Boarding the Ship

The boatmen aboard the ship and the onlookers nearby all froze for a moment.

Chen Ye set down the stone lock, switched hands, and lifted it again. His movements were clean and decisive, all in one smooth motion.

A warrior who had undergone Mortal Shedding once could exert around two hundred pounds of force. Lifting a stone lock weighing a little over a hundred pounds with one hand was easy enough.

But at this dock, you could count on one hand the people who could manage that.

The middle-aged man standing on the other side hurried over and said, his voice urgent, "We'll take him."

The middle-aged man's surname was Zhou. In his forties, he was the caravan manager in charge of recruitment, and at that moment he was so frantic over the shortage of hands that he was practically foaming at the mouth.

Several of the caravan's original guards had fallen ill just before departure. The merchant ship had already been loaded, and every extra day it sat idle meant another day of losses.

He had already hired two replacements along the way, but still needed one more.

Seeing Chen Ye's display of strength, Manager Zhou made an immediate decision and hired him on the spot.

"Our pay is based on a guard's rate: two hundred copper coins a day, with meals and lodging included. Can you accept that?"

Chen Ye quickly did the math in his head.

Two hundred and sixty copper coins a day.

Five days would earn him one tael and three mace of silver.

If he spent it to buy back his life, that meant every five days cost him one day.

Too little.

"Three hundred and fifty copper coins!" Chen Ye patted the knife at his waist. "If you agree, I can board right away. I guarantee I'm worth the price."

Manager Zhou gritted his teeth. "Fine, three hundred and fifty. Get your things together and board at once! Once you're aboard, you'll eat, drink, sleep, and relieve yourself on the ship. You're not allowed off unless we're in the Capital City unloading cargo."

"Fine."

Three hundred and fifty copper coins.

Three days would buy back ten days, leaving him one extra day to breathe.

That was enough.

They settled on a candidate quickly.

Under Manager Zhou's arrangements, Chen Ye boarded the merchant ship.

As soon as he entered the cabin, Manager Zhou paid six days' wages in advance to put everyone at ease.

So before doing a single thing aboard the ship, Chen Ye received his first pay: a full two thousand one hundred copper coins.

To save himself the trouble, Manager Zhou simply gave him two taels of broken silver and made up the remaining hundred copper coins with dried meat from the cabin.

Chen Ye didn't argue.

Two taels of silver in hand.

Without hesitation, Chen Ye immediately exchanged it for eight days of life.

[Remaining lifespan: forty-eight days]

The merchant ship set off.

On Great Peace Lake, the water surged and rolled.

The lake's distinctive fishy smell swept through the air.

That night, Chen Ye slept in the shared bunkhouse beside the dock. Before bed, he placed his crossbow and short knife beside his pillow.

Compared to sleeping in a ruined temple out in the wilderness, among piles of dead leaves, with every night bringing the rustle of wind and the cries of startled birds, this was the first time since escaping the Gao Family that he could sleep without keeping one eye open.

The nerves he had kept taut for so long gradually loosened aboard the ship.

He slept dreamlessly.

Early the next morning, Chen Ye woke up feeling refreshed.

Only then did he have the leisure to take a good look at the merchant ship.

It was a medium-sized flat-bottomed cargo vessel. The hold was packed with bolts of cloth, tea leaves, and medicinal herbs; spare mooring ropes and several barrels of fresh water were piled on deck.

There were five guards aboard. Two were veteran escorts who had traveled this route countless times, and one was a retired household guard.

The other two, like Chen Ye, were temporary hires.

Manager Zhou assigned everyone their watches, and meals were served to all at set times.

Chen Ye was assigned the night watch, leaving him the entire day to move about the ship and rest.

That afternoon.

Several merchants traveling aboard had gathered to chat, grumbling on and on about how merchant ships bound for the Capital City kept getting pushed aside lately.

An elderly merchant traveling aboard sighed. "Everyone knows which powerful family they've managed to curry favor with. There's no use complaining."

"Which powerful family?"

"Who else could it be? In the Capital City, who could it be besides the Xie Family?"

At the mention of the Xie Family, Chen Ye couldn't help perking up.

A guard traveling with the ship had drunk too much of the rice wine he'd brought along, and he too began cursing the Xie Family of the Capital City for being rotten to the core.

"Last year, our escort agency did a job for the Xie Family in the Capital City. They still haven't settled the bill. Several of my brothers ended up having a miserable New Year because of it."

Someone from the Capital City cut in. "Everyone knows the Xie Family is a second-rank noble house that'll eat you alive and not spit out the bones. They only took your money and didn't take your life. You got off easy."

Everyone aboard traveled to and from the Capital City, so they knew the noble families there inside out.

Once the conversation got going, several of them soon joined in.

Chen Ye listened silently nearby. From their words, he gathered that although the Xie Family was powerful and wealthy, they didn't have a good reputation among the common people.

"The Cui Family is upright, to be fair, but they don't have the influence the Xie Family does. Their business interests overlap in many places, and now that they've crossed paths in the Imperial Court, they're often at odds."

One of the guards spoke up, and everyone immediately nodded in agreement.

"The Cui Family has more daughters than sons. There are only two young masters in the direct line of this generation; the rest are all young ladies. Their martial foundation isn't as solid as the Xie Family's, either. Fortunately, the Cui Family knows how to manage its affairs and can still maintain the prestige of a second-rank noble house. But who knows how long that'll last?"

A Jianghu Guest with a knife at his waist grew impatient. "Enough about the Cui Family and the Xie Family. What do they have to do with us, the ones who earn our meals through hard labor? Those two families fight each other, and in the end, aren't we lowly folk the ones who suffer? If you ask me, it'd be better if all those powerful nobles dropped dead."

At that, everyone lost interest in continuing the conversation.

"All right, all right. Everyone get some rest. The stretch through the Reed Marsh is the hardest part. When we get there, don't let anything go wrong."

Chen Ye sat nearby with a bowl in his hands, eating quietly as he took in everyone's words.

Before this, he'd only heard the Xie Family mentioned by Zhang Tieyi and the others. All he knew was that they were one of the most powerful families in the Jing Kingdom.

He had no other impression of them.

Now, hearing what everyone had to say, he realized that even the most powerful families in the Jing Kingdom had rivals who could match them.

At the very least, the Cui Family seemed to have a serious rivalry with the Xie Family.

The merchant ship left Great Peace Lake and entered the Grand Canal.

The Grand Canal was narrow, with many shallows and densely packed locks. Visibility was poor at night, making collisions and groundings especially likely.

So most merchant ships stopped sailing after dark to reduce the risk.

As one of the guards, Chen Ye didn't take part in the daytime labor, but at night he was responsible for keeping watch.

After night fell, the river was utterly quiet.

On watch, Chen Ye sat by the ship's railing, found a whetstone, and began sharpening the short knife he'd brought with him.

The blade wasn't chipped yet, but it wasn't in good condition.

According to those "old hands" on the river, there were countless river bandits on the Grand Canal.

They said there was a bandit every ten li, all of them living by the blade.

He had to stay on full alert and couldn't let his guard down for even a moment.

Otherwise, one careless mistake and he'd end up at the bottom of the lake, food for the fish.

In this world, human life was even cheaper than he'd imagined.

On the sixth day after entering the river, the merchant ship reached a narrow channel with dense reeds on both banks.

Everyone aboard fell silent, almost as if by unspoken agreement.

By past experience, this was a place where river bandits liked to lie in ambush.