Chapter 217 (Patreon)

I watch Lin Quingyu look at Lianhua, turn her head toward the patterns still lying on her table, and then look back at Lianhua. And so on several times, as if she were trying to match what she has in front of her with what she couldn’t make sense of on paper a moment ago.

From my chair, pressed up against the edge of the table, I have to twist my body as far as the backrest allows to see the two of them at once, and what I see on Lin Quingyu’s face is the expression of someone who has just found a bargain in a jewelry shop.

Lianhua, on the other hand, is exactly the same as before. Still beside the wall, with her clothes open just enough, waiting for me to tell her she can close them again.

In the end, Lin Quingyu takes a step back, goes around the table on the same side she came out from and sits down in her chair, and for a moment she stays still, with both hands resting on the papers and breathing slowly, like someone counting to ten before saying something she might regret.

Lianhua, meanwhile, closes her clothes with the same short movements with which she opened them, adjusts her belt and goes back to her chair, to my left and a little behind, as calmly as if she had gotten up for a cup of tea.

On my right, Xia is staring at her own knees. Her ears are the same color they were at breakfast this morning, and she hasn’t said a single word since Lianhua undid the first fastening.

Lin Quingyu looks up at me.

“Sun Wen”, she tells me. “If you had something like this in your hands, why did you not show it to me the first day you came to this office?”

And she says it in a tone I have never heard from her.

Until now, Lin Quingyu has spoken to me with courtesy, with patience, with grievance when her distribution department had her cornered because of the backpack, and once or twice even with something resembling amusement. But never like this, with that hint of resentment of someone who has just discovered that someone has been hiding a treasure from her for months.

It takes me a moment to understand it, although when I do, it makes all the sense in the world.

Clearly every item the House of the Long Journey consigns through this office is one more line on her record, and right now she must be counting all the months those diagrams spent at the bottom of my backpack instead of on top of her table.

And from that point of view, I can’t even say she is wrong.

I rest my hands on the edge of the table, since it is clear that her imagination is running away with her, and it is better to make a few things clear from the start.

“There is something I haven’t told you yet, since I wanted to show you the garment first”, I reply. “But the brassiere, which is what I call it, has one small problem.”

Lin Quingyu says nothing; she simply waits.

“For it to do its job, it has to be made to the measurements of the person who is going to wear it”, I continue. “And its job is nothing other than making the person wearing it feel comfortable.”

I point at the sheets with a wave of my hand.

“If the cup is a little larger than it should be, it doesn’t hold”, I tell her. “And if it’s a little smaller, it pinches. And a garment that doesn’t do its job, in this case comfort, is useless.”

I pause while I think about how to put it, and then I continue.

“Every woman is a world of her own; no two of us have the same breasts”, I add. “So, for that reason, it can’t be mass-produced.”

I fall silent for a moment, because there is a part of that sentence I am not as sure of as I would like.

“At least, not with the materials I know of”, I finish.

Because in my other life, almost all the underwear sold in any shop adjusted itself thanks to fabrics that stretched and then went back into place, and that is why it could be made by the thousands in four or five sizes. Here, in fourteen years, I haven’t found anything like it.

But I haven’t looked for it among spiritual materials either. And in a world where that kind of material exists, I wouldn’t dare swear that there isn’t also something capable of doing the same.

Lin Quingyu listens to me to the end, and when I finish, she waves her hand, like someone shooing a fly off the papers.

“That is a trifle”, she tells me. “With the possibilities that garment has, that is a mere trifle.”

She turns her head toward Lianhua, just for an instant, and looks back at me.

“I did not know why your handmaiden had that figure under her clothes”, she continues. “But now that I know, I am completely convinced that this can become a veritable mine of spirit stones.”

I stay looking at her, not quite knowing what to answer, because it isn’t the first time someone has told me something like that.

My mother spent days questioning Lianhua about the first one I made, and reached exactly the same conclusion, that the garment had far more potential than I gave it credit for.

But it is one thing for my mother to say it, and quite another for it to be said by a Tower official who spends all day looking for ways to make more money.

