Burdened by Debt

Spending several hundred yuan to buy three sets of summer clothes for Heroine Yin inside and out, Cheng Yun thus learned—

Heroine Yin was a D-cup!

Heroine Yin truly did not sweat the small stuff; whether Cheng Yun told the clerk she was his girlfriend or some mentally unstable distant relative, and no matter how Cheng Yun ordered her around, she never grew angry. At most, she blushed ever so slightly and stammered agreement over and over.

Cheng Yun, meanwhile, was young, handsome, and dressed sunnily. Even with his somewhat decadent aura, he gave the female clerks no reason to be suspicious.

Throughout the entire process, Heroine Yin remained in a sleepwalking state.

Only when Cheng Yun took out his money to pay would a look of shock cross her face, while she frantically calculated in her heart how many bowls of beef noodles she had just spent all at once.

Emerging from the final Sanfu Department Store outlet, Heroine Yin had already changed into Cheng Yun's clothes.

She now wore a solid black t-shirt and a pair of high-waisted denim shorts. The t-shirt clung rather closely, highlighting her taut, powerful waist and full chest—an outfit that made her feel somewhat ashamed. Beneath the denim shorts were a pair of straight, well-proportioned legs, stepping into flat women's sandals. This footwear seemed to be called Roman sandals, and wearing them felt somewhat better to her than flip-flops. Apart from the skin above her neck, every other part of her was unexpectedly fair and tender, making it clear that she usually kept herself wrapped up tight as a drum—

If not for the fact that people in this world all dressed this way, Heroine Yin would never have dressed like this!

It was also at this moment that Cheng Yun discovered just how astonishingly good Heroine Yin's figure actually was, fully the physique of a top-tier beauty... scaled down proportionally. Without a point of reference nearby, one would absolutely never guess that her height was under one meter sixty!

Well, her bodily proportions were even better than Cheng Yan's!... No, no, they were about the same.

Her hair wasn't actually pure black, nor was it the blonde of Westerners; instead, it leaned slightly yellowish, much like a Chinese person's black hair that had been dyed, hanging down very naturally. Viewed from the right side, discounting the knife scar on her left cheek, she would be an extremely enchanting, miniature great beauty—provided she wasn't holding a knife in her hand.

On the way back, Heroine Yin carried several bags in each hand. The bags were very light, yet her heart felt extremely heavy.

Debt piled up like a mountain!

They quickly returned to the hotel. According to Yu Dian, Cheng Yan had gone out to buy groceries, so Cheng Yun hurriedly seized the moment to bring Heroine Yin upstairs, saying to her, "You'll stay here for the time being. I'll arrange a room for you shortly."

"Okay," Heroine Yin nodded heavily.

"First, I'll explain roughly what electrical equipment and facilities are in this room, and how to use them. Around noon, you'll go downstairs to Old Mage's room, number 202, to have lunch. I'll prepare lunch for the two of you," Cheng Yun said as he walked to the window and pulled back the curtains. The morning sunlight immediately filtered through the floor-to-ceiling windows, spilling across the living room. "Afterwards, if you're sleepy this afternoon, you can take a nap in my room first. If you don't mind."

"I don't mind at all, I don't mind!" Heroine Yin said hurriedly. This carpet was so soft she could just sleep right on the floor!

"Alright, then follow me." Cheng Yun walked toward the bedroom first, stopped at the doorway, and pointed to a row of switches. "This is the switch for the bedroom lights. Since it's a hotel, the lighting fixtures are arranged quite extensively, and you only need to press the corresponding button for a light to turn on. Like this..."

"Click!" Cheng Yun pressed a button, and the dim bedroom was illuminated by the warm yellow main light.

Heroine Yin gave a sudden start, staring in shock at the light on the bedroom ceiling: "Th-Th... What is going on here!"

"Watch closely!" Cheng Yun raised his voice slightly. "What you need to do right now is learn how to use it, not understand it. Don't act like a curious baby. Once you've stayed here long enough, you'll naturally understand the principles behind it."

"Oh." Heroine Yin had already intuitively grasped the meaning of the phrase "curious baby."

Feeling that he didn't need to explain things in too much detail, Cheng Yun walked straight toward the bathroom when he finished speaking. "Next, I'll teach you how to use the washbasin, toilet, shower, and similar facilities in our world."

Heroine Yin still stood at the back, intense curiosity flashing in her eyes. Facing the wall, she reached out and pressed the light switch, turning it on and off repeatedly...

