Chapter 125: Wooden Carvings, Dwarf News, Night Wind

"This wooden carving..."

Old Mr. Bantuolisa held a wooden carving that had not been painted and still retained the original color and texture of the wood, his words trailing off halfway.

"Is it because it wasn't painted? I think this is fine too. Although the original grain of the wood obscures some of the fine carving, giving the whole piece slight flaws, isn't that the very joy of a wooden carving?"

Young Master Lipuerde also held a wooden carving, his well-groomed fingers tracing the wood grain on its surface as he examined and played with it.

Seeing this young Human evaluate it this way, the Dwarf who carved it scratched his head, his face showing a mix of embarrassment and nervousness when facing an art critic. After all, this young man, dressed in what looked simple but was actually excessively luxurious, clearly looked like someone who knew a thing or two about art appreciation.

Being able to receive such an evaluation, he already felt satisfied.

After all, he was just an ordinary Dwarf Miner, and his only hobby was to find a bright place to sit on the ground after finishing his daily mining work and focus on doing some wood carving.

"However, I think these works still have room for improvement; there are some shortcomings." Young Master Lipuerde spoke eloquently, as if judging things in his area of expertise was a wonderful thing.

"May I ask..." The Dwarf was just about to ask where the shortcomings were when old Mr. Bantuolisa waved his hand: "I know what you want to say, Lipuerde. But the problem is that they haven't been painted. The issues with the wood grain you mentioned would naturally cease to be problems once they are covered by paint!"

The old gentleman, however, looked puzzled at a wooden carving of a Human figure in his hand: "I just feel that the image of this wooden carving gives me a sense of familiarity, as if I have seen this young Warrior on it somewhere, and very recently! Sorry, I'm getting on in years, my memory is failing a bit, not as good as when I was young."

Jier suddenly laughed at this moment, winking at Mr. Scott who was looking over from the side, and he said: "Haha, Mr. Bantuolisa, you didn't see wrong, and your memory is better than anyone else's. Don't doubt it, the prototype for this wooden carving of a Human Warrior in your hand is one of the Warriors under my command. Look, isn't he right over there guarding the carriage!"

Everyone looked in the direction Jier pointed and discovered that a young Warrior not far away, leaning on a Long Sword and wearing full armor, was exactly the same as the Warrior in the wooden carving held by old Mr. Bantuolisa. Even the weapons and equipment were identical, only the posture and stance were slightly different.

The posture of the wooden carving was one of preparing for battle: left hand holding a hand shield, right hand with a Long Sword resting on the right shoulder, body turned to the side, overall slightly crouched, feet separated front and back, maintaining a stable standing posture while also having an impeccable stance that could flexibly exert force and change.

But this Warrior now had a casual demeanor, leaning on his Soldier Sword and looking around to keep watch. Although he didn't look like he was about to fight, he was still a piece of Refining Qi that one could tell at a glance was ready to enter battle at any time.

Not to mention his skills, at least his mental state was excellent.

This was also an implicit reason why the Merchants who came to the scene held Jier in high regard. The Merchants had traveled all over the place and had seen countless Town Guards in various towns; this one ordinary Warrior under Jier already surpassed most of the guards and Soldiers they had seen, not to mention that the weapons and equipment on his body were also much stronger than those of most town guards and professional Soldiers.

Even the Town Guards in the wealthy Duoen Town had a significant gap in equipment.

After all, most of the guards in Duoen Town still wore a small amount of leather clothing and a small amount of leather armor for protection, with only a few guard leaders having full sets of metal armor that they didn't often wear. It wasn't that the wealthy town couldn't afford the supplies to re-equip all the guards, it was simply that they didn't want to invest such a large sum of money, along with the subsequent equipment maintenance costs.

After all, taking this money to engage in trade or lending it to small-scale Merchant Guilds was far more profitable in terms of returns than investing funds in the town's armaments.

Old Mr. Bantuolisa carefully looked at the young Warrior not far away, compared him with the wooden carving in his hand, and then laughed as well.

"Haha, it seems my memory is still fine. Didn't any of you notice this?" He laughed happily and naturally bought the wooden carving on the spot. This thing wasn't expensive, just two Silver Coins. After all, it was an ordinary wooden carving, the wood wasn't expensive, and these two Silver Coins were given out of respect for the Dwarf's exquisite carving skills.

Jier felt a bit nervous about this, wondering if the many Dwarf wooden carvings he had previously collected would end up in his hands, or if he had suffered a huge loss because the price was slightly low?

