Chapter 44

"Ms. Li, you're finally back," Zou Boss said eagerly as soon as she walked into the courtyard. Seeing the happiness all over his face, Li Yao knew the boutique shop must have done good business today.

"Today we served 30 VIP customers total," the shop owner said. "Almost all the wealthy families in Baichuan Market have become VIPs of our store."

"How much of the aloe cream was sold?"

"All 200 boxes were sold out! The profit was 160 taels!"

Li Yao nodded. This result was within her expectations. After all, not only was the aloe cream effective, she had also used modern marketing methods.

This way, her income was quite considerable.

She sold 200 boxes of aloe cream to the store, so her income was 400 taels. Plus the store's commission of 80 taels, the total was 480 taels.

As for the cost... it seemed to be less than 5 taels of silver, almost negligible.

It was simply outrageous profit.

Zou Boss took out four 100-tael banknotes and said, "This is 400 taels, the money for purchasing aloe cream. In addition, I will have the accountant finish today's books tonight and have someone bring you your share of the profits tomorrow."

"How can there be profit sharing on the first day?" Li Yao said. "Just do it monthly."

"Alright."

"Also, before profit sharing, first set aside 10% of the total profit in the books as development funds for the future," Li Yao said. "Our boutique store won't just open one in Baichuan Market."

This was exactly what Zou Boss was waiting to hear.

He could almost foresee River Bend Boutique Stores opening all over Yizhou Prefecture.

But dreams are dreams. There was still a big problem right now.

"We'll have nothing left to sell tomorrow."

Li Yao shook her head and had He Xiaoya bring another 50 boxes of aloe cream.

"Use these as placeholders first," Li Yao said. "In a few days, I'll come up with some new stuff. When that happens, we'll make another push."

"Sounds good. I'll wait for your good news."

After seeing Zou Boss off, Li Yao casually put the banknotes in her pocket, then announced to the children, "We're having lamb skewers tonight!"

After working so hard today and earning quite a bit, they definitely deserved to treat themselves. Hearing they could eat lamb again, the children immediately got busy cutting the meat, marinating it, setting up the grill, and starting the fire... Soon, the aroma of lamb skewers drifted over the simple courtyard.

"Mother," Da Zhuang said while grilling the skewers, "Now that we have some money, shouldn't we fix up the house before winter sets in?"

"Fix up what?" Li Yao said. "We'll build a new one."

This made the children even more excited.

The dilapidated thatched cottage really wasn't suitable for living anymore. It leaked when it rained and let the wind through.

Building a new house was perfect.

"Mother," Da Zhuang asked excitedly, "when do we start construction?"

"No hurry," Li Yao said, nibbling a lamb skewer. "I'll sketch a draft tomorrow first, then go find Li Zheng to buy some land."

...

"You want to build a house this big?"

Li Zheng wasn't surprised to hear this news.

But after seeing Li Yao's sketches, his jaw nearly hit the ground.

He knew Li Yao had made money recently, but he never imagined she was this wealthy.

The sketches Li Yao showed him had five buildings!

One residence, a spacious six-room unit. Flanking it on both sides were two more units, each with four rooms!

There was also a very wide-open space in the middle.

This was no longer a house for one family. It was practically a whole estate!

Was it big? Li Yao didn't think it was big at all.

Not to mention her own six-room main unit, the children's houses were just nicely 100 square meters each. What was the fuss?

"Living spaces definitely need to be more spacious," Li Yao said. "In the future when the kids grow up, they'll certainly need their own independent living spaces as well."

Li Zheng frowned. While it made sense to say that, was it really necessary to build everything in solid brick?

Solid brick was in no way cheap.

With so many buildings, they would need at least 60,000-70,000 bricks minimum, which at 2 coins per brick would be 100,000+ coins, or 100+ taels in silver!

And that was just the bricks.

Building houses also required lots of timber, tiles, etc.

Without at least 200 taels, how could it be built?

"Li Yao, I know you've made money recently, but there's no need to waste it like this," Li Zheng advised. "With this money, you could buy a five-courtyard house in the market and still have plenty left over. Why spend it in this mountain ravine?"

"Li Zheng, I've made up my mind," Li Yao said. "Living in the market is certainly more convenient, but it's too noisy. I still prefer the tranquility here."

Seeing her mind was set, Li Zheng stopped trying to dissuade her. "There's plenty of vacant land in the village, and the prices are low too," Li Zheng said. "Do you have a location in mind?"

"Yes, that vacant lot halfway up the hill behind my house will do."

"What? You want to build the house halfway up a hill?"

Li Zheng was more and more puzzled by Li Yao's thinking.

Most people built houses with convenience as the priority, so they were basically all at the foot of the mountains.

Yet Li Yao insisted on going against convention and building so high up. Wouldn't it be tiring going up and down every day?

"The mountainous land here is barren, so it's originally just 200 coins per mu," Li Zheng said. "But as a house lot, it would be 500 coins per mu. I'd say you need at least 3 mu for this house..."

"Make it 6 mu, bigger is better."

That was only 3.5 taels of silver, and she liked more spaciousness. There would be room for lots of things in the yard later on.

"Alright, I'll take you to survey it now."

"No rush," Li Yao said. "I also want to buy the whole back mountain, and the two mountains behind that too."

This time Li Zheng was stunned for quite a while.

The several mountain ridges behind Li Yao's house, apart from weeds, couldn't grow anything. There wasn't even a single tree.

Although as infertile mountain land the prices were low, that was still almost 5,000 mu!

Even at the bare minimum 100 coins per mu, it would cost 500 taels of silver!

taels!

Spending so much to buy a few barren mountains that could only grow weeds, this was nothing short of madness.

"What...what do you need so many barren mountains for?"

"I have my own uses for them."

Green waters and green mountains are gold and silver mountains. It seemed people of old times didn't really understand this reasoning.

Besides, if this was for farming and retirement, naturally there had to be some land first.

She didn't lack food, so buying some hills to amuse herself and casually grow some pasture to raise cows and sheep, as well as some fruit trees and such, this was the retirement life she envisioned.

She had originally only planned to buy the mountain behind her house. The reason for buying the two mountains further behind was to solve the water problem.

Those two mountains were relatively much higher, and were positioned north-south. If she could build a large dam between the mountains, the water flowing down from the big mountain could gather here and form a large reservoir.

Then He Wan village wouldn't need to worry about irrigation.

She could also divert the water to her home and utilize hydropower to build some water-powered machines, like watermills and water wheels. Maybe it could even be used for generating electricity.

Of course, that was all a long way off.

What she looked forward to most now was planting lotus flowers in the reservoir, raising many fish, and rowing small boats for leisure during free time. Just thinking about it made her very happy.