Yueqian saw how shocked the three were. She was glad she hadn't revealed all the money she had, though the 4,000 gold taels and a few silver taels seemed very little to spend in the town. Therefore, she kept this amount to herself to keep them informed.

    "What are you going to do with all this money? Isn’t it better to save it for your descendants?" Mu Heng frowned, worried about her intent to spend such a substantial amount.

    "I need to keep it safe for our descendants; money orders are too easily stolen."

    "What will you do then?"

    "I want to buy the land around here. Whoever wants to sell, I'll buy it all."

    "Do you have enough manpower to manage all that land?" Mu Heng disagreed.

    It was just a few of them, and buying now would mean relying on the Mu family, which he did not want.

    "I'm not asking you to manage it all by yourself. I just want to buy it under my name to prevent people from cheating us. Then, we'll make a deal. Let the village chief witness it. We’ll lease the land to them, and after harvesting, we can ask for a share of 10% or 20%, whatever you think is appropriate."

    Yueqian explained her plan. She didn't plan to use this land to earn a living; she just hoped to become a significant landowner with money flowing in without working.

    "That sounds... good," Mu Heng took a while to agree.

    Most people who inherited land from their parents still had to give almost half of their produce back. If they leased from them and only gave 20%, it wouldn’t be too hard on them. In the worst case, she would still get 10%. Although it might not seem like much now, if in the future they had many children and grandchildren, dividing the land for them to cultivate would be beneficial.

    "But... 4,000 gold taels can buy up the whole village, you know. At most, 40 gold taels would buy everything already," Xiao Long said. Yueqian smiled fondly at him.

    "Then shall we buy other places too? Buy up nearby villages as well, and maybe a shop in town. Let the elderly work it. When we're free, we can go and check the accounts. How about that?"

    "B... but... is that even possible? We would own a shop outright?" Xiao Long felt as if he was dreaming. He had never thought he'd have a stake in the town, but here his sister-in-law was, ready to buy a shop.

    And 4,000 gold taels weren’t a small amount. In the capital, it could buy up to 2 shops, but this was a rural area. How many shops could they buy? Four, five?

    "Xiao Long, those shops would originally belong to your sister-in-law. Even if you get married, you can't claim them as yours," Mu Heng cautioned his younger brother who was getting carried away. Of course, the young boy didn't plan to take his sister-in-law's property.

    But as long as it benefited his brother or sister-in-law, he was happy.

    His brother had looked after them to this extent. If he ended up happy and content in life, wouldn't that be good enough?

    "Xiao Long understands, but Xiao Long is still happy," he muttered under his breath, his small mouth pouting like a little cat, endearingly cute in the eyes of any onlooker.

    Yueqian looked at the two innocent brothers feeling like she was already one of their family. Indeed, the thick walls she had built had nearly been brought down by these children and her husband since last night.

    Having lived two lifetimes, the young woman had an acute ability to understand people, combined with the content in novels that spoke of the singular fortune of a villainess whose life ends well with a loving and loyal husband, acquired in exchange for ten gold taels.

    After meeting someone sincere, she felt that the world was a better place.

    Even though her mother treated her well, she was full of schemes and tricks to exploit others, which made Yueqian uncomfortable. She also knew that her mother's end was not good, partly due to Yueqian's own attempts to seek her mother's help to return, which led to the mother repeated mistakes and got the punishment, which led to her death.

    Such a tragic end would not have occurred if a villainess like her had accepted her fate and made her mother realize that such a life was happier than a life filled with false accolades.

    Well, it would be nearly a year before the next contact. In the meantime, her mother behaved normally, not wanting to anger her husband any further. If her daughter, like her, remained quietly and safely here in the future, her mother would also lead a peaceful life in her final years.

    "Mu Heng, about contacting the officials, could you please accompany me to handle it?" She needed to deal with the local government office in the town and going alone was not feasible as she was unfamiliar with the directions and had been brought here unconsciously.

    "Um, yes," Mu Heng looked at his beautiful wife. He wouldn’t dare refuse her.

    "Huan’er and I will go sell steamed buns, okay?" Xiao Long volunteered after they had eaten a paid meal as today’s wages.

    "Um, thank you very much. If your big brother and I are not back by noon, feel free to eat the buns," Yueqian told the children.

    In reality, she wasn't very concerned about Mu Heng's relatives. After all, they had no right to take her money. If they dared, they would face theft charges. The Villainess Qin like her wasn't afraid of any shame; her concern was more about being taken advantage of by others.

