"A female bandit?" An Hao’s eyebrows shot up as she reached out and grabbed An Ping’s ear, "Say that again for me?"
"Ouch, ouch, ouch! You really are like a female bandit!" An Ping’s features squeezed together in pain.
"Enough." An Hao let go and glared at him, "When no one’s around, you can joke around with me, but when there are so many people, it’s best not to call me a female bandit."
After being scolded, An Ping became more honest: "I got it, sis! Please help me out! I was just trying to recruit a few helpers for our family’s vegetable garden. Look at this bunch of old women, they’re about to eat me alive."
"How do you want me to help you?" An Hao smiled, "It seems my little brother is doing quite well, otherwise there wouldn’t be so many people coming to our door, right?"
Looking at the situation, it seemed like people from ten miles around had shown up, hadn’t they?
An Ping pulled An Hao into the back room: "Sis, our business is doing really well now, and the villagers are pretty jealous. Sometimes when folks walk by, they all want to get some vegetables from the garden. That’s all fine, but the key issue is that Dad and I have planted so much land, we simply can’t keep up. We work ourselves to death every day. The market’s pretty stable now, and our scale of planting is a bit small. I was thinking, since we have grown bigger, we wouldn’t mind growing even more. I was planning to hire a few people to help with the fields and then pay them a salary."
An Hao thought An Ping’s idea was good, and she raised both hands in agreement: "That’s no problem. You can even expand your market further. For example, supply to the clothing factory? Or even the military."
"The military? I don’t even dare to think about that," An Ping said excitedly. If they really could supply vegetables to the military, that would mean big earnings.
"Why not, ask brother-in-law’s father for some help?" An Ping was considering enlisting the aid of Qin Jian’s father.
"No. Don’t reveal any such connection. An Ping, you can negotiate on your own."
"What? Would the people in the military even let me through the gate?" An Ping worriedly said.
Qin Jian, who had been following behind An Hao, spoke up at this point: "I can help with that. No problem."
"Is that okay?" After all, it was using a backdoor. For someone as upright as Chief Ning, they probably wouldn’t like it, would they?
"Why wouldn’t it be okay? Later, Dad could provide an alternative option. The military has to make purchases every month anyway. At that time, let An Ping select fresh vegetables to send over, and if the price is fair, why wouldn’t it work? The warriors in the military would eat well, and a lot of money would be saved. Although the price per unit of vegetables for An Ping would be lower, the increase in volume would lead to earnings." And he could earn quite a bit of money.
Qin Jian knew his father would not abuse his authority, but he felt that his father would likely agree, as such an arrangement would be beneficial to both sides.
"That would be terrific." An Ping excitedly rubbed his hands together, "But we still need to hire workers. You saw the situation today. Did that crowd come to work? They practically came to pick out a son-in-law. It’s been nearly every day; I’m really fed up with it."
Why was it so hard just to hire someone?
"How many people do you need?" An Hao asked.
"I’ve already got three people here, and hiring two more would be enough. Let’s just start with that many for now. Too many and we wouldn’t be able to support so many employees." An Ping had gained some experience and done some calculations during these days of doing business.
An Hao thought for a moment and then said, "An Ping, I actually do have someone I can recommend to you."