Buy, Buy, Buy!

Ning Rongrong went looking for Li Hanche.

He had just finished training.

He had adjusted the gravity to three times normal and practiced spear techniques for two hours. The muscles in his arms were still trembling faintly.

Ning Rongrong ran up and stopped in front of him, her hands clasped behind her back and her chin slightly raised. Her expression plainly said, "I've already decided. You only need to obey."

"I want to go back to Heaven Dou City with you."

Li Hanche frowned.

"Huh? What are you going to Heaven Dou City for?"

"To stay at your house for a few days."

Li Hanche looked utterly baffled.

He released the gravity and rolled his wrists.

"There's no one at my house to wait on you. No cook, no maids to comb your hair, no one to make your bed or fold your blankets. If you go, you'll have to tie your own shoelaces."

Qingluo and Baiwei were currently preparing to make a push for higher soul power ranks, so they were extremely busy.

Though the two were called maids, they were actually Soul Masters Xue Qinghe had sent to protect him. They helped him handle matters; they were not there to serve anyone.

Ning Rongrong stomped her foot.

"Doesn't your house have two maids? Aren't they people?"

"They aren't there specifically to serve people either. They help me take care of things. They have their own cultivation duties, and sometimes they aren't home all day. If you go, there won't even be anyone to bring you wash water."

"I don't care! I can wash my own face!"

Li Hanche looked past Ning Rongrong for help.

At some point, Ning Fengzhi had appeared behind Ning Rongrong, standing with his hands behind his back.

His gaze upon the two children was calm, and there was still a smile at the corners of his lips.

"Go together. You can take a look at the Heaven Dou Auction House while you're there. The stewards the sect sent out will need time to gather information. The auction house may have ready-made leads."

Li Hanche could only nod in agreement.

"...Fine."

Heaven Dou Auction House.

As the largest auction house in the Heaven Dou Empire, its auction items covered almost everything that could circulate across the Douluo Continent.

Soul bones, soul tools, rare treasures, slaves—so long as one could afford the price, there was nothing one could not buy.

Ning Fengzhi had arranged a VIP room upstairs in advance, but Li Hanche did not go up.

He was more interested in the auction items displayed beneath glass covers on velvet pedestals.

Ning Rongrong followed beside him, looking around curiously.

She had come to the auction house many times, but every time she had followed her father directly into a private room. She had never properly browsed the main hall on the first floor.

Long display counters stood along both sides of the hall, with all kinds of auction items exhibited beneath glass covers.

A noble's ceremonial sword set with rubies, starting bid: five thousand gold soul coins.

A suit of battle armor said to have been worn by a certain Soul Sage, its scars proof of illustrious military achievements, starting bid: twenty thousand.

Li Hanche passed each display counter one by one, his gaze sweeping over every glass cover before moving away expressionlessly.

Not a single item was useful for increasing his strength.

His gaze paused for a moment on the final display counter.

A dried medicinal herb lay there, its tag reading, "Hundred-Year Heartchill Grass, starting bid: eight thousand gold soul coins."

Heartchill Grass was indeed an ice-attribute medicinal herb and would help his cultivation technique, but a mere hundred-year-old Heartchill Grass could only increase soul power by a negligible amount. Eight thousand gold soul coins was an outrageously inflated price.

He withdrew his gaze and stopped looking at the display counters.

He silently sighed in his heart.

Those immortal herbs from the original story that could remake a Soul Master from the marrow outward.

Eight-Petal Mysterious Ice Grass, Fiery Apricot Delicate Herb, Yearning Heartbroken Dew, Lovesick Heartbroken Red—only Tang San knew how to harvest and consume them.

Tang San had swept up every last one of those treasures in the original story. No one else had even laid eyes on them.

Then there was Yue Guan, Spirit Hall's elder, Chrysanthemum Douluo. He was also an expert at cultivating flowers and knew quite a bit about rare and exotic herbs.

But Yue Guan did not have the fate of a protagonist.

That was the advantage of a transmigrator's foreknowledge, and also his greatest regret. With his current strength, he could not reach those deadly lands either.

Sword Douluo and Ning Fengzhi left the auction house midway through, heading to the imperial palace to discuss important matters with Xue Qinghe.

Before leaving, Ning Fengzhi specifically told Ning Rongrong not to run around. Ning Rongrong readily agreed—and the moment they left—

She grabbed Li Hanche by the sleeve and dragged him out through the auction house doors.

Over the past two years, Li Hanche had walked this street countless times. Even with his eyes closed, he knew which shops had the best food and which blacksmiths had the finest quenching techniques.

But this was Ning Rongrong's first time wandering Heaven Dou City so freely. Whenever she had come before, she had always ridden in a carriage with her father.

From one doorway to the next, she had never truly crouched down in front of the little roadside stalls to take a look.

Like a little bird released from its cage, she fluttered from one shop to another, picking this up and putting that down, turning every strange little trinket over and over several times.

"Li Hanche, look at this!"

She held up a small stone carving. A crooked "fortune" character had been carved into its base, and the workmanship was so crude that even the carver had forgotten to smooth its edges.

The stall owner was a gaunt old man. Seeing Ning Rongrong pick up the ornament, he immediately broke into a beaming smile.

"You have a fine eye, miss! This is premium Qingtian stone carving. Put it in your home to guard the house and draw in wealth—just fifty copper coins!"

The stone was an ordinary riverbank pebble, and the carving was at an apprentice's level. Its cost price could not have been more than five copper coins.

Li Hanche stood to one side with his arms crossed, watching the old man tell barefaced lies without changing expression.

"I'll take it."

Ning Rongrong pulled out a gold soul coin and slapped it onto the stall. The old man grinned so widely he could barely close his mouth as he hurriedly made change.

She stuffed the ornament into Li Hanche's hands, then turned and ran toward the next stall.

The next stall sold handmade braided rainbow-cord bracelets.

The one after that sold glass windmills that supposedly spun out seven colors.

The one after that sold little pendants supposedly made from snow-rabbit fur from the Far North.

Li Hanche glanced at them. Judging by the texture and color, it was plainly ordinary rabbit fur.

Whenever a vendor saw Ning Rongrong approaching, their eyes lit up as though they had spotted a walking bag of gold soul coins.

Her shopping style was remarkably consistent: pick it up, look at it twice, "I'll take it!" pay, receive change, stuff it into Li Hanche's hands, then run to the next stall.

The entire process took no more than ten seconds.

The vendors' expressions shifted from initial surprise to secret delight, then from secret delight to a mutual, unspoken understanding.

A sucker had come to this street.

Some people even ran out from the shops behind them to the roadside, placing their usual dust-gathering "treasures of the shop" in the most conspicuous spots, just waiting for Ning Rongrong to come by.

Following behind her, Li Hanche was already carrying a small mountain in his arms.

Stone ornaments, rainbow-cord bracelets, glass windmills, rabbit-fur pendants, copper bells said to attract wealth, tasselled hairpins said to have been left behind by some imperial craftsman, and dried-flower specimens said to have been gathered from deep within the Star Dou Great Forest.

That dried flower was obviously just a roadside wildflower, dried and pressed flat. The base of the specimen even bore the words "Heaven Dou City West Market Flower and Grass Shop," yet Ning Rongrong had actually spent three gold soul coins on it.

"Don't you look at the labels when you buy things?"

He lowered his head to look at the line of print, speaking with disdain.

"This young lady never asks the price when she buys things."

She answered without even turning around, her tone as proud as if she were stating the most natural thing in the world.