    However, going to town to negotiate about the land was necessary. She needed to leave traces for the people from the Art Institute to follow, as they were her source of income. Every time a transaction occurred; the other party knew to bring her lumps of gold. Although the currency was equivalent to gold taels, she couldn’t use such certificates for transactions in her department stores.

    Ah, yes. Taking goods out of the department store was a form of trading. One gold tael, when converted from her world’s currency, could exchange for many goods,

    like 1 gold taels equal 4 baht of gold, and 1 baht of gold was worth 27,000 exchange coins. Therefore, if she used a gold tael to buy a bottle of fine liquor for 1000 each, she could get 27 bottles. If bought in bulk, she would get 30 bottles. Selling 10 bottles for one gold tael was still a profit of 2 gold coins.

    The rest was profitable for her to spend leisurely. Indeed, she had a lot of gold taels stored in the interdimensional space at the moment, although that didn’t mean there were no expenses to pay at times.

    She still needed to upgrade her storage space further, not to mention expanding her store to accommodate new products. Although she currently has many food and general stores, there were no IT products yet. Her level three department store wasn't even half complete. Yueqian believed that if she upgraded to level ten, perhaps there would be new activities to undertake.

    At the very least, she was already missing having a mobile phone…

    Speaking of lumps of gold, she planned to check if there was a place in this distant city that would accept them in exchange for gold taels; it would be more convenient than before, though trading in large quantities could attract unwanted attention.

    Dealing with the Art Institute seemed the safest option.

    "If you want to go to the city today, we need to hurry as there is only one cart going there," Mu Heng informed her after seeing her determination.

    "Let's go then," Yueqian nodded. She didn't need to prepare much, just asked him to help carry a chest of money, discreetly packed in a wooden cart normally used for transporting small animals.

    Fortunately, the process of buying land in the city and the villages could be handled directly with the officials at the center of the city. Dealing with the village chief was merely placing the land on the local market for the villagers at a reasonable price because they traded among themselves. However, there was a lot of vacant desolate land that was government-owned, which villagers could not afford and thus left unused.

    Yueqian's goal was those lands.

    She didn't want to cause issues with the locals, nor did she intend to be a middleman hoarding others' lands. Her plan was to buy the land and then let the villagers lease it for farming if they were interested; if not, leaving it vacant was no issue.

    The beautiful lady dressed in a soft pink, simple, yet elegant. Anyone from the capital city would be astonished if they saw how the Young Villainess Qin had transformed into such a beautiful lady, worth of affection.

    Normally if not wearing red, black, or dark purple, with terrifyingly red lips and excessively white makeup making it hard to tell her real face, one would find it strange to call her beautiful. But the current Yueqian looked as angelic as a celestial being.

    As they left the house, many villagers going about their daily work turned to stare in awe. They had never seen such beauty before. Even though city dwellers typically had clean, fair skin, her exquisitely beautiful face was particularly captivating. Even if her skin were as dark as theirs, she would still be called beautiful.

    "A’Heng, dressed up so nicely, are you taking your wife to town?" a rough-faced, serious-looking man asked, but Mu Heng responded politely, it seemed like he was someone Mu Heng regarded with respect.

    "Yes, Uncle Zhen, I won't be hunting with you guys today," the young man replied with a smile.

    "That's good. Since your wife is new here, take her to see the town. Maybe show her around the village if you have time, just in case you're not back by dusk, then she knew she could look for you at the farm," the middle-aged man suggested kindly.

    They were married now and needed to look after each other. Despite the not-so-good rumors about Mu Heng's wife, he chose to think well of Mu Heng and not mention it like others.

    "Thank you, Uncle Zhen, I'll find time to show her our places," Mu Heng responded obediently, he did not reject.

    Yueqian gave a gentle smile to the man, sensing no threat from him and finding him a worthy acquaintance.

    They had barely walked a few steps when Yueqian heard whispers following them. Her smile widened slightly, contrasting with Mu Heng's increasingly stern face.

    "Is that Mu Heng's wife from the capital? She's stunning."

    "What good is her beauty? Look at those hands, she doesn’t work at all. Being with Mu Heng, she's just a burden."

    "It seems A’Heng is quite smitten with her. Looks like he's even taking her to town."

    The whispers grew louder as emotions got the better of the onlookers, despite their attempts to speak softly for fear of being heard.