29. The Three Conditions
Hearing the girl’s words, Chen Wanchun was clearly surprised.
Mainly because this girl, who didn’t look very old, could actually say such things.
If the so-called Miss Yan hadn’t taught her this beforehand, then this girl’s character was far more noteworthy than her appearance.
“Of course,” Gong Yiling, seeing him silent for a moment, suddenly blinked with a mischievous expression. “These are the words my young lady asked me to convey. I don’t understand what they mean. Do you, Elder?”
“Is that so?” Chen Wanchun looked at the girl again, feeling that she wasn’t what he had initially thought. He couldn’t help but raise an eyebrow. “Your young lady is quite at ease letting you convey these things.”
“That’s because my young lady knew beforehand what the elder would say, so she had me prepare my words.” Gong Yiling smiled. “But if the elder says anything else I don’t understand, then I’ll have to ask you to leave.”
These words almost completely shut down Chen Wanchun’s idea of continuing to probe. He could only treat all of this as some kind of real coincidence.
Chen Wanchun frowned and said in a deep voice, “What does your young lady mean?”
“Actually, your predicament is not difficult to handle.” Gong Yiling replied, “Those herbs are indeed what my young lady needs, but her money is not so easy to part with. If you want her to help, you need to agree to three conditions.”
Chen Wanchun considered for a moment, then nodded. “Please speak freely.”
“First, my young lady needs you to give up your bid for the Lingxiao Pavilion. This shouldn’t be a problem for you, right?”
Chen Wanchun thought for a moment, then nodded.
She was right. They did know about this matter, and the shortage of raw materials in that pharmacy was not their doing, but because the other party seemed to have offended someone, and their supply channels had been robbed seventeen or eighteen times. Who could stand that?
Although they had thought about taking this bid, with His Majesty the Emperor’s thoughts, the possibility of these old pharmaceutical companies winning the bid was very small, so they were basically just there to make up the numbers.
“Second, my young lady is opening a shop here, not to embarrass you. Everyone should compete peacefully. There’s no reason to fight to the death.”
“But since you were the ones who started this, my young lady will certainly not be a pushover. Therefore, she has said that she needs you to abolish all commercial orders and written agreements with all other raw material suppliers in the capital.”
“What did you say!?”
The first request was painless. Chen Wanchun instinctively felt that this girl wouldn’t really make an unacceptable condition.
But this little girl had just slapped him in the face.
The raw materials and these pharmaceutical companies were basically a mutually beneficial and bundled existence. The reason they could force the raw material merchants to sell everything to them before was because their sales channels were limited. Who else could they sell to?
And there were indeed some other agreements between the two, such as in certain seasons, the output of a certain herb would increase. If these herbs couldn’t be quickly turned into pills, it would cause a lot of losses, but these pills were not necessities.
This kind of forced purchase agreement was also a way to protect the raw material merchants. Everyone did it.
But now, this girl had directly abolished this method. This way, those raw material merchants would definitely try to find new partners. And who else could be a partner?
“Your young lady has a big appetite.” Chen Wanchun sneered. “Can she really handle so many herbs?”
“If she can’t, she can ask others to eat with her.” Miss Gong’s face still showed an innocent smile. “My young lady thinks that the Youcang Court might be a good choice.”
“What!?”
This hit his weak spot, or rather, Gong Yiling was originally aiming for this weak spot.
It was to let this old man experience what a surprise was.
If everything went through the Youcang Court, then they would really have no qualifications to compete with His Majesty the Emperor in the future.
And this, on the contrary, actually had some room for maneuver. The main thing was that this girl didn’t seem to be able to really supervise their contact with those merchants.
At that time, they just needed to inform them in advance and let them know their difficulties. After the matter was over, they would burn the bridge after crossing it. Wouldn’t this matter just be over?
With this thought, Chen Wanchun nodded. “Alright.”
“Okay, then the third.”
Gong Yiling, seeing his expression, had actually already guessed what he was thinking.
And the third, was the key to completely shattering his thoughts.
“Those herbs, although my young lady will buy them back at three times your purchase price, she will only buy back one-tenth of them each month.”
“And after my young lady has paid, she doesn’t want to see the herbs, but the corresponding pills. During this period, if what you do makes my young lady dissatisfied, this agreement will be immediately void.”
The third request sounded very long, but its core content was actually just a few sentences.
I’ll pay, and you’ll process the things into pills, but I’ll only take away one-tenth of them each month. If you don’t abide by the second agreement, then we’ll part ways.
It seemed that this clause did not threaten the second content, but you had to know that these pharmaceutical companies had very little money now, and all they had were pills.
They had now lost two foreign sales places, and only one domestic one was still under the supervision of the Youcang Court. If this girl only provided them with so much money each month, it was not enough to maintain trade with the raw material merchants.
This was a full ten months. Although they could operate, people couldn’t drink the northwest wind for nearly a year, right?
This move completely sealed their attempt to play tricks, and a series of moves severely hit the foundation of the local pharmaceutical companies.
And the most crucial thing was that they really had no way.
“Is this the final say, with no room for compromise?” Chen Wanchun’s appearance became much older, and he suddenly admired the person who had thought of these three conditions.
At the beginning, he only thought the visitor was a somewhat famous alchemist, but he had seen many famous people. How many could not bow their heads under their joint attack?
The balance between business and royalty had never been said to be absolutely one-sided.
And this time, this girl had only used a few days to cause a heavy blow to the major pharmaceutical companies, and they had to accept this kind of thing that was clearly taking advantage of them when they were down.
“Your young lady is truly a phoenix among men.”
