“Mr. Chang, are you willing to take Miss Meng as your wife, to live with her according to sacred teachings, to be united with her before God, to love her, comfort her, respect her, protect her, as you love yourself…”

At St. Joseph’s Church on Sichuan Road—a small structure with a pointed roof and narrow wooden door—crowds gathered today in great excitement. Dozens of necks craned outside the church walls, all coming to watch the spectacle.

The plump Chinese pastor wore a robe modified from a traditional long gown, his queue hidden beneath a tall hat, a tobacco pouch at his waist, and a rosewood cross hanging from his chest, reciting his lines with utmost seriousness.

“…whether she be sick or healthy, rich or poor, to remain faithful to her until you leave this world?”

The pastor had probably been an opera singer before his conversion, delivering his speech with dramatic inflection and a strong dialect flavor. Before he finished speaking, the friends and relatives below burst into thunderous laughter.

Some elderly guests immediately covered their ears, whispering reproaches: “All this talk of love—how nauseating! What impropriety! This foreign nonsense is far too undignified! The Chang family really spoils their child, actually allowing him to carry on like this…”

However, most people were thoroughly entertained—the more embarrassed the newlyweds became, the happier they were.

The two newlyweds on the platform blushed like peaches under the gaze of all the guests.

The bride, Miss Meng, was eighteen years old—a quiet girl with a moon-round face who, at first glance, looked like a gender-swapped Chang Baoluo. The couple bore a striking resemblance to each other, both wearing Chinese wedding attire. Standing side by side in the sanctuary, they resembled the plump cherub dolls in paintings.

Several guests pointed at the Madonna statue behind the couple, curiously whispering: “What god is this? Guanyin the Child-Giver?”

As one of the guests, Lin Yuchan sat on a wooden pew in the chapel, watching this fusion of Chinese-Western wedding with great interest.

She had originally thought that those neither-Chinese-nor-Western tacky wedding customs were modern commercial inventions…

Turns out they had sprouted as early as the modern era.

However, from a modern perspective, it seemed tacky; from contemporary people’s understanding, it was already incredibly trendy.

Chang Baoluo kept grinning foolishly, occasionally cupping his hands toward the guests below. Lin Yuchan remained on edge, fearing he might blurt out “Welcome!”

After several reminders from the pastor, he bashfully said “Yes,” causing everyone to laugh and applaud so vigorously that the chapel roof seemed to shake.

Most people had never witnessed a Western wedding, so many guests treated it like watching a performance. They thought it was a creative bridal chamber teasing gimmick, specifically designed to embarrass the newlyweds.

After all, the “normal” wedding was still to come.

Several off-key suona horn sounds drifted into the chapel, quickly shushed by the church gatekeeper. A Chinese master of ceremonies, draped in red and colorful decorations, poked his head in, stared at the Madonna statue on the wall for a moment, then quickly shut the door and left.

In the small room adjacent to the chapel, tea and wedding sweets were already prepared for after the Western ceremony concluded, when the newlyweds would serve tea to both sets of parents. The gong and drum troupe and the decorated bridal sedan also waited at the church entrance. The bride’s brother held a red veil, watching vigilantly at the door, ready to cover her face the moment the bride emerged, then begin the standard Chinese procedure—escorting the bride, paying respects, and a grand banquet…

However, the Chinese-Western fusion would sometimes hit snags. Just as the newlyweds finished their vows, the master of ceremonies outside came puffing in, saying that the invited “All-Blessed Lady” to sweep the sedan had been surrounded and harassed by patrol officers on her way from the county seat, and was currently trapped at the small north gate.

The bride’s family hurriedly sent several elders to negotiate.

The Chinese wedding ceremony couldn’t begin temporarily. Fortunately, the pastor had contingency plans, inviting guests to look around while he transformed into a tour guide, pointing at oil paintings on the walls and vividly narrating creation stories.

Lin Yuchan squeezed out of the crowd and slipped into the corridor behind the church.

After the Beginning of Autumn, cool breezes brought waves of refreshment. A row of colorful monthly roses grew beneath the corridor, their heads bobbing high and low, sending forth a light fragrance.