“Why are you so convinced?” I ask her. “It’s a very difficult garment to advertise.”

And I say it thinking about what has just happened, because for someone to understand how it works, the only idea that occurred to me was to start unfastening my tunic in the middle of her office.

Which isn’t exactly a strategy that can be repeated at every counter in the city.

Lin Quingyu laughs when she hears me, not much and not very loudly, but she laughs, and the laughter changes her face completely, because suddenly she looks considerably younger than the woman who explained my contract to me on the first day.

“On the contrary”, she tells me. “It is the easiest garment to advertise that I have ever come across in my life.”

She rests her elbows on the table and laces her fingers together, and I, without realizing it, lean back a little in my chair, because it is the first time I have seen her so enthusiastic about something and I am not sure I like it.

“All I have to do is come to an arrangement with a few bro…”, she begins, and stops dead as she looks at me.

Then she looks at Lianhua, clears her throat, and I see perfectly how she changes words halfway.

“…with a few courtesan salons”, she continues. “It is better to call them that.”

On my right, Xia still doesn’t raise her eyes from her knees.

“We only have to make a few deals for their employees to wear it”, Lin Quingyu goes on. “And after that, I am completely sure that the rest of the similar establishments will come running to the Tower of the Five Dragons to ask about it.”

She raises a finger.

“Then word of mouth will carry it to the ears of more ordinary female cultivators”, she continues. “Who, intrigued, will want to know what this garment is that the men whisper and laugh about, and will then buy it out of curiosity.”

She raises a second finger.

“And this is Sanjiang”, she adds. “A city of commerce, through which men and women from everywhere pass every day. When they leave and return to wherever they come from, they will start talking about it or boasting about it. And the fame of the brassiere will do nothing but spread.”

She lowers her hand and stays looking at me, satisfied, like someone who has just presented a perfect marketing campaign to a novice.

But I listen to her without quite knowing what face to make, because, if I strip away the frills, what she has just described to me is very simple.

Make a deal with a few brothels so their girls wear the brassiere, and so their clients then talk about it. Let that make the rest of the brothels in the city want it too. And, in the end, let what those clients tell reach the ears of women, who will ask about the brassiere even if only out of curiosity.

In my other life, brands gave their products to the most famous people of the moment so that everyone would want to have the same thing they did.

I very much fear that this is exactly the same, only with a different kind of fame for the promoters, but there is something that doesn’t quite fit for me.

“What I don’t understand is how convinced you are that all women are going to be willing to pay for it”, I tell her. “If it has to be made to measure, it’s going to be expensive. Quite expensive.”

Lin Quingyu looks at me, and sighs.

“It is clear that you have not dealt with enough female cultivators since you left your Empire”, she tells me.

And then she smiles.

“Do you know which are two of the most expensive alchemist’s pills in the world?” she asks me.

I stay silent for a moment, because if someone brings up alchemist’s pills in the middle of a conversation about underwear, it isn’t to change the subject, and I am starting to suspect where she is going with this.

But the truth is that I don’t know. The only pills I really know about are the healing ones, and something tells me it isn’t those.

“No”, I reply. “I don’t know.”

“One is the Rejuvenation Pill”, she tells me. “And the other, the Eternal Youth Pill.”

The two names circle in my head for a few moments, and I don’t need to be an alchemist to get a fairly good idea of their effects.

“Do they do what I think they do?” I ask her.

“Probably”, she replies. “The first makes a person’s apparent age turn back to what it was in their youth. And the higher the quality of the pill, the younger the appearance of whoever takes it becomes.”

She pauses briefly.

“The second makes whoever takes it keep forever the appearance they have at that moment”, she continues. “Until the end of their days, and without showing any aging.”

And then her smile fades.

Not all at once, but little by little, until she has the same face again with which, a short while ago, she explained to me why no one is going to buy my chair.

“They are very rare pills”, she tells me. “The ingredients for making them are difficult to obtain, especially those for the Eternal Youth Pill.”

She clasps her hands on the table.

