Chapter 12 - Content

There was an odd beauty about the way these gorgeous ladies weaved between the tables, serving food with a shaded smile that did too good of a job at stealing these men's breath out of their lungs. Most of them were hardly aware of the amount they'd spent on some street food which meant Lei had to check every cash coin to keep an order about the place.

Some old guy had even winged him a hundred-copper cash coin without batting an eye, too busy trying to find his way through all that cloth and silk that revealed just enough to make his eyes sparkle. Half his teeth were missing, which should've made eating the bread a damned pain, but he seemed not that bothered today, nipping at the edges while cherishing the experience.

The square was full of these men, older and younger, and Lei reckoned they'd never been this desirous to spend some coin on a street dish. Granted, there was a line of women clicking their tongues at the severity of the situation, but for this once, Lei had decided not to keep an account of the gender disparity between his customers.

The pouring coins silenced the part of him that said this was a rather crude attempt at marketing.

It worked, and the mastermind behind this devious plan had a certain expression on his face that told failure wasn't a possibility in the first place. He'd probably known exactly how effective this plan would be when he flashed that mysterious grin and Lei was not at all bothered by his discretion on this case.

So he worked with practiced ease, slashing through the meat stick while making sure all the sides were equally cooked and crisped up. His team of little cooks had taken a backseat role when the group of women came cleaving across the square, and now were helping him with the bread and keeping his face clear of any sweat.

The leader of the misfits, Snake, and his fated sidekick, Stone were busy waving banners of cloth, embroidered with red silk that formed three striking words: the Heavenly Cook. As if it weren't enough, they both wrapped headbands around their foreheads and looked like Lei's personal mascots that somehow knew how to work the crowd that waited patiently in a line.

"Two more up, and ready! That'll be thirty coppers, sir." Lei smiled up at his next customer, a middle-aged man who hadn't found the chance to sit on a table and instead leaned his back to the stall, watching the dance triangle the ladies formed in between the tables. At each pluck of the zither, the ladies shifted a step, and something else seemed to shift in these men's hearts as they watched.

Lei had so wisely adjusted the value of his prized goods, upping the original eleven coppers to fifteen coppers, and even then he was now debating whether he should try to work up another thirty or so percent raise. Seemed like it would be the wisest thing to do, but then he reckoned caution was warranted in this case, as he was aware that entertaining a crowd this big could easily turn bad if people started complaining.

When the man gave him a fifty-copper cash coin, Lei fumbled with his stack and returned him the twenty before finally stepping back to take a breather. Looked as though he'd sold over fifty portions in just under an hour, and the pressure slowly tightened around his chest as the crowd kept wolfing down the dishes.

"Oh, how easy it is to pluck the strings of a man's heart, don't you think?" Fatty Lou said as he eased down near him, grinning out across the square. "Give them a toy, something flashy to look at, then watch as they become spellbound like a bunch of children marveling at the promise of a new world. I should be a puppeteer, or a master soulsman, if that's a thing."

"Soulsman?" Lei snickered. "That sounds rather ominous. Thought we'd be keeping away from unreliable practices like soul severing and head chopping."

Fatty Lou waved a hand. "It is perhaps a curse of mine, brother, to be always thinking of donning a greater robe over this mortal cage of a body. But I find a certain joy, an insidious satisfaction whenever I see the waves shift towards the way I imagined. Makes me feel like…"

"A god?"

"Exactly!" Fatty Lou snapped his fingers. "This must be how those cultivators always feel when facing us the mortals. To think that you can be holding sway over life and death with a mere word is terrifyingly tempting."

"Isn't that true for everyone with enough means?" Lei asked. "It doesn't take becoming a cultivator to make a man's life miserable."

"You're not wrong, but it certainly makes it easier to get away with it," Fatty Lou said. "Those demonic cultivators are all about that, right? Sneaky bastards always finding a way to save their skin from all the shit they do. Blast a city into pieces, then fly off to some forest by the sea, and hole up inside a cave for a hundred years. Then once you get back to your business, everything is forgotten and forgiven by the masses."

"Isn't there a word in the Empire that goes something like 'The Skyguard never forgets?'" Lei asked with a hint of doubt. Though he'd never seen those Skyguards himself, their reputation was definitely beyond the reach of their means. People thought of them as half-gods serving under the true Son of Heaven, the dogs of the emperor himself, ready to carry out the justice of the True Dragon at any moment.

Fatty Lou shook his head. "Spoken word will always be stronger than the real thing itself. Isn't that why people boast all the time? For all we know, these Skyguards can very well be a myth to scare bugs and beasts away."

"That's a way to look at it." Lei winced when the pressure grew heavier around his chest and started poking him like needles.

"It's happening again, right?" Fatty Lou said with a frown. "Tell me if there's anything I can do. Some water, perhaps? Or would you rather prefer one of our distinguished ladies accompany you? Trust me, they know how to use those hands."

