Cheng Nuo pushed open the picket fence of He Guixiang’s home and carried a sack of rice into the small courtyard.
She had purchased the rice from the Marketplace. She now used her single daily shopping opportunity exclusively to buy rice, flour, grain, and oil. The price of goods in town had skyrocketed. Because of the smallpox outbreak, rice that usually cost five wen per jin had risen to nearly twenty. Other staple foods had seen similar price hikes. The common folk lined up at the rice shops early, but many still went home empty-handed despite having money. Rumor had it that all merchant shipping to nearby towns had ceased; crews had been decimated by smallpox, and even if someone were now willing to pay to transport grain by sea, no one dared to take the job.
Cheng Nuo had delivered a bag of rice and a bag of flour to the Cheng Family that morning. Under the cover of the dimming dusk, she had withdrawn another bag of rice from the Marketplace to give to He Guixiang’s family. Fortunately, the Marketplace had a storage feature, otherwise she would have had no idea where to hide such a large quantity of grain. After several days of purchasing, her balance was visibly nearing three digits. If she didn’t find a way to acquire goods to sell back to the Marketplace soon, her daily shopping function would be shut down.
Chapter 34