The region of this town was called Nandao County. Although small, it appeared prosperous, and the impression it gave reminded Ji Yuan of when he had first arrived in Ning’an County.

But after a careful comparison, this place was clearly far inferior, at least based on the expressions of the common people.

If Ji Yuan were to describe it, the difference was that everyone in Ning’an County could be regarded as living and working in peace and contentment, while the residents here displayed a certain anxiety.

Shortly after entering the city, he arrived at the market. The streets were crowded, with people coming and going, not to mention the occasional carriage. In some places, pedestrians had to give way.

Ji Yuan was dressed in a white robe and walked at a steady pace. His hair was loose, a jade hairpin that looked exquisite adorning his bun. More importantly, he traveled alone.

After walking down the street for a while, Ji Yuan noticed that he was being followed by several groups of people. Judging from the gazes he felt and the whispered voices he overheard, these people definitely did not have good intentions, mostly intent on stealing or even murdering.

‘Oh, the hypocrisy of the world!1 The public security here is truly disappointing.’

Sighing in his heart, Ji Yuan didn’t pay much attention to it. He quickened his pace, and after circling around for a bit, he shook of the groups of people tailing him.

As he passed by a stall on the corner of the street, Ji Yuan stopped.

This stall was a dry biscuit shop, but it the biscuits were different from the ones that Ji Yuan bought before. When he happened to pass by, he saw the shopkeeper making these biscuits using two large iron molds to bake the upper and lower sides. Some salty dried vegetables were embedded in the middle, and after closing the dough, some powdered sesame seeds were sprinkled on top. Ji Yuan wanted to try it as soon as he smelled it.

“Shopkeeper, how much are your biscuits?”

Sensing that there were no sounds around the stall for the time being, Ji Yuan stopped in front and asked.

The old man making biscuits looked up, only to see a gentleman who looked like a scholar. This sight was not all that rare in Nandao County, but it was at least infrequent. Judging from his accent, the man did not seem like a local.

“The biscuits are sold for two coins a piece, and eight coins for a catty, which is about five biscuits.”

“Oh. Could you please let me taste the dried vegetables?”

“Taste the dried vegetables?”

The old man was a little surprised, but after a moment’s hesitation, he nodded, and handed some of the dried vegetables from the ceramic jar on the stall to Ji Yuan.

Ji Yuan tasted it, and smiled at the familiar salty taste.

“Shopkeeper, you must be from Ji Province in Dazhen, correct?”

“Uh, I’m not…”

The old man began to say, but then, as if suddenly remembering something, he immediately continued speaking.

“It seems that you know your stuff, Sir. To tell you the truth, I was indeed taught how to make these dried vegetables by a man from Dazhen back in the day. As for where in Dazhen he was from, I don’t know.”

Ji Yuan nodded.

“I see. Then please weigh ten catties of biscuits for me.”

“Ten catties?”

“Yes, ten catties!”

“Hey hey, wait a moment, Sir. We only have a little over six catties at the moment. I’ll make more for you right away. They will be ready in no time!”

Ten catties of biscuits was a large transaction for the old man. If they sold all of them, them most of today’s goods would be gone.

The old man was quick and dexterous. He chatted with Ji Yuan while making the biscuits, and soon had finished all ten catties.

After the biscuits were weighed, Ji Yuan naturally had to pay. He took out his purse. It looked like it was bulging, but when he looked inside, he saw that the copper coins, which made up the majority of his money, were all printed with “Yuan De Tongbao.”2 Since they were Dazhen’s coins, they would naturally not be in circulation here, so he had to take out a piece of silver.

“Here, shopkeeper, please weight the silver.”

“Oh wow, sir, you are giving me silver!”

This old man had never been outside of Nandao County, so he didn’t know how things worked in other places, but the value of copper coins in Nandao County was sometimes quite chaotic. The two coins per biscuit he had previously mentioned was the assuming the standard.

