The Evil Mother-in-law: Torment Children, Work Hard, Be Rich!-Chapter 354: Creating Hype for the Pigs

"Pandie, how did you sleep?"

"How many times did the child cry last night?"

"Is there enough breast milk?"

Tong Huaqiong came in and bombarded her niece with questions of concern.

Then she shooed everyone else out of the room.

Afterward, Tong Huaqiong stuffed the fifty silver notes she got from the Wu Family into Tong Pandi’s hands, and began probing into Tong Pandi’s background.

She held Hua Er in her arms, playing and singing a lullaby for a while.

"Our motherland is a garden, the flowers in the garden bloom brilliantly..."

"Let us row together, the little boat pushes the waves away, the beautiful white pagoda is reflected on the sea, surrounded by green trees and red walls..."

"Love how you walk alone through dark alleys, love how you don’t kneel, love how you face despair..."

Tong Huaqiong racked her brains singing popular songs from memory while carefully observing Tong Pandi’s reaction.

Tong Pandi’s face showed maternal gentleness, and she didn’t exhibit any surprise or excitement at Tong Huaqiong’s songs.

Could it be that she was pretending too well?

Unlikely.

Tong Huaqiong recalled how Tong Fusheng’s family came to her house, with Mrs. Wang complaining that Tong Huaqiong had changed to become like Tong Pandi, and from Mrs. Wang’s words, she learned that Tong Pandi’s personality had changed drastically last summer.

If Tong Pandi were from her hometown, she would never be content with having a child.

Now it was clear that Tong Pandi had a sense of regained affection towards Hua Er.

Tong Huaqiong confirmed a fact: Tong Pandi was a reborn Tong Pandi.

Realizing Tong Pandi was reborn, Tong Huaqiong felt slightly lost, disappointed that she still felt alone in this world.

But soon she felt happy for Tong Pandi, that her unfortunate niece was given a second chance, and more importantly, she didn’t resign to fate but worked hard to change the destiny of her previous life.

In this era, that was quite remarkable.

"Don’t think about anything, just focus on your postpartum confinement. After that, formally separate, and then live a good life with your two daughters. Heaven always leaves a way out," Tong Huaqiong said to Tong Pandi.

Tong Huaqiong planned to find someone in the village to take care of Tong Pandi during her confinement.

Liu Yueer, after her "confinement" period, needed to work in town, and fiery words from her might upset Tong Pandi.

So Tong Huaqiong never intended for Liu Yueer to take care of Tong Pandi during her confinement.

Just then, Mrs. Hong came to see Hua Er and upon learning that Tong Huaqiong was looking for someone to care for the confinement, she volunteered herself.

Tong Huaqiong understood Mrs. Hong’s feelings, she was more eager to take care of the baby than actually looking after Tong Pandi.

Taking care of someone during confinement is hard work, if Tong Huaqiong let Mrs. Hong do it, then Qinghe Bay’s top wife’s devotee, He Chao, would probably refuse to cooperate.

Thus, Tong Huaqiong thought of a compromise, hiring Mrs. Cao, Chun Ni’s mother, as their family worker to look after Tong Pandi, while Mrs. Hong could simply take care of the baby.

Mrs. Cao readily agreed.

Looking after Tong Pandi during her confinement was no difficult task for her, much easier than working in the pigpen, plus she got paid.

Tong Pandi therefore stayed at Tong Huaqiong’s home.

A few days later, Cai Wenpo came to visit, saying Ma Wenpo was being stubbornly pursued by the Xu Family of Black Dragon Pond, leading to her final admission that she broke the Xu Family grandson’s leg and was responsible for the deaths of several mothers and infants.

Two families of the deceased mothers made a huge uproar over this.

In the end, Ma Wenpo was sentenced to be executed, awaiting the execution by the end of the year.

As for those who caused Ma Wenpo to harm others’ families, some were also punished.

However, the families of other mothers who died at Ma Wenpo’s hands remained silent, as did their husbands’ families, thus escaping their fate.