But Young Master Lipuerde on the side silently bought the remaining wooden carvings at the stall on the spot. When Jier asked in a low voice, this young man of mysterious and noble origin replied in an equally low voice: "Although the raw materials for the wooden carvings are a bit ordinary, this Dwarf's carving skills are really good; it's just that the things he carved are too ordinary. If he could carve some things of their own Dwarf culture, they would be worth more. Furthermore, if I go back and find someone to paint these wooden carvings, the price could double. These wooden carvings would look quite nice as ornaments on a desk after being painted."

He held a wooden carving he had bought and pointed to the clothing styles and details that had been finely carved onto it: "Look, with this level of detail in the carving, how steady must the hand be to achieve it? I'm even worried that the craftsman who paints them might destroy the original aesthetic beauty of these wooden carvings? Or these details?"

Jier shrugged; as long as the value of these wooden carvings remained, it was fine. Jier didn't understand the aesthetic beauty of these wooden carvings or those particularly fine details. After his eyes underwent Knight Training, they were strengthened by Life Energy, and his vision was much better than that of an average person. The carvings that Young Master Lipuerde felt were fine were actually just so-so in Jier's eyes.

If he were asked to use suitable precision tools to imitate this wooden carving and make one just like it, it wasn't that he couldn't do it, but Jier could only imitate and couldn't truly create new wooden carving art like this Dwarf.

In the end, that set of Dwarf armor was not bought by the few Merchant Guild executives beside Jier, but by an outsider Merchant who was dressed tightly and unwilling to reveal his identity, who bought it as a collectible. Everyone understood this; many people at the scene had actually disguised themselves, some just didn't want to reveal their identities, some didn't want to come into contact with people they knew at the scene, and others had questionable identities themselves.

Jier saw several young women dressed as men, including Ms. Feiniya and her little sisters; the two of them had even changed into Merchant attire, sticking on fake beards and swaggering around the sales fair to inquire about news and contact other Merchants.

Although Jier didn't know why this person wanted to pretend to be a man to come to this sales fair.

This sales fair lasted until midnight. Jier also replenished some Lighting Orbs in the middle, and almost all the Dwarf items brought out were sold, except for the Dwarf kitchenware brought out by the two Chefs, which no one took a fancy to, even though the Merchants who came liked eating the Dwarf food that the two Chefs made on the spot for people to taste for free.

"There's nothing to be done about this. You know, people's tastes in food are far more stubborn and mysterious than most people imagine. Although everyone likes to eat the food you make, there really aren't many people willing to spend money to have themselves or their family's cooks learn a new set of Dwarf food preparation methods and use special Dwarf kitchenware."

Jier finally comforted the two Dwarf Chefs who were in low spirits, but Jier had overthought it; either of these two was over two hundred years old, so where would they need him to comfort them?

And the old Dwarf, who had been talking with the Vice President of the Burning Furnace Merchant Guild for a long time, was now directing everyone to clean up the aftermath of the sales fair, arranging personnel to guard their caravan, and gathering the remaining Dwarfs in the hotel restaurant to discuss the situation and earnings of this sales fair.

Earnings were important, but even more important was the various intelligence information revealed by the Merchants in the town during their conversations at the sales fair. And estimating which of these pieces of information would be useful for them to find their Dwarf compatriots.

But fortunately, the old Dwarf, relying on his many years of life experience, had managed to glean some useful intelligence during his conversation with Vice President Norris.

"Jier." The old Dwarf pulled Jier into an empty corner of the hotel, and he said to Jier with some excitement: "Good news!"

"Please tell me."

"I heard from the Vice President of that large Merchant Guild that in this Southern Province of yours, there are at least three large cities where Dwarfs live. Two of them even have Dwarf residential areas and external Merchant Guilds!"

Speaking of this news, the old Dwarf's eyes were practically brimming with tears. It turned out that as long as one walked out of the Babotali Valley, finding the possibility of returning home was not that difficult. And for the nearly one hundred years before this, what were they, these timid fellows, worrying about?

Many things are often such that before taking action, the vast majority of people will be dissuaded by some apparent difficulties, but when they actually do it, although it is still difficult, it is not as desperate as imagined.

And a lucky Mining Pick is also likely to dig up gold at any time!

"Then congratulations to you all, Mr. 'Iron Fist'." Jier was sincerely congratulating them.

"Then for the road ahead, are you going straight to those few towns? Or will you continue to follow my team? By the way, where in the Southern Province are those towns where Dwarfs live?" Jier asked.

The old Dwarf asked Jier to take out the map and then took a small note with the names of the towns simply recorded from his pocket. When Jier looked, he realized that they were the Province Capital of the Southern Province, and two cities near the Eastern Province to the east of the capital.