However, a lot of copper coins were not up to the standard. The privately-minted coins were all adulterated with different materials. Some coins were even exaggeratedly printed to be worth ten, but they didn’t hold the equivalent weight, making them unusable in transactions.

In these circumstances, gold and silver had become extremely valuable. Their purchasing power far exceeded that of a Dazhen’s coins, often fetching more than their actual value in copper coins.

Many people directly used silver to purchase a large amount of “real money,” and then melted it down and minted it privately, mixing it with other materials. In this way, one tael of silver could be worth three or four taels of silver in practice.

It was rare for someone to directly buy biscuits with silver. The old man reckoned that there might not even be any copper coins in the man’s purse.

Seeing the glimmering silver, the shopkeeper’s face lit up in joy. He weighed the silver and, having originally estimated a profit of forty coins, he now revised that estimate to at least a hundred and fifty coins.

A little further away, a few eyes had already noticed Ji Yuan’s bulging purse, and even more clearly noticed the silver he’d taken out. Someone whispered in the back corner of an alley behind a carriage.

“It’s a big fish. That purse is probably full of the white and yellow!”3

“That’s right…and that jade hairpin, too. I just took a closer look while passing by. It’s priceless!”

“Shh… let’s go.”

At the biscuit stand, the silver was weighed and the change was given. The old man tied the biscuits together with a hemp string and handed them to Ji Yuan, glancing around and whispering.

“Sir, you are a foreigner. From what this old man can see, some people are already eyeing you. Be careful!”

Ji Yuan’s speech was humorous, friendly, and gentle, which made it easy for people to favor him. The old man had seen a lot of things in his life, so he naturally noticed that some people around had some unkind intentions towards this gentleman, and he couldn’t help but remind him.

Ji Yuan smiled and bowed with cupped hands towards the old man before taking the biscuits.

“Thank you for the reminder, shopkeeper. I will be careful.”

After had had finished speaking, Ji Yuan turned around and strode away, biscuits in hand. He walked around for a while. When he passed by the entrance of an alley, the biscuits in his hand had disappeared.

In the distance behind, several men were doing their best as they struggled to follow Ji Yuan.

“Haah…haah…this guy… this guy walks really fast.”

“Haah… I mean… he looks so gentle… Hey, where are the biscuits in his hand, why are they missing?”

“Why do you care about his biscuits? As long as we’re still following the right person!”

“Let’s go, let’s go, hurry up!”

“Right, we can’t lose him.”

The people at the front didn’t stop walking, so the others couldn’t rest either. After barely catching their breath, they sped up again to catch up.

Ji Yuan kept striding ahead. The others were either thrown off or gave up, but the group behind him were relentless in their pursuit.

It’s wasn’t that he couldn’t use some techniques to get away, but hearing them talk about “killing a few fat sheep” and so on,4 Ji Yuan didn’t want to let them lose him.

By dusk, Ji Yuan had already made his way out of the city, after traveling down many twists and turns and circles. The nine people following him never lost track of him, which showed their strong determination.

There was a pavilion five li north of Nandao County, which was simply and crudely named “Five Li Pavilion.” It was here that Ji Yuan stopped, took out a biscuit, and sat inside to enjoy it.

Because it had been freshly made today, although it wasn’t soft, it was still easy to eat. At least it didn’t hurt his teeth due to being unbaked.

The nine men still following Ji Yuan hid behind a low hill covered with trees in the distance, but they were now out of breath and had to rest to recover their strength.

By the time Ji Yuan had leisurely finished eating a biscuit, the nine men had also rested enough and, armed with ropes and weapons, slowly began approaching Five Li Pavilion.

As the saying went, one’s appearance betrays one’s heart: the nine men’s faces now displayed a ferocity even more worthy of the term “extremely vicious” than the previous bandit Ba Zi.

“Scholar, you’re quite good at running, aren’t you?”

“Hey, hand over all your valuables!”

The leader was tall and muscular, wielding an iron whip. He launched into a barrage of threats even before reaching Five Li Pavilion. They had already scouted, and found no one around.

