Chapter Ninety-Four: We Do Not Sell

The six bandits under Sun the Great Roar decided to stay and work for Xiao Ding, which surprised him a little.

After all, these men had once been the butt of his tricks. Not only had he taken all their money, he had not even left them a stitch of clothing. Shouldn’t they have held a grudge against him?

In truth, the reason they wanted to stay and follow Xiao Ding was entirely because of Fan the Fatty’s persuasion.

For the past two days, with nothing better to do, Fan the Fatty had been chatting with them and had brought up Xiao Ding, saying that he was by no means an ordinary man and would surely rise to great things in the future. Following Xiao Ding would never be a mistake. He even said that he himself had already decided to stay.

These men had all come from humble peasant families and had taken to the mountains only because they had been driven to desperation. They had never wanted to roam the world as outlaws. Now that they had nowhere to go, they had originally thought Sun the Great Roar was a decent man and intended to follow him from then on. But after hearing Fan the Fatty’s words today, they all became tempted to follow Xiao Ding instead.

They discussed it with Sun the Great Roar. Even he did not know where he would go next, so of course he had no objection to their decision.

Thus they began searching everywhere for Xiao Ding, and at last found him behind the house.

After a moment’s thought, Xiao Ding said to them, “If you want to work for me, then from now on you must all obey me. You are absolutely not to do anything that goes against the law or morality ever again.”

“Of course, of course. In truth, we were all forced into it before. If we could have eaten our fill, who would have wanted to become thieves?” they all replied.

Xiao Ding looked at them and went on, “I happen to be short of help right now. You can work for me, and I’ll treat it as hiring you. I’ll pay you according to a laborer’s wage. If you want to work here at my house long-term, then I’ll consider it hiring you as permanent hands. What do you think?”

“You’ll even pay wages? That’s wonderful! We thought that if you could just feed us and let us stay, we’d already be more than content!” they said joyfully. They had heard that even Fan the Fatty did not receive wages.

“All right then. Go and rest for now. I’ll draft an agreement shortly. Once we’ve signed a labor contract, I’ll arrange work for you,” Xiao Ding said.

“Understood, Brother Xiao Ding. From now on, you’re our employer, and we’ll have to call you Young Master Boss instead,” the men agreed at once, then turned away in high spirits.

Young Master Boss!

Hearing this, Xiao Ding laughed inwardly, and he could not help thinking of a skit he had once seen on television before his transmigration, the story of Yang Bailao and Huang Shiren. There had been a line in it: “I say, Young Master Boss...” Could it be that in the future he, too, would become the sort of person Huang Shiren had been?

Seeing that Zhao Laixi was still standing before him, Xiao Ding hurriedly took out the remaining three gold ingots from his robe and handed them over. “I still have three gold ingots here. In the next couple of days, go to the money house and exchange them for silver to use for building the residence.”

One gold ingot weighed ten taels and could be exchanged for one hundred taels of silver. Three gold ingots were worth three hundred taels of silver, more than enough to build a proper house.

“Brother, where on earth did you get so much money? We may be poor, but we must not take the wrong path,” Zhao Laixi said, looking at Xiao Ding worriedly.

Yet inwardly he thought: This fool really does have some ability. He just gave away one ingot, and in the blink of an eye he pulls out three more. Four gold ingots are four hundred taels of silver. That is no small sum; not just anyone can lay hands on that so casually.

“Laixi, don’t worry. Your brother’s gold wasn’t stolen or seized. It was picked up. You can spend it with complete peace of mind,” Xiao Ding said with a smile.

Zhao Laixi took the gold and tucked it into his robe, but inwardly he grumbled: Go on, keep fooling me. Picked up, indeed. Why is your luck always so good? Why is it that I never find any?

He knew that even if he asked Xiao Ding, Xiao Ding would not tell him the truth, so he gave a response and left.

Two more days passed, and Mu Hong’s injuries had recovered to about seventy or eighty percent. After discussing it with Mu Yiyi, the two of them decided to leave early the next morning and return to the Mist Cloud Sect.

