Chapter 7: First Shopping Trip to the City

Jiang Jinshi didn't care about the struggle in Luo Feng's heart. He was jogging to test the endurance of his body.

After fusing with Xiang Yu's soul, he felt that his limbs were very powerful. Plus, the original owner often went to the city to gamble, so he wasn't unfamiliar with this road.

Of course, the only place he admired the original owner was here. Every time, he had to walk for an hour to the city to gamble, and after losing, he would walk home in the dark. If he put such perseverance elsewhere, the original owner would have achieved something long ago.

When Jiang Jinshi arrived at the city gate, he found that it was somewhat different from his memory.

Because of the lack of money, the original owner hadn't been to the city for a while, so his memory of Jiang City was still from a month ago.

Unlike the clean and tidy appearance in the past, a large number of refugees were now gathered at the city gate.

Most of them rested against the city wall, and whenever merchants or prominent rich people passed by, they would swarm up to pray for the other party to take them in.

Jiang Jinshi walked past these people and just looked at them casually without paying attention anymore. After all, Jiang Jinshi's clothes weren't good.

Under such a scorching sun, the lack of bathing for a long time led to a very strong smell, and the environment was even worse due to the household garbage and excrement that could be seen everywhere.

Until he saw a person lying on the ground covered in flies, Jiang Jinshi's pupils shrank.

This corpse was just placed here to be gnawed by mosquitoes and insects. Sooner or later, it would cause an epidemic, and by then, everyone within ten miles would die.

The situation he could see was already very tragic, and in places he couldn't see, how many bones would there be!

Although he saw it in his eyes, Jiang Jinshi was powerless to change it. Now he just wanted to improve his family's life and make himself live more comfortably.

Walking to the city gate, Jiang Jinshi was stopped by the city guards, who wanted to collect five wen as an entry fee and could only stay in the city for one day.

This left Jiang Jinshi in a dilemma. He only had the ten taels of silver from the task reward, which was a whole lump of silver. He didn't expect these soldiers to give him change.

Seeing Jiang Jinshi dawdling and not taking out money, the city guards thought it was another refugee wanting to enter the city, so they waved their hands to drive the other party away.

Secretly sighing in his heart, Jiang Jinshi was about to return when he was suddenly called by a soldier.

"Eh! Jiang the Idiot, haven't seen you for some time."

Jiang Jinshi looked carefully, and only then did he find the other party's information from his memory.

Wang Liu, a city guard in Jiang City, was someone the original owner met in the gambling house. Because the two often lost money and often gambled together, they were somewhat familiar with each other, but that was all.

Jiang Jinshi hurriedly greeted Wang Liu: "Brother Wang, are you on duty today?"

The soldier who had stopped Jiang Jinshi looked toward Wang Liu: "Old Wang, do you know him?"

Wang Liu nodded, and the soldier didn't say much and walked to the other side.

After Wang Liu walked closer, Jiang Jinshi asked Wang Liu: "Brother Wang, how has your luck been lately?"

Speaking of gambling, Wang Liu was immediately in high spirits, describing it to Jiang Jinshi with eyebrows dancing.

"The night before yesterday, I was almost finished losing, and when I took out money, a copper coin fell on the leopard. Hey, that round really opened a leopard, and I instantly won back my capital."

Jiang Jinshi hurriedly praised Wang Liu for his good luck, saying it must be the God of Wealth's favor.

These words were very useful to Wang Liu, who loved gambling. He immediately made up his mind to go and kill all sides in the gambling house tonight.

Even the eyes looking at Jiang Jinshi had some more smiles. Before, he only felt that this kid was wooden and unlucky. Only today did he find that the other party was also a good talker, so he issued an invitation to Jiang Jinshi.

"Jiang the Idiot, are you planning to go to the gambling house? Wait for me to finish my shift and we'll go together, let you see how your brother kills all sides today."

Jiang Jinshi looked embarrassed: "I'd like to go, but I have no money on me. Isn't this just preparing to enter the city to borrow some from my cousin."

Hearing this, Wang Liu was somewhat uninterested. Clearly, he didn't want to discuss too much with Jiang Jinshi, waving his hand and saying: "Then go!"

"Alright! Thank you, Brother Wang!" Jiang Jinshi showed a simple smile to Wang Liu and hurriedly mixed into the crowd and entered the city.

Behind him came the conversation between Wang Liu and the previous soldier.

"Old Wang, just let him pass like that?"

"It's fine, this kid isn't a refugee, he's a poor scholar who loves gambling."

"A scholar who loves gambling? That's rare."

"He only studied for two years. I guard the gate every day, so I say I'm a gate god!"

Jiang Jinshi ignored the mockery of others. As long as his purpose for entering the city was achieved, it was fine.

After arriving at the market, he was glad that it hadn't closed yet, so he could still do some shopping.

He went to the money shop first to break the ten taels of silver, otherwise, it would be too eye-catching.

Jiang Jinshi went to the rice shop first to check the price of millet. Grain prices were the best reflection of the rise and fall of a dynasty.

Seeing the price of millet at two taels and eight qian of silver per stone (each dynasty has differences, for the convenience of reading, here 1 stone equals 50 kilograms, 1 tael equals 1000 wen).

Even though he was mentally prepared, Jiang Jinshi was still startled by the grain price. This price was a full three times higher than before, but he still had to pay to buy a stone.

What he was somewhat glad about was that things weren't as bad as he thought.

He remembered that during the Chongzhen period of the late Ming Dynasty, due to the Little Ice Age natural disasters (continuous drought, locust plague), wars, government collapse, and other buffs stacked, the grain price reached the sky-high price of twenty-four taels of silver per stone of rice, and sixteen taels of silver per stone of rice and wheat.

At least the current situation hadn't reached that bad. With the system by his side, he should be able to survive this famine year peacefully.

Next, Jiang Jinshi spent a lot of money to buy a lot of seasonings, including salt. It didn't matter if his clothes were broken, he definitely couldn't treat himself badly when eating.

Finally, he bought a slab of pork fat and three catties of pork belly. He wanted to buy more meat, but there were no refrigerators in this era, and the meat would stink by tomorrow. Curing it would require a large amount of salt.

Thinking that he would also go out tomorrow, this was enough for now.

He found a donkey cart in the market and spent forty wen to send him and the goods back to Da Jiang Cun.

The old man driving the donkey cart was a good person. He hid the goods under the thatch and took out a dirty cloth to cover the thatch. Jiang Jinshi just sat on the thatch. With few goods, one couldn't see any clues at all.

This move also made Jiang Jinshi praise him repeatedly, avoiding a lot of trouble for him.

The journey was peaceful, and it attracted attention when entering the village.

"Little Ten from the Jiang family, didn't you go to cut firewood? Why did you come back in a donkey cart!"

"Aunt, I sprained my foot while cutting firewood, and this old man kindly sent me back."

The principle of not revealing wealth applies to any era, even if it's fellow villagers, one has to guard against it, especially his disgusting big uncle and second uncle.

His father was the third in the family. When he was young, he was exploited. After getting married and separating the family, they only gave his father the worst few mu of land.

It could be said that the situation only improved slightly after his father went to join the army, but his big uncle and second uncle always tried every means to take advantage, and his grandparents were also extreme, their hearts always biased and crooked. ===== CHAPTER 8 =====