Quick Transmigration: Why did you provoke him? He's love-struck!

Chapter 301 Towards the Golden Palace (5)

"..."

The child walked away with a resentful look on his face.

Over the next few days, Yan Zhen was busy making soap.

This product has a long production cycle, and once it goes on sale, it needs to be continuously supplied. She has to ensure that the inventory can keep up with demand.

But how to open up sales channels is the problem.

Unlike food, you can't taste soap before you buy it.

As a cleaning product, it looks ordinary and doesn't stand out on the shelf.

Moreover, the price of soap is not low, which alone can deter some people.

To open up sales channels, she needed to let people witness its cleaning power firsthand.

Yan Zhen thought of a common marketing tactic in modern society. If used well, it could make the soap a sensation in Yinzhou.

But if she wants to replicate the marketing strategy, she needs to find someone to help her.

That morning, Yan Zhen went to the slaughterhouse and carried back dozens of kilograms of fatty pork for the day. When she returned to her front door, she took out her keys to open the door when a small stone hit her on the back.

She immediately turned around and saw a child sitting on the opposite wall, holding a string of candied hawthorns, grinning at her as he ate them.

It was the petty thief she caught last time.

The "little thief" was a little different today. He had changed into a brightly colored new outfit, and his face and hands were clean. He looked smug and just like any other child.

Seeing Yan Zhen looking him over, the child, with one hand supporting himself on the wall and the other holding a candied hawthorn, nimbly jumped down from the wall, walked up to her, and proudly licked the candied hawthorn in front of her: "My mom bought it for me, it's so sweet."

Yan Zhen: "Oh."

Little brat.

Too lazy to pay attention to him.

Yan Zhen turned around and opened the door again, but the child followed: "My mother said she's going to fry pork cracklings for me."

Yan Zhen: "Is that so?"

Seeing that she was unmoved, the child emphasized, "My mother even bought me new clothes to wear."

"It's not my business."

Yan Zhen entered the room and was about to close it when the child quickly wedged one foot into the crack, raised his chin, and said, "My mother is so good to me. Is your mother this good to you too?"

Yan Zhen narrowed his eyes, reached out and grabbed the back of his collar, lifting him up: "You don't need to know whether my mother is good to me or not. You just need to know that if you provoke me again, your mother will have no son."

After she finished speaking, she threw the child out.

The child fell to the ground with a "plop" like a toad, and the candied hawthorn flew out of his hand.

Ignoring his sore backside, he quickly scrambled to his feet, picked up the candied hawthorn, and slapped off the dirt and sand. He then turned and glared fiercely at Yan Zhen: "Old bachelor!"

Yan Zhen: "..."

She slammed the door shut.

-

The child, perhaps feeling he had been taken advantage of and lost face by Yan Zhen, started arguing with her after that day.

Yan Zhen went out three times, and on two of those occasions, he saw Yan Zhen loitering nearby.

Every time the children see her, they either make faces at her or secretly throw pebbles at her back.

But soon, Yan Zhen discovered that the child was different from the children of ordinary families.

His new clothes were filthy, and his hands and face were covered in grime. He exuded the aura of a neglected "wild child."

One day, Yan Zhen returned home and was almost bumped into by a child who rushed out from around the corner as he entered the alley.

The child glanced at her once and then ran off, disappearing in the blink of an eye.

A moment later, a middle-aged woman rushed out of the alley, holding a broom and cursing, "You petty thief," "You son of a bitch," and "If you steal from my house again, I'll beat you to death."

Yan Zhen understood immediately; the child had stolen something again.

The middle-aged woman rushed to the alley entrance, but failed to catch the person, so she could only walk back with a gloomy expression.

Seeing Yan Zhen standing there, the middle-aged woman recognized her as her neighbor who rented a room next door and chatted with her for a few minutes.

Speaking of the child, the woman said angrily, "He's the son of that scoundrel from Qixianglou. He doesn't even know whose bastard he is. He gave birth to the child but doesn't care about him. He's always stealing small things. He's robbed my house several times... If I catch him again, I'll definitely hand him over to the authorities!"

Listening to the woman's grumbling, Yan Zhen didn't find it annoying at all; instead, an idea came to him.

The next day, Yan Zhen wrapped a packet of pork cracklings in paper before leaving home.

She walked out of the alley and sure enough, she saw the child sitting at the alley entrance, basking in the sun.

However, he was in a sorry state today, with a bruised and swollen face and torn clothes.

Upon seeing Yan Zhen, he didn't wink at her as usual, but instead listlessly lowered his head and picked at the dirt under his fingernails.

Yan Zhen chuckled, walked up to him, and took out some pork cracklings from his pocket and handed them to him.

The child was taken aback: "For me?"

"Ah."

He immediately took it, unfolded the oil paper, grabbed the pork cracklings, and stuffed them into his mouth.

Yan Zhen asked, "Is it delicious?"

"Delicious!" The child wolfed down his food, not forgetting to flatter Yan Zhen, "It's even better than my mother's cooking."

Yan Zhen smiled slightly: "Since you ate my food, you have to do something for me."

The child paused in his chewing of pork cracklings.

He swallowed the pork cracklings in his mouth with force, and looked at Yan Zhen with wary eyes: "What is it?"

Yan Zhen told him about her plan and coaxed him gently: "After it's done, you can eat as much pork cracklings as you want from my family."

The child's eyes lit up, and he readily agreed: "Okay!"

Yan Zhen asked, "What's your name?"

"Abao."

-

Time flies, and in the blink of an eye, Yan Zhen has been in Yinzhou for a month.

The first batch of soaps produced is ready to be shipped.

Meanwhile, Yinzhou City welcomed its annual Water God Festival.

The locals in Yinzhou worship the water god, and there is a very popular water god temple in the city.

Every July, a temple fair is held in the city, where people from all over the city go to the temple to burn incense and pray for good weather, peace and prosperity in the coming year.

On the day of the temple fair, Yan Zhen got up before dawn. She packed thirty bars of soap and simple stall equipment in a bamboo basket, and set off with A Bao, who hadn't showered for several days and was covered in stench, to the Water God Temple.

Yan Zhen had scouted the location a couple of days ago and knew that there was a river next to the temple with silt deposited at the bottom, which emitted a foul stench all year round.

She set up a soap stall by the river.

As dawn broke and the sun rose, more and more people came to offer incense.

As more and more vendors set up stalls during the temple fair, a temporary vendor street formed along the river, selling all kinds of snacks, rattan and bamboo baskets, daily necessities, rouge and powder, cloth and shoes, as well as chicks and ducklings...

The goods were dazzling, and people came and went in a constant stream.

Almost every stall had customers, and Yan Zhen's soap stall was no exception.

But after displaying the soap for a long time, she didn't sell a single bar. Customers either came just to look at it out of curiosity or were deterred by the high price of 800 coins per bar.

In an era when the monthly salary of low-level workers was generally only five hundred to one thousand coins, most people felt that spending eight hundred coins on a bar of soap was not worthwhile.

Yan Zhen wasn't in a hurry. Seeing the sun rising higher overhead, she gave A Bao a wink.

Ah Bao understood, turned around, squeezed into the crowd, and walked towards the riverbank.

A short while later, a loud splash came from the riverbank, and someone immediately shouted:

"Whose child is this? They've fallen into the river!"