Under the large trees outside the church walls, several simply dressed vendors sat cooling themselves, their carrying poles laden with rice cakes and pastries. A haughty foreign carriage raced past, causing the vendors to quickly cover their poles with coarse cloth. Those too slow had dust splash into their baskets.

They had to take out the dust-covered pastries and blow on them vigorously, then put them back in the baskets to continue selling, cursing softly all the while.

The most traditional China and the most trendy West mix awkwardly in this city. In comparison, the Chinese-Western fusion wedding inside the church appeared quite harmonious.

Someone was already sitting on the white stone bench in the corridor, long legs propped on the stone steps, apparently resting with closed eyes.

Lin Yuchan smoothed her skirt and sat beside him, two feet away.

“Boss, how about some financing?” she said sweetly with a gentle voice and sweet smile. “I had someone deliver the business plan letter yesterday—did you have time to look at it?”

Su Minguan quickly stood up, enthusiastically bowing to her. His expression was light and cheerful, with smile lines at the corners of his eyes and brows.

He had also received an invitation. He wore an eighty-percent-new azure robe with narrow sleeves and a standing collar that made his features appear clean and sharp.

But the style and fabric were quite ordinary—refined enough to show good taste without stealing the groom’s thunder.

“Thank you for thinking so highly of me, Miss Lin, but Su can’t help,” Su Minguan immediately smiled slyly. “Yixing Shipping needs to expand—the old headquarters in Shanghai isn’t a long-term plan. I just set my sights on two docks in Ningbo and Zhenjiang, including berths and warehouses, requiring substantial deposits. Very troublesome… Sigh, big business brings big troubles. What use is earning money when silver can’t buy happiness…”

While pontificating grandly, he watched her with smiling eyes, expressing great sympathy and spiritual support for Miss Lin’s current desperate straits and cash flow depletion.

Lin Yuchan rolled her eyes at him. “Giving shares!”

Su Minguan pursed his lips, savoring the gritted teeth in those three words.

He lowered his head, pulled out Lin Yuchan’s submitted “financing business plan” from his coat, and slowly flipped through it page by page.

When Yixing Shipping was dying, he had gritted his teeth to give her shares to survive, making this girl proud for quite a while.

Now this arrow of revenge was finally returned. Su Minguan was in high spirits, admiring Lin Yuchan’s naive commercial fake smile, deliberately drawing out his words with a triumphant former-serf-turned-master attitude.

“Miss Lin, you must understand,” he began slowly, looking thoroughly pleased with himself. “If I make a move now, I won’t be taking just one twenty-fifth.”

Fortunately, even when taking advantage of others’ misfortunes and mocking them, his despicable appearance wasn’t ugly. His features carried unrestrained arrogance and spirited glances—quite stylish in its own way.

Lin Yuchan glared at him fiercely.

She had anticipated this reaction. No choice—feng shui rotates, and who told her to be short on money now?

She wanted to get a loan, but major banks wouldn’t even consider opening accounts for women.

She could only target acquaintances.

She fiddled with the rose petals beside her, smiling sweetly: “No problem. I’m not like certain penny-pinching people—I’m very generous. For the new Boya Trading House, I plan to disperse shareholding. Baoluo and Old Zhao both invested their bonuses in shares. You can subscribe to however much you want, as long as I maintain a firm 51%.”

She spoke with confidence, seeming very modern, but had no business experience even in modern times. She had only seen financial news and reading materials, relying on piecing things together, plus imagination, to boldly decide to convert the new Boya to a shareholding system.

Su Minguan lowered his eyes, flipping her business plan to a certain page where the “shareholding system” detailed plans were indeed written.

Rose fragrance floated around them, mixed with the faint soap-pod scent from her collar—a fresh, clean, subtle fragrance.

He enjoyed the aroma, browsing through it unobtrusively, pondering for a moment before adopting a serious expression and looking at her with a half-smile.

“According to Qing law, a shop’s debts are the debts of all shareholders. If you mismanage and run off owing money, all these shareholders must be jointly liable. If someone subscribes to thirty percent or more, at minimum, it’s exile to Ningguta—Miss Lin, Manager Chang, and Old Zhao are honest people. You’re not supposed to fleece acquaintances like this.”

