Transmigrated as a Stepmother: Time to Bring the Family to Prosper!-Chapter 445: Literacy Is No Easy Feat

Afraid that her son might overstep, Song Yu scolded him once.

Qin Yao waved her hand to show it was okay. Little Lai Fu was quite obedient, unlike those at home who kept asking why and how, simply to be noisy.

So, Song Yu also listened quietly to Qin Yao’s explanation.

After all, the Song Zhang Ancestral Land was in the most prosperous Jiangdu Prefecture; before this, the family of three had only visited the most secluded place, which was the county town of Kaiyang County.

Going up trees to pick tea fruits, going down the field to plant rice seedlings, all were experiences for the first time!

The father and son marveled throughout the journey, arriving at the stationery factory.

"Master!" Yin Le squatted by the water vat, struggling to wave the vegetables she was about to wash.

Qin Yao glanced over, "Call me Manager Qin."

Yin Le instantly wilted, "Oh, Manager Qin..."

She wanted to say a few more words to the master, but the person was already gone.

Yin Le sighed; earlier in the morning, she had asked the steward, Liu Qi, who was teaching the literacy class. He told her, learning five characters a day, it would take no less than two hundred days to reach a thousand characters.

To Yin Le, it was undoubtedly like being struck by lightning.

But clearly, there was more than one solution, Yin Le thought, then I’ll learn ten characters a day, even twenty!

Thus, the time could be halved, or even reduced to one quarter.

However, she quickly faced a new problem; she asked General Manager Liu Qi if he could teach her a few more characters each day.

Immediately, she saw General Manager Liu Qi’s embarrassed expression. He said, "I barely know a thousand characters myself; I’m afraid I can’t teach you."

But he gave her a suggestion, telling her to go to the county town to find a teacher.

Yin Le’s face fell; the county academy didn’t accept female students. Where could she learn a thousand characters?

She wasn’t stupid and quickly realized that the master deliberately set a trap for her knowing she couldn’t learn a thousand characters, preventing her from becoming an apprentice.

Thus, early in the morning, she waited for Qin Yao at the canteen entrance, hoping to lower the threshold of learning a thousand characters.

To her surprise, as soon as she spoke, the person disappeared.

"Sigh~" Recognizing characters wasn’t easy, Yin Le sighed.

Meanwhile, Qin Yao took Song Yu and his son to familiarize themselves with the situation at the factory, calling all the stewards and general managers to meet and introduce themselves.

Qin Yao had already hinted at finding a shopkeeper to replace her. This time, she suddenly gathered everyone for a short meeting to announce Song Yu’s arrival. After the initial surprise, everyone accepted it.

Now, the stationery factory had become Qin Yao’s personal property; she made the decisions. As Song Yu showcased some of his management skills, people couldn’t help but be convinced.

These people, except for Qian Wang, the rest were forced into their positions, having learned a few characters and read some sentences, but far from writing or calculating.

After the short meeting, Song Yu stayed in the factory.

He chose Qian Wang, intending to start with the factory accounts, using the whole day to grasp the expenditure situation of several departments to facilitate the work the next day.

Song Yu’s idea was to be the main family’s money-making tool, merely maintaining the existing profit, knowing the main family wouldn’t be satisfied.

Moreover, there was a one-month probation test weighing heavily on him, and Song Yu dared not relax. 𝚏𝗿𝗲𝐞𝚠𝕖𝐛𝗻𝗼𝐯𝕖𝚕.𝚌𝗼𝗺

Upon inspection, Song Yu found that the existing model, apart from the assembly line concept, was imperfect: workers’ utilization was less than seventy percent.

Moreover, the stationery factory produced only two products: stationery gift boxes and Divine Power book boxes.

Both were the original versions without any innovation in over a year!

Even so, it was able to make money, with orders lasting until mid-year, which Song Yu found incredible.

However, that’s just what he saw after arriving.

During lunch at the canteen with the workers and stewards, Song Yu learned from their conversations that initially, the stationery factory’s conditions weren’t as good as they were now.

The road into the village was only completed at the end of last year, and the procurement network gradually matured at the beginning of this year, stabilizing the procurement costs.

Moreover, Qin Yao strictly controlled her personal profit line not exceeding thirty percent.

The rest of the profit was given to the workers—those occasional benefits like rice, flour, oil supplies, winter charcoal, and summer cooling soup.

Furthermore, each year she pays a portion of the land rent to the clan and the fees for quarrying rocks and wood.

The road built in the village was entirely funded from the factory’s profits.

Just after one lunch, Song Yu reassessed his wife’s true desires.

More profit didn’t seem to be the necessary condition to pass the test.

Perhaps, the wife wanted the current business model to be maintained long-term.

Song Yu held his head; the latter goal was more difficult to achieve than the former.

Simply increasing profit, he could quickly raise the silver reaching his wife’s hands by thirty percent.

The method was simple: squeezing workers to their limits and cutting unnecessary expenses would save a huge amount of silver.

Sadly, after lunch, he realized if he did that, in less than a half-month, his wife would pack up their family and send them back.

As Song Yu struggled, Qin Yao had already found temporary housing in the village for Mrs. Li and Little Lai Fu.

At Old Liu’s house.

Some rooms had been newly built before the year-end; Liu Bai, Liu Zhong, and Liu Fei each had their own room.

Jinhua and Jinbao now had their rooms, with Liu Fei’s old room vacant.

Originally, Mrs. Zhang thought of quickly bringing a daughter-in-law into the house, but Liu Fei had directly gone to the county town, under the high and righteous guise of studying. What could she do!

Knowing these daughters-in-law had their small home and unwilling to mingle with the uncles and sisters-in-law anymore, the new rooms all had stoves installed.

According to Old Liu’s idea, as long as they lived in the same yard, it was convenient for him to watch the grandchildren, and families wanting to cook separately was acceptable.

Occasionally being able to cook a good meal, He and Mrs. Qiu were finding life very satisfactory now.

Private desires satisfied, the large family had become quite harmonious.

It was just a pity about Liu Fei’s room, empty and desolate, causing Mrs. Zhang anger each time she saw it.

Qin Yao, leading Mrs. Li in to rent a room, had Mrs. Zhang point to Liu Fei’s vacant new room, "Just in time, rent it out and see where he sleeps when he returns!"

This was just talk; Qin Yao took it lightly and led Mrs. Li to see Liu Fei’s old room.

Because it was built later, it was quite remote, located in the eastern corner of the old house; just a few steps to the back door, crossing a small vegetable plot led to the road, and beyond the road was the river—washing and sweeping using water was very convenient.

The only drawback was living in someone else’s house always felt a bit constrained.

Qin Yao said, "This is only temporary. After the busy farming season, the house will need some renovations, and then I can build a room near the martial practice ground on the back hill, so you can move there."