Free Web NovelChapter 233: Chapter 233: A Crushing Defeat
When she first approached them with Xiao Chun and Shi Mingyue, her first choice had been Hongyun Printing House.
But the moment their Shopkeeper saw she was a woman, he just threw her right out.
It even started a fight between both sides.
After Ming Lingyi recounted this bit of history to Feng Shuyu, Feng Shuyu couldn’t help but laugh. "It seems I’m the one to blame for your troubles."
"Then shouldn’t I be thanking you? If it weren’t for you, how would I ever have met the female proprietor of Guanwen Hall? And I certainly wouldn’t have found Liufang Bookstore or started my restaurant," Ming Lingyi said with a laugh.
’A blessing in disguise, isn’t it?’
’If she had known what the Shopkeeper of Hongyun Printing House was like beforehand,’ Ming Lingyi thought, ’she probably wouldn’t have tried to work with someone like that anyway.’
"Hahaha, you’ve got a point there." Feng Shuyu clapped her hands and laughed.
"Now that we know Hongyun Printing House is behind this, why do you think they’re doing it?" Ming Lingyi asked.
Feng Shuyu considered for a moment. "Qiu Tao, the Shopkeeper of Hongyun Printing House, is the type who never lifts a finger unless there’s a profit in it. He’s known for a while that I’m the owner of Guanwen Hall and that Liufang Bookstore is my business. Seeing us rake in money hand over fist these days, he’s bound to be green with envy."
If it had been anyone else, they might have come to the printing house to discuss a partnership with her.
After all, Guanwen Hall isn’t very large. It started as just a printing house Feng Shuyu opened as a personal hobby.
Ming Lingyi’s orders alone were enough to keep the printing house staff busy from morning until night. Lately, the people at Guanwen Hall had been working around the clock. But no one complained. After all, the more work they did, the more silver everyone earned.
A printing house with a bit more foresight, a thicker skin, and a willingness to swallow its pride might have approached Feng Shuyu to discuss a collaboration.
Unfortunately, Qiu Tao already had a history of friction with Feng Shuyu. In fact, if it hadn’t been for Hu Yuwan, Feng Shuyu would have kicked him out of the Hu family’s business long ago. How could he possibly be enjoying his current status?
In Qiu Tao’s eyes, Feng Shuyu was likely his sworn enemy. Why on earth would he take the initiative to ask her for a partnership?
"But the book merchants are doing good business selling the official gazettes we produce. I doubt they’d look twice at the pirated copies from Hongyun Printing House. My guess is that Qiu Tao’s sales were sluggish, so he decided to try a different approach. He probably wants to offload this batch of shoddy inventory first, and who knows what he has planned after that," Feng Shuyu said.
As they spoke, the carriage entered the West Market.
"This is the place," Feng Shuyu said.
She didn’t rush to exit, but remained seated in the carriage. Lifting the curtain, she gestured for Ming Lingyi to come have a look. "That’s Hongyun Printing House up ahead."
Xiao Chun and Feng Shuyu’s attendants were riding in the carriage behind them. She disembarked and approached Ming Lingyi’s carriage, whispering, "Miss, I recognize him..."
A short distance ahead, a few people were crowded around the entrance of Hongyun Printing House.
A printing house wasn’t the same as a bookstore. The people who came and went on a typical day were mostly scribes or book merchants picking up inventory.
So, there generally wasn’t a lot of foot traffic.
But now, a crowd had gathered at the entrance of Hongyun Printing House, and Xiao Chun immediately spotted the man she had followed the day before.
Qiu Tao was having a clerk from the printing house hand out the remaining official gazettes to the people gathered there, and he did not look pleased.
When he first heard how Liufang Bookstore had made a fortune from that official gazette for Ming’s Restaurant, he could have kicked himself raw with regret.
The affair had become the talk of Shangjing City. After all, an official gazette bearing the private seal of the Holy Emperor himself, not to mention the Prefect of Jingzhao Mansion—what a novelty! And a piddling little place like Ming’s Restaurant, if it was looking to partner with a printing house, should have come to them, Hongyun Printing House.
After all, their printing house was the largest in the West Market, and its prices were reasonable.
Qiu Tao had originally thought he’d just have to stomach the pain of missing such a golden opportunity, but before long, his boss showed up.
This printing house had once been his boss’s passion project. And though the boss rarely involved himself in the business anymore, having left it almost entirely in Qiu Tao’s hands, the recent commotion over the official gazette was simply too big to ignore. His boss had summoned him directly to ask if the printing house’s revenue was ten times higher than usual this month.
After all, the roaring business outside Liufang Bookstore was plain for all of Shangjing City to see.
The moment Qiu Tao heard this, he dropped to his knees with a THUD.
His boss had just assumed that he had reconciled with Mrs. Feng and arranged for Hongyun Printing House to cooperate with Liufang Bookstore.
How could Qiu Tao dare to tell such a lie?
It was a lie that would be too easily exposed, so he had no choice but to confess everything. Then, he shifted all the blame onto Ming Lingyi’s shoulders. It wasn’t as if his boss was actually going to seek out the proprietress of Ming’s Restaurant and demand to know why she hadn’t partnered with Hongyun Printing House for their mutual benefit. He just claimed that Ming Lingyi had poor judgment, had chosen Guanwen Hall of her own accord, and had never even approached Hongyun Printing House, which was why they had missed out on this money-making opportunity.
With this explanation, Qiu Tao saw his boss’s expression finally soften a little.
’As long as it wasn’t my fault that profits didn’t increase this month, I’m fine.’
"Well, we can’t just sit on our hands," Hu Tuchao, the boss of Hongyun Printing House, said to Qiu Tao. "I know about her printing house. It’s just a hobby for her, it doesn’t do much business on a normal day, and it’s short on staff. I want you to take some gifts, pay her a formal visit, and get her permission for Hongyun Printing House to get in on this business with Guanwen Hall. Understood?"
Of course, Qiu Tao nodded.
’But how could he possibly be willing to do as Hu Tuchao said? Go to Feng Shuyu? The woman who had nearly driven him out, who had watched him grovel like a pathetic stray? Absolutely not!’
But he had to steal the business away from Liufang Bookstore and Guanwen Hall.
That was why Qiu Tao had come up with the idea to pirate Guanwen Hall’s printing blocks and do the printing himself.
However, when he first took these cheap official gazettes to the bookstores he knew, he hit a brick wall every time.
The paper and ink used by Guanwen Hall were incredibly expensive, but the final product looked completely different—it was high-class and elegant. In comparison, Qiu Tao’s version of the official gazette looked rather cheap and shoddy.
Hongyun Printing House had its own retail bookstore, but after just one day, they had lost more on the official gazettes than they had sold.
This type of official gazette wasn’t like a proper book; it was just a single sheet of paper. Someone who didn’t intend to buy it could read the whole thing in a glance or two. And for those who did buy it, it was just one sheet of flimsy, soft paper that was impossible to preserve. As a result, customers who had bought the pirated gazettes came back the very next day to return the useless things.
Qiu Tao had been fixated on using low prices to crush Liufang Bookstore, ensuring that neither it nor Guanwen Hall would be able to get back on their feet. To that end, he had printed a massive batch. He had been planning to make a grand move, but he never expected his venture to sink so spectacularly and so soon.