Click, click, click...

"Ahem!" Cheng Yun stood at the bathroom door.

"Oh, coming, coming." Heroine Yin hurried over to him, her gaze locked dead on the switch on the wall, then with lightning speed she reached out and clicked all the bathroom lights on and off, grinning broadly.

Cheng Yun could only feel speechless.

Glancing into the bathroom, Heroine Yin froze: "Whoa!! Not even the Emperor lived this luxuriously..."

A large double bathtub, a washbasin, a mirror, vases placed on cabinets, small decorative ornaments on the walls—white, gold, and other simple colors collided here, and the entire bathroom was spotless.

"Look at this..." Cheng Yun said as he turned on the washbasin faucet. A white column of water immediately sprayed out, making a rushing sound. "Like this, and it lets out water. Push it down again, and it turns off. If you tilt it toward the red direction on the left, it produces hot water, and toward the right, it..."

It took about half an hour for Cheng Yun to teach the heroine how to use every facility in the bathroom, a process that left him feeling mentally exhausted.

Yet at this moment, Heroine Yin was still playing with the shower head inside the bathroom with an excited expression...

He walked back to the bed and sat down, turning his head to sweep a glance around, and happened to spot the clothes Heroine Yin had changed out of along with her carried items.

A set of ramie cloth garments, a style no one in China had been willing to wear for centuries, was folded neatly. Next to the clothing lay a short sword, two daggers, four slender throwing knives, a package wrapped in yellow paper, and a tiny bamboo tube plugged with a wooden stopper. Unable to restrain his curiosity, Cheng Yun picked them up to take a quiet look. He saw that what was wrapped in the yellow paper was a large package of white powder, presumably lime or something with a similar function. Inside the bamboo tube was completely filled with red chili oil.

"She really is a dangerous element!" The corners of his mouth twitched as he glanced over at the bathroom, where that dangerous person was still using the shower head to wash her feet while turning the water on and off.

After a long while, Cheng Yun finally lost his patience and shouted toward the bathroom, "Have you played enough yet!"

"Ah?" Heroine Yin poked her head out.

"What do you want to eat this noon? Have you decided? If I have time, I'll cook for you; if I don't, I'll order takeout."

"What takeout?"

"I'm asking what you're eating this noon."

"I... I'm fine with anything! I'm not a picky eater, I can eat whatever!" Heroine Yin waved her hand grandly, then added, "Let's just eat something cheap, buy some cabbage or green vegetable leaves to make do!"

"Where am I supposed to go forage for cabbage leaves for you..." Cheng Yun expressed his speechlessness.

"No cabbage? Then a bowl of thin gruel or corn bread or something... I really am not picky!" Heroine Yin revealed a conflicted expression. "If there's none of that either, actually I can go without eating for a meal or two!... Well, the noodles I ate this morning were very rich in oil, they'll hold me over."

"..."

Unwilling to have any further communication with her, Cheng Yun taught her how to recognize the wall clock, told her to go find Old Mage for lunch when the time came, and then locked her directly inside the room.

At this moment, Cheng Yan was sitting on the sofa playing with her phone. Seeing him come downstairs, she froze for a moment, then said, "The groceries have already been bought and are in the fridge. If you need anything else, you'd better tell me now so I can go buy it. If you wait until later, there will only be leftovers left."

Cheng Yun walked over, opened the fridge, and took a look. Sure enough, this girl had bought quite a lot; all sorts of vegetables crammed half the refrigerator full.

He couldn't help laughing. "Did your cravings act up so you wanted to have a meat dish, or do you think my cooking skills are getting rusty and you want me to properly brush up on them?"

Cheng Yan's expression was somewhat unnatural, and she didn't pick up on his remark.

"Hmm?" Cheng Yun keenly discovered something off about her and frowned. "What's wrong with you? You're acting a bit strange!"

"I'm not, don't talk nonsense."

"You definitely are acting a bit strange." Cheng Yun clearly noticed that her tone and way of answering were different from usual, yet upon careful thought, he couldn't figure out what she had to feel guilty about.

"You should go stir-fry the dishes! It's already eleven o'clock." Cheng Yan looked at her watch. "I want to eat curry beef brisket; I've already bought the curry and put it in the fridge. I also want taro chicken—I bought the millet chili peppers too, add a bit more."

"Then come give me a hand."

After a brief hesitation, Cheng Yan put down her phone and stood up. "Alright."

