vncnus Chapter 2 Selling vegetables
Chapter 2 Selling vegetables
It got dark quickly.
Since Yang Ming lives alone and his rented apartment is too small to cook, he usually eats outside or buys a box of instant noodles, adds some hot water, and eats them. In short, he can manage on his own.
Yang Ming made himself a bowl of instant noodles for dinner and then immersed himself in the farm space. In just three or four hours, tiny green sprouts, about three inches tall, had already emerged from the purple soil. These sprouts were lush and green, exceptionally beautiful, and seemed to exude a vibrant and lively feeling.
Although Yang Ming came from a rural background, he couldn't distinguish the different kinds of sprouts because they were still small. However, he was relieved, knowing that this farm space did indeed have magical effects.
Before he knew it, Yang Ming fell asleep on the bed. When he woke up, it was already broad daylight.
"How's the farm space doing?" Yang Ming thought to himself, and immediately focused his attention on the farm space to check the growth of the crops. Upon seeing this, Yang Ming couldn't help but smile.
What one could see was a dense layer of green in the farm. Since there was no need to consider the issues of light and soil nutrients in the space, the seedlings grew together, making full use of the farm's space.
Soybeans, mung beans, red beans, and other plants have grown to half a person's height. Peanuts, potatoes, and sweet potatoes cover the purple soil like a green carpet. Even more impressive are the tomatoes, whose vines have grown to more than a person's height. Dozens of tomato vines are neatly distributed in the field, covered with fist-sized fruits. However, these fruits are still green and covered with a layer of white fuzz, indicating that they have just begun to bear fruit and still have a lot of room to grow.
"Oh my god, I'm going to be rich, I'm going to be rich, hahaha... At this rate of growth, I'm guaranteed to prosper..."
knock knock...
Just as Yang Ming was indulging in his smug fantasy, a knock on the door pulled him back from his reverie: "It must be the landlady coming to collect the rent..." He quickly regained his composure and opened the door.
"Xiao Yang, I heard you hit the manager and lost your job? Why can't you just put up with it? Living life is about learning to be patient. What can't you overcome if you just put up with it?"
The landlady, Zheng Yun, was a kind elderly woman around 60 years old. She lived on the ground floor of the building below Yang Ming's rented room. She usually took good care of Yang Ming, but she and her husband lived alone without any children, and they were struggling financially, relying on the rent to make ends meet. This made it difficult for Yang Ming to delay paying the rent.
When the landlady greeted him with concern, Yang Ming simply pulled out his wallet from his pocket, counted out eight hundred-yuan bills, and said, "Auntie, this is this month's rent..."
"Are you struggling financially? Don't worry about the rent..." Landlady Zheng didn't take the 800 yuan, but instead asked with great concern.
"It's okay, I'm doing just fine. I just found a job yesterday, it pays four or five thousand a month," Yang Ming said.
"Take this first. Next month, when you get your salary, pay me back along with the rent. You should buy a suit and dress more formally, instead of always wearing T-shirts." Aunt Zheng said with a smile as she took out a wad of RMB from her pocket.
Seeing the thickness of that stack of old-fashioned bills, which was only about four hundred yuan, Yang Ming was truly moved. This was the first time he had felt warmth in this city, and his eyes involuntarily welled up with tears. He quickly said, "Thank you so much for taking such good care of me, ma'am. I really can't accept this money. The job I found isn't with any of those big companies, so I don't need to dress up nicely..."
The two women declined for a long time, but Yang Ming firmly refused. Zheng Dama had no choice but to take it back and said that if Yang Ming had any difficulties in life, he should come to her. Yang Ming thanked her repeatedly.
Two more days passed. During these two days, Yang Ming stayed in his rented room, making do with a packet of instant noodles whenever he was hungry.
That noon, the tomatoes planted in the farm space were finally ripe. The bright red tomatoes, each the size of a durian, looked like big red lanterns and were extremely tempting.
drop by drop...
A sharp reminder sounded in Yang Ming's mind. Yang Ming quickly opened the farm space and entered it with his mind. He saw that the tomato option on the screen was now showing as ripe, and the 'harvest' option had changed from gray to available.
Yang Ming quickly clicked the "Harvest" option, and a dialog box immediately appeared on the screen: The tomatoes are ripe, do you want to harvest them?
"Yes..." Yang Ming quickly nodded.
brush……
Yang Ming had just clicked "Yes" when the incredibly tempting, bright red tomatoes in his farm space vanished instantly, leaving only a few green ones hanging sparsely on the branches. Watching the heavy, abundant fruit disappear, Yang Ming suddenly felt a sense of emptiness. A dialog box appeared on the screen: "Tomatoes have been harvested and stored in the warehouse. View?"
"Yes!" Yang Ming is now counting on farming to make his fortune, so of course he wants to see where the tomatoes go after they are harvested.
