Procurement in the Town

On the third day after setting out, Zhou Ye stood at a mountain pass and gazed at the farmland and cooking smoke of a distant village. He could not help smiling. He had finally found signs of human habitation. At last, he had made it out of the mountains.

To be honest, he had not encountered any wild beasts along the way. But the entire route had been rugged and perilous. Fortunately, Zhou Ye's agility and Basic Movement were high enough that he had not been greatly affected. Still, making markers along the way had delayed him somewhat. That was why it had taken until the third day to finish this arduous journey.

Carrying a shoulder pole, Zhou Ye approached the village. Before long, he came across an old man working in the fields.

"Sir, may I ask where I can buy and sell goods?"

The old man glanced at Zhou Ye's clothes and the load on his shoulder pole, then pointed in a direction. "Follow this road east for about an hour, and you'll reach our town. There are several shops there."

"Thank you!"

Though he had suffered quite a bit on the road, things went rather smoothly once he left the mountains.

More than an hour later, Zhou Ye arrived at a small town.

The town was not large. There were only a few dozen shops along a single street.

The first place Zhou Ye visited was a blacksmith's shop. Inside was a middle-aged blacksmith and several apprentices hammering iron.

Interestingly, aside from all sorts of common farm tools, there were actually quite a few weapons here. Zhou Ye even spotted some secondhand weapons. Clearly, the blacksmith's shop not only forged weapons, but also bought back used weapons and other ironware.

After all, this was near the prefectural city. Many people ventured into the mountains, creating great demand for all kinds of weapons.

With a glance, Zhou Ye immediately spotted arrows. Though these were privately made civilian arrows and not as good as military arrows, they at least had iron arrowheads, so their killing power was guaranteed.

When he had entered, Zhou Ye had planned to buy things like scissors, needles, and thread. Living in the Little Homestead, there would always be times when such items were inconveniently absent and needed.

But now that he had seen arrows, there was no way he would pass them up. He even found iron-tipped wooden throwing spears nearby. Those were weapons he needed as well.

Zhou Ye quickly asked, "Shopkeeper, how much are these arrows? And these throwing spears?"

Seeing business come in, the middle-aged blacksmith smiled. "Forty-two copper coins per arrow. If you buy a bundle of fifty, I'll give them to you for two taels of silver. There are only these two throwing spears left. Take them both for one tael."

Zhou Ye could not be bothered to haggle. After calculating silently, he found that he only had a little over two taels of silver from looting corpses. As for that fifty-tael banknote, he would avoid using it if possible.

At that moment, an idea suddenly struck Zhou Ye. "Shopkeeper, do you take swords?"

Since he already had three waist sabers, he could carry one and keep another as a spare, while the extra one could be sold. The surplus iron tools from the Old Camp could likewise be disposed of later.

As for a weapon to protect himself on the way back, did he not still have that woodcutter's knife?

Taking the military waist saber, the middle-aged blacksmith was likewise too lazy to ask where it had come from. He inspected its condition and said, "Little brother, I can give you at most two taels and two mace?"

Weapons like sabers sold extremely well, far better than arrows and throwing spears. To the middle-aged blacksmith, this was a very worthwhile deal.

After considering it briefly, Zhou Ye agreed to the trade.

Interestingly, the middle-aged blacksmith also took a liking to the smoked wild boar hind leg. That hind leg alone weighed more than forty jin. After the deal, Zhou Ye received a bundle of arrows, two iron throwing spears, scissors, and other items. He even got several dozen copper coins?

As he was leaving, the middle-aged blacksmith kindly told him, "Little brother, if you need needles and thread, go to the second general store at the street corner. They also buy pelts. The prices aren't as high as in the prefectural city, but they're fairly honest."

At the general store, he met a plump shopkeeper. After introducing themselves, Zhou Ye learned that the man's surname was Ding.

"Brother Zhou, these are bamboo rat pelts, right? This kind of fur is rather small and troublesome to process. Some of these are damaged too, so I can offer at most two hundred and twenty copper coins each. Snake skins aren't worth much. I can give you sixty copper coins per skin."

Seeing those damaged bamboo rat pelts, Zhou Ye recalled that they had been used for practice when he had first started skinning beasts. He could not help smiling, though he did not deny it. "Shopkeeper Ding, add a little more. It wasn't easy for me in the mountains."

"I'm running a small business here. Doing business isn't easy for me either! How about this..."

"Then I still need to buy some things. Give me a cheaper price."

"Fine! Just pick whatever you want."

"..."

Truthfully, Zhou Ye was already quite satisfied. He had not expected these bamboo rat pelts and snake skins to sell for more than twenty taels of silver. If he had known, he should have hunted more bamboo rats back then.

But then he thought of the more than one hundred bamboo rat pelts still at home. If he included those from the ones he was raising, there should be more than two hundred, right? In that case, there was nothing to worry about.

Yet after the transaction, Zhou Ye could no longer restrain his damned urge to buy things.

"Shopkeeper Ding, how much is this map?"

"Brother Zhou, this is a simple map of the nearby towns and mountain regions. Someone like you who ventures into the mountains truly needs one. But there's also a copy of the Beast and Herb Compendium here. You should buy one too. If you come across valuable herbs or beast materials in the mountains, you won't let them slip through your fingers, will you?"

Zhou Ye thought that made sense as well. He asked, "How much?"

"For both together, two taels."

"That expensive?"

"How is that expensive? Little brother, knowledge is priceless! Look, didn't you earn more than twenty taels from one trip into the mountains?"

"You can't calculate it like that."

"Fine! I'll give you a discount of one mace of silver?"

"Huh? You have fishing nets here too? Give me one. But do you have fish traps?"

"What? What's a fish trap?"

"Forget it. Then give me some materials for weaving nets. I'll go back and make one myself!"

"..."

After buying those things, Zhou Ye followed Shopkeeper Ding's introduction to the pawnshop next door. There, he bought a full set of secondhand cotton-padded clothes, cotton-padded trousers, a cotton-padded hat, and cotton-padded shoes that someone else had forfeited outright, along with a thick quilt. Though they were used goods, they were still seventy percent new.

Afterward, he found the home of a local stonemason and bought a small stone mill.

Truthfully, without guidance from a local, he would never have found where to buy a stone mill.

Shopkeeper Ding was equally accustomed to buyers like Zhou Ye making large purchases.

After all, making a trip into the mountains was truly not easy. Many people built camps in the forests. There were also those who could not endure the oppression of the authorities and fled into the mountains, becoming "wild people"—that is, mountain folk.

Though these people all lived in the mountains, they still had a need to trade with the outside world.