Lin Yuchan: “I…”

This was where the Qing fell behind. Traditional Chinese enterprises were legally required to bear joint debt responsibility—economically termed “unlimited liability companies.” Once enterprises went bankrupt, all shareholders had to participate in debt repayment until completely ruined.

Imagine some stockholder buying a thousand yuan of company stock on their phone, only to find two years later that poor management left the company heavily indebted. Opening their phone, they see stock prices falling, breaking through zero to negative ten thousand yuan. If they couldn’t pay, they’d face credit blacklisting, become deadbeats, even imprisonment—who would dare buy such stocks?

Though there were no stock exchanges currently, the principle remained the same.

So Chinese shops’ so-called joint investment and shareholding generally involved acquaintances—everyone prospered together or suffered together. Strangers wouldn’t dare risk tying their fate to several unrelated business partners.

The former Guangzhou Thirteen Factories’ merchant officials, when wealthy, were rich as nations with universal admiration. Once capital chains broke and debts couldn’t be repaid, according to Qing law it was fraud and illegal fundraising. Yesterday’s red-capped merchants who dominated commercial seas instantly became criminals. Family fortunes accumulated over generations were completely confiscated, and when necessary, wives and children had to be sold.

The saying “wealth doesn’t last three generations”—conducting business in feudal China was exactly this precarious.

Su Minguan’s family had fallen this way. He naturally knew the risks.

So when Lin Yuchan had demanded Yixing shares, both emotionally and logically, he had to ask: What if I go bankrupt with debts? Are you psychologically prepared?

Western mature capitalist society’s old foxes, to avoid such risks, had long ago legislated allowing “limited liability companies”—if companies lost money and went bankrupt, shareholders could apply for bankruptcy protection, losing at most their investment while not involving other personal property, achieving complete separation from company debts.

This way, capable merchants might have several failed startups, but keeping green hills meant not worrying about firewood. Their accumulated personal capital wouldn’t be zeroed out, thus staying long-term in the capitalist class, ensuring society’s continued prosperity and wealth.

Of course, “limited liability companies” also had drawbacks. For instance, major shareholders could maliciously declare bankruptcy, leaving piles of bad debt while still sitting on vast fortunes, living carefree.

But those were ultimately disorders after capitalism’s abnormal prosperity, affecting minorities. On nineteenth-century international business stages, it wasn’t yet a serious problem.

One could imagine that when Qing doors opened and Western “limited liability companies” flooded in to compete with domestic “unlimited liability companies” on the same stage, they could instantly beat Chinese merchants senseless, easily destroying any potentially large Chinese commercial giants.

Of course, Qing officials and citizens initially didn’t accept such Western companies that could legally default on debts—why play this way? Why can you cheat?

But no choice. They had superior ships and cannons, convincing with “reason”—refusal wasn’t an option.

Could they learn from them?

—Ancestral laws couldn’t be changed.

As long as Qing laws didn’t change, Chinese merchants could only enter the arena wearing shackles, with thin health bars and only one life, while opponents were well-equipped with unlimited revival cards!

In summary, Su Minguan felt Miss Lin’s sudden inspiration was creative but perhaps too risky.

“It’s not that I don’t trust you,” he confided frankly. “But such shops can’t grow large. Your future shareholders, for their safety, simply won’t allow you to borrow heavily…”

Lin Yuchan smiled as she listened to him finish, then flipped the business plan over a page.

“This is a copy of the shop’s legal entity change application, already approved by the Municipal Council. It’ll be completed in a couple of days. I guess you didn’t look carefully.”

Su Minguan was about to explain “unlimited joint liability” to her when he suddenly heard something unexpected and paused.

“…Legal entity?”

Outside the church, scattered gong sounds continued. Inside, guests’ laughter rose and fell. He changed from his lazy sitting posture, straightening up and looking at her in surprise.

“Legal entities” only existed for Western companies.

The young lady never joked about serious matters.

Looking down again, the Chinese-English application showed this Chinese-funded shop at No. 7 Saigon Road with the English name prominently displayed:

Liberal Trading, Ltd.