Cheng Yun felt even more suspicious.

Normally, Cheng Yan would only come to the kitchen to help him out when she was in a very good mood or when he was truly too swamped to manage, and it was impossible for her to agree so readily as she did today.

The two of them began bustling about in the kitchen. As they chopped vegetables, Cheng Yun frowned and questioned Cheng Yan a few times, but she glossed over it vaguely, so Cheng Yun simply focused on cooking and asked no more.

Considering there were two starving transmigrators in the hotel, he purposely made the portions of the dishes larger, and then right before plating, he found an excuse to send Cheng Yan away, secretly dishing out a portion for Old Mage and Heroine Yin and preparing to take it over to them.

Originally, Cheng Yun figured that no matter what, Cheng Yan should have been surprised enough to ask, "Huh, how come there's so much less food after it's done cooking?" He had even planned to pull out pretexts like "dishes shrink when cooked" to fool this silly girl. As it turned out, Cheng Yan was distracted the entire time and didn't ask him at all.

Soon, the three of them were seated together in front of the coffee table at the first-floor reception desk.

Faced with her favorite curry beef, Cheng Yan still ate without much focus, burdened with worries. She looked rather like Cheng Yun did when he was little, returning home after doing poorly on an exam, terrified of being beaten by Professor An.

Meanwhile, the atmosphere in room 202 was entirely different.

On the small table embedded in the wall sat a basin of curry beef, a basin of taro chicken, half a plate of sweet-and-sour napa cabbage, and a basin of sweet potato white rice. Seated beside it were an Old Mage and a wild heroine with drool pooling in her mouth.

"Gulp!" Heroine Yin swallowed hard, forcibly restraining herself from reaching out with her bare hands to grab and eat. "Old Mage—is it Old Mage? I heard the Station Master call you that. Do you eat like this every meal here?"

"Pretty much," Old Mage smiled. "The dishes are basically different every day."

"So they pretty much all have meat and white rice!" Heroine Yin seemed to have figured something out; it turned out that Station Master definitely looked down on things like cabbage leaves or corn bread.

"Pretty much."

"Wow! The Station Master lives so well..." Heroine Yin was filled with emotion. "If I had known, I would have shattered the void and come over earlier! The rumors in the pugilistic world are really true!"

"What rumors?" Old Mage was quite curious.

"That the Upper Realm has white rice to eat at every single meal!"

"Oh," Old Mage nodded and said, "When civilization develops to a certain degree, material goods are bound to become more and more abundant. People in this country probably don't lack rice to eat."

Saying this, Old Mage recalled the young front-desk girl who had arrived a few days ago, and suddenly fell silent for a moment.

He immediately added, "With very few exceptions."

"Too blissful!" Heroine Yin had already picked up her chopsticks and popped a chunk of beef into her mouth. Because the soup was thick and scalding, she let out whimpering sounds from the burn, continuously gasping for air, yet she couldn't bear to spit it out.

Then she shoveled a fierce mouthful of rice.

"So delicious! This is the best thing I've ever eaten in my life, wuwu..." Heroine Yin's eyes brimmed with tears. "Before this, the only time I ate stir-fried dishes and white rice at the same time was when my parents were still alive, and that was during the autumn festival... Wuwu, if I had white rice to eat every meal, who would bother wandering the pugilistic world? I'd just hole up at home eating white rice every day!"

Old Mage smiled and slowly began to eat as well.

"Sigh!" Heroine Yin stopped lingering on her emotions and shoveled food into her mouth in huge bites, a bowl of rice bottoming out in no time.

Old Mage was clearly giving way to her, eating only a symbolic amount while she essentially consumed all the rest of the rice and dishes. She even cleaned the sweet-and-sour napa cabbage soup, including the pickled peppers and garlic bits inside, down to the last drop.

Disregarding her image, Heroine Yin let out a burp, stretched lazily, and revealed an expression of enjoyment. "Good..."

She suddenly froze, her words trailing off as her expression abruptly grew heavy.

Seeing this, Old Mage asked, "What's wrong?"

After staring blankly for a long time, Heroine Yin turned to Old Mage and asked, "Senior, these dishes cost money, right? How much is your living expense for a meal here?"

"I'm not too sure either, you'd have to ask the Station Master." Old Mage smiled slightly, keeping to himself the fact that he didn't pay.

"With so much meat, it must be very expensive?"

"It's alright." Old Mage glanced at the empty plates on the table. "Judging by the prices in this place, three dishes like this would probably cost around a hundred yuan at a restaurant outside."