Ji Yuan gathered the biscuit crumbs in his palm and at them. Then he dusted off his hands, stood up, and looked at the newcomers.

“If I give up my valuables, would you let me go?”

The nine men had already surrounded Five Li Pavilion, and the leader looked Ji YUan up and down.

“We would be too worried to just let you go, we would need to search you.”

Ji Yuan nodded.

“Then you’d let me go after the search?”

“Hahahaha… Letting you go would be such a hassle. The area around Five Li Pavilion is a wilderness, teeming with wolves and other wild beasts. We can just kill you and leave the remains to them.”

Hearing these words, Ji Yuan looked at the people in front of him, and suddenly burst into laughter. Though his vision of the men was blurry, their hostility was palpable.

“Haha, there’s no room for negotiation?”

The fact that Ji Yuan could still laugh at this moment made the men a little uneasy.

“You… are you a martial arts expert?”

But Ji Yuan didn’t answer them. Instead, he turned his head and glanced towards the woods beside the pavilion.

In Ji Yuan’s ears, the sound of footsteps and something piercing the air approached. Just two breaths later, a dark figure flashed over the treetops.

Shiiiing…

The sound of a longsword being drawn out of its sheath was accompanied by the cold light of the blade. The moment it appeared in a flash in front of the pavilion, the sound of the newcomer’s blade slicing through flesh sounded out.

“Look out…”

“Pfft…”

“Pfft…”

“Pfft…”

The sword blade slashed past, and the man holding the iron whip and the people around him fell to the ground, without even being able to react as the sword sept away. The momentum of the sword stopped and it spun in the air. The newcomer leaped off of one of the pavilion’s pillars to gain momentum, and swung his sword at the moment he jumped off and spun in the air.

“Look out…”

“Quick…”

“Pfft…”

“Pfft…”

“Pfft…”

Several more men were felled without even being able to finish their sentences.

In an instant, the nine people surrounding the pavilion had all fallen, and the newcomer stood outside the pavilion. He shook off the blood on the sword and returned it to its sheath.

“Good skill!”

Ji Yuan praised sincerely. From the perspective of a cultivator, such techniques were naturally insignificant, but this man was nonetheless definitely a martial arts master. He could distinguish the martial arts from his body movements, positioning, swordsmanship, and use of true Qi. The man’s movements and swordsmanship were quite impressive.

“Sir, you are still the same as ever. Your appearance is as excellent as before, even after not having seen you for so many years! Just now I thought I made a mistake, but I didn’t expect that truly would turn out to be you, Sir!”

Ji Yuan opened his eyes a little wider, and looked up and down at the newcomer with his blurry vision.

“That voice… are you Young Master Yan? Oh, now I should call you Master Yan!”

The newcomer, dressed all in black, took a few steps closer to the pavilion, holding out his sword and bowing to Ji Yuan.

“Yan Fei greets Mr. Ji. I didn’t expect that you would still remember me!”

Yan Fei raised his head and looked at Ji Yuan. It would be difficult for an ordinary person to notice the oddity of Ji Yuan’s half-opened eyes if they only took a cursory glance, but Yan Fei could clearly see that pair of blue eyes that were still fresh in his memory.

“Hahaha, I would never forget the voices of your group of young warriors.”

Yan Fei glanced at the corpses beside him, and asked with a smile.

“Sir, I killed nine people. Don’t you have any objections?”

Ji Yuan shook his head and smiled. He could see something in the decisiveness of Yan Fei’s sword.

“People die for money, and birds die for food. They all bring it upon themselves. As for those who disagree, so what? If they don’t listen, you don’t have to either.”

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T/n: whoops I accidentally published this one early. Sorry!

1. Literal translation of 世态炎凉 (shìtàiyánliáng)

2. Yuan De being the emperor’s name, and Tongbao being “national currency”

3. Slang for silver and gold

4. i.e. killing rich victims