Spending time working naturally meant cutting back on his study time.
Besides, Zhao Chi wasn't originally from this world.
Just adjusting to this world had taken up a great deal of his time.
Now he also had a very heavy course load.
Forging, sewing, medicine-making, martial arts, spiritual arts, tactical planning, racial knowledge, talent information, magical beast attributes, and so on and so forth.
There were all sorts of subjects.
Every course took time.
Fortunately, he had already finished cramming all the foundational knowledge.
After that, he only needed to focus on mastering one or two subjects.
But the school had so many specialist instructors, and he could ask them for guidance at any time.
With such a great opportunity, it would be a real waste not to learn more.
So he would rather eat poorer meals and spend his time studying and training. He really had no time to work.
Besides, he had little desire for material things.
As long as he had enough to eat, that was fine.
Even if he wore the same few sets of clothes all year round.
Even if he barely had a social life.
Even if others looked down on him.
He didn't care at all.
He treated his life in this world like playing a game.
Who would get angry at an NPC in a game?
That was why his good friend Yang Xiong always felt he had a great attitude.
The head instructor, Li Ruanyu, also admired that about him and offered him some help from time to time.
Lu Yi, the prettiest girl in class, often found her gaze drawn to him as well, which annoyed several other classmates.
Zhao Chi didn't want to spend time dealing with them, so he kept a respectful distance from both her and those classmates.
That only made Lu Yi pay even more attention to him, while those classmates disliked him even more.
Zhao Chi felt rather helpless about it, too.
But that was only a minor distraction.
Right now, he only had seventeen silver coins on hand.
That definitely wouldn't be enough to buy clothes for those female villagers.
After all, women's clothes tended to cost more.
And ten more would arrive tomorrow, another ten the day after, and more every day.
So buying clothes outright definitely wouldn't work.
Zhao Chi thought it over.
He bundled up the bedding on his bed.
Then he took out the spare sheets and clothes from the cabinet and took down all the curtains.
It was all fabric.
He could have them use it to make simple clothes.
It was summer anyway, so it wasn't cold at all.
They only needed to cover their private parts.
Besides, these female villagers... were women who lived in villages. That wasn't a pointless statement; it meant they all knew how to do some sewing and mending.
Although that didn't qualify as a sewing skill, they could still stitch together simple clothes to cover themselves.
And this was only an emergency measure.
Later, they could go hunting and make clothes from animal hides.
Even leather armor.
Before long, Zhao Chi had packed a huge bundle.
He slung it onto his back and headed straight out.
There were many cities in this world where humans gathered.
Zhao Chi didn't know much about the other cities.
But in Snowfield City, goods from a territory couldn't be exchanged directly with goods from the wider world.
It wasn't that doing so was impossible.
The law simply didn't allow it.
Because taxes had to be paid.
A territory could be viewed as another country.
Whether goods were brought into a territory or taken out of one into the wider world, it all counted as trade.
Taxes had to be paid in either case.
Dedicated methods and personnel monitored this in real time.
Any attempt to evade taxes would be detected immediately.
With the bundle on his back, Zhao Chi jogged the whole way.
He ran from the village to the town.
Though he was panting with exhaustion, he gritted his teeth and kept going.
It was working hours right now.
There weren't many pedestrians on the road.
Although students like Zhao Chi were on break, ordinary office workers and laborers weren't.
In this world, most people couldn't escape the fate of working for a living either.
Soon, he reached the exchange.
Snowfield City was a prefecture-level city, after all, and covered a vast area.
It had hundreds of exchanges, both large and small.
This one was the closest to him.
It wasn't busy right now, with only a little over thirty people inside conducting business.
There were receptionists at the entrance.
When Zhao Chi came in, a female receptionist immediately asked:
"Hello, sir. What can we help you with?"
Zhao Chi pointed at the bundle on his back.
"I'd like to transport these into my territory."
"What items are they?"
"Bedding, clothes, curtains, things like that."
"Are they merchandise? How much is there?"
"They aren't merchandise. This is all of it."
The receptionist pointed to a nearby counter.
"All right. You can take care of that at counter eight over there."
"Okay, thank you."
"You're welcome."
The exchange was a little like a bare-bones bank.
It was managed fairly efficiently.
Counter eight wasn't crowded, with only two people waiting ahead of him.
Soon, it was Zhao Chi's turn.
The clerk asked him similar questions.
Then the clerk scanned the bundle with a device.
"Sir, these goods are subject to a three-percent fee, which comes to one copper coin."
"..." Zhao Chi silently took out the money.
So this whole huge bundle only costs one copper coin in taxes?
Still, that made sense.
After all, it was nothing but old clothes, old bedding, and old curtains.
They were barely worth anything.
"All right, your goods have been registered and approved for teleportation. You may teleport them whenever you wish."
Zhao Chi nodded. "Thank you."
"You're welcome. Is there anything else you need help with?"
"Um... I'd also like to buy some rice."
The clerk looked a little troubled. "Sir, this counter handles goods registration. If you'd like to make a purchase, you'll need to go to another counter."
Zhao Chi nodded. "Understood. Thank you."
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