Chapter 171: The Stubborn Youth, the Blood-Stained Four Taels and Seven Maces of Silver
Chapter 171 – The Stubborn Youth, the Blood-Stained Four Taels and Seven Maces of Silver
“Fortunes told! Divinations cast!”
“To those bound by fate, I ask not for a single copper; to those without destiny, ten thousand gold cannot buy my sight!”
A young man hawked loudly by the side of the bustling street, yet the hurrying mortals paid no heed to his humble fortune-telling stall.
“Chen Changsheng, give it a rest already.”
“If you swindle another poor soul, watch your skin. They’ll beat you to a pulp.”
Hearing this, the loud-mouthed Chen Changsheng turned to look at the plump auntie selling steamed buns from a nearby cart.
“Auntie Wang, it isn’t as if I want to peddle fortunes either!”
“But in this peaceful and prosperous age, the coffin shop business is dreadful. If I don’t scrape together some side work, what am I supposed to eat?”
“Speaking of which, do you have any of those three-delicacy buns today?”
“I do, saved them especially for you.”
At the mere mention of three-delicacy buns, Chen Changsheng abandoned his fortune-telling stall and darted over.
Five steaming buns were swiftly wrapped in a sheet of oiled paper.
Taking a bite, the soft dough gave way to a savory, dripping filling, painting an expression of pure, unadulterated bliss across Chen Changsheng’s face.
As he devoured the freshly steamed buns, Chen Changsheng struck up a casual mental banter with his system.
“System, am I truly unable to bear the Heaven’s Mandate in this life?”
“Correct.”
“Why?”
“Speaking logically, your current foundation is vastly insufficient to bear the Heaven’s Mandate.”
“To put it in mortal terms: you are too lazy. You are unworthy of bearing the Heaven’s Mandate.”
Upon hearing this, the delicious bun in Chen Changsheng’s hand instantly lost its flavor.
“System, that’s crossing a line. I have been cultivating with extreme diligence.”
“According to my records, over the past one hundred and eighty years, the Host has merely cultivated for half a shichen each day.”
“The remainder of your time is spent eating, sleeping, wandering aimlessly, and robbing mortal children of their candied haws.”
Exposed so thoroughly, Chen Changsheng didn’t so much as blush, his heartbeat steady as he replied coolly.
“You can’t pin that on me!”
“Er Gou bought the very last skewer of candied haws. It’s his own fault for refusing to share.”
“I used to split my buns with him all the time, yet he hoarded his sweets. That is fundamentally unfair.”
The system’s voice remained utterly devoid of emotion.
“Host, you have drifted through the mortal dust for one hundred and eighty years.”
“Based on an evaluation of your actions, you appear to be searching for a specific type of person. Do you truly believe such a being exists?”
Facing the inquiry, Chen Changsheng sighed, “I can’t say for certain, but my gut tells me this kind of person has to exist.”
“Because living creatures have a knack for forging the most impossible miracles.”
“Wu Li bore the Heaven’s Mandate, yet he still bled out upon the Road to Heaven.”
“If I were to shoulder the Heaven’s Mandate right now, I don’t believe I could surpass Wu Li.”
“Simply put, sending another bearer of the Heaven’s Mandate to walk the Road to Heaven is nothing but treading the same doomed path.”
“So, I need to find someone. Someone who defies logic, someone stronger than a chosen bearer of the Heaven’s Mandate.”
“Does the Host consider this notion grounded in reality?”
“By all measures of the heavenly Dao, a bearer of the Heaven’s Mandate is the absolute zenith of this realm.”
“Since they represent the pinnacle, no living entity can surpass them, at least not in a direct confrontation.”
Listening to the system’s retort, Chen Changsheng polished off his fourth bun.
Tucking the final bun into his robes, Chen Changsheng murmured, “Human will dictates the outcome. If the bearer of the Heaven’s Mandate was truly invincible…”
“…then Wu Li’s blood wouldn’t have stained the Road to Heaven.”
Leaving those words hanging in his mind, Chen Changsheng swayed on his feet and ambled away from the fortune-telling stall.
……
Wan Hua Lou.
“Young master, come up and play for a while!”
A flock of charming, powder-scented women leaned over the carved wooden railings, soliciting guests. Any man who walked past couldn’t help but cast a lingering glance upward.
Though their hearts burned with yearning, a quick, sobering squeeze of the flat money pouches at their waists forced most to swallow their desires and walk on.
