Jiang Fa sat in the shade of a tree, watching Liu Wen's back disappear around the corner of the courtyard wall.
This was far from the first time Liu Wen had done this.
Ever since they had crossed words and made enemies on the day they joined the martial arts school, Liu Wen had found every possible way to disgust them, openly and behind their backs, with sneers and barbed remarks.
Wang Dahu sprang to his feet and hurled the flatbread in his hand to the ground. It broke into several pieces, kicking up a cloud of dust.
"Damn him! I've put up with him long enough!"
He swore, his chest heaving violently and his eyes red.
"That bastard Liu Wen really thinks we're easy prey? Every single day, buzzing around in front of us like a fly. Who's he trying to sicken?"
Li Tie remained squatting where he was, his head lowered and his hands clenched together, his knuckles cracking.
Jiang Fa bent down, picked up the flatbread Wang Dahu had broken, dusted it off, and handed it back to him. "Don't take it out on food."
"No matter how angry you get, it won't solve anything. Smash your flatbread and you're the one who goes hungry. Liu Wen will carry on just as before. What, are you going to chase him down and beat him up?"
Wang Dahu froze, then took the broken flatbread.
Jiang Fa was right.
The martial arts school forbade private fights between disciples. Anyone who broke that rule would be expelled immediately.
What could he do to Liu Wen?
If he lashed out on impulse and taught Liu Wen a lesson, he simply couldn't bear the consequences.
"I know that's how it is, but I just can't swallow this! Why does he get to show off in front of us every day? Just because his family has a bit of stinking money?"
Wang Dahu spoke sullenly.
"I've seen those Blood Condensation Pills a few times at the medicine shop," Li Tie, who had remained silent until now, suddenly said.
"Even the smallest kind costs at least five taels of silver each."
Five taels of silver.
Wang Dahu jerked his head up, his eyes round as saucers. "Five taels? That thing the size of a sugar bean? Five taels of silver?"
"My parents grub away in the fields for a whole year, and after paying rent, they only have three or four taels left."
Wang Dahu's voice trembled slightly. "One pill swallows a whole year of my parents' blood and sweat? What... what the hell is this?"
All three came from poor families, whose entire annual expenses amounted to little more than ten taels.
Two tiny pills were worth a whole year of food, drink, and living expenses for their families.
This wasn't taking medicine. It was eating silver, devouring a family's lifeblood.
Li Tie nodded, his expression bitter. "Liu Wen's aptitude is about the same as ours. With medicinal supplements, he progresses faster than we do. He has a very good chance of breaking through to Ming Jin within three months, while we..."
He paused, resentment in his voice.
"We'll probably fall far behind him. These things simply can't be made up for through hard work alone. No matter how desperately we train, one pill gives him the equivalent of ten days or half a month of our grueling work. How are we supposed to compete?"
Wang Dahu let out a heavy sigh and plopped back onto the ground. "Then what do we do? Just watch him climb onto our heads and shit?"
Li Tie looked at Jiang Fa. "Jiang Fa, you've got a good head on your shoulders. Say something."
Jiang Fa brushed the crumbs from his hands. "Liu Wen having money is his business. Us not having money is ours. If he takes pills to train, we'll train another four hours. We can catch up eventually."
"Easy for you to say!" Li Tie stamped his foot. "One pill is worth ten days or half a month of our work. What are we supposed to catch up with? Our lives?"
Jiang Fa raised his eyes to him, his gaze as calm as still water. "Then tell me, besides training more, what else can we do?"
Li Tie opened his mouth but couldn't find anything to say.
Wang Dahu said glumly, "What if... we found some way to get a little silver?"
"Where?" Li Tie glanced at him helplessly. "Steal? Rob someone? Or perform martial tricks on the street for money? Whatever we made probably wouldn't even cover one round of those street thugs scraping our bones and sucking out the marrow."
Wang Dahu lowered his head and fell silent.
Jiang Fa stood and brushed the dirt from his trousers. "Come on. Time to train."
Then, without waiting for the other two to respond,
he headed toward the outer courtyard's training grounds first.
Seeing this, the two could only follow behind Jiang Fa as though resigned to their fate.
The sun sank in the west.
After a day of grueling training, the three went to the dining hall together.
Li Tie and Wang Dahu walked in front.
"By the way, have you scraped together this month's room and board?" Wang Dahu turned to Li Tie.
The martial arts school provided free room and board for the first month, but starting from the second, every disciple had to pay.
"I'm still short half."
Li Tie's voice was muffled, his face troubled.
"My family won't be able to send money until next month."
"Next month?" Wang Dahu frowned.
Li Tie sighed deeply, his tone carrying a trace of humble helplessness. "Tomorrow I'll go plead with Steward Ma and explain things properly. See if he can give me a few more days, then I'll make up the payment when my family's money arrives."
Jiang Fa walked two steps behind them, listening quietly without interrupting.
He was worrying about the same thing.
As the old saying went, the poor could study, but practicing martial arts took wealth.
