Shopping, and shopping with a vengeance!

"Forty copper coins," Li Xuan replied.

The young wife drew in a breath, clearly finding it expensive.

"Could... could you lower the price a little? Would thirty-five do? My mother-in-law is ill, and all she wants is some fresh fish soup..."

Someone nearby chimed in, "Young lady, live fish from running water beneath the ice are rare this time of year. Forty coins isn't expensive!"

Li Xuan glanced at the child in her arms and her earnest eyes, and his tone softened.

"Ma'am, this fish really is plump, with no muddy taste. It's wonderfully nourishing. How about this? Forty coins, and I'll throw in two good Yellow Essence rootlets. Stew them with the fish, and the soup will be even more nourishing-good for an elderly person's health. Would that work?"

The young wife's eyes brightened. Yellow Essence was good stuff too.

She hesitated a moment before nodding with a smile, carefully counting out forty copper coins and handing them to Li Xuan.

"I'll take this one, then. Thank you, young man."

"Here you are."

Li Xuan took the money, deftly threaded a straw cord through the fish's gills, and lifted it up to hand to her.

He also picked two long, slender Yellow Essence rootlets from the pile of medicinal herbs and gave them to her.

Li Zhong and his wife had been a little bewildered at first, but seeing how easily Li Xuan handled things and how business was picking up, they gradually relaxed.

Wang briskly helped collect payments and make change, while Li Zhong sorted the medicinal herbs and arranged them neatly.

When anyone asked, he explained with an honest, affable manner that they had grown them on their own hillside and guaranteed that they had not been fumigated with sulfur.

Finally, after just under an hour had passed.

Nearly everything on the stall had been sold.

The Yellow Essence brought in around a hundred and fifty copper coins, and the Poria nearly a hundred.

Adding the money from the fish-two at forty each, two at thirty-five, one at thirty, another at thirty-five, and the last two bundled together for seventy-the total came to two hundred and eighty-five coins.

Together with the seven hundred coins from the sheepskin, this trip to market had brought in over twelve hundred copper coins, equivalent to a little more than one tael and two mace of silver!

For the Li family, who had always lived in poverty, this was nothing short of a fortune!

Wang carefully put away the heavy copper coins and bits of silver.

Her hands trembled a little, and her face glowed red with excitement she could not suppress.

Li Zhong was beaming too, calculating how much grain and salt they could buy.

"Come on, Sister-in-law, Big Brother! Let's go shopping-and shop with a vengeance!"

With their weighty haul of over twelve hundred copper coins tucked away, the Li family's joy almost overflowed from their faces.

Wang kept a tight hand over the money pouch. Even through the coarse cloth, her fingers could feel the solidity of the coins, giving her a sense of security she had never known before.

First, she led the two brothers straight to the grain shop.

"Shopkeeper, one dou of good brown rice! And white flour... half a dou of that too!"

Wang's voice was louder than usual. She remained careful with every coin, but now spoke with confidence.

She watched the golden brown rice and snow-white flour being poured into sacks.

Most of the lingering fear left in her heart by years of living on thin gruel finally melted away.

Next came a jar of salt and a bottle of oil. Wang chose carefully, weighing quality against price.

Li Zhong followed behind with an easy grin, volunteering to shoulder the increasingly heavy sacks of rice and flour.

As they passed a butcher's stall, Li Zhong could not help swallowing at the sight of the hanging pork and the pig bones on the chopping block.

Wang hesitated too, but remembering the half leg of lamb still at home, she ultimately could not bring herself to buy meat. Instead, she picked out two large, cheap bones with hardly any meat on them.

"We can break these up and simmer them into soup when we get home. At least we'll get a little taste of meat."

Li Xuan's attention, however, was drawn to a nearby peddler's stand selling malt sugar and sesame cakes.

Several children crowded around it, gazing longingly.

Remembering Xiu'er's hopeful little eyes when he had left home, he walked over and spent ten copper coins on a small packet of malt sugar and two baked cakes sprinkled with black sesame seeds.

