Chapter 49

Bei Qiao listened quietly, his eyes sweeping across the stalls. In this alternate world without assembly line operations, the items sold at the stalls weren't exactly the same. But because of the labor involved, even the most common gadgets weren't cheap, which made Bei Qiao completely unwilling to pay for them.

Bei Qiao: It seems that it is time to pick up the carpentry skills that I lost in middle school. In situations where I cannot wear a jade crown, I can't leave my head empty all the time.

The stall owner chatted with Bei Qiao for a while, then left her alone and got back to work when someone came to buy something. Although Bei Qiao was handsome, making money was more important to the lady.

Bei Qiao left and drove to the reliable blacksmith shop the old lady had mentioned, where she ordered hidden quivers and a breastplate. She had originally wanted to order a set of armor for herself, but unfortunately, it took quite some time to craft and was too expensive for her to afford.

Forget it, just like you don’t need to buy a safe when you have no money, let’s put aside the fear of insufficient defense and increase the lethality first.

"How much would you like another box of arrows?" The size of the sleeve arrows needed to be adjusted. Bei Qiao stood near the door of the blacksmith shop and took out a fan to fan himself because it was so hot.

The blacksmith quickly glanced at the fan in Bei Qiao's hand and pondered for a moment: "Then, two strings of cash and four hundred coins."

The apprentice beside him widened his eyes after hearing this: "No! Why such a low price! Oh, that fan seems to be... I understand, hum!"

Bei Qiao, who was glared at by his apprentice, silently stopped fanning himself and turned the fan to observe carefully: What on earth did they see? There was no word "Qin" written on this fan.

With doubts in her mind, Bei Qiao took out the money and handed it to the apprentice, then received the adjusted hidden arrow. She had already stuffed the breastplate she had bought earlier into her clothes. Of course, it was necessary to equip a life-saving item properly.

Pulling down his sleeve to block the hidden arrow, Bei Qiao suddenly felt the urge to travel the world with his sword: "Now that I have money, I can go to further places. It's really not easy!" But before that, I have to go back to the Novice Village. If nothing else, a decent escort agency must have escorts besides the escort leader, right?

After leaving the blacksmith shop, Bei Qiao drove straight to the bank, intending to exchange some copper coins for her to carry with her. As the carriage turned a corner, she noticed the government office located at the intersection.

The government office here still has staff from the game organizers employed. For various reasons, their chances of promotion are not very high. Sometimes they will serve as constables until retirement, and then recommend new colleagues to take over before retirement.

The job of a constable is neither particularly good nor particularly bad. As migrant workers with no family background, it's difficult for them to advance further, so the profession of constable is quite stable for them. As long as there's no war or murder, they'll receive a stable salary in the local area, neither too high nor too low, and they won't be able to get promoted.

Prefects and county magistrates were all sent down from above. Some were sons of aristocratic families, some were newly crowned top scorers, and some were young men sent out for training. With seals in hand, they rushed to various government offices. Regardless of their achievements, if nothing unexpected happened, the sons of noble families would always be promoted faster than the other two types.

"There is no notice on the wall. It seems nothing big has happened recently." Bei Qiao pulled the reins, signaling Honghong to speed up.

Arriving at the bank, Bei Qiao found a spot to park the carriage, tied the rope to a wooden stake next to the bank, and received a small wooden sign from the carriage attendant. This was the bank's carriage parking area, and when leaving, one could use the sign to retrieve their carriage.

The money houses in Linjie City are different from those in Yuanshan Village. The latter mainly serve players, while here, most of the users of the money houses are natives.

Because they rarely stored money, and the truly important items were protected by mechanisms, the Novice Village's bank had virtually no security measures, not even a gatekeeper. Seeing so many guards patrolling the bank at first, Bei Qiao was a little unaccustomed, thinking someone was coming to rob the bank.

Bei Qiao: That’s right, this is normal. In reality, even the smallest bank has to carry guns when using financial escort vehicles. How could a money house not need guards? There is no one guarding the money house in the novice village because there is almost no money above the ground.

Facing the guards' suspicious gazes, Bei Qiao walked into the bank and looked at the price tag hanging at the door: "To exchange money, please go left. The handling fee for depositing money is, um... um."

Bei Qiao carefully reviewed the price list again and discovered that in the bank, whether depositing or withdrawing money, there was a handling fee. The only free fee was when exchanging silver bills and coins. No wonder the ancients used wooden boxes and pottery jars to store money. The handling fees for depositing money in a bank were too painful.

"Looks like I need to save more if I want to save money." Bei Qiao shook his head and went to the left window to exchange a small bag of copper coins. The young man in charge of the exchange had no expression on his face. He took the small change, weighed it, counted the copper coins, and pushed the coins towards Bei Qiao. His movements were neat and efficient, and the whole process took only five minutes.

