"Boss, a bottle of soda." Thanks to his memories of his previous life, Kano could naturally speak Chinese, but his Mandarin wasn't the standard Grade 2-A variety. It carried a slight Hunan-Jiangxi Region accent.
For example, whenever he spoke too quickly, he tended to mix up his n's and l's, so the people of Hailar, whose accents were mostly from Northeast China, could tell Kano was an outsider the moment he opened his mouth.
As for Zhao Qingshan, that went without saying-as long as you weren't deaf, his Cantonese-accented Mandarin made it obvious where he came from.
The general store's owner therefore assumed Kano's group had traveled all the way from the south to see the grasslands. Their lineup also looked very much like a trio consisting of a father (Zhao Qingshan), a stepmother (the Slit-Mouthed Woman, Miss Miyano), and a son (Shoichi Kano).
It was just that the three of them didn't look remotely alike.
"What kind of soda?" The old man surnamed Bai, who looked to be in his sixties, stood up and pointed at the mass of glass bottles in the refrigerator. "There's Dayao, Coca-Cola, Fanta, Sprite..."
"They're all two yuan fifty if you take the bottle with you, or one yuan fifty if you drink it here. If you take it away and bring the bottle back afterward, I can refund you one yuan."
"Mom, what do you want to drink?" Shoichi Kano casually murmured in Japanese.
The Slit-Mouthed Woman tugged at her mask out of habit. "Anything's fine."
Boss Bai's gaze sharpened, and his expression changed instantly. "Japanese devils?!"
Judging by the aura faintly stirring around him, this man most likely had a trick or two up his sleeve!
But the moment the Slit-Mouthed Woman sensed his aura, muscle memory also prompted her to form the hand signs for Simple Domain. All that remained was to activate her cursed energy!
Her right palm faced outward, all five fingers hanging naturally downward to form a modified version of the Buddhist Wish-Granting Mudra. Her left palm also faced outward, but its fingers were pressed together and pointed upward in a modified Fearlessness Mudra. She held her hands before her, one high and one low, like the two ends of a balance scale.
A fight was on the verge of breaking out!
Zhao Qingshan panicked completely! Like a headless chicken, he hopped around, using wildly exaggerated gestures to draw everyone's attention while rattling off words like machine-gun fire. "Both of you, calm down, calm down, calm down!"
At some point, a Coin Sword made from Qianlong Tongbao coins strung together with red cord soaked in cinnabar water had appeared in the old shopkeeper's hand. Holding the sword in one hand and forming a sword-finger gesture with the other, he pointed at the Slit-Mouthed Woman's face in an impressively graceful pose.
"Six Ding and Six Jia, reveal your divine might! Help me break baleful forces and destroy evil demons! Urgent as Law-"
"Simple Do-"
Both sides began chanting almost simultaneously.
Then Zhao Qingshan grabbed the old man, while Kano wrapped his arms around the Slit-Mouthed Woman cursed spirit's waist from behind. "Mom, calm down!!!"
Honestly, she felt soft and fleshy.
This sudden move stalled the cursed energy building inside the Slit-Mouthed Woman. Its activation failed, and her Simple Domain naturally failed to take shape.
The old shopkeeper also failed to finish his "Urgent as Law Commands."
Zhao Qingshan pleaded until he nearly dropped to his knees, and with Kano explaining alongside him, they finally managed to quell the old man's hostility-this group wasn't their enemy after all. They had only come to ask his son, Bai Guangzhi, for an item.
Since both sides had now revealed some of their abilities, the old shopkeeper, Bai Ning, dropped the pretense and openly admitted that the so-called "Mongolian gentleman" was his son, Bai Guangzhi. They had once made an enemy of a curse user who had fled Japan, and that bastard had brutally murdered the old shopkeeper's daughter-in-law and granddaughter.
Although his son had gutted the man using their Inherited Technique, avenging them, he still worried that their enemy's associates would come knocking.
That was why the old shopkeeper had reacted as though facing a formidable enemy when Kano's group revealed that they spoke Japanese.
The incident had also traumatized the old shopkeeper's son, who had been trying ever since to find a way to return to the past and save his daughter and wife.
"To be honest, he's become a little obsessed now. His mastery has already surpassed mine, too, so I have no way of pinpointing his whereabouts."
The Slit-Mouthed Woman, who understood human negative emotions better than anyone, offered her view. "It's understandable that he's become obsessed. This isn't his fault."
After Kano translated that, the old shopkeeper merely sighed without answering.
Then he took out three bottled drinks and placed them on the counter as a treat. "If you're looking for my son, I really can't contact him. You can only try your luck and see whether he comes by my store over the next few days."
Shoichi Kano picked up a bottle opener and opened two of the drinks, handing a bottle of Weiwei Soy Milk to the Slit-Mouthed Woman beside him and slipping in a straw for her.
Then he looked at Bai Ning. "But I heard from people in the business that when they want to find your son, they mail their letters here for you to pass on. Is that right?"
The Slit-Mouthed Woman instinctively shuddered at the soy-based drink in her hand, clearly having developed PTSD from douzhir. But she soon realized it was only ordinary soy milk, and slipped the straw through the gap at the edge of her mask, taking little sips.
"That's true," Bai Ning admitted. "But I can only pass them on when he comes to see me."
As soon as he finished speaking, he went to the very back of the store and fetched a black plastic bag containing a thick stack of accumulated letters.
"These are all letters people have asked me to pass on to Guangzhi." The old man took out the unopened letters to show them, then put them back into the plastic bag. "But I can only give them to him when he comes to see me."
"Then how long do we have to wait here..." The Slit-Mouthed Woman wasn't particularly comfortable with the relatively dry climate here. Although she wouldn't suffer from difficulty acclimating the way humans did, the absence of that familiar salty sea dampness in the air left her feeling uneasy.
"Let's wait a few days first..." Shoichi Kano was out of ideas, too. "If there's still no news when our visas are about to expire, we'll leave."
"Sorry for the trouble, Boss Zhao, but we'll have to ask you to keep an eye on things." He patted Zhao Qingshan on the shoulder. "There should still be around seven hundred thousand yuan on that Black Card. If you need any, just let me know."
Zhao Qingshan nodded without saying much-after all, he had come to act as their intermediary. It made perfect sense to leave this sort of thing to him.
"How about this, Mr. Bai?" He went straight to negotiating with Bai Ning. "Whenever your son comes by, I'm sorry for the trouble, but could you give me a call?"
"That's no problem," Bai Ning replied casually. "I have a whole pile of letters to give him anyway. One more or less won't make any difference."
"Still, I think you could show a little sincerity. That would prove you aren't here to cause trouble."
"If it's money, that's easy. Just name your price, Mr. Bai." Shoichi Kano smiled warmly.
Bai Ning shook his head. "I don't need money. For people like us, wealth is already just a worldly possession. As long as we can maintain a decent life, that's enough."
"As it happens, an old customer of mine has run into a little trouble," Bai Ning said with a smile. "As you can see, I'm old. My legs aren't what they used to be, and getting around isn't easy. Why don't you handle this for me? Consider it a show of sincerity."
Kano agreed to the request without giving anything away, while inwardly grumbling, Damn it, the way this old geezer whipped out that Coin Sword didn't look anything like someone whose legs weren't what they used to be or who had trouble getting around!
But he had already agreed, so he could only accept it.
Before you continue