“See this?
My salt is even better than what they sell at the supply and marketing cooperative.” The peddler began to boast, holding up his goods.
There was no refined salt back then, only coarse salt.
The only way to judge its quality was to see how white the grains were and how many impurities they contained.
Yuan Si didn’t know how to judge it; she couldn’t tell good from bad at all.
However, she could see that the salt grains weren’t very clean, though she didn’t know if salt from other places was the same.
Still, she couldn’t let him see her ignorance.
She picked up a few grains and studied them intently for a moment before nodding to show they were acceptable.
“If you’re trading for salt, how about I give you a *jin* and four-tenths?
What do you say?” the peddler asked, his mind already working on his own little scheme.
At the cooperative, coarse salt cost thirteen cents per *jin*.
A *jin* and four-tenths was worth 18.2 cents.
He saw that Yuan Si was just a little kid and assumed she couldn’t do the math, so he decided to try and pull a fast one on her.
But inwardly, Yuan Si wasn’t six years old, and of course, she could do the math.
“No.
You have to give me a *jin* and a half.”
“Hey now, kid, if I give you a *jin* and a half, I’ll be taking a huge loss!
You’d never get that much from anyone else.”
“Spare me the details.
Is it a deal or not?” Yuan Si couldn’t be bothered to listen to him drag things out.
Her bluntness left him speechless.
In the end, he figured he would still make a profit, and seeing that the little girl wasn’t joking, he dropped the act.
“Fine, fine!
A *jin* and a half it is.
I’ll consider it my way of making a new friend.
If you have anything else to trade in the future, just come find me.”
With that, he took out a small scale from his carrying pole and weighed out a *jin* and a half for Yuan Si.
“Take a look.
It’s piled high.”
Yuan Si glanced over.
‘Piled high, my foot.
The scale is barely level.’
Then, Yuan Si spotted something else good in his basket: toothpaste and a toothbrush.
She had wanted to buy these for a long time and had even mentioned it to the old lady.
But nothing had come of it.
It seemed unlikely the old lady would ever buy them for her, so she’d have to figure it out herself.
After asking the price, Yuan Si felt she had a long road ahead of her.
‘Trying to afford all my daily necessities just by making hair ties is going to be a long-term project.’
Back home, Yuan Si didn’t hold anything back.
She poured the entire *jin* and a half of coarse salt into an earthenware jar and added water to let it soak.
The coarse salt wasn’t good for cooking directly because of the impurities.
Some more particular families would process it after bringing it home.
They would dissolve the salt in water, filter out the impurities, and then dry the remaining saltwater under the sun.
This process yielded fine, powdered salt.
“How could you be so headstrong?
That was so much money, and you just went and traded it all for salt?” The old lady sounded heartbroken.
‘That little girl trading with a peddler all by herself…
he must have taken advantage of her being a child and short-changed her.
Just thinking about all that money makes my heart ache.’
Yuan Si was a bit dumbfounded.
‘So much money?
Wasn’t it just twenty-one cents?
That counts as “so much money”?’
“But we were out of salt.
And I don’t want to eat fish porridge anymore,” Yuan Si said pitifully.
Although Yuan Si had been able to eat her fill these past few days, her life had been nothing short of torture.
For the first several days, she’d eaten roasted fish porridge.
Because they had no salt and the porridge needed some salty flavor, the old lady had taken it upon herself to chop up their roasted fish and boil it into the gruel.
Later, when the roasted fish ran out, Yuan Si took out several more large, fresh fish.
The old lady promptly turned those into fish porridge as well.
She had been battling fish porridge for days on end and desperately needed a change of pace.
“You child, you’re spoiled rotten!
Doing whatever you please…
such a spendthrift.” The old lady muttered endlessly as she circled the jar.
But it was a done deal.
No amount of muttering would help; the salt was already dissolving in the water.
「Three days later」
The coarse salt in the jar had finally turned into fine salt powder.
