Fei Minglan, a tall girl, smiled slightly, with a shy, mischievous and playful look in her eyes, and said, "I know you all came here for 'Su Xin Ru Xue', and I really want to show it to you. But... it's a pity, a pity."

"What's wrong?" The girl in bright red brocade clothes raised her eyebrows and asked a little displeasedly, "Have you already sold it?"

"The one who knows me is Shuhe." Fei Minglan grinned at the girl in red brocade.

Jiang Shuhe frowned and said, "Are you so short of money? We agreed that the best orchids this year will be left to me."

What's more, this is a pot of the best lotus petal orchid that is rare to find in a century. Her name is Shuhe, how suitable it is.As the eldest daughter of the prefect's family in Kuaiji County, Jiang Shuhe believed that no one was more worthy of that top-quality orchid than her.

Because the royal family in Jingwei loves orchids, and it is said that Queen Xue is even more obsessed with orchids, people now take pride in raising orchids. The annual orchid festival in Kuaiji County is very lively, and the "King of Flowers" selected every year can sell for a sky-high price.

This year's "Kao" is "Suxin Ruxue" bred by Fei Minglan.

Jiang Shuhe said: "Last year's 'Kao' sold for 20,000 taels of silver. I will add another 5,000 taels and sell 'Su Xin Ru Snow' to me. How about that?"

Twenty-five thousand taels of silver was considered a huge amount in the eyes of dignitaries.

Since the founding of Jingguo, successive emperors have paid great attention to people's livelihood issues, tried their best to regulate prices, and suppressed profiteers who hoarded goods and disrupted the market, so prices are quite stable.

A commoner family of four only had twenty taels of silver for a year. This was a fairly comfortable life, as they could eat fish, meat, and teeth every month.If we were more frugal, such a family would not even be able to afford twenty taels.

Twenty thousand taels of silver is enough for a commoner family of four to spend a thousand years, but some people spend a lot of money just for a pot of orchids.

Jiang Shumei, a girl in a bright red gauze skirt, helped her sister and said, "Minglan, even if you don't care about the money, for the sake of our sister's face, you should leave the 'Snow Heart' to my family."

Many of the girls in the flower hall are rich ladies from the families of officials or wealthy businessmen, among whom the girls of the Jiang family are the highest.

Fei Minglan smiled apologetically and said, "It's not that I don't want to leave it to you. It's actually been pre-arranged. I only paid a deposit of 20,000 taels."

According to the established rules in the business world, the deposit generally only accounts for 10% of the total amount, or at most half, so the buyer will spend at least 40,000 taels of silver to buy the flower.

The rich and wealthy ladies couldn't help but make an uproar.

"Wow! It's so expensive!"

"Oh my God! Who can be so generous?"

"We don't have such scammers in Yuyao County, right? Is this still an orchid? Gemstones are not that expensive!"

"Minglan, are you a guest from out of town?"

Fei Minglan shook his head and said, "I'm not sure. The order was hastily made yesterday by a middle-aged man who looked like a butler. He said that within three days at the latest, the master would come to pick up the flowers in person. From the accent of the man, it sounded like the official dialect of the capital city."

"Oh! People from the capital!"

"Capital City? No wonder the spending is so generous."

"There are hidden dragons and crouching tigers in the capital, and I don't know who the big shot decided it was!"

The ladies suddenly realized it, as if it was no wonder they were so aware.

Jiang Shuhe and Jiang Xumei looked ugly, but they did not dare to say any unpleasant words rashly. They were not afraid of offending Fei Minglan, but they were afraid of accidentally offending people from the capital.

Although they are arrogant, they are not stupid and will not easily provoke enemies for their father.

The atmosphere was a little awkward for a while, but Zhang Ruyun, a young lady from the weaving family, smiled and intervened to smooth things over: "Businessmen value credibility the most. Since Minglan has already made a promise to someone else, we won't take it away, but it's always okay to feast your eyes on it, right?"

"Yeah, yeah, let's take a look at the head office, right?"

Fei Minglan didn't want to upset the hearts of many young ladies, but...she smiled a little embarrassedly and said, "If you had come two days earlier, I would have shown it to you, but now the buyer requires it to be kept secret and is not allowed to be viewed by outsiders."

Cha Shumei couldn't help but frown, "How domineering!"

Fei Minglan smiled bitterly and said, "So I ask you, sisters, to forgive me. It's not because I don't want to, but I actually can't."

Jiang Shuhe suddenly said: "Minglan, I heard that the second young lady of your family was engaged to the governor's son a few days ago. Is this true?"

