At three-quarters past the Mao hour, the East Market was still brushing the frost from its bluestone slabs when Pei Hongxiu's weaving workshop was surrounded so tightly by Persian merchants that not even water could leak through. Ali charged into the dyeing room clutching a Persian carpet, his glazed glass bracelets clanking sharply against the doorframe. "Zhang Yifan! You cut off my livelihood, so I'll cut off your looms!" Behind him followed grain merchants and tea merchants, every single one of them wearing leaden expressions and gripping joint boycott petitions in their fists.
"Well, well, is this an attempted palace coup?" Zhang Yifan twirled his Abacus Bead Pouch, the indigo abacus beads clicking together at his fingertips to form the character for 'Harmony'. "Persian merchants sell poisonous cloth, while Han merchants protect the common people. How did it somehow become my fault?" Huwa immediately carved a little figure holding an abacus on the boycott petition, the abacus bead's tongue licking the character for 'Poison', which coaxed muffled giggles out of the grain merchants.
Xiao Moli appeared carrying her newly painted *Merchant Road Win-Win Scroll*, which depicted Persian and Han merchants drinking a cup of tea together, while Huwa's ghost-face abacus beads 'swam' inside the teacup. "Please take a look, everyone. Persian glazed glass and Tang Brocade indigo can perfectly complement each other—" She suddenly pointed toward the double-colored cloth in the dye vat.…
Chapter 104