An Yan

Biodata

Feature	Value
Name	An Yan (安颜)
Alias(es)	An’an; Yan’er 84 56
Gender	Female
Affiliation	Jiang Nuan’s business ventures in Great Xia; formerly the An family 34 57 131
Occupation/Role	Merchant and shopkeeper; Jiang Nuan’s business partner and chosen elder sister 26 42 55
Family	Biological daughter of Minister An Laiyun; formally severs their family ties 57
Status	Alive in her latest documented main-story appearance 238
First Appearance	Chapter 25 in the provided material 25

Background / History

Switched identity and family mistreatment

An Yan is the true daughter of Minister An Laiyun, whose identity was switched with An Yuxue’s. Raised away from her biological family in the countryside, she spent years doing physical labor. Guagua later reveals that An Yuxue helped instigate her adoptive parents’ attempt to marry her to an old man and contacted mountain bandits in an effort to have her killed 29 55 56.

Returning to the Minister’s Residence did not give An Yan the security she expected. An Laiyun favored An Yuxue, accepted accusations against An Yan, and relegated his biological daughter to a dilapidated, secluded courtyard. He never publicly announced her true identity 25 57.

An Yan also carried a painful memory of a cousin who once cared for her but later rejected and humiliated her. Rice porridge became associated with that lost kindness 26.

Leaving the Minister’s Residence

After hearing Jiang Nuan’s warnings, An Laiyun investigated and overheard An Yuxue openly threatening An Yan. He found An Yan preparing to leave and refused her request to sign a Severance Letter 25.

His attempt at reconciliation consisted of moving her into an expensive courtyard. However, the flowers delivered there were lilies—An Yuxue’s favorites, to which An Yan was allergic. Unmoved by the gesture, An Yan left ten letters bearing her signature and fingerprint and departed. Unable to afford an inn, she sought shelter in a cave 25.

Rescue and a chosen sister

Guided by Guagua, Jiang Nuan found An Yan feverish beside a nearly extinguished fire. She administered a fever-reducing pill, had guards carry her to a nearby estate, and summoned a physician 26.

When An Yan regained consciousness, she discovered that she could hear Jiang Nuan’s thoughts. Those thoughts revealed sincere admiration for her as Great Xia’s future foremost female merchant. An Yan accepted Jiang Nuan’s offer to become sisters and later reaffirmed that choice: the girl had already shown her more kindness than her blood relatives 26 27.

An Yan initially knew little about Jiang Nuan’s background. She learned that her new younger sister was the Ninth Princess during the confrontation at the General’s Residence 30.

Establishing a business

Jiang Nuan gave An Yan half the gold recovered after the General’s Residence dispute, explicitly treating it as an investment. An Yan accepted and identified an underperforming jewelry shop in an excellent location as a possible acquisition. The shop belonged to Jiang Nuan’s Fourth Brother, Jiang Yehua 34.

An Yan prepared detailed business plans and favored combining jewelry with clothing: customers purchasing one could be encouraged to buy the other. Jiang Nuan contributed modern marketing methods and clothing concepts, while An Yan assessed their commercial value and translated the ideas into practical plans 42.

The venture developed quickly. An Yan reported one million taels in a single day’s takings. Later, palace-driven promotion emptied the shop’s stock and generated advance orders and deposits, requiring her to work overtime on production 54 71.

Sabotage and formal severance

An Yuxue hired a man to accuse the shop of selling clothing that caused a rash. An Yan offered a medical examination and promised to take responsibility if the shop was at fault, but the accuser refused and demanded compensation. The resulting alarm threatened sales and prompted refund demands 55.

Gu Qingfeng’s disciple exposed the supposed rash as painted marks. The accuser confessed, and An Yuxue was arrested on Jiang Yehua’s orders. An Yan ignored An Laiyun when he approached afterward and returned to work 56.

An Laiyun then demanded that she return home, arguing that she owed him lifelong obedience and that public business activity was disgraceful for a woman. When he threatened to disown her, An Yan accepted and prepared another Severance Letter. He signed it before Jiang Nuan and Jiang Yehua, formally ending their family ties. An Yan felt liberated rather than saddened 57.

Later work and recognition

An Yan continued expanding her work with trusted companions. Yun Shining helped manage the businesses, while Zhangsun Yi temporarily worked at the shop for room and board. An Yan later recruited Cen Xue as a temporary assistant after recognizing how readily she understood Jiang Nuan’s unusual ideas 84 166.

At the Peach Grove Poetry Gathering, An Yan organized promotion for new peach-blossom milk teas and offered one of three limited-edition peach-blossom outfits as a prize 131.

The Heavenly Screen’s historical presentation later includes An Yan among the figures associated with Jiang Nuan, though the supplied passage does not specify her individual accomplishments 249.

Appearance

• Striking beauty: A sea-green jacket draws admiration from the shopkeeper during her shopping trip with Jiang Nuan 28.
• Physical strength: Years of manual labor allow her to overpower Mao Yonghong and support the injured Yun Shining almost single-handedly 29 50.

