This town is called Nandao County. Although it is not big, it looks prosperous. It feels like Jiyuan first came to Ning’an County.
But after careful comparison, there is naturally a huge difference here. At least the obvious gap can be seen from some of the expressions of the people.
If you want to describe it based on fate, the difference is that everyone in Ning’an County can be considered to live and work in peace and contentment, but there is some kind of anxiety in the expressions on the faces of the people here.
Not long after entering the city, there is a market. The streets are very crowded, with people coming and going, plus carriages and horses. Some places have to be given way.
Ji Yuan was dressed in a white shirt, walking slowly and unhurriedly, with disheveled sideburns, and a black jade hairpin that looked to be of excellent quality was inserted into his bun. More importantly, he was alone.
After walking on the street for a while, Ji Yuan found that he was being stared at by several groups of people. Judging from the sights he felt and the whispers he heard, almost none of these people had any good intentions. Either he wants to steal, or he wants to kill him.
‘The world is so hot and cold, the public security is really unflattering. ’
Sighing in his heart, Ji Yuan didn’t pay much attention. He quickened his pace and walked around to get rid of several groups of people.
Passing by a street corner stall, Ji Yuan stopped.
This stall is a dry biscuit shop, but it is different from the ones Ji Yuan bought before. When he happened to pass by, he saw the owner who made this biscuit using two large iron molds to bake the top and bottom cakes respectively. A kind of salted dried vegetables was embedded in it, and after being folded together, some powdered sesame seeds were sprinkled on it. Ji Yuan wanted to try it when he smelled it.
“Shop, how do you sell these pancakes?”
Ji Yuan saw that there was no sound at the stall for the time being, so he stopped in front of the stall and asked.
The old man making the pancakes looked up and saw a gentleman who looked like a scholar. This cannot be said to be very rare in Nandao County, but at least it is rare, and the accent does not sound like a local.
“This cake sells for two cents per piece, and eight cents per pound. There are about five pancakes.”
“Oh, can I have a taste of this dried vegetable?”
“The taste of dried vegetables?”
The old man felt a little strange, but he hesitated and nodded. He picked up some dried vegetables from the pottery jar at the stall and handed them to Ji Yuan.
Ji Yuan tasted it and smiled at the familiar salty aroma.
“Is the store’s ancestral home from Jizhou, Dazhen?”
“Well, this is not…”
The old man said something, as if he suddenly thought of something, and immediately said again.
“It seems that the gentleman knows his stuff. To tell you the truth, this dry dish was indeed taught by a Dazhen man back then. As for where he came from Dazhen, the old man doesn’t know.”
Ji Yuan nodded.
“That’s it. Could you please help me weigh ten kilograms of pancakes?”
“Ten pounds?”
“Not bad, ten pounds!”
“Hey, sir, wait a moment. The ready-made ones only weigh a little over six pounds. I’ll make them for you right away. They’ll be ready in no time!”
Ten pounds of pancakes are a big deal for the old man. If they are sold out, most of today’s goods will be gone.
The old man was quick with his hands and feet. While making the pancakes, he chatted with Ji Yuan. In a short while, he had finished making ten kilograms of pancakes.
After passing the scale, he naturally had to pay. He took out the money bag. It looked bulging, but looking inside, the copper coins that accounted for the majority were all printed with “Yuande Tongbao”. Since it was a big money bag, Of course Zhen coins are not in circulation here, so I had to take out a piece of silver.
“Here, the store will weigh the silver first.”
“Oh, okay, the guest officer gave you money!”
This old man has never been out of Nandao County, and he doesn’t know what it is like in other places. However, in Nandao County, copper coins are sometimes very confusing. The two cents per cake he mentioned refers to the standard kind.
However, many copper coins are actually not up to standard. They are minted as private money and are mixed with other materials. Some copper coins are exaggeratedly printed and can be worth ten to one, but they do not have that weight. Many people do not recognize them when trading.
In this case, gold and silver become extremely precious. Their purchasing power far exceeds that of Dazhen, and they can often be exchanged for copper coins that exceed their own value.
Many people directly use silver to buy a large amount of “real money”, then melt it and mix it with private coins. One tael of silver can be worth three or four taels of silver.
It is rare to buy pancakes directly for Bai Yin. The old man estimated that there were almost no copper coins in the money bag.
Seeing the white silver, the shopkeeper was very happy and his face turned rosy. He weighed the weight and found that with this small piece of silver, he originally earned forty cents, but now he estimated that it would be less if it was too much. You can earn more than one hundred and fifty cents.
From a few places a little further away, some eyes had already seen Ji Yuan’s bulging money bag, and even the silver he took out, and there were people whispering in the corner behind the truck.
“It’s a big fish, I’m afraid the money bag will be full of white and yellow things!”
“That’s right…and the hosta, I just took a closer look at it while passing by. It’s priceless!”
“Shhh…go.”
At the cake stall, the money was weighed and change was given. The old man at the stall tied the cakes into a string with hemp rope, handed them to Ji Yuan, looked around and whispered.
“Sir, you are a foreigner. As far as the old man is concerned, some people are already targeting you. Please be careful!”
Ji Yuan’s conversation is funny and friendly, and he easily attracts people’s favor. The old man has seen a lot of things, and naturally he can see that there are people around him who have ill intentions towards this grown-up man, so he can’t help but remind him loudly.
Ji Yuan smiled and cupped his hands towards the old man before taking the pancake.