All the girls immediately forgot about Orchid, and all looked concerned about this new news.

Fei Minglan was stunned for a moment. She didn't expect Jiang Shuhe to change the topic so suddenly. She thought for a while, then nodded and admitted with a smile, "It's true. My sister has been promised to the second son of the governor's family and will get married soon."

A group of teenage girls turned to look at each other, exchanging miraculous thoughts about "It's really like this."

Jiang Shumei was only thirteen years old, and she didn't have that much in mind. She asked outright what everyone was thinking, "Minglan, wasn't it promised to you earlier? And the elder sister has not yet been engaged, so why did it come to the younger sister first? What's more, although the second son of the governor's family is not the eldest son, he is also the second son. Why can't Minghui be his wife?"

Fei Minglan's face darkened, but she felt helpless. After all, what Jiang Shumei said was indeed true - in the eyes of the world, the Fei family was just a low-level businessman, so what if they were the richest man in Yuyao County?Still can't match the official son.

Yuyao County belongs to Kuaiji County, and Kuaiji County belongs to Yangzhou. The highest military and political officer in Yangzhou is the governor of Yangzhou, which is four levels higher than the prefect of Kuaiji County. Even if the Jiang sisters are betrothed to the governor's family, it is still a high ranking, let alone a merchant woman like Fei Minglan.

Not all people in the world are equal. They are divided into three, six or nine classes at birth, not to mention those actors, prostitutes, matchmakers, thieves, pawns and other low-ranking people. Among good people, farmers, farmers, merchants, and merchants belong to the category of people with the least social status.

Fei Minglan's father, Fei Zhonggui, made his fortune by selling salt. The three counties of Yuji, Yuhang and Yuyao in Kuaiji County are probably all related to the salt industry.

Fei Zhonggui was a natural businessman with unique vision and decisive methods. In just twenty years, he became the largest salt merchant in Yuyao County.And because the wife he married was from the Zheng family, a maternal family of the current emperor, although she was just a distant daughter, Fei Zhonggui was fawning and filial, and somehow managed to establish a relationship with the direct line of the Zheng family. As a result, he jumped from an ordinary businessman to an imperial businessman.

It was because of her status as the daughter of an imperial merchant that Fei Minglan got in touch with the Jiang sisters, Tong Ruyun and other official ladies and became close friends.

However, Fei Zhonggui suddenly died of illness in the first month of the year due to years of hard work. The Fei family was without a pillar of support and suddenly fell into all kinds of troubles.

Coupled with the fact that the current emperor has been suppressing his maternal relatives since he ascended the throne, the power of the Zheng family has been greatly reduced. The Fei family's biggest backer is no longer reliable. This year, even the status of the imperial merchants is somewhat shaky.

Fei Minglan's brother and sister were both concubines, and her mother was a delicate woman who didn't like worldly affairs. The Fei family's relatives also came to take advantage of her. Fei Minglan's father's mourning period had not yet ended, and he had already lost one head and two children. He was so worried and had nowhere to talk.

Chapter 1(2)

Fei's Orchid Garden was originally built by Fei Zhonggui for his wife because Fei Minglan's mother loved orchids. Fei Minglan was immersed in it since she was a child and learned the superb skills of raising orchids. In order to please her mother, she built the Orchid Garden better and better, and gradually became a famous garden in Yuyao County.

During the short-term flowering period, many celebrities wanted to visit Fei's Orchid Garden. In order to build connections, Fei Zhonggui opened the orchid garden, and short-term orchid flower festivals became a routine.

The Jiang sisters couldn't stand Fei Minglan's way of charging fees to enter the garden, and felt that it was insulting to her to sell orchids, but they had no idea of ​​the hard work Fei Minglan had put in to maintain the expenses of such a large family, and the huge amount of donations required to keep her qualifications as an imperial merchant.

In order to maintain their status as imperial merchants, the Fei family not only paid 100,000 taels of silver to direct descendants of the Zheng family every year, but also paid varying amounts of tribute to officials at all levels, including the governor of Yangzhou, the prefect of Kuaiji County, and the magistrate of Yuyao County.

If the qualifications of an imperial merchant are not guaranteed, then Fei Zhonggui's family property, which he has worked hard to accumulate throughout his life, may be snatched away by others.

Fei Zhonggui had two younger brothers, a second brother who was his biological brother, and a third brother who was a concubine.But Fei Zhonggui had no legitimate children. He only had one legitimate daughter, Fei Minglan, his eldest son Fei Mingde, who was born by a maidservant, and Fei Minghui, a concubine who was a compatriot of Fei Mingde's mother.