Chapter 234: Gritting Teeth and Enduring

The owners of various restaurants clearly shared Ma Chun’s mindset. In their view, Fenglin Restaurant was just trying to scare people—those who were too timid to keep operating would regret it in a few days!
On the same day, these restaurants posted notices offering steep price cuts!
The wealthy in Autumn Wind City were delighted. They no longer needed to cook at home, dining at different restaurants each day—morning at one, noon at another, and evening at yet another. Compared to cooking at home, the cost was similar, yet the quality was far better, making it easy to choose.
Ling Zhengyang, confident in his strategy, was in high spirits and even ordered several specialty dishes from various restaurants for everyone to try.
As for Lin Dong, though he understood Fenglin Restaurant’s intentions, he chose to remain silent. His own restaurant needed to focus on fighting back. If they exposed Fenglin Restaurant’s schemes and some restaurants were forced to close, it would only add pressure to inns like his.
The next day, Fenglin Restaurant issued another notice: 50% off with copper cards, 40% off with silver cards.
The restaurant owners were thrilled. They believed the guild’s news had indeed emerged but was being suppressed by Fenglin Restaurant. Otherwise, Fenglin wouldn’t have rushed to suppress it. Even if they couldn’t force other restaurants to close, lower prices would attract more customers. Once the guild’s news spread, they would have more competitive advantages.
In less than an hour, ten major restaurants rushed to cut prices further, with those with more capital even reducing prices by 70%. At such prices, even Fenglin Restaurant’s low-cost, high-profit model would suffer losses.
On the third day, Fenglin Restaurant intensified its efforts: 40% off with copper cards, 30% off with silver cards—a loss-making sale.
Without surprise, including Lin’s Inn, which knew of Fenglin Restaurant’s scheme, all were drawn into Fenglin’s game, with prices dropping again and again.
That day, all eleven major restaurants in Autumn Wind City suffered losses. Lin’s Inn wasn’t faring any better. Despite having low-cost, high-quality beef balls and turtle stewed in maple leaves, it also ended up in the red.
On the fourth day, Fenglin Restaurant remained silent, but the wealthy customers began to stir. One after another, they brought gift boxes and flocked to the homes of the ultra-wealthy. By evening, they all headed to the residences of officials in Autumn Wind City.

Even the restaurant owners who hadn’t sent anyone to Fenglin Restaurant to gather information could tell from this move that news from the chamber of commerce had come out. Otherwise, these large businesses wouldn’t have rushed to curry favor with the big players and officials in Qiufeng City. Their goal was surely to get them to be more lenient in the future or to secure a share of business from the smaller merchants.

Sure enough, just the next day, some restaurant owners who were acquainted with Qiufeng City’s officials received word that Emperor Qianwei had officially approved changing guilds to chambers of commerce, with pricing to be handled by the chambers in each city. However, prices set by county-level chambers had to be approved by prefecture-level chambers before they could be implemented.

The time for a major counterattack had arrived. Without hesitation, all the large restaurants cut prices by half! As long as they could retain their customers, the loss would be only for a few days, at most a dozen days. By then, with customers in hand, even if Fenglin Restaurant was wealthy, it wouldn’t dare to keep cutting prices indefinitely. After all, they weren’t just competing against Qiufeng City but against the entire Great Han Kingdom. Moreover, such actions would amount to self-destruction—other large restaurants wouldn’t gain any advantage, while Fenglin Restaurant, with its large number of customers and many high-end clients, would suffer even more losses.

Even if Fenglin Restaurant were tempted to continue fighting among itself, once the chamber of commerce was established, prices wouldn’t be determined by Fenglin Restaurant anymore. Gradually raising prices would calm things down.

The next day, Fenglin Restaurant issued another announcement, one that gave all restaurant owners a glimmer of hope for victory. Copper cards would get a 30% discount, silver cards a 50% discount! Fenglin Restaurant had raised prices—actually, doubled them. This meant it would anger the large businesses and also indicated that Fenglin Restaurant could no longer afford to keep cutting prices.

This time, no other restaurants followed suit. Fenglin Restaurant’s price hike had angered its customers, presenting an excellent opportunity to poach them. Anyone who raised prices would be acting foolish.

For a while, instead of raising prices, other restaurants focused on promoting their unique features. All sorts of gimmicks were resorted to, just as before, leaving the smaller restaurants and eateries in a difficult situation.

In the large restaurants, spirit beasts and materials cost as little as one or two hundred coins per plate. Although still a bit expensive for ordinary people, it wasn’t impossible to try them once in a while. As a result, even the smaller restaurants, which should have been unaffected, were impacted. Though the impact wasn’t severe, it forced them to find ways to make up for it.

The obvious solution was to lower prices to steal business from the smaller eateries.