“Thank you to the store for reminding me. I will be careful if I save it.”
After saying that, Ji Yuan turned around and walked away with the pancakes in hand. He walked around for a while. When he passed by the entrance of an alley, the bunch of pancakes in his hand had disappeared.
Far behind, several men struggled to follow Ji Yuan closely.
“Huh…huh…this man, this man walks really fast.”
“Hey… I mean, look at how polite he is… Hey, where is the cake in his hand, why is it missing?”
“What do you care about the cake? As long as the person is right!” “Let’s go, let’s go!”
“Yes, yes, you can’t lose track.”
The people in front kept moving, and they couldn’t rest. They managed to catch their breath for a few moments, and then accelerated and chased after them.
Ji Yuan has been walking in front. The others were either shaken off or gave up. Only the group behind him persisted in pursuit.
It’s not that he can’t escape easily by using a blindfold, but after hearing them talking about “slaughtering a few fat sheep” and other topics, Ji Yuan didn’t want them to lose him.
In the evening, Ji Yuan had already left the city while going around and around, and the nine people following him never lost sight of him, which shows his strong determination.
There is a pavilion five miles north of Nandao County, which is simply and crudely named “Wuli Pavilion”. Ji Yuan stopped here, took out a pancake and sat in the pavilion to eat it.
Because it was newly made today, although it is not soft, it is still good enough to eat, at least it will not irritate your teeth if it is not baked.
The nine people following Ji Yuan were hiding behind a low hill covered with trees in the distance. However, they were panting at the moment and were resting to regain their strength.
When Ji Yuan slowly finished a pancake, the nine people over there were almost rested, and they approached Wuliting little by little with the noose and the guy.
As the saying goes, love comes from the heart. The ferocious faces of the nine people at this moment are more worthy of the word “evil” than Bazi before.
“Scholar, are you good at running?”
“Hey, hand over all your valuables!”
The leading man had a strong figure and was holding an iron whip. Before he even got close to Wuliting, he was already threatening him arrogantly. They had already seen it, and there was no one around Wuliting at all. People.
Ji Yuan gathered the crumbs of the cake together in his hand, put it into his mouth and ate it, then he clapped his hands and stood up, looking at the visitor.
“If I put down valuable things, can you let me go?”
Nine people have gathered around the Wuli Pavilion. The leader looks up and down at Jiyuan Road.
“You don’t worry about us, we have to search.”
Ji Yuan nodded.
“Then let me go after a body search?”
“Hahahaha… Letting you go is still troublesome. There is a wilderness around Wuliting, and there are so many wild wolves and beasts that we can just kill them or bury them.”
Ji Yuan heard this and looked at a few people in front of him, and suddenly laughed. Although the people in his sight were very blurry, the hostility on them was very obvious.
“Haha, no need to discuss?”
Ji Yuan was actually able to laugh at this moment, which made a few people a little scared.
“You, aren’t you a master of martial arts?”
However, Ji Yuan did not answer their words. Instead, he looked sideways at the woods beside the pavilion.
In Ji Yuan’s ears, the sound of stampeding and breaking through the air approached, and after just two breaths, a black shadow flashed out from the treetops in the forest.
“铮”
The sound of the long sword being unsheathed was accompanied by the cold light of the sword body, which penetrated with the visitor. The moment they flashed in front of the pavilion, the sound of the sword blade entering flesh was heard.
“Someone…”
“Pfft…” “Pfft…” “Pfft…”
The sword blade passed by, and the Iron Whip Man and the three people around him didn’t even react. They fell to the ground after being hit by the sword. The man who came with the sword stopped, turned around in the air, stepped on the pavilion column to use force, turned and jumped Sweep the sword at the moment.
“Be careful…” “Hurry…”
“Pfft…” “Pfft…” “Pfft…”
A few more people couldn’t even finish their sentences before falling down.
In an instant, all nine people surrounding the pavilion fell down. The visitor stood outside the pavilion, shook off the blood on his sword and returned it to its sheath.
“Good skills!”
Ji Yuan sincerely praised him. From the perspective of a cultivator, such methods as finding books on www.zhaoshuyuan.com are naturally nothing, but he is also definitely considered a master of martial arts. Regarding the identification of martial arts, He also has a thorough understanding of body skills, moves, and use of Qi, and his body skills and sword skills are all very good.
“Sir, you are still sir, and you are still as charming as ever after so many years! I thought I had made a mistake just now, but I didn’t expect that it is really you, sir, who is here!”
Ji Yuan opened his eyes slightly and looked up and down at the visitor with blurred vision.
“This voice…are you Young Master Yan? Oh, now you have to be called Master Yan!”
The visitor in black attire took a few steps closer to the pavilion, held his sword and bowed to Ji Yuan.
“Yan Fei has met Mr. Ji, but I didn’t expect that Mr. Ji would still remember me!”
Yan Fei raised his head and looked at Ji Yuan. If a normal person only took a cursory glance, it would be difficult to detect the abnormality of Ji Yuan’s half-open eyes, but he could see those pale eyes that were still fresh in his memory.
“Hahaha, Ji will never forget the voices of these young heroes.”
Yan Fei looked at the corpse beside him and asked with a smile.
“Sir, I killed nine people, do you have any objection?”
Ji Yuan shook his head and smiled, something could be seen from Yan Fei’s decisiveness in drawing the sword.
“Man perishes for money, and birds perish for food. So what if you don’t have an opinion? If they don’t listen, you may not listen either.”