Happy Third Day: Buying by the Tonne
“Five tonnes of fine salt, and five hundred jin of each of the other spices.”
Spices were luxuries after the apocalypse, while salt was a necessity. There was no harm in stocking up on more.
Besides, Jiang Muyun was planning to make some pickled vegetables.
Although her space could preserve fresh vegetables, it was obvious that such things could never be brought out in front of others during the apocalypse.
Pickled goods, dried foods, canned foods, and other items that were easy to store were the most common foods in the apocalypse.
After thinking for a moment, Jiang Muyun added, “One hundred jin of each type of chilli powder, and dried chillies too.”
Although she herself did not like spicy food, after the extreme cold arrived, chillies became the most popular seasoning.
She could prepare some and use them to trade with others later.
As soon as the boss heard the quantities Jiang Muyun wanted to buy, he immediately changed to paper and pen to take notes, and called for the workers in the shop to go find a vehicle to haul the goods.
Jiang Muyun continued listing items as if ordering from a menu.
“Ten boxes of dark soy sauce, one hundred boxes of light soy sauce. As for the other things like seafood soy sauce, give me two boxes of each for now. One hundred boxes of cooking wine, two hundred boxes of vinegar, all in those large bottles.” Jiang Muyun pointed at the 1.5–3L family-sized seasonings on the shelves.
Jiang Muyun herself loved sour flavours like her life depended on it. She was the kind of person who could drink the vinegar straight after finishing dumplings. Heaven knew how she had survived ten years in her previous life without vinegar.
As for cooking wine, she also had to prepare plenty of it.
After the acid rain, large areas of land lost the ability to grow crops, and animals also quietly began to mutate. Ninety percent of survivors in the apocalypse relied on insects and mushrooms to live.
As for the remaining people, aside from a small number of powerful elites, there were people like Jiang Muyun, who had good skills and enough courage to search everywhere for mutated animals and survive by hunting.
Mutated animals did indeed become larger than before, but mutated meat was truly awful to eat. Especially that foul, gamey stench—it was practically the real-life version of shit-flavoured chocolate.
Jiang Muyun felt that she could not rely only on stored goods without replenishing anything.
After the apocalypse, whether it was to conceal her space or to adapt to the new ecology, she needed to have the ability to survive even if she lost her space.
So spring onions, ginger, and cooking wine absolutely had to be enough!
“Five hundred jin each of ginger and garlic.”
Later, Jiang Muyun was also planning to dig up some soil and store it, to see whether she could develop a bit of farming. So she did not need to prepare too much of things like ginger and garlic. The five hundred jin she bought also included the portion she would use for pickling vegetables once she got home.
“Two hundred jin of every kind of sauce. I want every type of sauce in the shop. Can the spicy and non-spicy ones be loaded separately?”
The boss was so delighted his mouth could hardly close, and he repeatedly agreed. “Sure, sure. I’ll arrange for people to load them right away. And I’ll give you all those boxes of curry blocks for free. No. 32, X Village, right? We can deliver them this afternoon.”
Jiang Muyun accepted the goods list and glanced over it. Seeing no issues, she took out her phone and paid the deposit.
The boss’s shop did not look eye-catching, but just as he had said, he mainly did business with regular customers, and it was not as if he had never handled even larger orders.
Each item Jiang Muyun bought did not seem like much on its own, but she bought so many different categories.
And judging from what Jiang Muyun had hinted, she planned to continue buying from his shop later. Naturally, the boss was happy.
Altogether, Jiang Muyun spent more than a hundred thousand yuan.
And that was because most of the seasonings she wanted were local brands with cheap prices.
As for another important seasoning, sugar, Jiang Muyun could only withdraw some cash and buy it in scattered amounts along the way.
In Hua Country, white sugar was considered a strategic material. When white sugar and potassium nitrate were mixed in a certain ratio, they would form a product called KN-SU, namely potassium nitrate–sucrose.
After being heated, potassium nitrate–sucrose would undergo a chemical reaction and release large amounts of carbon dioxide and nitrogen. It was often used as a catalyst and combustion aid.
For ordinary household use, buying a few jin or even a few dozen jin was fine. But if someone stockpiled it in large quantities without a reasonable explanation, Hua Country officials would definitely come knocking.
After agreeing on the delivery time with the boss, it was already lunchtime.
As Jiang Muyun walked along the road, she could smell the fragrance of food drifting over from all directions.
Jiang Muyun touched her stomach. From yesterday until now, she had only eaten one bowl of instant noodles.
She had spent ten years in the apocalypse and had long since become numb to hunger. Her stomach had also been damaged by long-term starvation. Sometimes she could not even tell whether she was hungry or simply suffering from stomach pain.
I can’t live like that in this life. My luck is this good, so I have to live well, Jiang Muyun thought.
Not far ahead, Jiang Muyun saw the small restaurant that the auntie had recommended yesterday. She decided to extravagantly eat a big meal to celebrate the fact that great fortune must come after disaster!
Farmhouse steamed pork with rice flour, three-style cured meats, braised pork.
