"I just met with the Foreign Devil Shek Chi-yik this afternoon, and we haven't had dinner yet. Remember to tell the workers to tidy up. Tomorrow, the Foreign Devil will bring the purchasing manager from the department store to visit the factory. I'll go ask Sister Xiong to help make some food."
After leaving Lou Fengyun's room, Sister Xiong's wife and her husband were sitting at the kitchen door, picking and washing vegetables for tomorrow's use. Nowadays, the wig factory's grain and vegetables are supplied by the workers under Scribe Hui's command. The workers would deliver the vegetables needed by the factory the day before, so the couple didn't even need to do the purchasing; the grain and vegetables they needed were delivered directly to the kitchen.
"Sister Xiong, could you please make something to eat? We haven't had dinner yet, and we're hungry. How about you cook a couple of dishes, and Brother Xiong, would you like to have a couple of drinks with me?" Song Tianyao, lacking any boss-like demeanor, squatted down in front of Sister Xiong and her husband, offered Brother Xiong a cigarette, and said to Sister Xiong with a forced smile.
Sister Xiong put the vegetables back, clapped her hands, and said nonchalantly, "Cooking doesn't cost money, does it? You bosses act all generous all the time. Go to the kitchen and get the leftovers yourself..."
"I'll go make some dishes... Of course, the boss can't eat leftovers. Those leftovers can be taken home by the night shift girls tomorrow morning. You old hag, you have no family, without Boss Song's help, you and I would have starved to death long ago." Brother Xiong took the cigarette that Song Tianyao handed him, got up and walked towards the kitchen, scolding his wife for saying such things to Song Tianyao.
This time, instead of scolding her husband, Sister Xiong surprisingly offered an explanation. "It's because he's so philanthropic that I advised him to be more frugal. I wish his factory could run for decades, so you and I could work peacefully for decades until we die."
"It's just two dishes, it won't bankrupt me," Song Tianyao said with a smile as he lit a cigarette.
Although Sister Xiong was practically the leader of the female workers in the factory, when it came to cooking, it was always Brother Xiong was the head chef, while Sister Xiong was at most an assistant, doing things like washing rice, washing vegetables, and chopping vegetables.
Before long, the sounds of pots and pans clattering and the aroma of food filled the kitchen. Hearing the fragrance of the food, Sister Xiong turned around and went back to the kitchen to take out a small square table and set it up next to the kitchen. She also took out a small jar of Wujiapi and set out bowls and chopsticks. Fearing that the yard was a bit dark, she went back to the kitchen to get a windproof oil lamp, lit it, and placed it in the center of the square table.
The factory didn't have any high-quality ingredients; it was just the cheap dishes that the workers ate for their three meals a day. Brother Xiong skillfully stir-fried clams with black bean sauce and water spinach with beef, and also cut a small plate of char siu pork and brought it up. Although they weren't fancy dishes, just common dishes from a street food stall, the colorful presentation of the dishes made them quite appetizing.
Song Tianyao pulled up three stools and placed them over there, then called out from the courtyard, "Mr. Ning, come out and have a couple of drinks."
Hearing Song Tianyao call his name, Ning Zikun pushed open the door of a dormitory room and walked out.
The master swindler Ning Zikun, along with his disciple Song Sidi, set up Heavenly Immortal Scheme to swindle money from the poor. Song Tianyao accidentally stumbled upon it and brought him back to the factory to teach Song Tianyao, Lou Fengyun, and others how to judge the quality of hair cutting and the timing of the weaving process. After teaching them, Song Tianyao was supposed to pay Ning Zikun and his disciple to leave, but in the end, Song Sidi was the one who was driven away by Ning Zikun because of his stupidity, while Ning Zikun himself stayed.
According to Ning Zikun, if one has a comfortable life, who would want to stop setting up a business for more than ten years and then go back to their old ways? In his youth, he did indeed work as Eight Roles of the Thousand Gates, and with a few companions, he ventured to Macau, Beiping, the provincial capital, and even Shanghai Bund. He was a figure who roamed the world. After the victory of the War of Resistance Against Japan, he decisively retired from the business and never took action again.
When he set up the scheme, he was specifically responsible for being the "escape artist," the "escape general" in the "Eight Roles of the Thousand Gates of Deception" game, responsible for helping his companions successfully escape. Therefore, he knew how to make props such as wigs and beards for disguise. After retiring, he simply stayed in the provincial capital to make wigs and beards for the Cantonese opera troupe, thinking that he could enjoy his old age in peace after the war. However, he did not expect that the War of Liberation would start again and the Chinese Civil War would begin. What Ning Zikun found most unacceptable was that the banknotes issued by the Kuomintang depreciated too quickly. He was a con artist, and although he knew how to cheat money, he did not understand economics and finance. When he went to the bank to withdraw money, he realized that the banknotes he had worked so hard to cheat were now worthless.
Old Ning was so angry he vomited blood. He cursed the Kuomintang for being heartless and said that the banks were the real swindlers who didn't give good people a way to survive.
Indignant, he exchanged his devalued banknotes for his entire fortune of Hong Kong dollars 20,000 and fled to Hong Kong. Once there, he had no intention of returning to his old ways and continued making wigs and props for others. Besides, Hong Kong dollars 20,000 in savings might not be enough to make him a moderately wealthy person in Hong Kong, but if he was frugal, he could live comfortably for five or six years. With his wig-making skills, he could easily make a living for the rest of his life.
Ning Zikun believed that since the country was in chaos, Hong Kong was now under Britain control, there wouldn't be any more problems.
As a result, the Korean War broke out immediately. Britain became the second largest participant in the United Nations Forces and sent troops to North Korea. Rumors immediately began to circulate in Hong Kong, saying that once the Korean War ended, Mainland China would definitely take back Hong Kong by force.
Having suffered greatly from the war, Ning Zikun, who wanted to leave before the mainland could militarily retake Hong Kong, was forced to angrily return to the scene. He risked everything, spending a high price to buy three girls: Fu Xinniang, Shu Yan Shi Yin. Moreover, he didn't intend to kill the rich, believing that since Hong Kong was a colony, killing the poor wouldn't be taken seriously and was a safer option. So he independently set up a Heavenly Immortal Scheme to swindle money to retire overseas, but it all fell apart at the hands of Song Tianyao.
When Ning Zikun was teaching Song Tianyao and others how to ventilate at the factory, he had discussed this issue with Song Tianyao. Moreover, considering that Song Tianyao hadn't mistreated him, and that he wasn't allowed to leave the factory before the mission and was provided with wine and meat for every meal, Song Tianyao specifically used his own experience to advise Song Tianyao not to open a factory at this time. Otherwise, no matter how much capital he had, it wouldn't be enough to be swindled by the bank if there was another war, he would tell Song Tianyao about his own tragic experience as a bloody example.
As a result, he failed to persuade Song Tianyao. Instead, he was moved by Song Tianyao's words. He didn't want to leave his hometown at an old age and go overseas, only to be buried in the ground after death surrounded by foreigners, and become a ghost so that he couldn't understand the ghosts next door.
So after teaching Song Tianyao the techniques of hair weaving and styling, he sent his apprentice Song Sidi away, while he chose to stay in the factory to help Song Tianyao instruct the female workers. He could enjoy three meals a day and a salary of Hong Kong dollars 120 by going to the workshop a few times a day.