The Lucky Farmgirl
Chapter 852 - 830

Chapter 852: 830

Manbao sat with Madam Tang for half a day and received a list from her—names of powerful, influential, or wealthy ladies in Yizhou City who fancied peonies.

After leaving the County Governmental Office, Manbao hired an ox cart to leave the city.

Outside the city, there were flower farmers. Manbao stopped quite a distance from the flower fields and gave the hired cart driver a piece of silver, saying, "Please go into the village for me and buy two pots of peony flowers, red ones, any variety will do, just pretty ones. I’ll wait here for my brother. You can come back to pick me up later."

The driver hesitated, "Don’t you want to look at the flowers yourself?"

"No need, they’re just for personal viewing. As long as they’re red, I don’t have much requirement. Buy two pots, and the rest of the money is for your trouble."

Hearing this, the driver immediately took the money and was about to drive off when Manbao said, "Leave the cart, my brother will need to load things on it later."

The driver looked at Manbao skeptically, so she smiled and said, "Don’t worry, I won’t run off with your ox. I’m a doctor at Jishi Hall. If you don’t believe me, I can give you three taels of silver as a deposit, how about that?"

The driver hesitated for a moment, then said embarrassedly, "Well, Miss, you’d better give me three taels of silver as a deposit then. My ox is an important asset for my household."

Manbao expressed her understanding and took out three taels of silver from her pouch to give him.

After he left, Manbao then sat on the ox cart, closed her eyes slightly, and sank her consciousness into the system, "Keke, help me contact the flower trader we dealt with last time."

While helping her make the connection, Keke asked, "Do you intend to..."

"I want to buy some more flowers," Manbao said. "I talked with Madam Tang just now and only then did I realize that white peonies are rather ordinary among peonies. The reason the one I have, the one in the flower market and shops, could command such a high price is because of its pure color."

"Besides white peonies, yaohuang, moutan peony, and Er Qiao—these peony varieties are the most expensive."

As they spoke, they connected with the flower seller. Manbao had Keke reply on her behalf, "Describe yaohuang, moutan peony, and Er Qiao to him. I only want one pot of each variety, I don’t care if they’re hybrids, I just want ones with colors similar to ours. Also, I need twenty pots of pure white peonies, preferably similar to the one taken by the Prince of Yizhou’s residence this morning."

Keke made the request exactly as told.

For the seller in the future world, the color and size of flowers were not an issue; they could all be achieved through technological cultivation methods.

What was difficult to achieve was gene stability in plants.

These hybrid varieties that could only be produced through technological means typically could only maintain genetic balance for two generations. By the third generation, they would suffer from genetic instability, and 99.99% of such genetically unstable flowers would look awful.

And the generation of a flower is calculated by its blooming period; if a pot of flowers blooms twice a year, then by the second year, its genes would collapse. This is quite distressing for flower enthusiasts.

Hence, what future people pursued were ancient varieties with stable genes. Though they were difficult to cultivate and not as attractive or brightly colored as the hybrid varieties, these were not issues, as long as they could keep a pot of flowers for ten or eight years, with each year seeing an improvement—that sense of accomplishment was enough to delight them for ten or eight years.

The seller, guessing Manbao’s identity, was eager to serve her well, thinking that once they became familiar with each other through more business, he could obtain more from her.

Even though he had not yet thought of a way to bypass the main system of the Star Network to trade with Manbao, surely a way could be devised by people, couldn’t it?

The main thing was, he had to treat this one and only customer well.

So when Manbao requested that he pack these flowers in wooden boxes and mail them sealed, he did just that, and did not charge her for the packaging.

For you see, wooden boxes were not cheap.

Though the seller took a loss on this deal with Manbao, he finally got the chance to speak with her about something more personal, "Are you planning to grow these flowers yourself, or will you be selling them?"

"Selling them, why do you ask?"

"Nothing much, just a word of caution. These flowers might turn ugly after they bloom next year, so it might be best if you change your location next year, otherwise watch out for people coming to settle scores."

Manbao replied, "Alright, I’ll keep that in mind."

The seller shipped out the packed flowers and, as usual, told Manbao with a smile, "Next time you want to buy flowers, come to me. We’re running a large farm with all kinds of flowers."

Manbao felt okay working with him too, aside from what Keke said about him being prone to lying.

Manbao received two large boxes and one medium-sized box. She looked around and asked Keke, "Is anyone nearby?"

"There’s no one within an eight-hundred-meter radius."

So Manbao comfortably took out the boxes and had them stacked on the cart.

When the cart driver returned with two pots of flowers, he saw three boxed stacked on the ox cart, with Manbao sitting on the yoke, swinging her legs back and forth.

The driver approached and asked, "What’s this?"

"These are the flowers my brother bought. He’s got other things to do and won’t be joining us. Uncle, please take me and these items back."

The driver handed over the two pots of peony flowers to Manbao and, scratching his head in confusion, asked, "If your brother went to buy flowers, why did he send me to buy more?"

"These two pots are gifts from me, while those my brother bought are for giving to others. It’s different."

The driver then understood, chuckled, and said, "Is it because your brother was unwilling to spend money on flowers for you, and that’s why you secretly bought some yourself?"

Manbao just smiled and didn’t reply.

The driver returned the deposit to Manbao, then drove back to the city.

When Manbao got home, Bai Shan and the others had already returned from school early and had learned about that morning’s events from Zhou Lijun. They were quite indignant. Upon seeing Manbao rush through the door, they wanted to comfort her.

Seeing them, Manbao’s eyes lit up and she waved her hands, saying, "Good, you’re all home. Come out and help me move stuff. Daji, where’s Silang? Hurry and call him out to help."

Daji called for Zhou Silang, and everyone went out to see three boxes placed on the ox cart. These boxes, unlike the local square ones, were long, almost like coffins, except that the topmost one was shorter.

Zhou Silang looked at them, puzzled, and asked, "Who makes such boxes?"

The cart driver coughed lightly and said, "You see, you also find these boxes odd, right?"

In fact, he had wanted to mention it when he first saw them, but since Manbao was a guest, it would have been impolite to comment, so he had held it in the entire way.

Zhou Silang didn’t care about sparing Manbao’s feelings and nodded, saying, "Odd? Manbao, who made this box for

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