CHAPTER 27: CHAPTER 27: LITTLE MOUSE: SO THIS IS HOW HARD IT IS TO BE HUMAN

Ping’an Lane, at the gate of the courtyard where Chen Xu resides.

A young boy with wheat-colored skin was curled up, squatting by the door. Beside him was a pair of baskets, filled to the brim but covered with a coarse linen cloth, making it impossible to discern what was inside at a glance.

The boy was dressed in a half-old, not-new indigo short coat. Although the cuffs and lapels were patched, they were kept neat and clean.

Chen Xu alighted from the carriage at the end of the lane, leaned on his crutch, and came to the front of his home. The moment he made eye contact with the boy, the boy immediately leapt up joyfully from the ground.

"Second Brother!" the boy called out repeatedly, rushing forward with joy and enthusiasm, but came to a halt just as he was about to collide with Chen Xu.

Then, his gaze fell on Chen Xu’s right hand holding the crutch, and his expression changed instantly: "Second Brother, what happened to you?"

Chen Xu sighed silently, realizing he couldn’t hide it anymore.

The visitor was precisely his third younger brother in this life, Chen An.

Since coming to the county to study after the New Year, Chen Xu had only sent a message once to inform his family that he was temporarily residing in Ping’an Lane, but he hadn’t mentioned his broken leg.

At this moment, when Chen An’s expression changed, Chen Xu immediately said, "Don’t worry, I just fell, that’s all. This leg can be healed."

The phrase "can be healed" barely managed to appease Chen An, who hesitated for a moment before ultimately deciding not to dwell on Chen Xu’s leg injury. Instead, he turned around and hoisted the two baskets on the ground with a shoulder pole.

"Second Brother, today is your birthday, and father and mother asked me to bring grains and eggs to celebrate with you. Come on, let’s go inside the courtyard first."

The two entered the courtyard, and Chen Xu turned to close the courtyard gate.

Chen An carried the two baskets into the kitchen and placed them down, then carefully took out a cloth bag from his jacket.

He poured out the contents of the cloth bag, revealing seven or eight pieces of shimmering broken silver, which roughly added up to at least four or five taels in appearance.

Seeing the solid silver in his hands, Chen An breathed a sigh of relief.

He cradled the silver in his hands as if holding a rare treasure and brought it to Chen Xu, smiling, "Second Brother, look, this is the five taels of silver the family scraped together. Mother said you can’t go to the county exam without silver coins, so she asked me to bring it to you."

This year’s county exam was scheduled for mid-April. Chen Xu had come to the county at the beginning of spring, intending to prepare for this very exam.

This was also, in Chen Xu’s heart, the last chance he was giving himself; he had originally considered that if he couldn’t take the exam smoothly this time, he would temporarily put aside the matter of the imperial exam.

He had witnessed the many hardships at home; a man living in the world couldn’t continuously have his family support him just for the mere possibility of climbing upward.

Chen Xu looked at that small pile of broken silver in Chen An’s palm and sighed softly.

He reached out to push Chen An’s fingers over, letting Chen An tightly hold onto the handful of broken silver in his palm.

"Xiao An, honestly tell Second Brother, where did this silver come from?"

Chen An was startled, a trace of panic flashing across his face, and he hurriedly said, "Second Brother, what nonsense are you talking about? The silver... the silver was cobbled together by the family!"

"You can’t fool me," Chen Xu said. "When I left home at the beginning of spring, the family had already given me five taels of silver. Tell me the truth, where did this silver really come from? Lying to me brings you no benefit at all. On the contrary, your Second Brother’s years of studying aren’t for naught, surely I’m better than you..."

"Second Brother!" Chen An’s lips trembled as his voice rose, finally unable to hold back any longer, "It’s Eldest Brother, Eldest Brother went to Jun County to dig a canal! Digging the great canal for the government earns three taels of silver."

At the sound of this, the two brothers faced each other in silence.

Chen An’s heart raced furiously, not knowing why, but at this moment, he actually felt a little afraid of his Second Brother.

Chen Xu remained silent for about a dozen breaths. No one knew that, in this silence, he could hear in his ears the noisy squeaks of two mice once again.

"So it’s this difficult being human, lacking money is truly pitiful."

The little mouse clicked its tongue in amazement, its voice innocent but carrying a hint of carefree pity.

Master Jiu’s aged voice, however, was filled with surprise as he said, "Huh, the bad luck on this Scholar’s body has completely vanished, quite amazing. But since his bad luck has left him, just give him a little more time, and with his current fortune, making money shouldn’t be difficult."

Hearing this, Chen Xu was internally stirred.

He began studying at the age of seven. Initially, when he was young, it was indeed primarily relying on his family’s support.

But once he got familiar with his surroundings, he quickly started figuring out ways to make money by himself.

As an engineering-minded man, he certainly didn’t lack methods for making big money in ancient times. However, while making money is easy, keeping wealth is difficult. In the current world, some overly prominent methods should not be used when weak, as that would be courting death.

So, Chen Xu engaged in some minor hustles, like making small toys such as Nine Linked Rings and Seven-piece Puzzles to sell to classmates, helping classmates with questions and such.

Furthermore, he secretly wrote storybooks, copied books, sold calligraphy, and the like.

These methods initially worked well, but once Chen Xu failed the county exam for the first time, everything changed.

His bad luck manifested in all aspects—

This matter need not be elaborated; now that Chen Xu had resolved this misfortune, from now on he should naturally be free to pursue his ambitions.

Through the words of the Mouse Demon, he was reminded of the silver he lacked during his previous streak of bad luck.

That was the year before last, before the New Year, when a storybook he wrote achieved quite good sales across the entire Yunjiang Prefecture.

According to the agreement with Boya Book Studio, Chen Xu should have received a ten percent profit share.

This was already an extremely low profit share, but on that day, when Chen Xu went to collect the payment he deserved, the shopkeeper at Boya Book Studio, relying on the power behind him, shamelessly refused to pay on the grounds of "silver coins theft."

Afterward, this shopkeeper named Sun Wu even pretended to say to Chen Xu, "Mr. Chen, truly our entire Boya Book Studio has suffered a robbery, what can be done? Of course, Mr. Chen, rest assured, no matter what, what is due to you won’t be shorted.

You just wait a couple of months, and when our owner recovers, even if we have to sell pots and smash tiles, we’ll pay you that draft fee, won’t we?"

Power on one side, nothing to be done.

At that time, what Chen Xu had in mind was that after passing the county exam the following year and obtaining the title of Scholar—

Even if it’s just the title of Scholar, the son of a shopkeeper would not dare to cheat him again.

By then, even without mentions, wouldn’t that Sun probably voluntarily come to deliver the manuscript fee?

Such thoughts at the time couldn’t be said to be naive but were certainly an action born out of helplessness in the face of bigger forces.

But that was then, this is now.

After experiencing a series of fortuitous events, Chen Xu’s entire worldview underwent a radical change.

The world was no longer the same; should he still abide by those rules established by layers of shackles like before?

Rules are things that, from the day they are established, are meant to be broken.

Thinking about what he was going to do, for some reason, Chen Xu felt a faint thrill of excitement begin to rise.