Just like Pandie’s husband’s family, the Wu Family, without direct evidence and since Tong Pandi and the child were fine, they suffered no damage except for a damaged reputation.

Tong Pandi lived well at Tong Huaqiong’s, eating and sleeping well, looking even better than before giving birth, and Hua Er was well-fed and healthy.

Tong Pandi noticed her aunt’s entire family was different from the previous life.

Her cousin Jingzhe didn’t go to Wanliu Academy for studies.

The whole family of the eldest cousin was no longer a doormat at home.

Her aunt opened a pastry shop and a pesticide-seed shop.

Taohua didn’t get engaged to Fan Tong.

The honest eldest cousin even had an illegitimate child, and her cousin-in-law was pregnant again.

Most surprising to her was that Man Er, as a girl, was attending private school.

She suspected her aunt’s whole family was reborn, but after some time of observation, she found that wasn’t the case.

Nevertheless, she felt genuine happiness that her aunt’s family was living so vibrantly.

As Tong Pandi was nearing the end of her confinement, Tong Huaqiong’s pigpen welcomed great news. The sow gave birth to twelve piglets and the seventeen pigs raised in spring were ready for slaughter.

Tong Huaqiong was busy promoting her own pigs.

Seventeen pigs, aside from saving one for her own family’s Spring Festival, the rest were all to be sold.

Although a pig slaughtered before the Mid-Autumn Festival had sparked talk about how fragrant the pork was, it only circulated within a limited crowd and most people in Yan Guan Town and even Pingchuan County still had the impression that pork was smelly and gamey.

Before everyone accepted Tong Huaqiong’s pork, she wouldn’t rashly slaughter all sixteen pigs.

She didn’t intend to open a butcher shop, as that was too time-consuming. She only needed to manage the pig farm and supply pigs to butcher shops in the Ning City area.

After all, no one can monopolize all the business.

Her current focus was on convincing butcher shops to buy her pigs.

However, this didn’t trouble Tong Huaqiong, after all it was just a matter of marketing and building momentum.

She trusted the quality of her pork, believing once it reached the table, it would change consumers’ opinions, thus opening up the market for her pig farm.

Since her pigs were raised on refined feed, their cost would naturally be higher than others, and thus the price of pork would be higher, but not unaffordably so for the general public.

Butcher shops prioritize cost, and merely relying on Tong Huaqiong’s persuasion might not make them willing to purchase her live pigs.

She couldn’t just invite butcher stall owners to pig meat tastings by killing the pigs, as that’s not feasible.

Doing so might mean no profits on her pigs this year.

The only way was to adopt the first batch of pastries’ promotion method, by selling the pork to affluent families or well-off families who are picky eaters. Once they taste the delicious pork, they’ll certainly inquire around.

This inquiry would catch the attention of butcher shop owners, bringing business her way.

She wouldn’t even need to leave home, and buyers would come.

She wasn’t worried about Yan Guan Town, with Boss Qian’s big loud voice there, her pigs could seize Yan Guan Town’s butcher market.

Now she aimed to conquer the market in Pingchuan County and the surrounding towns of Yan Guan Town.

After devising a strategy, Tong Huaqiong had Gu Dahuan arrange for the slaughter of a large fat pig.

This time she didn’t ask Mr. Cao’s husband, Tian Fugui, to slaughter the pig but invited a butcher from the neighboring village.

After the pig was slaughtered, Tong Huaqiong personally took Gu Dahuan and hired hands like Ergou to Pingchuan County.

First, they went to County Magistrate Liu’s house to give Mrs. Han some pork.

Then they knocked on the doors of Pingchuan County’s wealthy families.

Initially, when stewards heard it was to sell pork, they wanted to close the door, but upon realizing it was Sui Feng Village Lady delivering the pork, they begrudgingly bought a few pounds.

Tong Huaqiong and her team spent over half a day successfully marketing a pig.

The affluent households, hearing that Sui Feng Village Lady was personally pushing pork sales, found it laughable how money-hungry she was, willing to risk her reputation for sales.

But once the prepared pork was served at the table, they began asking how to purchase Tong Huaqiong’s pork.