While the old lady was out at work, Yuan Si secretly used a spice box from her ‘space’ to pack away some of the salt for her own future use.
When the old lady returned, she grumbled as she collected the salt powder, saying Yuan Si must have been cheated.
Otherwise, how could a *jin* and a half of salt yield so little?
Yuan Si suppressed a laugh and nodded emphatically beside her.
‘Yup, definitely cheated.’
That evening, ignoring the old lady’s objections, Yuan Si insisted on eating pure roasted fish—the kind with lots of salt sprinkled on it.
Of course, she couldn’t take out her barbecue grill.
She just built a small fire on the kitchen floor and started roasting.
This was the first time the old lady had truly witnessed how stubborn her little girl could be.
Once her mind was set, nothing could change it.
To get her roasted fish, the girl had even glared at her, looking as if she would throw a fit if her mother didn’t agree.
The old lady was furious.
‘Such disrespect!
There’s no sense of propriety anymore!’ But in the end, she just sulked as she watched her daughter happily roast the fish.
After all, what could she do?
It wasn’t as if a mother could just strike her child.
But when her little girl fed a piece of the savory, fragrant roasted fish into her mouth, her heart finally softened.
‘This girl…
aside from being a bit of a glutton, she’s actually quite good.
Ah, what more could I ask for?
A filial child is enough.’
After this bit of internal pep talk, the old lady looked at her daughter and once again saw nothing but perfection.
“Mom, is it good?”
The old lady smacked her lips.
“Hmph, of course it’s good.
Look at how much salt and firewood you wasted.
I’m telling you, this is a one-time thing.
If you’re this wasteful again, just you watch how I’ll deal with you.”
Yuan Si heard this but didn’t take it to heart.
‘Looks like the old lady still needs some more educating.’
“Mom, have you forgotten I have an Immortal Master?
Do you think I’ll ever be short of these things in the future?
You’re with me now, so just eat without worrying.
If we really run out of money, I’ll just ask my Master to send more fish.
We can always trade fish for firewood or salt, right?” This was an idea she had just recently come up with—fish could also be used as a universal currency here.
Indeed, the old lady had been so preoccupied with her daughter’s spendthrift ways that she had genuinely forgotten about the girl’s Immortal Master.
She pursed her lips but, in the end, said nothing.
Yuan Si pressed a whole roasted fish into the old lady’s hands and said in a worldly-wise tone, “You don’t have to worry about these things anymore.
From now on, just stick with me, and you’ll be living the good life.”
The old lady chuckled at her daughter’s precocious, adult-like manner.
“Oh, give me a break.
You’re barely knee-high and you’re already boasting.
You haven’t learned many skills, but you’ve sure got a way with words.
Who do you take after?”
“Hehe, Mom, didn’t you say I take after you?
That means we’re both going to be capable people in the future.” Yuan Si shamelessly flattered her mother to make her happy.
“Hmph, I don’t see it.
It looks to me like all your ‘capability’ is focused on eating.”
“And what’s wrong with that?
We can eat our fill and eat well now.
Isn’t that much better than other families?” Yuan Si knew her mother’s heart well and hit right on her sensitive spot.
The old lady had been competitive her whole life, always wanting to compare what she ate and wore with others.
Whatever other people had, her family had to have it too.
If others couldn’t eat their fill, the fact that her family could was a huge victory for her.
“Hmph, you’ve got a silver tongue, you do.
Fine.
I see you’re too capable for me to handle anymore.
I can’t control you, so I won’t even try.
I’ll just sit back and watch what you make of yourself, how much of a spendthrift you become.” The old lady had come to understand that this daughter of hers was no longer the same person she used to be.
She couldn’t win against her, so she might as well let go and enjoy life as a pampered old woman for once.
“That’s the spirit!
Don’t you worry, Mom.
From now on, I’ll definitely make sure you eat your fill and eat well.”