126 Can You Deal with the Sudden Wealth Syndrome? (2/2)
She turned around to see Ning Que staring blankly in his seat. There was a very complicated and wondrous emotion on his face. He looked as if he had been hit silly by gold raining from the heavens but at the same time, looked as if the gold hitting his head had hurt him so badly that he wanted to cry.
”Young Master, you're a little odd today.” Sangsang looked at him curiously and asked, ”You looked really pitiful when we left the casino. It looked like you owed them hundreds of taels.”
”Can I not look pitiful? I've embarrassed myself thoroughly today. I have never done anything so stupid in my entire life.” Ning Que answered angrily. Thinking of the wad of notes lying beneath his bed, the look of irritation on his face was replaced with one of joy. ”However, if I can earn this much cash all the time, I wouldn't mind being stupid for the rest of my life, ” he continued.
After saying this, he wiped the smile off his face before indicating for Sangsang to sit on the stool in front of him with his hand. He said in a very serious manner, ”I think we need to have a family meeting”.
Family meetings were the hardest things he'd ever experienced in his past life. His subconscious must have been so traumatised, he continued having family meetings in this life even though there were just the two of them. He had them often no matter whether they were living in the Min Mountain or in the City of Wei.
Sangsang knew that the young master was going to speak nonsense endlessly. Handling it like a pro, she retrieved her needlework bag and changed into a comfortable pair of slippers before sitting down on the stool before him, ready to listen to his lecture respectfully.
”Every dormitory in the Academy has wise sayings from famous people hanging at the windows. While I think that the calligraphy is only average, the sayings are pretty good.”
Sangsang was concentrated on weaving shoe soles. She did not raise her head when she heard that but only sniffed lightly, indicating that her young master should continue. Ning Que shook his head at her. She had always been like that when they held family meetings despite him telling her off several times. He could do nothing but to ignore her and continue his speech, hoping that his only audience wouldn't run off.
”There was a saying that goes like that- One's environment changes his temperament. One's upbringing changes his constitution. What does this mean? It tells us that when you have two thousand tales of silver, you cannot be as miserly as when you have twenty tales of silver. You can't eat leftovers… ”
Upon hearing this, Sangsang raised her head and looked at him with a face of dissatisfaction and a mournful expression.
”Alright, thrift is a virtue. But you have to think about it. We are not lacking in money now and have over ten thousand tales of silver. The casino will send us our dividends every month. We cannot live like when we were poor anymore, and we shouldn't try as hard and do everything we can to earn money.”
Ning Que sighed with regret, ”In other words, scholars have to do scholarly things. Cultivators have to do what cultivators do. They have to live with self-restraint and sophistication and not think about counting on his skills to earn money. It doesn't look well in the eyes of people. I have decided, I shall not win money through cheating at the casino. I'm afraid the instructors at the Academy might die of anger if they found out about it. I've also decided that I will take down all my writings from the shop tomorrow. As for the business, let's collect writings from poor scholars and sell them for marginal profits.”
Sangsang drew the needle from the sole with a tug. She bit the string and it broke with a little ping. She looked at Ning Que with a face full of question. ”You're not even going to sell a single one? Young Master, don't you think it's a little like having sudden wealth syndrome?”
Ning Que was startled by her words and coughed lightly, saying, ”Your description isn't that apt. It's not called sudden wealth syndrome. It's more like, feeling at ease with a comfortable nest egg… We cannot display any sudden wealth syndrome, nor is the comfortable nest egg that comfortable. I guess we should still hang my calligraphy for sale but mark up the prices so that they won't sell for under one thousand pieces of gold.”
Sangsang thought that her young master's most expensive piece had only sold for twenty tales of silver and that was the only expensive piece he had sold. They had cooked up a feast to celebrate scamming an idiot then and now he's saying that he won't sell his calligraphy for under a thousand pieces of gold. There might be a lot of stupid wealthy people in Chang’an, but were there as many idiots for them to scam?
Ning Que saw the strong doubt in the handmaid's dark eyes and smiled. He said, ”Remember, we are now filthy rich. We don't need that kind of income. This is like spending a thousand pieces of gold to buy a horse carcass. It's just to get our name out there.”
…
…
Sangsang followed his instructions and took down most of his calligraphy works in the Old Brush Pen Shop before buying a large pile of writings from the Scent Workshop. When there are customers who would like to purchase Ning Que's writings, she would dutifully say that the owner's writings are extremely precious and they would only sell for one thousand pieces of gold.
However, what happened after that did not exactly go according to Ning Que’s imagination. The reputation of the Old Brush Pen Shop did not go up, but business got even worse. They received nothing other than sarcastic comments such as, ”Did the boss go nuts from being poor?”.
Now that the two are stinking rich, they did indeed develop the Sudden Wealth Syndrom. Even Sangsang wasn't as obsessed with the shop's income. Ning Que busied himself with studying in the Academy in hopes that he would ascend the second floor to learn more about the different magics.