When they heard that Mu Yiyi was leaving, the other women also decided to depart.

Yue Yurou had spent the past few days looking for a chance to be alone with Xiao Ding, hoping to speak with him privately. But the Tian family home was full of people, and she never got the opportunity. Though reluctant to part, she also decided to leave first. After all, she still bore the heavy responsibility of restoring her sect. As for the old, weak, and injured members left in the Jade Purity Gate, she did not even know how they were faring now.

After these days of recuperation, Tang Yunzhi’s leg injury had greatly improved. So long as she did not strain the injured leg again, it would heal slowly with rest.

During these days, she and Yue Yurou had already agreed that Yue Yurou would help her refine the Meridians-Clearing Purple Spirit Elixir. Although the Tang Clan had the formula for the pill, it was not certain whether they could truly refine it successfully.

Thus, after Yue Yurou returned to the Jade Purity Gate, Tang Yunzhi planned to go with her and recuperate there. She thought that once her leg had healed and Yue Yurou had finished refining the medicine, she could simply return directly to the Tang Clan in Shu.

The Mei sisters had secretly fled the Mei Sword Manor in order to avoid an arranged marriage. These days, their father, Mei Qiuyang, must have been frantic with worry.

“Let’s see if you still dare force us to marry. If you force us again, we’ll run away again!” the two of them thought.

When they heard the women were leaving, Xiao Ding tried to keep them a few more days.

But Mu Hong was preoccupied with matters in the sect and insisted on leaving with Mu Yiyi.

When the Mei sisters saw that Mu Yiyi was going, they too began to miss their families and decided not to stay either.

In truth, Yue Yurou still wanted to remain for a few more days, but seeing that everyone else was leaving, she felt too embarrassed to stay behind alone. So she declined Xiao Ding’s invitation, using the excuse that she wished to bury her master’s and fellow disciples’ ashes as soon as possible.

Tang Yunzhi, for her part, did not mind at all. Going with Yue Yurou was enough.

Seeing that they had made up their minds to leave, Xiao Ding no longer tried to keep them.

He brought out the yellow meridian-clearing purple spirit flowers and asked Yue Yurou and Tang Yunzhi to keep them safe so they would not forget to take them. These little yellow blossoms had already dried after several days of sunning, and though they looked like a large heap, they were actually very light.

Xiao Ding also returned the antidote Tang Yunzhi had given him before he entered the mountains, as well as the Soul-Stealing Tube. After all, these were treasured items of the Tang Clan, and they were Tang Yunzhi’s trump cards for self-defense.

Thinking that the group would leave early the next morning, and that he no longer had any gold to give them, Xiao Ding suddenly remembered the eleven luminous pearls.

“Why not give them the luminous pearls as travel money?” he thought. With pearls of such size, not to mention priceless, they would probably fetch thousands, or at least several tens of thousands, of taels of silver if sold.

That night, Xiao Ding brought out the luminous pearls and gave one each to Mu Yiyi, Yue Yurou, the Mei sisters, and Tang Yunzhi.

The women were astonished at first sight of the pearls, and when they saw that Xiao Ding had given each of them one, they were even more delighted.

“I don’t have any gold left to give you for travel expenses, so I’m giving each of you a pearl. If you run short of money on the road, you can always exchange it for silver,” Xiao Ding said.

“Brother Xiao Ding, I’d never bear to sell the pearl you gave me. I want to keep it forever as a memento...” Mu Yiyi said happily.

“Brother Xiao Ding, I won’t exchange mine for money either. I’m going to keep it with me at all times and think of you whenever I see it...” Yue Yurou said, and by the end her face was red.

“Brother Xiao Ding, we won’t sell ours either. You are our benefactor. The gifts you’ve given us, we will carry by our sides for the rest of our lives...” the other women all said in turn.

This...

Xiao Ding was left speechless. He did not know what else to say.