Wei Tingyu thought for a moment, then said, "He's a poor man with the title of Marquis."
The pupils of the head of the Zhao family shrank slightly, but Old Master Zhao was still smiling, "Then the question I asked just now may be wrong, it should be niece-in-law, what do you do?"
Wei Tingyu smiled abruptly. "What Old Master Zhao said is true. What can I, a person who is disabled and seriously ill, do? I guess there are not many people who are more idle and useless than me."
Old Master Zhao rolled his eyes, and the words "I'd be foolish to believe you" were almost written on his face.
Wei Tingyu smiled but said nothing. Of course, he couldn't let others know what he did. However, he was not lying now. He was too idle to do anything, and he was also too useless to help his own Xuan'er at all.
Old Master Zhao sat back in his old chair leisurely, holding a small teapot in his hand. "When I was young, I went to the imperial city several times and met two nobles by chance. Seriously speaking, they were probably pampered and had their own set of rules since childhood, which made them seem aloof. Otherwise, they seemed to be no different from ordinary people. You..."
There was something a little more profound in Old Master Zhao's smile. He was a few years older than Doctor Lin and was a businessman. He had seen all kinds of people in his life, so his eyesight was definitely not bad.
When Wei Tingyu is with Xiaocao, he will unconsciously become gentle. It is not forced, but natural. However, when she is not around, he will be a little different. You know, in the imperial city, those rumors about him are not all false.
However, no matter how the Zhao family speculated, Wei Tingyu remained unmoved. After all, there was really not much relationship between them. Whether they speculated or not, it was always the same.
Old Master Zhao secretly sighed, today's little fox cubs are more cunning than old foxes.
Xiaocao and Wei Tingyu settled down in the Zhao family. Of course, the Zhao family's inner house was not ruled by the eldest master's wife, but it was his mother. This old lady was also quite clear-headed. Although she favored her youngest son to a certain extent, she was still very clear about the major issues. Therefore, there might be some minor frictions in the inner house, but it would never affect her eldest son's affairs outside.
Speaking of which, when she came here more than ten years ago, it was this old lady who was in charge of the inner house of the Zhao family. Her husband was not very good and was not favored by her father-in-law, but she was quite capable. However, this old lady was a little snobbish. When Xiaocao and Doctor Lin were staying at the Zhao family, perhaps she despised them for being poor and thought they were just like poor relatives who came to beg for money, so she didn't like them very much. If it weren't for her son's health being improved under Doctor Lin's care, and if they were not invited by Old Master Zhao, she would not dare to neglect them. However, she was probably still heartbroken that those good things were used on "poor people".
This time, after learning about Xiaocao's identity, her expression looked a little unhappy. There were no patients in the Zhao family now, and she was not Doctor Lin. She brought people to the door, which meant she was taking advantage of them.
It is not difficult to deal with such a person. After seeing her, Xiaocao immediately stated her current identity. She almost said clearly that she is not a "poor man" now, but just borrowed a place to stay for a while and will not take advantage of her.
Sure enough, the old lady's eyes changed immediately. She looked so enthusiastic that it was clear that she was trying to build a relationship with him.
Xiaocao smiled indifferently. She stayed because of Old Master Zhao's kindness. If it interfered with her treatment of Tingyu, then she would just move out. As for whether the old lady would be questioned by Old Master Zhao, that was her business.
However, they were originally arranged to live in two places, one inside and one outside. Xiaocao refused to live in the inner courtyard and went straight to live in the outer courtyard with Wei Tingyu. As for whether someone would say something about her, she didn't care at all.
Xiaocao's identity was not concealed, but Wei Tingyu's identity was only known to Old Master Zhao and the head of the Zhao family. However, since he was the fiancé of the daughter of the Minister of Rites, he must have some status.
It should be noted that in the Qi Dynasty, except for those of low status, those who were directly demoted by the court order and their designated descendants, and some special groups of people who were prohibited from taking the imperial examinations, no one else was prohibited. Naturally, merchants were definitely not within the scope of the prohibition.