"Oh! What did you buy such expensive things for?" Wang fretted as soon as she saw them. "Think how much salt ten coins could buy! You child, the moment you have a little money, you start throwing it around!"

Li Xuan handed her the sweets and cakes with a smile. "Sister-in-law, isn't making money all about giving the family a better life? Xiu'er's been looking forward to them. Besides, you, Father, and Big Brother should all have a taste too."

Wang was still scolding him for "squandering money," but she carefully accepted the sweets and cakes.

She wrapped them neatly in oiled paper and placed them at the bottom of the bundle, where they would be safest, yet could not hide the smile tugging at her lips.

With the main purchases more or less finished, Wang hefted the remaining money and said to Li Zhong:

"Husband, watch our things. I'll go over to the cloth shop and look at cotton and coarse cloth. This cold is downright vicious-we need to add more padding to the winter clothes for you, your brother, and Father."

Then she noticed a little wine-shop banner not far away, with Li Zhong's gaze drifting toward it, and added sternly:

"And don't you sneak off to buy wine! It's expensive and only causes trouble!"

Li Zhong ducked his head with a sheepish grin. "I won't, I won't. I'm just looking, just looking."

Only then did Wang sling the somewhat emptier bundle over her arm and hurry toward the cloth shop.

Once his wife was out of sight, Li Zhong indeed seemed rooted to the spot, staring yearningly at the wine shop.

Li Xuan understood as clearly as a polished mirror. He counted out twenty copper coins from inside his robe, pressed them into Li Zhong's hand, and whispered:

"Brother, just buy a little. Dilute it when you drink, and don't let Sister-in-law smell it on you. I'm going to look around the smithy and see what tools they have."

Clutching the money, Li Zhong was both delighted and a little embarrassed. He nodded repeatedly.

"Yes, yes, just a little, a little! Go ahead, go ahead!"

Li Xuan turned toward the street corner where he remembered the smithy stood.

Before he reached it, he heard the rhythmic clang of hammering and the whoosh of bellows. The air was thick with the distinctive smell of coal and heated metal.

The smithy had a small storefront, with flames blazing inside.

Ironware hung on the walls and lay piled on the floor, mostly farming tools-hoes, sickles, plowshares-as well as a few woodcutting blades and short knives.

A burly, bare-chested blacksmith with knotted muscles was hammering a glowing iron bar, sweat pouring off him like rain.

Li Xuan stepped inside and quickly swept his gaze around.

He looked at the bow first. A dark iron-framed longbow hung on the wall, its austere shape making its extraordinary power clear at a glance.

He asked the price, and the blacksmith answered without lifting his head:

"That one? Twenty taels of silver. No bargaining."

Li Xuan had not expected a good bow to cost so much. After silently doing the sums, he could only shake his head.

Next, he looked at a saber. It sat in its sheath, its hilt wrapped with worn hemp cord, and looked quite sharp.

The blacksmith quoted, "Five taels and five mace." Once again, Li Xuan was left speechless.

Finally, his gaze settled on a pile of odds and ends in the corner.

There were defective iron scraps, broken spearheads, and a small bundle of unpolished iron arrowheads tied with straw cord, about a dozen in all, dark and rough in

shape, but iron nonetheless.

"How much for these arrowheads?" Li Xuan asked.

Only then did the blacksmith stop working. He wiped his face with a sweat towel and glanced over.

"Those? Made them for practice. Haven't trimmed the edges. They're very rough. Want them? Fifty copper coins for the lot."

That was a price he could afford.

Li Xuan paid and carefully put away the bundle of rough iron arrowheads.

Although he could not afford a ready-made fine bow or sharp blade, he now had these iron arrowheads.

Once home, he could slowly grind them into shape himself and fit them onto wooden shafts.

They would be far more powerful than his old sharpened iron scraps or bone arrowheads, a considerable improvement in their own right.

With a little regret and far more anticipation, Li Xuan stepped out of the smithy's scorching air.

He had just stopped at the street corner, considering whether to find his elder brother or his sister-in-law.

When a slightly breathless voice, filled with delighted surprise, called from behind him:

"Warrior... Warrior Li! Please wait! Please wait!"