There were people lining up behind him. Bei Qiao picked up the copper coins and turned to leave. Before leaving, he dodged a thief's outstretched hand and, with a twist of his ankle, knocked him to the ground. The thief was unlucky; when he fell, he rolled right under the feet of one of the guards, and several completely different money bags fell out of his body, catching him red-handed.

Without even glancing back to see the thief being dragged away, Bei Qiao pocketed the copper coins and left the bank. He exchanged the wooden sign for his carriage and spent the rest of his time exploring other parts of Linjie City. After inspecting the escort agencies in Linjie City, Bei Qiao felt the case wasn't particularly relevant, so he wandered around to see if there were any suitable side businesses for the agency.

Bei Qiao has temporarily given up on the path of finding items and returning to the Novice Village Bank to exchange them for cash to start a business. Everything that can be bought in Linjie City can be bought by all players. It is said that things are valuable because they are rare. It is obviously impossible to exchange such common items for a large amount of cash. The cost of transporting them may be more expensive than their own value.

The possibility of the protagonist having an adventure like picking up a bargain is very low. Others are not blind. If they really want to pick up a bargain, they can consider going to the wilderness. As long as you can rob the woodcutters, hunters, herbalists, etc., and successfully return to the Novice Village alive with your harvest... Well, you may not get rich. After all, the game has been developed for so many years, and there are many warriors who are not afraid of death. The "precious" medicinal materials you risked your life to grab may be worthless options that others have eliminated using the system decades ago.

After eliminating a bunch of impractical options in his mind, Bei Qiao drove his carriage past the door of the brothel and took a quick look at this place that often appeared in novels.

Of course, there were no courtesans to be seen. The brothels of this otherworldly world were the equivalent of high-end clubs in reality, charging exorbitant fees. Just entering the brothels cost a fortune. Bei Qiao wasn't sure what the minimum charge was, and he had no intention of challenging the temper of the brothel's thugs with his wallet.

"Come to think of it, I've never been to a club outside of school." Bei Qiao had never felt so clearly about her ordinariness and poverty as she did now. According to the national per capita income standard, she wasn't yet well-off, and she still needed to work hard.

Bei Qiao didn't know the difference between this brothel and those in ancient times, but it was said that the brothels here only allowed prostitution and redemption. Regardless of whether a woman was an oiran or not, as long as she saved enough money, she could redeem herself. Incidentally, an oiran was not necessarily a woman.

The contract to enter a building is like a normal labor contract; it must be done voluntarily. Families sell their children and send them to jail! Someone kidnaps and forces a decent girl to be imprisoned! The courtesan cries that she didn't consent, and her boss and his men are imprisoned together!

The Empress who established these regulations stated: "Preserving the brothel is my last act of kindness. Voluntariness is the bottom line of kindness. We abolished the crime of hooliganism, but within ten years, you were exposed. So what's left to say? We'll punish you all! If you want to gang up on others, then go build the Great Wall! Let the peasants rest."

Once again, the peasants, who were told they were exempt from corvee labor, said: "Thank you, Queen! Long live the Queen! The human traffickers deserved it!"

The boss who is always inspecting his own business: Is there anyone who is unwilling to do this? If so, please tell me in advance, we can discuss everything, don’t make me go to jail!

After recording what he saw in Linjie City in a small notebook, Bei Qiao drove back to the inn and parked the carriage next to his original carriage, allowing the little horse Honghong and the donkey Huihui to meet.

Huihui grew up on a horse farm and was raised with horses. When he saw his owner leading a horse over, he did not behave violently. After Beiqiao got off the horse, he quickly rubbed his head into Beiqiao's hand with a very well-behaved expression.

Huihui: I can’t be laid off, absolutely not!

Beiqiao rubbed Huihui's head and said, "Huihui, this is Honghong. She will pull the cart with you in the future." That's right, although he had enough money to buy another horse, Beiqiao did not plan to abandon Huihui. Instead, he planned to let a horse and a donkey pull the cart together.

Honghong came over curiously, pricked up her ears and showed her teeth to Huihui: Hello!

Huihui turned his head from Beiqiao's palm and blinked: Hello.

After asking Huihui and Honghong to get along well with each other, Beiqiao checked the hay in the trough and brushed their backs with a brush.

Huihui and Honghong are both gentle girls. They seem to get along well at the moment, but I'm not sure if they can cooperate well and keep pace when pulling the cart. If they can't cooperate well, Beiqiao will have to consider letting them travel separately.

"Let's see how well they cooperate first, so we can head home tomorrow morning!" Bei Qiao raised his hand and patted the necks of both the horse and the donkey, always remembering to treat them equally: "We'll just run for a short while, then we'll rest. If you encounter any danger at night, remember to shout loudly. We're not staying in the Tianzi Room for free."

Since Beiqiao's room was upgraded, the treatment of the mount has also been upgraded. Not only are the fodder and stables a level higher than before, but there are also dedicated people who take turns to watch over the horses day and night to prevent them from getting lost.