Chapter 706: The Five-Taels Cotton Padded Jacket
The women boarded the grand train, its whistle piercing the air as it chugged and clattered, carrying them towards an unknown new world.
The sheer novelty of riding a train filled them with an exhilarating sense of excitement.
Having never left Houjia Village in their lives, the women and children possessed a narrow view of the world. They simply found the train fascinating and fun, unaware that the technology it embodied was revolutionary for this era. No other place in the entire world possessed it; only Gao Family Village did.
The less they understood, the more joy they found in it; knowing too much often meant getting lost in surprise and shock, missing the simple beauty of the experience.
It wasn't long before the train pulled into Han City Station.
It was scheduled for a fifteen-minute stop here.
Some passengers disembarked, while new ones boarded.
Even with the women, children, and logistics soldiers combined, they didn't fill an entire carriage. A small portion of it was still occupied by other travelers coming and going.
A man dressed in merchant's clothes, with a Heavenly Lord statue embroidered in gold thread on his chest, boarded the train and entered the carriage occupied by the logistics team. His eyes immediately found Zhuge Wangchan, and he greeted him with a smile: "Well, well, Little Zhuge!"
Teng Yifeng laughed. "After so many years of development, Chengcheng County town is thriving, and cement sales there are starting to plateau. To keep the money rolling in, I need to open new factories in places where development is still picking up."
Zhuge Wangchan smiled. "Boss Teng's business is expanding rapidly; you'll be making a fortune!"
Teng Yifeng chuckled good-naturedly. "It's all thanks to the Heavenly Lord, the old sage himself."
As the two men chatted, the women nearby cautiously observed them. One sharp-eyed woman noticed that Teng Yifeng's Heavenly Lord statue was embroidered with gold thread, while Zhuge Wangchan's was done in cotton.
The contrast was quite striking.
She quietly approached one of the logistics soldiers and whispered, "Big Brother, with your Heavenly Lord statues, does gold embroidery mean you're a big shot, silver means a rank lower, and cotton thread means even lower? Like how the imperial court officials' robes are ranked?"
The logistics soldier chuckled. "Not at all! Gao Family Village doesn't have such a ranking system. What kind of thread you use for your Heavenly Lord statue is entirely up to personal preference."
"If you like gold thread, use gold thread; if you like cotton, use cotton. Naturally, wealthier folks often lean towards gold thread," the soldier explained with a smile. "But it's not absolute. For instance, our village's chief administrator, San Shier, is a person of the highest status and certainly not lacking money, yet he prefers using colorful cotton threads for his Heavenly Lord embroidery."
"Then there's Gao Sanwa, the most mischievous kid in the village; his Heavenly Lord image isn't embroidered at all. He spent a small fortune commissioning a craftsman to forge a copper badge with the Heavenly Lord's face carved into it."
The logistics soldier chuckled. "It's very open, really. Everyone is free to express themselves however they like. The Heavenly Lord himself encourages this, asking everyone to avoid showing class distinctions through clothing and such."
The women didn't fully grasp concepts like "class distinctions," but they understood one thing clearly: wealth allowed for individuality, while a lack of it meant sticking with the common cotton thread.
It seemed they'd need to pay close attention when considering marriage prospects!
They were still pondering the mysteries of the Heavenly Lord statues.
Teng Yifeng's attention turned to them. "Little Zhuge, what's the story with these women? Where did you 'recruit' them from?"
Zhuge Wangchan gave a wry smile. "There you go again, saying I 'recruit'! These are refugees rescued by the Heavenly Lord."
Teng Yifeng's eyes lit up. "Refugees, you say? They'll surely be looking for work once they reach Gao Family Village, won't they?"
Zhuge Wangchan replied, "Indeed! They'll need jobs."
Teng Yifeng was overjoyed. He quickly turned and gestured to the women. "Ladies, would you like to come work at my factory? My new cement plant needs cooks and cleaners. The pay is three catties of flour a day, with room and board included, and you'll even get year-end bonuses, zongzi, and mooncakes during festivals!"
The women all froze, utterly astonished by his words.
"Huh?"
The last time they'd heard such an offer was in Jishan County, from a young lady of a prominent family. At the time, the wages and benefits sounded so unbelievable, they'd dismissed the young lady as a con artist.
But now, hearing Teng Yifeng say it, they were bewildered.
One woman couldn't help but ask, "Are the wages for jobs here always so generous?"
"Er!" Teng Yifeng winced at the word "generous," a little embarrassed. "Ladies, please don't be sarcastic. I know these wages are quite ordinary, not generous at all. How about this: I'll give you an extra five catties of flour as a bonus at the end of the month."
The women gasped in disbelief: "!!!"
They thought his initial offer was already incredibly high, yet with a single question, he'd increased it.
Seeing the women bewildered, the logistics soldier, who had been escorting them, couldn't help but smile. He leaned closer to explain. "Actually, these wages aren't high at all. Grain prices in Gao Family Village are very low right now; a catty of flour is only seven or eight coppers at most. Three catties a day means earning just over twenty coppers, less than seven hundred coppers a month. It's truly not a high wage."
The women stammered, "What? What... what?"
The logistics soldier lowered his voice. "Cooking and cleaning, you see, are considered low-skill labor, so they only pay these subsistence-level wages. If you're skilled in weaving, sewing, or embroidery... then don't go work for Teng Yifeng. Go to the textile factory as a skilled female worker, and you could earn three taels of silver a month!"
The women gasped, "Three taels!!!"
Three taels of silver truly stunned them.
In the small village they used to live in, no one earned three taels of silver a month. They had only heard that their village chief had a distant relative, an oil merchant in Qinzhou City, who could earn four taels of silver a month.
Every time the village chief mentioned this oil merchant relative, he'd beam with pride, boasting about how capable and impressive his kin was.
Once, when the oil merchant visited the village chief's home in Houjia Village, all the village women flocked to see him. They marveled at his wife, who wore a beautiful floral cotton-padded jacket and had a silver hairpin in her hair.
That floral cotton-padded jacket alone would cost five taels of silver! The women of Houjia Village had never in their lives imagined affording such a garment.
They envied that woman beyond measure!
Now, hearing the wages offered at the Gao Family Village textile factory, the women were completely dumbfounded. "Three taels!" one exclaimed. "If I could earn three taels of silver a month, and the factory provided room and board, why would I even need to marry? I could raise my children myself, buy five-tael cotton-padded jackets for both myself and my child, and even wear a silver hairpin!"
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