Huizhou County

The rising sun had just begun to climb, the warm light in the east barely revealing a trace of dawn. While the neatly packed houses and streets still lay veiled in thick fog, the heavy city gates had already been opened by the guards.

After a night of bustle and revelry, Huizhou County gradually awakened from its slumber once more.

Vegetable farmers and petty vendors entering the city for market, merchants and porters hauling goods—their influx instantly spread the warmth of everyday life through the little town along its broad roads paved with blue bricks and stone slabs.

Though the lingering aftermath of the barbarian calamity and natural disasters at the Northern Border had not truly reached Huizhou County, the war had nevertheless affected it to some extent.

The unrest that had persisted at the Northern Border for years had turned this small county town at the junction of two provinces into a waystation for countless merchants and sword-bearing wanderers heading north. The arrival of these opportunists had brought business opportunities and development to this once utterly unremarkable county town, but it had also brought no small amount of chaos.

As roosters crowed in the backyard, Tang Si, as usual, opened the doors of his little eatery while dawn still lingered. Just as he was carrying the prepared tables, chairs, and stools out onto the street to set up shop, he discovered that someone had died outside his door again.

A wanderer of the martial world.

One glance at the calluses on the corpse's hands and the blade wound stained red with blood was enough for Tang Si to identify the man's rough status.

After a brief silence, he silently moved the corpse to the entrance of the neighboring shop, then fetched two basins of clean water and washed the