Drip.
A drop of water fell from the corner of the eaves and splashed onto the little stool in front of the house with a soft sound.
Zhao Mou's ears twitched. He awoke from a long, groggy sleep, his eyes slightly unfocused, and rolled over to sit up.
"Brother, getting up?"
A gloomy voice suddenly came from behind him. Zhao Mou's hair stood on end in fright, and he turned to look. On the other side of the wooden bed lay his oversized younger brother, long in the arms and legs. A trace of sleepiness lingered on his expressionless, coffin-like face, and his long hair was strewn messily beside his hand.
Memories flooded into Zhao Mou's mind, and he gradually came to his senses. "Mm. It's time to get up. I have to deliver books to the bookstore today."
The autumn wind had already begun to turn chilly, making the cramped, ramshackle wooden house seem especially flimsy.
The Zhao family's parents had died early. As the elder brother, Zhao Mou had struggled to keep himself and his younger brother, two years his junior, alive. He had worked all kinds of jobs since childhood and picked up a few skills, along with a little literary talent. Though he wasn't good enough to qualify as a scholar, his brush calligraphy was astonishingly beautiful. So he occasionally took copying jobs from the bookstore, earning several dozen copper coins per book—more than he could make doing manual labor.
Thanks to Zhao Mou's hard work, they had managed to save a little money and buy the shabbiest house on the edge of the county town.
But their lives had only become a little more stable. They were still troubled by the struggle to survive. If Zhao Mou didn't earn more money over the next two