A family like the Zhao family naturally hopes that someone can enter official career. Not to mention how much benefit it will bring to the family, but if someone is in officialdom, the family background will appear different, right
It's just that the Zhao family seems to have no destiny in official career. It's not that they can't study hard, or those who can study always encounter various problems. So far, there are only two scholars in the Zhao family, which looks really pitiful.
However, even so, there were still many scholars in the Zhao family, and a lot of money was spent on them, not only on pens, ink, paper and inkstones, but also on hiring famous teachers. Of course, the number of famous teachers was actually limited.
No matter what happens in the future, now that a distinguished person from the imperial city has suddenly come to the family, they naturally want to take this opportunity to build a good relationship. After looking for Xiaocao among the female relatives to no avail - in fact, they couldn't even see her at all - the male members of the Zhao family went to Wei Tingyu. Even if his family background was not so high and he was a useless person, he probably didn't have much say, but the so-called "husband and wife are one", and no matter how bad he is, his connections in the imperial city are thousands of times stronger than theirs, so he will not lose out no matter how you calculate it.
However, who is Wei Tingyu? It is simply a pipe dream to expect to get any benefits from him. To be honest, even if you just want to get a promise from him, it is basically impossible.
Xiaocao was concentrating on studying her things, and she accidentally found out that Wei Tingyu was harassed by people from the Zhao family. You know, those people were not just Old Master Zhao's family, but also people from the side branches. Xiaocao questioned the correctness of staying in the Zhao family for a moment.
Wei Tingyu, on the other hand, pulled Xiao Cao and said with a smile: "It's okay. In fact, I have been quite bored recently. These people are good for me to relieve my boredom. If I am tired, I will just refuse to see them. So you don't have to worry."
After Xiaocao confirmed the truth of what he said, he just threw up his hands and stopped.
Old Master Zhao and the head of the Zhao family naturally knew about this situation. The head of the Zhao family was a little worried, but Old Master Zhao took it seriously and even had an attitude of enjoying the show. Wei Tingyu was a tough nut to crack at a young age, and making him suffer a setback was just a small "revenge".
Patriarch Zhao was helpless. They always say that old people are always children. Grandfather is really getting more and more...
After a few days, Wei Tingyu lost interest in this way of killing boredom, and went straight to find the head of the Zhao family, saying that he wanted to take a look at the Zhao family's medicinal materials business. This request seemed a little bit against the rules. The head of the Zhao family thought about it for a long time, and all kinds of thoughts came to his mind, but he didn't show it on his face and agreed with a smile.
Wei Tingyu has never done business, but there is a type of person who is a jack of all trades and can learn things quickly. Of course, he won’t be able to master it right away, but it is no problem for him to figure out what is going on in a short time.
In fact, it took less than ten days for Wei Tingyu to know everything about the Zhao family's business. Even if some things were deliberately avoided from him, he could still figure them out from the known things. The head of the Zhao family sighed in his heart, thinking that he was too smart. It was no exaggeration for his grandfather to say that he was a shrewd man.
Accordingly, they naturally couldn't stop worrying, and even had conspiracy theories, wondering if he had some intentions towards the Zhao family. Born in a marquis's mansion, and a prince, so what? There was no lack of struggles everywhere, especially since the prince didn't have a healthy body. When he was in the imperial city, it was unknown what kind of life he lived. The Zhao family might not be ranked among the medicinal material merchants in the entire Qi Dynasty, but it was not impossible that this family had a very good foundation.
However, facts told Mr. Zhao that he was really thinking too much. After Wei Tingyu had almost understood the affairs of the Zhao family, he asked Mr. Zhao to take him to meet Old Master Zhao.
Wei Tingyu didn't waste any words and went straight to the point, "I wonder if Old Master Zhao and the head of the Zhao family are interested in becoming a royal merchant?"
After these words came out, the grandfather and grandson looked a little uneasy. After a long while, they slowly put down the teacup in their hands and looked at Wei Tingyu, "Master Wei, are you serious?"
"There should be a limit to jokes. Do you think I would joke about this? This matter should be related to the development of the entire Zhao family. Am I the kind of person who doesn't take other people's entire family seriously?"
"Please forgive us, Master Wei. We didn't mean that. We were just too shocked and couldn't believe it for a moment." The head of the Zhao family said hurriedly. There was no other way. This matter was so important that it was really difficult to treat it with a normal mind.
