Gasp! She's a Time Traveler Using Modern Tech to Improve Ancient Life-Chapter 368 - 365: Fire Breaks Out at Midnight

The cold melon from Lin Mengli’s household was sold to the Yu Family lady in Yu Yao at a price of thirteen gold coins. Ten gold coins were handed to Lin Wanwan, and within a few months, their family profited three gold coins, bringing immense joy to the entire family.

Seeing this, the clan members also wished for Lin Mengli to help them sell, but Lin Mengli was hesitant to take up the business.

Each day, his accounting studies were already exhausting all his energy. Selling melons for his own family was a responsibility he embraced, but he wasn’t as proactive in selling melons for his clan brothers.

If he took a commission, it would harm his reputation; if not, the melons had immense value, and what if something went wrong? Bearing risks without benefits, why bother with a thankless task?

Therefore, he mostly managed the clan brothers’ requests with reluctance. He only earnestly helped push the sales for the cold melons from the families of his direct cousins, Lin Mengbo, Lin Mengjin, and Lin Mengxing.

The cold melons from these three families were quickly sold at the same price, resulting in great rejoicing among this branch of the family.

Among the clan, there was increasing jealousy, but fortunately, Lin Mengli was rarely home, so he pretended not to hear it.

The other three families naturally remained very low-key and would not flaunt it.

When the clan members sourly asked how much their cold melons sold for, the women would say they didn’t know, as the men handled the major matters, while the men claimed ignorance, saying the women managed the money.

Luckily, this sentiment didn’t last long, as the Lin Family Manor held a monopoly on cold melons, making sales inevitable.

Soon, other families that cultivated cold melons also sold them for twelve or thirteen gold coins, except for two families who tried to hoard and hadn’t sold yet.

One of those households was Lin Qingyu’s grandparents’ place.

Lin Mengzhong and Lin Mengyi, being brothers, rotated sleeping in the yard since the cold melons grew to fist size, guarding them.

By now, others had sold their cold melons, resolving a concern, but their household still retained the worry.

This matter primarily involved Lin Qingyu’s younger uncle, Lin Mengyi, who had two sons and was making the decisions.

According to Lin Mengzhong and his wife’s thoughts, they should sell for twelve gold coins if given the chance; it’s best to secure the money as melons can’t be preserved indefinitely.

Today, they are valued at this price; what if tomorrow the nobles lose interest, then who would buy them!

However, the elder Lin Mengzhong, having only two daughters, always worked hard with little say in family decisions.

Thus, his brother Lin Mengyi convinced their parents to hold onto the melons for a higher price, and the couple could only heed.

Lin Mengyi harbored this thought because he inadvertently heard from a merchant while selling fish at the harbor that cold melons in Qiantang County are now sold at fifteen or sixteen gold coins each, and these melons were all flowing out from Mao County!

At present in the Great Tang, apart from the Western Regions, which could produce small, low-quality cold melons, no other region had introduced cold melon cultivation technology. The ones circulating were precisely those Lin Wanwan brought from the modern era to Mao County.

With such high-quality cold melons, selling at high prices in Qiantang County was not surprising.

After all, in Chang’an, the cold melons, much inferior to those from Mao County, were even beyond purchase for wealthy individuals, reserved only for royal families!

Since antiquity, the lavish pleasures of the rich have always been unimaginable to those at the bottom. It’s like in Dream of the Red Chamber, where a feast in the Grand View Garden costs as much as an entire year’s expenses for an average family like Granny Liu’s.

Since Lin Mengyi found out that passing cold melons through merchant hands before selling to aristocrats earned fifteen or sixteen gold coins, he couldn’t bear to sell his cold melons cheaply.

A distant cousin who was somewhat close to him, upon hearing this information, shared the same mentality and refused to sell cheaply.

One gold coin equates to six strings of cash! Nearly twenty-four pieces of silk fabric! The gap between twelve, thirteen, and fifteen, sixteen is three gold coins!

It’s not strange they have such thoughts; it’s the bold that thrive, while the timid starve.

In the Early Tang, an ordinary family of six, under favorable conditions and free from disasters, had an annual income of approximately forty-three or forty-four shi of grain after taxes.

Their yearly consumption of grain was about thirty-three shi, with clothing costs needing about two strings and four hundred cash (around seven shi), and daily expenses for oil, salt, soy sauce, and vinegar reaching about one string and two to three hundred cash (approximately 3.5 shi), theoretically balancing income and expenses with little surplus.

If they engaged in some sideline activities such as silkworm farming to supplement household expenses, life could be more comfortable and allow for savings.

However, realistically, achieving "subsistence agriculture" was an ideal state.

Those who managed to save belonged to the wealthier peasants, living beyond the means of typical civilians.

The Early Tang was rife with disasters, leading many true farmers to endure hunger. The young adults of Lin Family Manor, before Lin Wanwan’s arrival, never had a day of full and satisfying meals.

Now, just by planting a single cold melon, in a few short months, they could earn profits equal to a year of hard labor’s total income. How the word "joy" falls short!

The entire village, who bravely requested credit seedlings from Lin Wanwan for planting, were joyful, while those lacking courage to gamble felt envy seeing others prosper.

Thankfully, the Clan Leader held significant prestige, and he refrained from taking advantage of Lin Wanwan, so even his household did not plant cold melons.

Seeing that not even the Clan Leader’s family had them, everyone felt slightly balanced inside.

Within the clan, eleven households made vast fortunes from cold melons, with two families waiting to prosper. Consequently, during this period, Lin Family Manor was quite prominent in the surrounding ten miles.

There were nearly ten families arranging engagements, with matchmakers visiting daily, leaving the Clan Leader with delight so intense that he lost his bearings.

Ensuring his clan’s propagation and flourishing was the Clan Leader’s utmost mission, and seeing the favorable situation now, how could he not be joyful?

Despite all things having intertwined fortunes and misfortunes, high income naturally brought higher risks.

The cold melon craze was immense, finally leading to a significant event one dark and windy night.

Having boarded the merchant vessel bound for Qiantang and awaiting people to exchange silk fabric for cold melons the following day, the Lin Guofu household (Little Qingyu’s grandparents’ family) caught fire that very night!

The blaze was fierce, but fortunately, the family had been anxious over the cold melons and hadn’t slept deeply, allowing them to escape before the fire grew.

The house set ablaze inside and out, quickly alarming the entire Lin Family Manor with cries from the women and children, accompanied by the clanging of pots and pans.

The clan members from Lin Family Manor, including servants from Lin Wanwan’s household, came running with buckets, attempting to extinguish the flames. 𝙛𝓻𝒆𝒆𝒘𝙚𝓫𝙣𝙤𝒗𝙚𝓵.𝙘𝙤𝙢

Lin Qingyu’s former grandmother Lin Lu and Lin Mengyi’s wife, Lin Sun, wailed loudly, unable to do anything but scream.

The elder’s wife firmly held her children, preventing them from wandering dangerously near the fire scene, an utter chaos filled with deafening sobs.

When the fire was finally out, everyone gazed at the remains of Lin Mengyi, charred to ashes under the night sky, their eyes swelling with redness. A tragic incident unfolded before them, stirring deep heartache!