Chapter 130

The man took the paper, had a look at it and then said, “I only recognize a few simple characters on it, but there should not be any problem for me to carve them. Who will print it when it’s done?”

Qin Shuwu felt that it would be troublesome for Xu Ran to print it himself, so he said, “You shall print it as well. What’s the price? Give me a reasonable number.”

The man smiled, “Brother Qin, look at you, when had I charged you an unreasonable price? If not, my business here won’t be this good.”

Qin Shuwu didn’t take it seriously, “If you have a good business, you won’t have the time to gamble. So let’s talk about the price.”

“Brother Qin, don’t be impatient. I’ll put it this way, how about I charge you only one pence for carving one character, and another for printing one sheet.”

It sounded very cheap with one pence, but it would be a large amount of money for all, not to mention how many characters there would be on this paper. Even if he were to print one character in one piece of paper, they really couldn’t afford it.

Hearing that person’s words, Qin Shuwu was a little angry, “Zhao Mazi, you are not trying to scheme against me, are you? One pence for one word and one pence for one piece of paper. If I print a few hundred or thousand copies, I might need to give you my stall as payment?”

Seeing that Qin Shuwu was angry, the man turned meek and subservient, “Brother Qin, don’t be angry. Give me your price? I’ll make it a deal no matter how much you ask?”

“Since you said so, I’ll set the price. There aren’t many characters on it. You can refer to this size of the paper. I will give you one or two taels of silver. As for the print, I have to print at least 100 copies and there might be more in the future. I will give you 10 taels of silver, and we’ll see if I need more. And you shall buy the paper and ink yourself.”

“This, this, Brother Qin, this is too little. Whoever carves would ask more than that, let alone the print.” The man started to bargain.

“Do you think I don’t know what you carve for others? It’s just a few characters which would not cost you too much energy. Plus there’s a lot of repeated characters on it. You just need to carve it once, and this is the best price I can give. I’ve only come looking for you because I see that you don’t have much work recently. If you don’t do it, then I’ll go find someone else!”

Qin Shuwu pretended to set out, so the man hurriedly stopped him, “Don’t, Brother Qin, you know that I don’t have much business in such a cold day. I’ll do it. I’ll take as much as you say. We have a deal.”

After that person agreed, Qin Shuwu turned his eyes to Xu Ran.

Xu Ran nodded. The price was within his acceptable range. He said, “Then Brother Qin, let’s have it your way. I just wonder when I will get the booklet.”

“Ten days, It’s quick for me to carve, but the printing will take some time. You can come and get it in ten days.” the man said.

Xu Ran asked again, “Do you need a deposit first?”

The man waved his hand, “No need. You are Brother Qin’s younger brother. You can pay when you come get it next time.”

Xu Ran cupped his hands together. “Thank you.”

“Alright, alright, I can’t stand you pedantic guys. I’m going back to work. Brother Qin, you shall return!”

Qin Shuwu didn’t mind and left after speaking a few more words to Xu Ran.

At noon, they had lunch at Qin Family. Qin Shuwu offered his chess as if he was offering a treasure, and even pushed Xu Ran out to explain the chess game to the two old people at home.

Xu Ran had been very patient with the old. He explained patiently to the two. They both recognized some simple characters, so it was much faster to teach them than Mr. Hu.

And there were two of them who could practice with each other. Although they were bumps in the process, they were enjoying themselves.

After lunch, Qin Shuwu went to the shop. Xu Ran had nothing to do otherwise so he stayed with the two old people in the Qin Family. It was until about 5 o’clock in the afternoon when the two old people could play with each other did Xu Ran return home.

It was getting dark earlier and earlier, so it was better to go back early. He was all alone on his way home.

Xu Ran had been in a hurry. Nevertheless, it was already dark when he reached home just in time for dinner.

Xu Ran was planning to go to Xu An’s house and tell him about starting to make chess. There was no flashlight in this place. It was completely dark after dinner. Liu Tong stopped Xu Ran when he saw the sky outside.

“Ran, it’s already dark. Wait till tomorrow morning. There’s no need to rush. At this hour Wu Mei and the rest might have gone to bed.”

Xu Ran nodded after thinking about it, “Fine, I’ll go again tomorrow. It’s getting colder and colder. Remember to ask Shao Yu to start saving fire stone, or there won’t be enough next month.”

“I know, I had told him about it and I had told Shao Yu how to arrange everything at home. I can’t help you with things outside but I won’t have you worry about things at home.” Liu Tong felt a bit embarrassed when he said it.

