Chapter Twelve: Tavern Decorations

  Upon arriving at the large hall of the wine house, I saw that they had already arrived. There were three people in total, one of whom brought a little boy who looked to be around five years old. The three women appeared to be around 26 or 27 years old. In ancient times, people could get married at the age of 15, so by modern standards, they weren't considered young either.

  "Qin Jie, is this what you brought us here to do? Where's the boss?" The woman with the little boy asked, seemingly familiar with each other.

  "Hehe, the one standing next to me is it." said Qin's wife with a smile.

  "What? Him?" The three women were astonished. Whoever saw such a small child as the boss would also be surprised.

  "Hehe, that's me! Everyone is older than me, so just call me Jian Cheng." Li Jiancheng said with a smile.

  "Then this wine house won't be opened just for fun, will it?" one of the women asked, taking him to be a young master who had opened the store purely for entertainment.

  "Of course not, it's not clear now, you'll understand later. Anyway, the wages won't be low!" Li Jiancheng said casually after failing to explain, "There's one thing you need to remember, when I talk to outsiders, I say that this wine shop is my young master's store, and Qin Furen is the manager of this wine shop. I hope you don't reveal that I'm the boss of this wine shop." Li Jiancheng said seriously, if people knew that he was the boss of this wine shop, it would be difficult to open in the future. This wine shop will not only be my place to make a fortune but also an intelligence base. You know, wine shops are where all kinds of people gather, and it's the easiest place to obtain information.

  Later, Li Jiancheng learned that the woman surnamed Xie who was carrying a child was named Wan, and her husband's surname was Wang. The other two were: the one who asked questions, surnamed Ye, was named Ying, and her husband's surname was Zhang; the other, surnamed Li, was named Bing, and her husband's surname was also Li. However, since their husbands had all died in battle, Li Jiancheng directly called them by their maiden names, otherwise it would have been painful for them to remember their husbands.

  Finally, Li Jiancheng took them to the adjacent residence and told them that from now on, this place would be theirs to live in. He would come over whenever he had time, but if he didn't have time, he wouldn't come. Then he let them go move their things over, and next was starting to redecorate the wine tower. After a while, they all moved their stuff over, not much, just some bedding and clothes. Li Jiancheng then told Qin Furen to take Li Yiniang and Ye Yiniang to tidy up the fourth floor, no way could he do it himself since they were all older than him, of course judging by appearance. And Li Jiancheng had no choice but to call them that. He and Wang Furen with the surname Xie went down to the cellar because she had a child and was reliable, so Li Jiancheng decided to let her be in charge of distilling wine. Then Li Jiancheng operated the distillation once more and told her to just do it like him, then use all ten glass containers, telling her that for the next few days, she only needed to focus on this and not worry about other things. After seeing her operate without any issues, Li Jiancheng reminded her of some precautions, and the two also went up to the fourth floor.

  "Come over and gather around, I'll tell you my idea. Let's arrange it this way later." After everyone arrived, Li Jiancheng continued to say: "This wine tower has 12 rooms on each floor. First of all, the lobby and second floor can be entered by anyone. The third floor is divided into 12 golden VIP rooms according to the 12 zodiac signs: Golden Rat, Golden Cow, Golden Tiger, Golden Rabbit, Golden Dragon, Golden Snake, Golden Horse, Golden Sheep, Golden Monkey, Golden Chicken, Golden Dog, and Golden Pig. To enter the third floor, you must have our iron-made VIP card. As for the fourth floor, only those with our jade-made supreme card can enter."

  "Speaking of which, Aunt Ye asked again, 'Jiancheng, in this case, will anyone come?' The others also looked at Li Jiancheng with worried eyes."

  This is great, now starting to consider the hotel, a thumbs up. Li Jiancheng smiled mysteriously: "Don't worry, someone will definitely come. Think about it, during the famine years, didn't the price of rice rise? The principle is the same." Several people listened with bright eyes, Ah! It's true that goods are precious when scarce! So they all paid attention to Li Jiancheng's words.

  "And the fourth floor is divided into five rooms, with every two rooms combined into one room, called Mei, Lan, Zhu, and Ju. The last room combines all four rooms and is called 'Shui Liang Dong'. This room does not allow anyone to enter without my permission." Li Jiancheng said, "So the cleaning work for the third and fourth floors will be left to you, while the original staff will go clean the main hall and second floor."

  "By the way, do you know of any famous chefs or pastry chefs? The dishes we cook and the things we make must also be of high quality. Only then can we attract more customers." Li Jiancheng asked the four people.

  "My father was a royal chef before he passed away, so I also learned some things from him. But I don't know if it can meet your standards," said Ye Ji with a bit of tension.

  "My father was a royal pastry chef before he passed away, so I also know some things." Li Ayi continued to say.

  "That's great, I'll make a list and you guys do it, let's see how it goes!" Talented people, both of them are descendants of imperial families, but they should have declined by now, otherwise how could they live so miserably.

  "I also know some culinary skills." said both Mrs. Qin and Auntie Xie at the same time.

  "Haha, that's great! It seems that the original chef plus you guys should be enough, so we won't hire a new chef for now. But when the time comes, you'll have to work harder." Upon hearing Li Jiancheng's concern, several people showed a moved expression. Some people are just simple and sincere, as long as they are treated well, that's all they need. In fact, what people demand is not much, unfortunately, it often doesn't get satisfied.

  "Alright, I'll go prepare the VIP cards now. You guys find someone to decorate the fourth floor as I said earlier. Ah, Auntie Xie, you can go do what I told you to do. If there's nothing else, hurry up and finish decorating the store so we can open soon." After saying that, Li Jiancheng went to the neighboring courtyard. Unfortunately, the gold bars he exchanged yesterday were still here, and he couldn't take them back home. If anyone asked, they would know he had pawned the jade ring, and he estimated he would be in for another big scolding. He took out 20 gold bars and gave them to Madame Qin to handle the renovation matters, while he took three gold bars to make the VIP cards.

  He first went to the gold shop and exchanged his gold bars for 300 taels, then came to the ironware store and ordered 200 VIP iron plaques, each weighing one tael. However, the plaques also needed to be marked with numbers ranging from one to two hundred. He paid a deposit of 100 taels first, and after they were made, he would have them delivered to the wine house for payment.

  As for why he wanted numbers on the plaques, it was to prevent counterfeiting in the future. Now that he has sent these out and registered each number with its corresponding person, who would dare try to counterfeit them? As for borrowing from one another, it's a joke - once the wine house becomes famous, who would dare borrow randomly?

  Then he rushed to the jade shop and ordered 20 jades, paying a deposit of 50 taels. He also wanted numbers engraved on these. Similarly, they would be delivered to his doorstep for payment.

  Indeed, money was being spent like flowing water! Buying the wine house cost him 10,000 taels, and now he didn't know how much more decorating would cost. However, spending three hundred taels on VIP cards wasn't painful for him - after all, he could make it back in the future.

  As soon as I returned home, the first thing that greeted me was my second brother Li Shimin's resentful gaze, which made Li Jiancheng's skin crawl. As for Father and Mother, they didn't say anything, after dinner they went back to their room to continue practicing his "Longevity Formula", unfortunately there was still no progress. Then I went to sleep, a night without any conversation.