Where Immortals Once Walked-Chapter 214: Little Rascal

“It’s also Panlong City’s earliest main street. Fifteen years ago, there were hardly any storefronts; now there are still just as few, not a single one more!”

He thrust his index finger up into the air. “You can’t buy one even if you’ve got money. Tell me, do you think the property there is hot or not?”

He Lingchuan laughed and asked, “So, Tianshuang Tavern?”

“Who goes to that shabby joint? They even water down their best wine,” Hu Min sniffed. “If we’re going, we’re going to Yixiang Tower[1].”

Yixiang Tower showed its pedigree in the decor, and in prices that ran twice those of common taverns like Tianshuang.

He Lingchuan patted his pockets. Luckily, he had saved a little from the last few patrol missions.

Xiao Maoliang could not make it; A’Luo came as promised. He Lingchuan also invited Liu Tong, Doorboard, Skinny, and Willow. The moment his current squadmates heard he was holding a feast at Yixiang Tower, they showed up without a second thought.

Only then did he learn that the squad had lost three men in the brutal battle eight days ago. Including him, there were only six of them in their squad left alive. The roster would obviously be reshuffled; until replacements arrived, they could catch their breath.

Fallen comrades were always a sorrow. Yet the mood at the table was anything but morose—everyone ate and drank with real gusto.

He Lingchuan understood. These were men used to licking blood from a blade’s edge. Life and death had long since been weighed and set aside; joy was taken while it could be taken.

Even grief, when it came, was but a passing thing.

To live in Panlong City was to be forced to learn how to move on.

After any major battle, business boomed for all, whether it be restaurants, taverns, or pleasure houses. Fresh from drawing their merit rewards, officers and soldiers did not mind scattering a little silver in the markets for a taste of fun. It kept the city’s wheels turning.

By midday, Yixiang Tower was packed wall to wall.

Doorboard stood with his cup and bellowed to the room, “He Lingchuan is here, who’s drinking with him?”

The hall fell silent at once; heads turned in unison.

Doorboard pointed at He Lingchuan, pointing his finger and raising his chin for emphasis, and shouted again, “Well? Who’s up?”

With a boom, answers came like a wave.

A man even burlier than Doorboard vaulted off a bench, took two strides, and loomed in front of He Lingchuan, sloshing half his wine.

He lifted his cup to eyebrow height and rumbled, “Good man, I drink to you!”

What else could He Lingchuan do? He raised his cup and drained it.

Skinny hurried to refill his cup for him. 𝒇𝒓𝒆𝒆𝙬𝒆𝒃𝓷𝒐𝓿𝙚𝙡.𝒄𝓸𝒎

Two more men elbowed their way through. One got there half a step ahead and nearly poked He Lingchuan in the nose with his cup. “You brought my fiancée back. I owe you my thanks!”

He Lingchuan blinked; the hall burst into laughter. Several voices jeered, “He risked his life to bring your wife home, and all you’ve got is a few sweet words? That’s far from enough! You’re far too stingy!”

The man bared his teeth. “Don’t need you lot teaching me manners, I already sent something!” He then turned to He Lingchuan and said, “Those jars of pickles. They stink to high heaven, don’t they?”

So those were from him! Caught off guard, He Lingchuan hesitated, then admitted, “They... they reek!”

The man beamed. “Exactly! The smellier the pickle, the better it is!”

The man then leaned in and earnestly said, “I’m telling you, whenever the smell of my old ma’s pickles comes out of those jars, folks line up to buy. They’re no cheaper than Spring Terrace wine from the southern side of the city!”

So he meant it as a real gift. He Lingchuan clinked and downed another cup with him. “Good, when I finish the ones you gave me, I’ll come back for more.”

Thumb up, the man ceded his spot to the next well-wisher.

After a few more toasts, a woman with short daggers at her waist shouldered her way through. She set her cup in front of He Lingchuan, then jabbed a thumb over her shoulder at the pickle-giver. “I’m his fiancée! If you hadn’t jumped into that monster den, he’d probably be off chasing some little lady right now. I’m here to thank you!”

A’Luo was mid-sip when the woman came over and spoke, and she ended up choking on her wine with a sputter.

He Lingchuan glanced at the woman. She was broad-shouldered and sturdy. Then, he looked at her tall, lanky fiancé. He cleared his throat and said, “I wish you two a hundred years of harmony.”

She turned to him and said, “I’ll toast you three cups; drink as you like.” She poured, tipped back three in a row—drinking them as though they were nothing but water—then added, “My younger sister isn’t married yet. She’s met plenty of prospects but turns her nose up at all of them. She’s very picky. Want me to introduce her to you?”

Before he could answer, someone nearby cut in, “Don’t. Don’t even bother. Her little sister’s a hellcat. Once she gets her claws in you, you won’t escape!”

Laughter rippled through the hall. The woman gave a chilly snort. “Wu Laoliu, on your feet. You and me, outside!”

The spotlight had already moved on. He Lingchuan quietly knocked back another cup, then glanced over his shoulder. There were still dozens queued up, with a hundred onlookers. His scalp suddenly tingled.

Barely half an hour later, they had drunk him halfway under.

He flattened himself against the table to hide from the toasts. Skinny thumped his back and told the room, “He’s down, he’s down! Save your well-wishes for next time! Come early!”

After a long bout of blocking and deflecting, the enthusiastic drinkers finally drifted away.

It took ages for He Lingchuan to steady himself again; he circulated his true energy to force the drunkenness back down.

