"No? After being county magistrate for so many years, you didn't skim even a drop of oil?" Sheng Huai'an looked at County Magistrate Chen.
Was this guy really an incorruptible official?
"If you think you can do better, then you do it. I'll give you the county magistrate's seat and write to His Majesty at once." If he had been able to beat Sheng Huai'an, he truly would have smashed that face, which was even more handsome than his own.
"Heh, if I hadn't failed even the provincial scholar exam, do you think I'd care about some mere county magistrate post?" Sheng Huai'an spoke with immense bravado, as though being a county magistrate was nothing.
He wanted to be the top scholar, to be prime minister, to be...
"Tell me, what's the most you can lend me? Give me a straight answer. I'm waiting on the money to buy rice for the pot. Surely Lord Chen can't bear to watch nine thousand soldiers howl with hunger, can you?"
"At most, five thousand taels. That's my entire fortune. Take it or leave it." County Magistrate Chen was truly at his wit's end with this old scoundrel.
Clearly, he had come to borrow money, yet he acted as though he had come to collect a debt.
"What? Five thousand? You really are poor." Sheng Huai'an stared at County Magistrate Chen with wide eyes.
How had this fellow served as county magistrate so unsuccessfully?
There were so many wealthy households in the city. Had he really failed to squeeze even a little oil out of them?
Even the village chiefs from Sheng Huai'an's previous life had made more money than Chen Tianhua, a county magistrate.
"I'm not lending you anything. Leave. My home doesn't welcome you." Chen Tianhua was so furious that veins