Journey to the West: Starting by taking Sun Wukong as my disciple!-Chapter 539 It’s Not Good to Be Tall, There Are No Suitable Clothes
"There have been a lot of refugees recently, and a while back, someone came claiming they wanted to sell grain. They robbed our store, and not only that, they made a complete mess of the place. I’m truly scared, so I dare not serve any of these out-of-town guests anymore," the shopkeeper confessed the truth.
This was somewhat credible. Hearing this, Tian Peng lowered his head to examine his clothes.
You couldn’t blame the shopkeeper for his suspicions; Tian Peng’s clothes were indeed a bit dirty and disheveled. He would need to change into cleaner clothes once he exchanged for some silver taels.
"I’m not here to rob you of grain, I’ve brought some that I’ve grown myself. I was in a rush when I left and only brought grain, no silver, so I thought to exchange some for silver taels to have on hand," Tian Peng said, placing the grain he carried onto the table.
"This is what you grew yourself?" the shopkeeper was somewhat surprised as he opened the bag Tian Peng had placed on the table.
The wheat kernels were full and sun-dried to perfection; you could even smell the scent of wheat when you got close to them.
This quality of wheat was rarely seen in their shop; how could this man in such attire have brought such fine wheat?
"Yes, I grew it myself. What’s the matter?" Tian Peng was puzzled. "The wheat is all top-notch. If I weren’t short of money, you wouldn’t even get to see it."
Though he often gave away grain as if it were some other kind, you should know that all of this grain came from Chaos Residence’s storehouse. Even the immortals can’t eat it often, let alone the ordinary people at the grain shop.
"Indeed, it is all top-quality wheat," the shopkeeper didn’t just say anything to drive down the price, after all, the quality of the wheat was there for all to see. "May I ask where is the young man from?"
"Why do you need to know so much?" Tian Peng felt a bit guilty. "Just tell me if my wheat is good or not."
"It’s good, it’s definitely good," the shopkeeper said. "That’s why I wanted to ask where the young man came from. I want to know what kind of place can produce such fine wheat."
"I grew it myself, we can’t even grow this back home," Tian Peng lied through his teeth. "Being able to grow such fine wheat, I’m the only one in the village. Let’s get to the point, how much can you give me for it?"
"Hold on, let me weigh it first," the shopkeeper suggested as he picked up the balance scale to weigh the wheat.
The wheat actually weighed about seven or eight jin, something that Tian Peng himself knew well, and with the current disaster, the price of grain was not cheap.
After weighing it, the shopkeeper said, "The wheat weighs eight jin, I will calculate the price based on the best wheat price in our shop, one silver tael, does that sound good to you?" 𝒇𝙧𝙚𝓮𝙬𝙚𝓫𝒏𝓸𝓿𝓮𝒍.𝓬𝙤𝓶
Tian Peng weighed the silver tael with his hand; grain was not like other things, one silver tael was actually a decent sum.
He nodded and said, "Fine, that’s acceptable."
"Oh right, I also have some fine flour here, which I was planning to let you see what flour ground from the wheat looks like. Why don’t you take that as well, just give me a bit of money for it."
The fine flour wasn’t much, only two jin, but processed goods are always more expensive than unprocessed ones.
The shopkeeper looked at the flour; it was ground so finely, it was almost like dust.
"It must have taken a lot of effort to grind the wheat into this," he remarked.
"Ah?" Tian Peng scratched his head, as he wasn’t quite sure about that—wasn’t it just a matter of waving some mana and turning it into flour? What could be so particular about that?
But since the shopkeeper had asked, he replied, "Ah right, something like that."
"I can give you two strings of cash for the fine flour," the shopkeeper said, taking two strings of cash out from behind the counter to hand to Tian Peng.
"Young man, is your home far from here? If possible, I hope you can come by often to deliver goods. We can talk about the price and everything."
"Ah, we’ll see," Tian Peng replied noncommittally, as he wasn’t actually there to sell grain.
Upon leaving the grain store, Tian Peng stepped into a ready-made clothing shop.
The tailor was attending to customers. When he spotted Tian Peng entering, without a second thought, he tried to shoo him away, "Scram, scram, scram! Where did this beggar come from? You can’t even pick the right place to beg; this is a clothing store, not a place with food to give you."
The doorway was quite low, so Tian Peng had to stoop to enter. By the time the tailor finished speaking, Tian Peng had fully stepped inside.
Seeing how tall Tian Peng was, the tailor was astonishingly surprised, "Can beggars grow to be so tall?"
"Who are you calling a beggar?" Tian Peng glanced at the tailor sideways, "I’m here to buy clothes."
"Oh, you’re here to buy clothes." The tailor nodded and then said, "I’m truly sorry, young man. Given your height, our shop doesn’t have any ready-made clothing that would fit you. If you don’t mind, why not sit and wait while we make some for you on the spot?"
The tailor no longer saw Tian Peng as a beggar, reasoning that someone of his height probably didn’t shop for clothes often.
This was a small business, frequented mostly by ordinary folk; the young man looked as though he wore his clothes till they could be worn no longer before thinking of buying new ones.
"Custom-made right now?" Tian Peng felt somewhat disappointed, as he really couldn’t wait for that.
Ever since he arrived in Kaifeng, he had realized that changing his attire was indeed necessary, as there were far too many escaping calamity.
If he kept wearing the same clothes, he feared that even in the Kaifeng Prefecture the officers might treat him as a beggar.
"Young man, you’re not a local, right? You seem to be in a hurry. If you add a bit more money, we can prioritize your order," the tailor said with a smile.
"Add money?"
Tian Peng considered the small amount of money in his purse. If he was to add money, he didn’t know how much that would be; if it was a substantial amount, it would indeed be unworthy.
The more Tian Peng thought about it, the more regretful he felt. If only he’d asked Mr. Monkey to bring him a couple of sets of clothes when he came, he wouldn’t be in such an embarrassing situation now.
"It’s not expensive at all." Seeing Tian Peng’s hesitation, the tailor immediately understood his concern, "Our clothing is not very pricey to begin with. If you add ten coins as an urgency fee, I can make sure to rush it for you."
Ten coins were indeed acceptable, so Tian Peng quickly took out the money and handed it to the shopkeeper.
He first paid the urgency fee, and the shopkeeper took out a measuring tape to measure Tian Peng’s height.
"Young man, what are you preparing to do? It will help me choose an appropriate fabric for you."
"Oh, I’m here to report to the authorities," Tian Peng said casually, "Nothing too fancy is needed, just a simple design will do."
This revelation hit the tailor with such force that he was left stunned. "Report to the authorities?"
"Yes, our town is under Bianzhou’s jurisdiction, but the County Magistrate does nothing. Now there’s a drought. The crops the people had planted hardly yielded anything, yet they are still required to pay taxes every year. Those who fail to pay get thrown into prison, and the serious cases... they even get beaten to death," Tian Peng explained.
The people of Kaifeng, being so close to the Kaifeng Prefecture, naturally cannot comprehend the struggles of those outside.
When the tailor heard Tian Peng say this, his shock was immense, "How can such things happen? Doesn’t the government build irrigation canals? And about disaster relief, aren’t these things part of what the government does?"
"Indeed, all these are tasks for the government." Tian Peng smiled, but his smile was only a tug at the corner of his mouth.
Disbelief filled the tailor’s eyes. Truly, if he were still in the Heavenly Court, he could not have imagined such a situation.