Jier had known before that in terms of population distribution, the Saint Hors Kingdom basically had a decreasing population from east to west. After all, the vast majority of the population of this country consisted of migrants from the Empire who were in excess of the land's carrying capacity.

Coming from the Empire in the east, of course, the shorter the migration distance and the better the place of migration, the more willing the migrants were to settle down locally rather than taking more risks to head toward the unknown distance.

Even now, migrants from the Empire were still pouring in from the Eastern Province of the Kingdom and reaching other less populated provinces of the Kingdom through several routes to settle down.

For example, Kendall County in the Northwest Province received a small number of migrants every year. But by now, few could run to Kendall County in one go; most were migrants who, after settling in one place, failed to take root locally and had to migrate again. After a few times, they moved from the Eastern Province to the Beibu Xingsheng, from the Beibu Xingsheng to the Northwest Province, and finally reached Kendall County along the trade Shanglu to settle down.

"It seems we can still travel together for a while. How about this, I will send you and your companions to the Province Capital of the Southern Province—Jun'gu Bao, how about that? Once there, not to mention whether you can persuade your compatriots to take you back, at least you can get a batch of legal identities from them, right? By then, no matter what, you can discuss and decide."

Facing Jier's words, the old Dwarf nodded: "You are quite right, let's do as you say, Jier. For the rest of the journey, we will rely on you all. Of course, now we also have sufficient funds, so we won't always have to eat your supplies on the road."

"Haha, what are you saying? Having a group of Dwarf friends with reliable combat power like you traveling with us, our caravan has saved a lot of trouble! It's clearly me who has gained. You might not know, but the Merchants in this Duoen Town actually regard your team as a group of alien mercenaries. Thanks to your presence, my team of nearly a hundred people appears to be something that needs to be treated with caution in the eyes of those people."

Jier happily revealed this news to the old Dwarf.

The old Dwarf didn't say anything about this and went back to calculate the night's earnings with his subordinates.

Jier also dispersed the Lighting Orbs in the backyard, let the Warriors and Dwarfs guarding the caravan and supplies light up Torches, and patrolled in pairs.

This Duoen Town was good in every way, except that it was secretly ruled by the Thieves Guild. But fortunately, it was already completely controlled and managed by the Thieves Guild here, so they didn't need to support local gangs to do some terrible things to seek profit and make money like in Grass Rat Town.

The Thieves Guild here could completely use rules and power to make a profit in more decent ways, rather than getting their own hands dirty.

Therefore, unlike other places, Duoen Town had no soil for gangs to survive. The forces on the surface were all under the unified management of the Merchant Union and the Town Guard, and some black and gray industries were also operated by the Merchant Guild. And secretly, they were all directly managed by the Thieves Guild. Those unemployed gamblers, old drunks, scoundrels, hooligans, and thugs either lived honestly and went to be debtors to make a living when they had no money, or they just got out.

Those who didn't leave would only disappear silently into the night of Duoen Town.

Just as if those people had never come to Duoen Town at all.

It was late at night, and Jier returned to his large room on the high floor of the Jinbi Dingdang hotel, and told the two Warriors who had been helping him watch the door during his absence not to continue guarding and to go to the room to rest.

When Jier was in the room, he naturally did not need his Warriors to help guard the door. If he needed to go out, he only had to call out a couple of times, and other Warriors living downstairs would come over of their own accord.

The room was quite luxurious, with carpets spread all over the floor, and the seven rooms were meant for him and his accompanying personnel to reside in. But in reality, because the inn had many vacant rooms, and everyone else had their own, only Jier lived here.

Lighting the Oil Lamp, Jier tossed the various items on his person onto the desk in the bedroom.

This room even came with a semi-circular balcony, but because Jier had been busy before, he had simply not opened it while rushing in and out. At this moment, he opened the balcony, and the night breeze, carrying the hot air unique to summer, blew in from outside.

He came to the wooden balcony wearing only a set of undergarments, his hands resting on the sturdy railing as he looked at Duoen Town in the night.

Unlike other towns in this world that grew quiet at night, Duoen Town had many lights and glows shining even in the middle of the night; if one listened carefully, one could even hear the sounds of singing, dancing, and women's giggles coming from the distant streets.

On the street downstairs, several of his Warriors walked out of the inn together, their faces filled with excitement as they headed toward the places that remained lively in the middle of the night.

Jier shook his head, hoping these guys wouldn't be so unable to control themselves that they spent all the hard-earned money they risked their lives for in these places.

But Jier could not control others; how they chose to spend their own money was their own freedom. Jier only hoped that when dawn came, he wouldn't have to go and redeem foolish subordinates who had spent all the money in their purses, just like he had to do back in Yemei Town.

Hopefully, it won't be like that.

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