The auntie had said that this place’s steamed rice-flower fish was superb, so of course that could not be left out. Add a plate of sizzling prawns too.
And Hua Country’s divine dish, tomato and eggs, plus shredded potatoes. Finally, a plate of fresh, tender stir-fried seasonal greens!
Her stomach and intestines were still healthy right now. They could withstand the occasional indulgence!
By the time Jiang Muyun had eaten three bowls of rice under the restaurant owner’s stunned gaze, and finally leaned back in her chair while rubbing her stomach and drinking water, she was so full she could barely walk.
It had been so long since she had felt this kind of fullness.
The auntie really was all-powerful. The food at this restaurant was so delicious that Jiang Muyun wanted to swallow the plates too.
After eating and drinking her fill, Jiang Muyun had all the leftovers packed up. Watching the waiter skilfully pack the food, she suddenly had an idea.
“Sis, do you deliver meals here? I’d be ordering a lot.”
The waiter did not even need to ask the owner before answering directly, “We do. We deliver around here. Is it for workers? Should we pack them separately as boxed meals, or all together? If packed separately, spend over five hundred and we’ll knock off fifty. If packed together, we’ll knock off another twenty. Rice is free.”
Jiang Muyun did not hesitate at all. “Pack them together. For the dishes on this table, give me portions for fifty people each. For the other dishes, give me portions for ten people each.”
Two point eight million seemed like a lot, but once she started spending, it would disappear quickly. Of course, she had to save wherever she could.
The waiter was a little surprised now. “That much?”
There were many warehouses around here, but none of them were very large. Most people who rented them were small merchants using them as temporary transfer points. They would not store too many goods. But judging from the quantity Jiang Muyun was buying, there had to be at least seventy or eighty unloading workers, right?
Jiang Muyun smiled. “It’s not just for the warehouse here. Most of it is for a big warehouse in the neighbouring county. Everyone says your food is good, so I came here specially today to run this errand.”
The small restaurant was not big, and Jiang Muyun had not deliberately lowered her voice. The proprietress behind the cashier heard her words and smiled so widely her mouth could barely close. She called out loudly, “That’s right! Our cooking is famous! If it tastes good, come again!”
That evening, the amount of food Jiang Muyun received was truly generous. The restaurant’s original van could not fit everything, so they even borrowed the neighbouring shop’s vehicle to deliver it together.
After eating and drinking her fill, Jiang Muyun took a slight detour and walked to the small convenience shop from yesterday.
The person watching the shop was still the same auntie from yesterday. As soon as the auntie saw Jiang Muyun, she greeted her warmly.
Jiang Muyun entered the shop in a few quick steps and immediately asked for two cartons of the most expensive soft Zhonghua cigarettes in the store. The auntie smiled so hard her teeth showed.
After paying, Jiang Muyun asked as though casually, “Auntie, if I wanted to buy some local rice and flour, do you know where I should go?”
The auntie instinctively said, “Just go to the wholesale market to the east. They have everything there. We go there often.”
Jiang Muyun pretended to be interested. “Then Auntie, do you know which shop has good rice and flour? I’m unfamiliar around here and don’t really know how to judge. I’m afraid I’ll buy the wrong thing.”
The auntie smiled. “That, I’m not too sure about. We’re all villagers here. Our rice and flour are grown at home. Not many people go outside to buy them. How much do you want?”
Jiang Muyun estimated in her heart. If an adult ate an average of half a jin of rice every day, then they would consume nearly two hundred jin of rice in a year. If she stored fifty years’ worth for herself, she would need at least five tonnes of rice.
Jiang Muyun said, “At least ten or so tonnes of rice and flour. I’ll also need to buy quite a lot of oil.”
That amount was not small for a single farming household.
The auntie mentally calculated her family’s harvest this year. After setting aside what they would eat themselves, the fixed amount they would sell to the grain station, and a portion to sell to the grain shop—after all, the village had its old customs. It was fine to occasionally sell to outsiders to earn some money, but they could not damage neighbourly relationships because of it.
The auntie paused. After confirming that her family had enough grain, she lowered her voice and said, “If you want to buy rice and flour, then there’s no need to buy from the shops.”
Jiang Muyun smiled too and cooperatively lowered her voice. “What do you mean by that?”
The auntie said, “The rice and flour in the shops are all collected from the villages around us. They add a label, pack them in bags, and the price shoots right up.”
Jiang Muyun very tactfully stuffed a banknote into the auntie’s hand, then took two bottles of mineral water from the fridge. She twisted open one bottle and handed it to the auntie.
“Auntie, then tell me how exactly I should buy this rice and flour.”
This bit of loose change was not much. More importantly, Jiang Muyun’s attitude made the auntie feel thoroughly pleased and respected. She immediately patted her chest and said, “If you trust me, Auntie, then go to the Huimin Processing Factory to the south. When the villages around here harvest grain, they send it straight there for processing. They have rice, flour, oil, everything. It’s all new grain from this year. Just say Auntie Feng Cui sent you.” The two of them muttered together for a while and agreed on the price. Both felt they had profited, and they revealed a smile of mutual understanding.
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