Seeing him like this, Xu Ran felt that he might have started to overthink it, so he hugged him and kissed him, “Tongtong, how can you say that? You are a great contributor to our family. You must be tired from carrying such a big belly. He has been torturing you for so long. You just need to give birth to the baby in your stomach. I have got everything else under cover.”

Liu Tong touched his stomach and smiled gently. “He’s coming out in a month. Ran, do you want a Ge’er or a boy?”

Xu Ran touched his chin and thought about it seriously, “I had already had two boys. I kinda hope that I could have a Ge’er whom I would spoil a little, but if it is a boy, I won’t dislike either. Just deliver it, don’t worry!”

Liu Tong rolled his eyes at Xu Ran. “No one talks like you do. What do you mean by not dislike? Even if it’s a boy, you need to treat him as well as Tangtang Guoguo.”

Seeing that Liu Tong was getting angry, Xu Ran quickly nodded, “Yes, I definitely will.”

Liu Tong gave him a forgiving look. He paused for a moment and then asked, “Ran, we haven’t given the child a name yet. I don’t know if it’s a Ge’er or a boy, but he should have a nickname anyway!”

“Nickname, there should be one, but Tongtong, I want to know how you came up with the names of Tangtang and Guoguo. I wanna eat them whenever I hear the names!”

Liu Tong smiled embarrassedly when he mentioned it, “On the day I gave birth to Tangtang and Guoguo, Wu Mei came to see me. He stuffed me a candy in my hand. I looked at that candy and thought that you wouldn’t name the child and neither would dad-in-law and daddy-in-law so I would have to name him myself. And it happened to be a twins and Wu Mei had given me a candy in hand so I might as well name them Tangtang and Guoguo. Ran, Tangtang and Guoguo don’t have formal names yet.”

When he said the last sentence, he unconsciously felt a little sad that they still didn’t have formal names.

In fact, Xu Ran has always thought that there were. Although he didn’t know their names in his memory, he believed that there should be names. However, since everyone called them Tangtang and Guoguo, Xu Ran did not give it much thoughts. After all, every child had a name when they were born or before they were born.

Xu Ran said in a daze, “Then I’ll give the baby inside you a nickname first, and I’ll think about the formal names for three of them, alright?”

Liu Tong nodded. “Okay, then what do you have in mind for the nickname?”

Xu Ran recalled those protagonists who ran away pregnant in the romance drama and thought that calling him ball was actually quite good.

It got turned down by Liu Tong for the reason of the name being weird.

There was no ball in this era, not even Cuju (an ancient Chinese game which is “thought to have been the earliest form of football”), and the character “ball” had never been seen, which was indeed quite strange.

Xu Ran tilted his head and thought for a while, “Then what about Baozi (bun)? Let our son grow as white and fat as a bun.”

“But isn’t Mantou (steamed bun) even more like that?” Liu Tong asked.

Xu Ran started to explain to Liu Tong, “You don’t know it. Think about it, Mantou is quite big and white. What if our son grows as fat as steamed bun in the future?”

“But what’s it different from Baozi? Baozi is also fat and white.”

“Of course it’s different,” Xu Ran said righteously, “Baozi has fillings, and Mantou doesn’t. If Baozi has no fillings, he would definitely be skinnier. My son can be fat when he is a child, but he cannot be fat when he grows up.”

Liu Tong pondered for a while and felt that what Xu Ran said made sense, so he did not refute anymore. Therefore, the child’s nickname was settled.

Baozi.

After deciding the nickname, he should think about a formal name. It was really a hard job. Xu Ran racked his brain and thought about it for a long time without anything satisfying.

Liu Tong suddenly said to Xu Ran, “Ran, how about we name the child in our belly Xu Nian, meaning that he’s always be in our mind.”

“Xu Nian,” Xu Ran repeated in a low voice, and then happily kissed Liu Tong, “Tongtong, you are so smart. Whether he is a Ge’er or a boy, it’ll do and It’s enjoyable to the ears.”

Liu Tong smiled embarrassedly and was very happy with Xu Ran’s approval.

Xu Ran continued, “Then we’ll name Tangtang Xu Qing, Guoguo Xu Mu. I admire you, Tongtong! (Qing Mu means admiration)”

Liu Tong became even shyer after hearing it, but the smile on his face became more obvious.

The formal names of the three children were settled. Tangtang was called Xu Qing, Guoguo was called Xu Mu, and Baozi was called Xu Nian.