“That is why, whenever one appears, there is an enormous commotion”, she continues. “Among women as much as among men.”

She separates her thumbs, as if with them she were also separating one from the other.

“Women want them for themselves”, she adds. “And although there are men who may also be interested in taking them, most see them differently. They consider that, if they give one to the woman they want to court, they have already won half the battle.”

She lowers her voice, and her tone turns grim.

“Wars have even been declared over one of those pills”, she finishes.

I look at her, and no matter how hard I try, I can’t quite take it seriously, since a war over a pill that basically gets rid of wrinkles is beyond my understanding of this world.

“It can’t be that extreme”, I tell her, rather cautiously.

Lin Quingyu doesn’t laugh this time; instead, she stays looking at me for a moment, as if deciding where to begin.

“In the world of cultivation, practically every female cultivator considers a good appearance essential”, she tells me. “There are even some who consider it more important than their level of cultivation.”

She raises a finger.

“And the more power they have, the more importance they give to their own appearance”, she continues.

Then she stretches her arm across the table and rests her fingertips on the patterns.

“That is why a garment that enhances their figure, as it does for your handmaiden, is something every female cultivator, sooner or later, is going to want”, she tells me.

She taps the paper a couple of times.

“On this continent alone, I know of three sects made up entirely of female cultivators”, she adds. “I can assure you that, as soon as they learn of the existence of this garment and of what it can do, they will place orders in bulk with the Tower of the Five Dragons.”

I swallow, and without realizing it I close my hands around the armrests.

And the worst part is that I no longer doubt her, because I know perfectly well the crazy things many people are capable of doing for their appearance.

In my other life there were people who injected poison into their foreheads so they wouldn’t get wrinkles, people who spent on a jar of cream what they paid for a month’s rent, and people who mortgaged their lives to go under the knife simply because they didn’t like their nose.

And all that in a world where the only thing you could buy was a little borrowed time, because, in the end, everyone always grew old.

So, if in my old world they did all that, Lin Quingyu has just made it very clear to me what they would be capable of doing in this one, where youth that can be kept for centuries is sold in the form of a pill and there are people willing to go to war for it.

And compared with a war, a made-to-measure silk garment, however expensive, is practically a bargain.

I loosen my grip on the armrests and lean back, and since I can’t think of much else to add, I say the only thing that seems obvious to me.

“Then I take it you are very interested in my designs”, I tell her.

“Yes”, Lin Quingyu replies. “Very interested.”

But she doesn’t take her eyes off me.

“Although you should know something that the Tower has already confirmed on other occasions”, she continues. “A new type of garment, if it is in great demand, can bring in a great deal of profit the first few years. But afterward those profits decrease little by little.”

And before I have time to ask her why, she continues her explanation.

“Because when the Tower accepts clothing designs, the agreement clearly states that it is not going to devote itself to pursuing every seamstress, dressmaker and the like in the world to keep them from copying the design”, she tells me. “And they will copy it; do not doubt that sooner or later, they will.”

She shrugs.

“The only thing we will prevent is some trading company wanting to sell it in large quantities”, she finishes. “But not small private businesses, since that would be impossible.”

I nod slowly, because I understand that perfectly.

In my other life, any dress that appeared on a runway had been copied in the street markets by the following week, and however much the fashion houses protested, no one managed to stop it.

And if in a world with laws, lawyers and patent registries it couldn’t be done, here there is even less chance of stopping a seamstress who saw the brassiere once, and decided she could make one just like it, from doing so.

“I understand”, I tell her. “And it’s already far more than I expected from something I thought had no prospects at all.”

This morning at breakfast, I told Xia I was coming to sell the impossible. And now it turns out that one of those impossibles has buyers, a lot of buyers.

Lin Quingyu nods and settles into her chair.

“Then, for the contract, I offer you the same terms as with the backpack”, she tells me.

I go over them from memory while she waits. Three tiers. A fourth of the profits for the garment just as I have brought it, a fifth if the Tower develops it with spiritual materials, and three parts in every twenty for custom orders, made to the client’s measurements and with whatever enchantments the client wants.