Turbulence swept through the restaurant industry of the Great Han Kingdom as Fenglin Restaurant’s price cuts triggered chaos, yet the imperial court remained calm. When the matter was occasionally brought up, it was suppressed. Days passed, and the various restaurants waited anxiously until finally, important news arrived. The regulations for the merchants’ association had been finalized after improvements based on existing guild rules. The only remaining challenge was how the associations in each city should collect silver. The association needed staff for external operations and travel expenses, as well as wages for its clerks and guards and for daily expenses—all of which required silver, undoubtedly to be paid by the merchants. The problem was how to collect this money. If charged per person at two silver coins per month, it wouldn’t be a big deal for large merchants but would represent a significant expense for small ones, even exceeding the benefits of joining the association. If the money came from large merchants, it would surely be gathered, but who should decide the association’s pricing? If all merchants voted, the large merchants who paid would surely object. But if voting rights were allocated based on contributions, it would mean all large merchants controlled the association, and their lower costs would lead to prices too low for small merchants to bear. In fact, this wasn’t such a big problem. Not only the owners of the restaurants but also all the wealthy merchants believed that in the end, it would be the large merchants who paid, with government oversight. As time went by, matters related to the association seemed to calm down, and the wealthy merchants lost their enthusiasm, as the establishment of the association was confirmed and most of the regulations were in place. Once the government was convinced, everything would be fine. Moreover, since Fenglin Restaurant’s food and drinks were more expensive than those of other restaurants, customers began to return. Seeing the increasing number of customers, the restaurant owners endured losses in the hope that things would improve once the association was officially established. After all, the silver and connections Fenglin Restaurant provided to the government couldn’t compare to those of all the restaurants combined. Once the association was established, not only would Fenglin Restaurant no longer be domineering, but it could also draw some large merchants from the smaller restaurants. At Lin’s Inn, Lin Dong was practicing under Yunlan’s protection when there was a knock at the door. Ma Chun brought news that surprised him—a visit from Wang Shuangxi and his son, along with Yi Yi. After a brief moment of distraction, Lin Dong smiled bitterly. If the whole family came together, they probably wanted to discuss strategies. But Lin’s Inn was already struggling to survive—where could there be any strategies?

Helplessly, since the guests had arrived, Lin Dong had no choice but to go out to greet them and lead the three of them to the back yard. After Ma Chun served tea and they exchanged a few words, as Lin Dong had expected, Wang Shuangxi said with a wry smile, “Manager Lin, how’s the business at Lin’s Inn?”
“What else can it be?” Lin Dong also smiled bitterly. “We have to hold on and wait for the chamber of commerce to be established.”
Wang Shuangxi sighed heavily and said helplessly, “Manager Lin, to be honest with you, we came here to ask Lin’s Inn for help.”
“Help?”
Lin Dong was puzzled. Although one of the features of Ke Lai Restaurant was its fair prices for dishes and drinks—reduced by 10% at once, resulting in even greater losses—four or five hundred taels of silver per day should still be sufficient to make it through.
Although Wang Shuangxi’s financial resources were among the lowest among the still-operating restaurants, having over a hundred thousand taels of silver on hand, it shouldn’t be a big problem to cover losses for a few months.
“Manager Lin, you know best what’s going on at Ke Lai Restaurant,” Wang Shuangxi explained. “I can hold on in the short term. But seeing the silver decrease day by day, I feel uneasy. I also don’t know if the chamber of commerce will be established in a month or two. If it isn’t established in a month or two, even if we manage to hold on until then, the remaining silver probably won’t be enough to raise the prices of dishes and drinks again.”
Lin Dong hesitated for a moment before speaking truthfully, “The chamber of commerce definitely won’t be established in a month or two.”
“Why? Did Manager Lin hear something from Lord Li?” Wang Shuangxi stood up in shock.
“Sort of,” Lin Dong nodded. He had asked Li Jiancheng, but there was no clear answer. All he knew was that not only the two major factions but also many princes were involved in this matter. The distribution of interests might happen within a few days, or it might take thirty to fifty days, or even three to five months. With such a major issue, Li Jiancheng certainly wouldn’t have any information about it.
“If that’s the case, then we really need Manager Lin’s help,” Wang Shuangxi said anxiously.
“Boss Wang, please go ahead. I’ll definitely help if I can,” Lin Dong nodded. Although they were losing money every day at the moment, the inn still had over four hundred thousand taels of silver on hand. Lin’s Inn in Xilan City also earned four or five hundred taels of silver per month. Even if Bai Jingtai brought a hundred thousand taels of spirit stones, there was no need to worry about borrowing money.
Wang Shuangxi took a deep breath and said, “I’d like to ask Manager Lin to allow Ke Lai Restaurant to accumulate points for Lin’s Inn’s VIP card system as well.”
“Ke Lai Restaurant accumulating points for Lin’s Inn’s VIP card system?” Lin Dong was confused.

Wang Shuangxi nodded and said, “Vitality Balls are used up quite a bit every day. If the VIP card from Lin’s Inn could also accumulate points for meals at KeLai Restaurant, it would mean that even if I raise prices, I could still help KeLai Restaurant retain its customers. If Manager Lin agrees, I’m willing to exchange 30% of KeLai Restaurant’s shares after the chamber of commerce is established.”
Lin Dong remained silent.