Su Minguan’s breathing lightened for an instant, staring at those three letters “Ltd,” feeling like he didn’t quite recognize English anymore.

Ltd—Limited—limited liability company.

Su Minguan had helmed Yixing for nearly two years. Those foreign shipping companies that secretly and openly created obstacles, squeezed him out, and competed with him using abundant capital, regardless of their auspicious Chinese names like Qichang, Huahai, Beiqing, Jinliyuan—when you opened their registration documents, their original foreign names all ended with these three letters.

This caused his instinctive reaction to get a headache whenever he saw “Ltd.”

He suddenly turned toward Lin Yuchan, feeling dizzy and his heart racing, the girl before him suddenly seeming somewhat unfamiliar.

She still wore an unruffled smile, blinking at him. She held rose petals in her hand, sending forth a bewildering fragrance.

Su Minguan asked solemnly: “How did you manage this?”

“Not the usual way. Others can’t learn it,” she apologized. “First, Boya was registered as a trading house within the concession, with original shareholders holding American citizenship, so it never applied to Qing law from the beginning. As for after the transfer… just like transferring real estate, some legal operations can modify shop nature under Chinese controlling shares. Like your steamships flying British flags to avoid taxes—it’s a grey area… A few days ago, I made three visits to persuade Mr. Rong down from his pile of engineering drawings, spent half a day checking legal documents, and used his connections in legal circles to fight for this suffix.”

She caressed the three letters “Ltd” with her finger, showing an indulgent smile.

“Limited company—legal debt default.”

Ding clang ding clang, outside the church, suddenly began beating gongs and drums. Suona sounds instantly drowned out the organ music.

The “All-Blessed Lady” finally arrived fashionably late. The wedding procession prepared sedan chairs and began the Chinese wedding procedures.

With a whoosh, the church doors opened wide. Guests abandoned the pastor, rushing out in a flood, chatting and laughing as they followed the sedan. Several children surrounded the groom, asking for red envelopes.

Enormous firecracker sounds echoed through the sky. Su Minguan’s heart jumped along.

Someone loudly called toward the corridor: “Sir and Madam, it’s finished here! Come watch the heaven and earth ceremony and eat the banquet!”

Lin Yuchan stood up, smiling as she looked back at Su Minguan.

“Boss, how about some financing?”

Su Minguan: “…”

He had underestimated this girl.

He bent down, picked up a fallen wedding sweet from the ground, looked deeply at her, and said softly: “What should I do—I want to marry you.”

Lin Yuchan blushed momentarily, then looked up to see him deliberately making a playful face, his gaze carrying unserious roguish mischief, joking.

She smiled back: “Boss Su, please spare me. I don’t earn money easily.”

This wasn’t a joke but sincere. She could handle others, but if Su Minguan targeted her money, she feared not even bones would remain.

Su Minguan laughed heartily: “Let’s go—we’ll discuss more at the feast.”

He put the wedding sweet in his pocket, his eyelashes fluttering quickly once, hiding a moment of gloom.

Good awareness. Best if she forever treats this as a joke.

The new home wasn’t far from here. With music and celebration for a quarter hour, they leisurely walked and arrived.

Dozens more guests came to observe the ceremony—those who disdained or lacked the courage to attend the earlier church wedding.

Rong Hong, despite his busy schedule, made time to attend, cheerfully accepting toasts from the newlyweds.

He had decided to personally travel to Europe and America, inspect top factories, and purchase the best, most advanced machinery for China’s Westernization Movement.

Overseas ship tickets weren’t easy to buy these days, but he now held fifth-rank blue feather insignia with virtually unlimited public funds. Merchants naturally opened every convenience, offering first-class cabins on auspicious dates, departing soon.

Rong Hong was eager to depart, luggage already packed, even personal clothing mostly sorted. Today, he temporarily opened his trunk, only finding one Western suit. After putting it on, he looked sharp and spirited, radiating foreign sophistication.

Lin Yuchan was certain that if he wore this suit while walking at Bund intersections while distributing money to refugee beggars, he definitely wouldn’t be stripped. Patrol officers would surely surround him protectively.