Lei gave him a straight look before sighing. "I'll be fine. You go handle the customers, I'll be there just in a second."

The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

Fatty Lou lingered around for a second longer, then nodded and trudged away in silence, allowing Lei to focus on the growing pain that now coated his body like a thorny blanket.

He felt that same cold sensation slowly seep through his skin, but paused when he thought about the night they'd tried the Spirited Fried Rice. The Qi inside that dish carried a similar cold, but for the lack of a better word, it was more… composed. The energy or whatever the hell it was that came from people eating his dishes, on the other hand, was like the touch of a slimy snake that made his skin crawl.

This is different from Qi. It doesn't circle inside my body but instead gets sucked by something near my heart.

The din of voices inside his ears slowly grew into a mixed buzzing that punched up at his mind, fingers of his right-hand clenching round the stone step as he fought back the urge to scream. It was cold, and got colder still, like a frozen blade twisting through his guts.

Your [Tier] has increased by 1 level!

The screen appeared right before his face, then flashed blue in the dark of his lids when he clamped his eyes shut. He took deep breaths to gather himself, the left side of his chest throbbing as though it was alive. It took some time but finally, he felt the pain alleviate into the sting of a newly-closed wound, and he found that much more manageable.

With a shake of his head, Lei opened his eyes and peered out around him. His back was drenched in cold sweat, knees shaking and chest heaving with each breath. When he took the first step the world decided to spin on him, but it cleared away soon after he trudged a little more, the pressure that'd taken hold of his body wearing off in time.

He balanced himself on the stall, resting his hands on the counter as his heart pounded in his chest. Then he slowly found his rhythm back into the business, the cold handle of the cleaver giving him a much-needed break from all that buzzing.

If this continues, I'm going to break.

Lei sighed and had some water to calm his nerves. There was an odd satisfaction, the sort of feeling you'd get while leveling up in some old-school RPG as he gained a new tier every now and then, but the pain seemed to be getting worse.

I guess there's no gain without any suffering.

The only solution he could think of to at least keep up with this sudden hike in agony was to make his body more durable. But without spiritual ingredients, let alone cultivating, he couldn't even feel the Qi.

That made him question if their clever idea of posting missions in the Adventurers' Guild would bear fruit any time soon. As Fatty Lou had said, Jiangzhen didn't have that many cultivators to speak of. Most who had some semblance of talent would venture deep toward the heart of the Empire, in hopes of getting recruited by sects or the Empire itself. There were even academies, Empire-approved institutions that provided strict education in things like alchemy, formations, soul cultivation, or basic cultivation, but not everyone could get into such places.

For cultivators to stay in a place as remote as Jiangzhen it took more than just fondness of their hometown, hence why most cultivators in the city worked for the Governor's Office. They got paid richly for their efforts and owned properties in the center of the city that brought them hefty profits.

They are more like merchants on drugs. Perhaps we should blame the Empire for this twisted form of society.

In most of the novels Lei'd read back on Earth, cultivation or anything spiritual was beyond the reach of mortals, away from their touch like the clouds floating over the night skies. But the Eastern Chu Dynasty's ingenious idea to implement a common currency had twisted the way of this world, made it so that cultivators and mortals lived together, and rather thrived together in some aspects.

From the memories of his soul brother, Lei knew that you could buy a spirit stone in exchange for a golden coin in places like Lanzhou. This was the Empire's way of competing against martial sects, and despite all the complications it brought to the society, it seemed to have worked wonders for the Eastern Continent in general.

There were no great wars in the last years, save for the quarrels between sects and some trifles with the Indigenous populace that lived high up on the mountains or beyond the borders of civilization.

The late Emperor Xia was a genius, there's no doubt about that. He basically pitted all the sects against each other, making them compete over resources and territory while claiming most of the continent by working for the common good.

Unfortunately, Jiangzhen hadn't been lucky to be blessed with such opportunities.

"Big Brother Lei, is everything alright?" said a mellow voice, waking him from his thoughts. Little Mei's face was full of concern. "Is there anything I can do?"

Sometimes I wonder who's the real adult here.

Lei shook his head and smiled at her. "I was just thinking about something, Little Mei. There's nothing to worry about. Are you hungry? I can make another one for you."

When Lei turned to the kebab, he noticed that he'd cut the last part of the meat some time ago. The spit was empty. But he took a breath of relief when he saw that they had enough for two or three portions laying on the wooden base.

Little Mei shook her head. "I'm not hungry. I just wanted to check on you."

"Oh, did you now?" Lei felt a smile on his lips. Thinking too much about certain things… It'd been a curse of his old self, but luckily, and strangely, there were enough people around him in this world to keep him away from brooding thoughts. He patted Little Mei's head before staring up at the night skies.

"The stars… They're beautiful, right?" he muttered. Even against all the worries and uncertainties, he'd never felt this content in his life.

…..