Wei Tingyu smiled, "Nothing. In the past few days, I have observed that the Zhao family's medicinal materials are of high quality and have a very good reputation in this industry. The Zhao family's behavior is also commendable. Although the Zhao family may not have the foundation compared to the big medicinal material merchants in the entire Qi Dynasty, this kind of thing cannot be generalized."
The key point is that Xuan'er chose to settle here, which shows that she recognizes the medicinal materials here.
"However, the number of imperial merchants is fixed. We don't know about the others, but when it comes to medicinal materials, it's been the same few families for many years. It is said that the relationships behind them are very deep. Even with the help of Master Wei, it will be very difficult for us to get in and share a piece of the pie. After all, if we get in, the benefits for others will be diluted. Taking away someone's power is like killing their parents. If the hatred is big, it will probably bring trouble to Master Wei." Neither the head of the Zhao family nor Old Master Zhao was overwhelmed by the excitement.
In fact, the benefits of becoming an imperial merchant are obvious. The brand of imperial merchant means "the best". In the minds of ordinary people, how can the things used by the emperor be bad? Therefore, if two different people sell the same thing, if one of them is called an imperial merchant, then the business will definitely be much more prosperous.
Moreover, medicinal materials are no different from other things. No one will try every means to plunder them. As long as they are well managed, there is no possibility that just because a certain thing is favored by the superiors, the superiors will follow suit and create a large number of "pursuers", leading to disastrous consequences.
With the background of the Zhao family, have you ever thought about becoming an imperial merchant? Actually, yes, but in the end, you gave up the idea. Now, it is an indisputable fact that the old man of the Zhao family is expanding the Zhao family's medicinal materials business. Although it is said that the expansion of the Zhao family will squeeze the living space of other families, he has used normal means and has never played any conspiracy behind the scenes. Even when others are calculating the cost, he counterattacks in an upright manner. He has a clear conscience.
Even so, he never thought that he could lead the Zhao family to become an imperial merchant. If he did well enough and trained outstanding heirs, perhaps he could achieve it in them.
But now, gold bricks are falling from the sky right in front of him, but he has to consider whether he can pick them up easily.
"There is one thing I can tell you now, but it needs to be kept secret. Regarding medicinal materials, one imperial merchant will probably be removed from the list this year. The people behind them have been too ruthless in their exploitation. The head of the family is different from before and is a little short-sighted. The medicinal materials they offer as tribute have problems, and they are passing off inferior materials as good ones. Of course, they are not bad quality goods, but the main problem is the age."
This was not originally within the scope of Wei Tingyu's cleanup. However, he happened to hear Xuan'er mumbling that a certain medicine in the Imperial Hospital was not old enough. This might have been a big deal, but the nature of what Wei Tingyu was doing was different, and he was very sensitive to some things. He immediately asked someone to investigate, and they actually found the problem.
As for the others, there are some minor problems which can be dealt with. However, medicines are something that may be needed to save lives at critical moments, so there cannot be any problems with them.
If Xuan'er hadn't brought him out to look for medicine, the matter would have probably been almost settled.
If an imperial merchant leaves, then either a new one will be needed, or the territory will be divided up by several other imperial merchants to increase the amount and variety of their tribute. Wei Tingyu had no interest in this guy before, but now, he doesn't mind giving the Zhao family a chance.
The hearts of Old Master Zhao and the head of the Zhao family began to beat. They had thought that Wei Tingyu was not a simple man, but they did not expect that he could even know such a thing. However, "Even so, the competition is probably very fierce. Our Zhao family..." He stopped talking. If he said it out loud, it would only boost others' ambitions and destroy his own prestige.
"You should actually correct what you said before. This matter has nothing to do with me. I will not be involved in it. In fact, it is related to Xuan'er. Things are not as complicated as you think. With just one word from Xuan'er, your Zhao family will become the imperial merchant. No one will compete with you, and no one will trip you up behind your back. Even if they want to do something, the master behind them will stop them immediately."
This was even more surprising than asking the Zhao family to be the imperial merchant. "What does this mean?"
Wei Tingyu curled his lips and smiled...