But who told him to be devoted to serving the country? After returning home, he immediately switched back to national dress, learned Cantonese, calligraphy, and wore fake queues… making himself look Chinese again, resulting in various instances of being looked down upon and bullied.

Now wearing Western dress, he attracted many secret onlookers whispering to each other: “Is this Chinese or foreign? Looks very wealthy… Married? How about we introduce someone?…”

Lin Yuchan obtained a guest list, carefully scanning it. Every name represented a potential fundraising target.

Today was Chang Baoluo’s joyous day, inviting close friends and relatives. Everyone mixed regardless of gender—even if they looked down on her as a female merchant, most wouldn’t make scenes.

Plus, this was the shop where the groom worked—they had to give some face, right?

This was her rare opportunity.

She followed the list, thick-skinned, chatting with over ten people. Indeed, though people found a young lady opening a shop and fundraising presumptuous, they all smiled as they accepted her business cards without showing ugly faces.

Lin Yuchan returned to her seat to drink water. After just two sips, she felt the female guests at her table suddenly stand up.

“Oh my, the groom must drink this cup!”

The groom had come to toast.

According to Chinese wedding customs, the bride was already in the bridal chamber wearing her veil, not joining the festivities. So only the groom made rounds.

Moreover, today’s Chinese-Western fusion wedding was relatively primitive, with no best man invited. Chang Baoluo was honestly taking at least a dozen drinks.

His originally round, fair, blessed face had become like a double-yolk moon cake. He walked unsteadily, the floor beneath his feet seeming like a magnet with uneven attraction.

Most female guests at this table were elders, pointing at him and laughing, competing to force more drinks on him.

Lin Yuchan pressed her lips in a slight smile, not adding insult to injury.

Unexpectedly, Chang Baoluo shakily held up a cup, first walking a zigzag curve, then executing an in-place drift, landing directly before her.

“Miss Lin…”

Several aunties at the same table changed expressions.

They were all relatives who had participated in the original “alley matchmaking services” and had long forgotten this matter. Hearing Chang Baoluo call out “Lin,” they suddenly remembered.

Someone whispered, “Who invited her? Shouldn’t have! Did she come herself?”

Lin Yuchan was also startled and stood up.

Alcohol emboldens the timid—he better not say anything wrong today. So many bride’s relatives are watching.

Chang Baoluo smiled dizzily: “Miss Lin, please—leave. Forgot to tell you. Honeymoon. Taking leave.”

Lin Yuchan sighed in relief, laughing out loud.

“Where to?”

“My wife, her hometown, Ning—Ningbo. Three days later, return visit, incidentally… incidentally play along the way.”

“Return visit” and “honeymoon” could be organically combined—Chinese-Western fusion reaching new heights.

Lin Yuchan naturally approved readily, laughing: “How long will you play?”

Chang Baoluo lowered his head, somewhat embarrassed: “Honeymoon—, naturally, one month. I heard that’s a foreign custom.”

Lin Yuchan: “…”

Taking the literal meaning?

However, the new Boya currently had depleted cash and a light business. She’d have to wait until fundraising was completed before getting busy. Missing him for this month wouldn’t be catastrophic.

Lin Yuchan weighed for a moment, finally saying: “Then I won’t pay salary for this month.”

Paid wedding leave—don’t even think about it, no way.

Chang Baoluo blushed: “Wouldn’t dare, wouldn’t dare—no salary.”

Their brief conversation left the surrounding alley aunties tongue-tied.

“Is this that Miss Lin?—Oh, it’s Little Baoluo’s new boss. Probably just looks similar…”

As for why Baoluo would recognize a young girl as his boss, everyone tactfully didn’t ask on this joyous day.

After finishing this cup, Lin Yuchan’s congratulatory duties were complete. Checking the time, she wouldn’t stay for the bridal chamber festivities, moving against the crowd flow and exiting.

The air immediately cooled two or three degrees, the noisy music also fading. Looking around, she discovered Su Minguan had also left his seat simultaneously and was standing at the entrance of an adjacent teahouse, waving at her.

She smiled and walked over.

The charm of “limited liability companies.”