The warehouse status was immediately displayed on the screen, with very concise information:
Storage type: 1
Name: Tomato
Quality: Normal
Weight: 3500 kg
There are two more buttons below: one is "Sell" and the other is "Manifest".
Yang Ming tried clicking on the manifestation, and another dialog box appeared on the screen: Please select weight (unit: kg). Below it was a keyboard-mode numeric table with ten numbers from 0 to 9 for inputting data.
Below that is an "OK" button.
Yang Ming simply typed in 100 and clicked OK.
In an instant, a pile of tomatoes appeared out of thin air in Yang Ming's hut. He counted them; there were exactly 40. Each one was the size of a durian and emitted an extremely tempting aroma.
Glug glug...
The fragrant aroma whetted Yang Ming's appetite, and his stomach suddenly growled. Unable to resist any longer, Yang Ming picked up a tomato and took a big bite.
It's incredibly refreshing, sweet and juicy, with a hint of sand and a very faint sourness, yet it's so tempting that you'll want to swallow your tongue.
"Delicious... If this stuff were taken to the market, it would definitely sell for 10 yuan a pound and be a hot seller..." Yang Ming looked at the pile of tomatoes and then thought about the remaining 3400 kilograms in the warehouse, his eyes practically glowing with greed.
For the past three days, Yang Ming had been constantly on edge, worried that the produce grown in his farm space wouldn't taste good, and that he wouldn't be able to harvest the crops. (The harvest option for unripe tomatoes was grayed out, and there was no "manifest" button.) Now, he was finally half relieved. His priority now was to take the tomatoes to the market to test the waters.
Yang Ming and Aunt Zheng borrowed a tricycle and an electronic scale. They found some cardboard boxes, packed 39 tomatoes into them, and then loaded them onto the tricycle. Yang Ming rode the tricycle towards the vegetable market.
Sweating profusely, Yang Ming finally arrived at the vegetable market. It was already afternoon, and there weren't many people in the market. Yang Ming paid the management fee, received a receipt, found a temporary stall in the market, opened his box, and began selling tomatoes.
The extra-large tomatoes looked fantastic, and their enticing aroma quickly attracted many customers.
"Young man, these are tomatoes? How come they're so big? And they smell really good!" A middle-aged woman in her forties, with a small basket slung over her arm, bent over and carefully examined the enormous tomatoes. A thin gold necklace hung from her neck. "Tsk tsk, they all look exactly the same! How much are they?"
"Auntie, this is a tomato, a new variety, 10 yuan a pound..." Yang Ming said with a smile.
"Young man, tomatoes are usually only 50 cents a pound, why are yours so expensive?" the middle-aged woman said, frowning.
"Auntie, you really can't blame me for this. I didn't want to sell them at such a high price either, but my tomatoes are so delicious. If I sell them for 50 cents a pound, how will the other vendors sell them? I'm trying to differentiate myself from everyone else, otherwise I'll be blocking their path to wealth. Everyone works hard from dawn till dusk to make a living, isn't that easy?" Yang Ming said logically.
The middle-aged woman curled her lip: "How many tomatoes do you have? Are you blocking someone's path to making money?"
"You can have as many as you want... Our new variety is not only big and delicious, but also highly productive! I can guarantee you that it's absolutely delicious, no less than those fruits that cost hundreds of yuan per kilogram..." Yang Ming said.
"What you say makes sense, young man. Then weigh one for me..." The middle-aged woman was already drooling from the aroma of the tomatoes. She didn't bother to haggle with Yang Ming and simply picked a tomato from the box.
"Okay..." Yang Ming replied, quickly setting out the electronic scale and placing the tomatoes on it. Each tomato weighed exactly five pounds. "Thank you, Auntie, that's fifty yuan..."
"Here you go!" The middle-aged woman handed Yang Ming a fifty-yuan note, took the tomatoes, and put them into the small basket slung over her arm. She was really embarrassed to start eating them in front of so many people, even though she kept swallowing her saliva.
Everything is difficult at the beginning. Once there is one, there will be two. Once the first person tries something new, there will be no shortage of others. A middle-aged woman spent fifty yuan to buy an extra-large tomato, and immediately others followed suit. The fresh fragrance emanating from the tomato was already tempting. Before long, all 38 tomatoes were sold out.
"It's selling quite well at 10 yuan per jin. People's quality of life is getting higher and higher. This truckload weighs 195 jin and sold for 1950 yuan. In the farm space, it has grown 7000 jin in the past three days. If it's all 10 yuan per jin, that's... 70000 yuan... You can harvest 10 times a month... My God, that's 70 yuan a month..." Yang Ming counted the money while calculating in his mind. The more he calculated, the more surprised he became. If this continues, he can buy a three-bedroom, two-living-room house in S City in two months.
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