Every aspect of martial training cost money. Clothing, food, lodging, travel, weapons, medicinal ingredients-which of them didn't require silver?
When Jiang Fa's father first heard that he wanted to learn martial arts, he had sighed all day long.
It wasn't that he begrudged the ten taels of tuition to become a disciple. He knew that martial training was a bottomless pit that could squeeze every drop of blood and sweat from a poor family.
Father emptied his savings to scrape together those ten taels. Things at home must be tight now. I absolutely can't ask them for room and board as well. I have to find a way myself!
Jiang Fa thought to himself.
As he walked, something suddenly stirred in his mind, and a figure surfaced in his thoughts.
He lowered his voice and asked, "Chen Erniu's family is about as well-off as ours. Where does his money for room and board come from?"
Chen Erniu.
He was the outer courtyard disciple among the senior students who rose earliest and left latest every day.
Ever since Jiang Fa joined the school, he had seen that man on the outer courtyard's training grounds almost every day, arriving early and leaving late, sweating like rain, undeterred by wind or rain.
When it came to diligence, even Jiang Fa felt inferior.
Li Tie's steps faltered. He glanced back at Jiang Fa with a strange expression.
"You don't know about Chen Erniu?"
Li Tie kept his voice very low.
Jiang Fa shook his head.
Li Tie bit his lip and hesitated before saying, "Chen Erniu's family lives in Li Family Village outside the county town. To scrape together his tuition, his parents steeled themselves and sold their two mu of poor farmland."
"His parents hoped day and night that he'd make something of himself through martial arts, so they could rise on their son's success, stop suffering, and enjoy a life of ease."
Li Tie sighed and continued, "Unfortunately, Chen Erniu's aptitude is low, and he's had a frail constitution since childhood. After two months of training, his stance training is still a long way from breaking through to Ming Jin. With the three-month deadline drawing closer every day, he's truly desperate."
Jiang Fa listened without speaking.
"What's even more fucked up is,"
Li Tie lowered his voice further,
"after paying the tuition, there were barely a few coins left from selling the land. He left all of it with his parents and didn't bring a single copper himself. When it was time to pay for room and board last month, he was already gnawing on flatbread and drinking cold water."
Remembering Chen Erniu's scrawny frame, Jiang Fa frowned. "If that's the case, wouldn't even a man forged from iron break down if it went on?"
Training required not only external exercise, but internal nourishment as well.
If someone overtaxed and depleted themselves, they would not only make no progress in martial arts, but ruin their body too.
Li Tie fell briefly silent. Only after a long while did he force out a few words. "He's taken on the Black Tiger Gang's King of Hell's Debt."
Jiang Fa's heart jolted.
"King of Hell's Debt?"
Li Tie nodded. "Yes. I heard he went to the Black Tiger Gang a while ago to borrow money at usurious rates."
Jiang Fa's expression grew grave.
The Black Tiger Gang!
It was one of the local gangs entrenched in Qingshan County. Its members were all desperate outlaws, vicious, violent, and ruthless in their methods.
They routinely ran rampant through the streets and alleys, lent money and collected debts, and fought over territory. Countless lives and untold blood stained their hands. They were a criminal force everyone scrambled to avoid.
Ordinary people wouldn't dare have the slightest connection to the Fierce Tiger Gang, even if they starved or died in poverty.
What Chen Erniu had done was no different from drinking poison to quench his thirst, bargaining with a tiger for its hide!
"How much did he borrow?" Jiang Fa asked.
"No one knows the exact amount."
Li Tie gave a bitter smile, his eyes filled with regret and lingering fear. "But a couple of days ago, someone supposedly saw him outside a medicine shop in the county town. He bought several large packets of Blood Strengthening Powder in one go, enough to nourish him for a long time."
"He really is staking his life on this!"
Something stirred in Jiang Fa's mind, and his gaze flickered.
"Doing this is taking a desperate risk, but if it lets him break through, it's hard to say whether it's good or bad."
Watching his expression, Li Tie guessed what he was thinking, and his tone turned serious.
"Jiang Fa, listen to me. Those people in the Black Tiger Gang have no humanity. Chen Erniu was driven into a corner because his three months were almost up, so he had no choice but to stake everything on one throw. Don't go doing something foolish like him. If we can't get into the inner courtyard, so be it. At worst, we can go back and sell our brute labor. That's still better than throwing our lives away."
"Don't worry. I know what I'm doing."
Jiang Fa nodded, knowing Li Tie was worried that he would follow Chen Erniu down that same road of no return.
After dinner, he returned to his room and, while no one was around, pulled the small coarse-cloth pouch holding his silver from beneath his pillow.
He carefully counted it once.
Three copper coins and a small piece of silver weighing less than two-tenths of a tael. They weighed almost nothing, yet they were all the savings he had scraped together by skimping on food and daily expenses.
This little wasn't even enough for food and drink, let alone martial training.
"It still comes down to money!"
Jiang Fa remained silent for a long while. Deep in his eyes, an unnoticed ripple and a trace of resolve flashed.