Personality

An Yan values independence and dislikes owing favors, regarding debts of kindness as particularly difficult to repay. She has little desire for possessions: when Jiang Nuan takes her shopping, she chooses mostly gifts for her younger sister rather than purchases for herself 26 28.

Her guardedness does not prevent deep affection. She cooks for Jiang Nuan, welcomes her as family, and takes her ideas seriously despite her age. Jiang Nuan’s plan to provide affordable winter clothing also revives An Yan’s own wish to help others—a wish she had suppressed while struggling to protect herself 27 28 42.

An Yan becomes firm and unsentimental toward people who disregard her boundaries. She refuses her father’s demands, feels relief after severing ties, and turns strictly businesslike toward Zhangsun Yi when she believes he has deceived her. By contrast, she describes her independent working life as genuinely happy 57 84.

Abilities & Skills

Commercial judgment and shop management

• Evaluates location, local competition, product demand, and an existing shop’s losses before choosing a business model 34 42.
• Recognizes the potential for jewelry and clothing to increase each other’s sales 42.
• Organizes accounts and reports the shop’s daily takings 54.
• Seeks dependable assistants rather than attempting to manage every new project alone; worries that unsuitable hires could leak business secrets 50 54.
• Identifies hot pot as a restaurant opportunity, though Jiang Nuan explains that scarce, expensive seasonings make it impractical at that point 63.

Clothing design and promotion

• Has studied clothing design and understands most of Jiang Nuan’s explanations of puff sleeves, A-line skirts, lace trim, and other unfamiliar styles 42.
• Recognizes that cute character designs could appeal to children and girls 42.
• Supports producing duck- or goose-down winter clothing to help people who cannot afford adequate warmth 42 43.
• Develops her own event-based promotion, pairing peach-blossom drinks with a limited-edition outfit prize at the poetry gathering 131.

Hearing Jiang Nuan’s thoughts

• First notices the ability while recovering from her fever; initially assumes her illness has muddled her mind 26.
• Uses Jiang Nuan’s unspoken information to understand the Mao brothers’ identities and judge the prospects of acquiring Jiang Yehua’s shop 29 34.
• Learns Zhangsun Yi’s concealed family background and proposed marriage arrangement through Jiang Nuan’s thoughts 84.
• Remains among the people whose reactions confirm the mind-reading phenomenon when Jiang Nuan finally tests it 238.

Physical capability

• Nimbly dodges the maids attempting to seize her and incapacitates Mao Yonghong with a kick 29.
• Half-carries Yun Shining outside during her recovery 50.
• Her demonstrated strength comes from physical work; the supplied context does not establish formal martial-arts training or a ranked cultivation level 29 50.

Cooking

• Prepares sweet, savory, and spicy dishes when uncertain of Jiang Nuan’s preferences 28.
• Her braised lion’s head meatballs earn enthusiastic praise from Jiang Nuan 28.

Relationships

• Jiang Nuan — Rescuer, chosen younger sister, investor, and business partner. Their bond gives An Yan both emotional belonging and the means to pursue commerce 26 27 34 42.
• An Laiyun — Biological father, later formally estranged. His favoritism, neglect, and insistence on obedience culminate in a witnessed Severance Letter 25 55 57.
• An Yuxue — False heiress and hostile rival. She threatens An Yan, participates in earlier attempts to harm her, and stages an accusation against her shop 25 55 56.
• Yun Shining — Friend and business colleague. An Yan helps care for her while injured, and Yun later assists with shop work and promotions 50 84 131.
• Jiang Yehua — Supporter of the venture and witness to An Yan’s family severance. An Yan admires his competence and asks whether he can continue helping at the shop 54 57.
• Zhangsun Yi — Temporary employee and romantic pursuer. His joking offer to become a stay-at-home husband gives way to conflict when An Yan learns that he concealed his noble background and his father’s proposed match with Jiang Zixuan 84.
• Cen Xue — Temporary assistant recruited at An Yan’s insistence because she understands many of Jiang Nuan’s unfamiliar concepts 166.
• Guagua — Jiang Nuan’s system companion, whose physical manifestation An Yan witnesses during a meal 28.

Notable Quotes

“What hard work? My life is so much better now than it used to be, and I'm doing something I love. I feel really happy.” 84

“They're not outsiders. Just say whatever you have to say.”
— Defending Jiang Nuan and Jiang Yehua’s presence during her confrontation with An Laiyun 57

Trivia

• Guagua identifies An Yan as Great Xia’s future foremost female merchant. This is a revealed future, not a wealth ranking she has already achieved when Jiang Nuan rescues her 25 26.
• Jiang Nuan’s attempt to replace An Yan’s painful association with rice porridge backfires comically: after three days of plain porridge, An Yan is thoroughly tired of it 26.
• Jiang Nuan decides to use An Yan’s mistreatment as material for a novel so readers will condemn her father’s behavior 73.