```
Yang Ge didn't know whether the misunderstanding was his own on the term "soon,"
or whether Shen Fa was mistaken about the efficiency of those eunuchs...
In any case, he waited and waited, until even the fifteenth day of the first month had passed, but the imperial envoy never arrived.
On the eighteenth day of the first month, the grain market, which had been closed for over a month, suddenly opened.
Not only the three major grain firms but even those small grain shops that had closed due to lack of supplies were reopening their doors, selling grains at last year's prices from August and September!
The residents of Luting County were naturally delighted, and in groups, they pushed hand carts and wheelbarrows to the grain market to purchase grain, hauling back home two big cartloads...
The grain shops, too, refused no one, imposing neither purchase limits nor price increases, letting the people of Luting buy to their heart's content.