In the Guizhen Stone Forest, they had fought back to back with no way out, and he had thrown himself into the den to set it ablaze. It had forged a rock-solid camaraderie, and with the alcohol as a catalyst, they were calling each other brother, trading jokes and grins like old friends.

Liu Tong leaned over to explain, “I reported your performance. The higher-ups were impressed, but they think you haven’t been on patrol long enough and lack experience, so you won’t be getting a promotion for now.”

A twinge of disappointment pricked him. A bump up to platoon leader would give him a shot at the Gale Army, but right now, he had not even managed to become a fire captain yet.

But as Liu Tong said, without enough time in the field, how was he supposed to command others?

Face flushed, fist on his chest, Liu Tong swore, “Brother He, you’ve got guts and luck. Give it a few more missions, so long as you don’t die, you’ll rise for sure!”

Willow could drink most men under the table; she was already through two small jars. When she was drunk, she laughed easily, very much unlike her usual attitude of “everyone owes me money.”

She clapped He Lingchuan hard on the shoulder. “These men are all cowards. None of them dared deliver Sun Jiayuan’s compensation to his family themselves. They said they couldn’t stand to see a woman weep, so they made me go. Me! I wasn’t even close to Sun Jiayuan.”

She clapped him on the shoulder again, then she lowered her voice as she said, “When I delivered it, his sister Sun Fuling didn’t cry at all. She was cold as ice. We chatted a while. It turns out that Sun Jiayuan had run up a whole pile of bad debts outside, those so-called donkey-hide IOUs[2]. Compound interest on top of compound interest, who knows how many times it’s doubled by now. Recently, he even stole Fuling’s field deed and valuables to try and ‘win it back,’ then lost again. He’d already chopped off the little finger on each hand, swearing he’d never gamble again, and then... then he died right before he started on the ring finger.”

No wonder Sun Jiayuan had marched to his death with such resolve. In this world, gambling debts were the one thing you could not run from. “Since he’s been honored as a fallen hero, do the gambling debts get wiped clean?”

“Of course. The creditors grumble, but Panlong City gives a fallen hero’s family one chance to offset guilt with merit. Let alone unpaid debts, even a murder charge can be cleared after sacrificing oneself for a good cause. People call it ‘merit wiping the slate clean.’”

“That’s a thing?” He Lingchuan popped a peanut into his mouth. Tianshuang Tavern sold peanuts for one copper a plate; here, there were four for each plate. He could not taste what made them special, other than the price, of course. “I thought gambling was banned in Panlong City.”

“You kidding? Of course it’s banned,” Skinny said between gulps. “But a gambler will always sniff out a gambling den the same way a cat sniffs out fish.”

He Lingchuan shrugged. Light and shadow always accompanied one another; what ought to exist and what should not, Panlong City had no shortage of either.

Willow moved to clap him on the shoulder again, and he dodged. When that woman drank, she never knew her own strength.

Bellies full and cups drained, everyone headed home. Skinny even packed up the leftovers. As he put it, they had to answer the city’s call for frugality. There would be no wasting grain, especially when everything was so pricy.

He Lingchuan and A’Luo both lived in wood houses, so they split a donkey cart back.

A’Luo was woozy and nearly stumbled getting down.

He Lingchuan, on the other hand, had mostly sobered up. He paid the fare, helped A’Luo to his door, then walked back to his own place.

He stopped at his gate and sighed.

A door like the one at his house might as well not exist. Most people could vault it one-handed. However, he had just traded all his rewards for a store; all he could do now was rack up more merit and hope to upgrade his housing situation soon.

The truth was, military merit was not easy to earn in Panlong City. This time, he had lucked into a rare chance for major personal merits. Ordinary patrols still meant facing deranged monsters, which were no small danger, but the merit and rewards trickled in by drops.

Most soldiers could only inch upward within the system, like snails crawling up a tree. They were not allowed to commit any crimes, nor were any mistakes allowed. Merit was hard to earn and easy to lose.

Had A’Luo not made one big mistake and fallen straight to poverty in a wood house? He still had not clawed his way back after so long.

He was just about to push the door open when a voice said, “Hey.”

The voice came from right beside him.

He turned and saw a woman standing slightly over a meter away with a boy of seven or eight.

Her lower face was veiled with a cloth, leaving only a pair of almond eyes showing. Her eyebrows were fine and long, and her skin was milk-white.

“You need anything?”

As soon as he spoke, the boy jerked, as if he meant to bolt, but the woman held him fast.

He had assumed they were mother and son, but a closer look showed her fingers locked around the boy’s shoulder. He was scrawny as a monkey, yet his expression was all feral cub, baring his teeth at anyone who came near.

What’s this about?

The woman spoke again, “What did you lose?”

“How did you—” Her question came out clipped and incomplete, and it took He Lingchuan a beat to catch up. “A bundle of firewood and two crucian carp.”

“This brat stole from seven houses nearby, yours included. He came back to your place a second time to steal the things by your door, but a passerby shouted, and I chased him down.” She tugged the boy forward. “I’m a victim too.”

“Where have I seen you before?” He Lingchuan felt like the boy looked familiar. He rifled his memory. Wait, damn, isn’t this the little thief I ran into when I first dreamt my way into Panlong City?

Back then, the brat had been reaching for the divine bone necklace. He had been about to teach him a lesson when Hu Min called out to him in the street. Caught up in their happy reunion, he had let the brat slip away.

And round and round they had gone, only for the little rascal to steal from him anyway. “So it’s you!”

The boy turned his head away, refusing to look at him. “I don’t know you!”

1. Yixiang also literally translates to overflowing fragrance. ☜

2. This is probably just a metaphor for a debt that tightens and suffocates just like drying hide. ☜