Staring up at the extravagant facade of Wan Hua Lou, Chen Changsheng smacked his lips, and then…
He slipped into the shadows and circled around to the establishment’s dingy back alley.
……
“Thirteen, hurry up and scrub those night soil buckets! Miss Xiao Hong has complained about the stench three times already.”
A coarse, middle-aged woman barked her orders at a thin youth.
In the face of her scolding, the youth said nothing, trudging silently toward the foul-smelling wooden vats in the corner.
A moment later, a furtive figure peeked around the damp brick corner of the alley.
Only after confirming the alley was empty did Chen Changsheng swagger out into the open.
“Today’s catch is three-delicacy filling. You want a bite?”
Staring at the plump, steaming bun, the emaciated youth swallowed a mouthful of thick saliva and croaked out,
“I want it.”
“Then beg me.”
At that single condition, the desperate hunger in the youth’s eyes was snuffed out like a candle in the wind. He lowered his head and aggressively went back to scrubbing the night soil bucket.
Seeing this pigheaded display, Chen Changsheng rolled his eyes so hard they nearly stuck in his skull.
“Seriously, must you be as unyielding as raw, unpolished iron?”
“Would uttering a single word of submission kill you?”
“You would rather let your stomach rot than eat this bun?”
Hearing the taunt, the youth abruptly stopped scrubbing the filth.
He rinsed his calloused hands in a basin of murky water, fished a blackened, rock-hard lump of cornbread from his rags, and began to savagely gnaw on it.
Watching the boy practically grind his own teeth against the stale bread, Chen Changsheng sighed, plopped down beside him in the muck, and slowly savored the final meat bun.
The two sat shoulder-to-shoulder, eating in absolute silence amidst the reek of stale wine and night soil.
A quarter of an hour passed. The food was gone, yet the suffocating silence remained.
“You really won’t beg me?”
“You toil in the gutters of Wan Hua Lou for one reason: you want to buy Aoxue Hongmei’s freedom.”
“But Aoxue Hongmei is the undisputed reigning flower of Wan Hua Lou. A wealthy merchant from the capital once slammed a thousand taels of gold on the table and was still shown the door.”
“With your pathetic wage of one mace of silver a month, how many lifetimes will it take to save enough?”
“If you just open your mouth and beg—even a half-hearted, casual plea—I will hand you your heart’s desire on a silver platter.”
Faced with a temptation that would break any mortal’s spine, the youth merely stood up in silence and shoved his raw, bleeding fingers back into the filth of his labor.
Staring at the boy’s stubbornly hunched back, Chen Changsheng let out a weary, ageless sigh.
“Fine then. We will wait. I have all the time in the world to see if you will ever open your mouth and beg.”
With a swish of his sleeves, Chen Changsheng vanished from the alley, leaving the youth to silently scrub at the endless grime.
……
Time bled away, and the massive gears of Jinshan City continued to turn.
In a mortal metropolis this vast, countless dramas unfolded daily.
There were petty squabbles over missing chickens, and there were bloody murders in dark alleys. Yet, one singular event gripped the tongues of the entire populace.
Zhao Ke, the second young master of Jinshan City’s most tyrannical ruling family—the Jinshan Yinhai Manor—was taking a concubine!
And the woman forced into his palanquin was none other than the jewel of Wan Hua Lou, Aoxue Hongmei.
……
Wan Hua Lou.
“Beat him!”
“Break his damn legs!”
“A filthy toad lusting after swan meat! You truly don’t know the immensity of heaven and earth!”
“You? Redeem Miss Hongmei? Piss in a puddle and look at your own wretched reflection!”
The burly, coarse-tongued thugs of Wan Hua Lou surrounded the emaciated youth, kicking and stomping him into the dirt.
Though beaten until the copper tang of blood choked the air and his face was an unrecognizable mask of crimson, the youth’s gaze remained fiercely locked onto the tightly closed doors of the upper floor.
His tattered money pouch was ripped apart in the brutal struggle, sending a pathetic spray of loose silver rolling across the dusty floorboards.
These meager coins were the sum total of the boy’s life, blood, and sweat, painstakingly hoarded over five grueling years. A grand total of four taels and seven maces of silver.
He had just marched through the front doors, intending to use these four taels and seven maces to buy the freedom of Wan Hua Lou’s most untouchable goddess.
High above the violence, a solitary, ageless figure sat in the shadows of the second floor, silently looking down at the bloody spectacle below.