And it is right at that last word that my thoughts get stuck.

“Is there really anyone who would want to enchant an undergarment?” I ask her.

Lin Quingyu opens her mouth, and then closes it again as she looks over my shoulder, to my left.

“There are enchantments”, she tells me. “But I am not going to mention what they are used for.”

She looks back at me.

“Mainly because I do not want your handmaiden to murder me”, she continues. “She has been glaring at me ever since I mentioned my method of promotion.”

I turn my head to the left as far as the backrest allows.

Lianhua is sitting exactly as before, with her hands on her knees and her usual face, without a single gesture too many. But she has her eyes fixed on Lin Quingyu, and she doesn’t blink.

“But there are female cultivators who may want them made for themselves”, Lin Quingyu goes on. “Or male cultivators who order the garment as a gift.”

I look back at her, and I don’t ask her anything more.

Because I can get a fairly good idea of what kind of enchantments they are, and I have decided it is a subject I don’t need to go into. Not today, and preferably not ever.

“I agree”, I tell her. “With the same exclusion of the Tianjing Empire as in the other contracts.”

Lin Quingyu nods, as if she had already counted on it.

“Although this time there is one difference”, I continue. “If you ever want to reach an agreement there, you will have to ask Guifei Xiang.”

Because in the Empire, my mother, with Jiǎngshī Yun working for her, surely already has plans I know absolutely nothing about. And the last thing I want is for the Tower to get in their way without asking her first.

Lin Quingyu doesn’t ask me who she is. And considering that she was the one who handled the creation of the House of the Long Journey when my mother sent her delegation, I suppose she doesn’t need to.

“Of course”, she tells me. “I will state it expressly.”

“And I want to add one more point”, I tell her.

“Go on”, she replies.

“That the Tower provide this garment to me and to my handmaidens whenever we ask for it”, I tell her. “In fact, that was the main reason I brought you these designs in the first place, to see if the Tower could do it so that I wouldn’t have to look for a seamstress on my own.”

On my right, Xia’s ears turn a little redder still, while Lin Quingyu drums her fingers on the table for a moment.

“I can accept that, as long as they are made with ordinary materials”, she tells me. “And for any garment made with another kind of material or carrying some enchantment, I can add that we will charge you at cost.”

I think about her offer for a moment, and I can’t find any fault with it.

With ordinary materials it is exactly what we wear now, which is just what I need, and for that I won’t pay anything. And if someday I want something better, paying only what it costs to make is much more than I would get from any seamstress in the city, who on top of that would have to learn how to make it from scratch and would charge me for every failed attempt.

“I accept”, I tell her.

Lin Quingyu nods just once, opens a drawer, takes out a sheaf of blank sheets and sets it in front of her.

“Then I will draw up the contract right now”, she tells me.

I stay watching as she brings her brush to the paper, with the brassiere still going around in my head, when I realize something.

Because in my other life, a brassiere almost never went alone; it came with a matching lower counterpart, of the same fabric and the same color, and one without the other always seemed incomplete.

And here, under our clothes, what the three of us wear, like any woman in this world, are loose cloth drawers tied at the waist with a cord, which do their job and which clearly don’t go with the brassiere at all.

And I, who should have been the first to notice, haven’t until this very moment, because, truthfully, it isn’t as if I needed it either, although without elastic it is clear that it will have to be tied like the garments I wear now.

“Wait a moment”, I tell her before she changes her mind.

The brush Lin Quingyu had picked up to draw up the contract stops a couple of centimeters from the paper when she hears me.

“I have something more to offer you along with the brassiere”, I continue. “Could you give me some paper? I want to make you a design your seamstresses can use as a guide.”

Lin Quingyu sets the brush back in its rest and looks at me with curiosity.

“What do you mean?” she asks me.

“An undergarment for the lower half”, I reply. “One that complements the brassiere, although I can’t offer you patterns, since I have never felt the need to ask for one.”

I pause.

“But with everything you’ve told me, it’s clear that your future clients will be very interested”, I finish. “I call them panties.”