"Oh heavens!" Heroine Yin widened her eyes, hastily going back to counting on her fingers. "A hundred coins, and I ate all of that. I'm definitely going to have to pay the lion's share of the meal money. Doesn't that mean in a single meal I ate ten bowls of beef noodles!"

"Let's split it evenly," Old Mage offered kindly.

"That's still seven... no, eight... wait, six... six bowls of beef noodles!" Heroine Yin felt that in the future, just eating beef noodles would be enough for her!

"Heroine Yin shouldn't think of it that way," Old Mage said. "The prices in a steadily governed region must be related to per capita income. Since the people in this place can afford this kind of food, it shows they can easily earn the money for it. As long as Heroine Yin follows the Station Master's advice of 'work-study housing,' getting meals certainly won't be a problem."

"Is that so?" Heroine Yin paused. "Don't you go tricking me. Even though I didn't study much, I am very fierce!"

"I would certainly never deceive Heroine Yin."

"Alright, I'll trust you for now." So saying, Heroine Yin remained heavy-hearted.

Then Old Mage calmly cast a spell, and the bowls and chopsticks instantly became as clean as new. He sat back down in his chair, reached out to poke at the air, and summoned that floating screen.

Unfamiliar handwriting quickly emerged—

"The people of this world categorize this country's culture as 'music-oriented culture'. The characteristics of 'music-oriented culture' are... Personally, I feel this bears similarities to the culture of the Great Thousand Continent..."

"Corresponding to this is the Western 'guilt culture' of this world..."

Staring blankly at the words scrolling across the screen that she couldn't understand at all, Heroine Yin couldn't help asking, "Old Senior, is this strange device also from this world..."

"No, this is an invention from my world," Old Mage said with a smile, while the text on the screen never stopped.

"Then what are you doing?"

"I'm recording what I see and hear in this world, writing it down. When I return to my original world, these things I'm recording now might provide some inspirational value to quite a few juniors."

"Can it be eaten as food?"

"No."

"Oh." Having not yet transcended low-brow tastes, Heroine Yin instantly lost interest. "Then do you have paper or a pen? I need to record what's happened to me in this world too."

"Oh?" Old Mage looked at her with some surprise, then produced snow-white paper and a quill from somewhere unknown.

Heroine Yin laid the paper flat on the small table and lowered her head to record earnestly, though her handwriting was crooked: "Beef noodles eight coins, braised egg one and a half, fried egg one and a half, buying clothes seven hundred and sixty... Oh gosh, how is it this much!"

Old Mage silently withdrew his gaze and continued with his own work.

"There is a very peculiar creature in this world called the tardigrade. It is capable of... In the absence of experimental equipment, I conducted simple research, magical striking, conduction, transformation, and other tests on it..."

Cheng Yan slipped away with an excuse as soon as she finished eating. Little Yu Dian volunteered to wash the dishes as usual, and unable to talk her out of it, Cheng Yun went upstairs to find Old Mage and Heroine Yin.

At that moment, Heroine Yin had just finished tallying her tab and was checking it meticulously four or five times with her fingers.

How she hoped she had calculated wrong, yet in the end she had to accept this heavy reality—

Only coming here for half a day, she already owed Station Master eight hundred and twenty-one coins!

"Heroine Yin is a person of principle," Old Mage laughed. "Unlike those wandering knights of my kingdom when I was young; they would often do anything at all just to earn a bit of money."

"Sigh, we have no choice either," Heroine Yin furrowed her brows tightly, her face full of melancholy. "People in the pugilistic world are all bitter souls. Ordinary folk are afraid to deal with us, high officials and noble lords think we're dirty and refuse to deal with us either, and the government views us as trouble and wishes we would all drop dead. Even when we run into fellow martial artists, we're liable to come to blows over a few dozen coins, a job that fills one's belly, or a shred of face. If we don't stick to the rules, how are we supposed to get by..."

Stepping into the room just in time to catch these words, Cheng Yun said nothing, neither confirming nor denying them.

Where was not the pugilistic world, and where were there no rules?

Old Mage merely smiled and said, "People who conduct themselves and live according to rules always have it a bit better."

Then, with an ambiguous smile, he looked toward Cheng Yun. "You have questions for me?"

"Yes," Cheng Yun nodded, looking somewhat solemn.

I wanted to publish them as two chapters, but ugh, too lazy to split them...