wei family’s shops to be elegant and presentable, such as musical instrument shops and painting shops. Little did she know that without decades of history, no foundation, and no reputation, no one would patronize these shops.
“Uncle Qiu, I invited you here today because I want you to help me revive these shops.”
As she spoke, she handed over several shop deeds. These shops were part of her mother’s dowry, and had previously been rented out to others. Seeing that the lease was about to expire, she didn’t plan to continue renting them out, but wanted to open them herself.
“This? Miss, this is not a joke. Besides, how can an unmarried young lady like you open a shop and do business? This is absolutely impossible.”
“As long as I don’t show my face, and you don’t show your face, hire a few trustworthy shopkeepers and do it one by one. I don’t expect to have much income in a year, I just want to revitalize these shops.”
“But, this, this is not okay either.”
Wei Nanxun stood up and solemnly bent her knees: “Uncle Qiu, you know the situation in the mansion better than I do. My father travels all over the world to support this family, but how do they treat my father and our siblings? My father has worked so hard for so many years to accumulate this family fortune, but he hasn’t saved any of it for himself. My father is getting old, and in a few years he won’t be able to run around anymore and will be useless. Do you think my aunt will be willing to give him much family property then? I don’t want to see my father’s hard work and sincerity trampled on.”
Steward Qiu was naturally loyal to Master Wei, and he had always felt that Master Wei’s efforts over the years were not worth it, but he had tried to persuade him many times without success, so he gave up and only planned to manage his own affairs.
Never thought that one day he would hear such awareness from the young lady.
“Miss, let me consider it.”
“I believe in Uncle Qiu, and don’t put too much pressure on yourself. Just treat it as managing my dowry in advance.”
Steward Qiu thought for two days, and finally agreed. The young lady was right about one thing, he must not let Master Wei’s hard work be ruined by these ingrates again, and he must prevent future troubles.
Since he agreed, it couldn’t be just a game. He reported everything to the young lady, from discussing what kind of shop to open, choosing shopkeepers, how to repair and rebuild, and how to operate.
What he didn’t expect was that the young lady listened very carefully, wrote down everything he said, asked questions if she didn’t understand, and didn’t perfunctorily deal with it at all. She sincerely wanted to open a shop.
This also made Steward Qiu more motivated. In just one month, he had transformed one of the shops into a pastry shop, which was about to reopen next month.
“Uncle Qiu, this is our first shop. I want to go and see it in person tomorrow on opening day.”
Steward Qiu: …?
That’s not what you said at the beginning, didn’t you say you wouldn’t show your face?!