Chapter Thirteen: Exploring Foreign Lands

  At home, Du Le was not the most diligent one, but every day he had to get up early to open the store for business.

  But this time, he slept particularly soundly.

  It wasn't long before Du Le heard the sound of footsteps and the murmur of voices, which grew louder and more chaotic until he couldn't sleep anymore.

  Having no choice, Du Le could only stretch his waist, but unexpectedly, he fell to the ground covered with dust. Du Le shouted and opened his eyes, and the scene in front of him reminded him of what had happened yesterday.

  What entered Du Le's eyes was a scene of an ancient street market, with streets that could accommodate about four small cars lined up and walking in both directions. The people coming and going were dressed in various colors of silk, brocade, and linen; there were also all sorts of occupational figures, such as shopkeepers, vendors, fortune tellers, writers, and peddlers carrying poles and hawking their wares along the street.

  Du Le, who was originally worried about being treated as an outcast, discovered that there were quite a few people like him sitting on the street corners, some holding rice bowls and others stretching out their hands to beg. His heart felt much lighter. The clothes he was wearing now at least conformed to the local beggar attire.

  Du Le saw the people in front of him, all with yellow skin and black eyes, similar to his own. For some reason, Du Le felt a sense of security. Humans are born as social animals that live in groups, and it's easy for them to find a sense of security within a group.

  Du Le carefully observed his surroundings to confirm that no one would find his attire strange or harbor too much hostility towards him, before he stood up and patted the dust off his body.

  As a would-be businessman who had decided to venture into the business world, Du Le had long been prepared to go to an unfamiliar place to make a name for himself. A businessman must understand the market, in short, Du Le must be clear about where he is. Of course, if he could send news back home immediately, Du Le would not stay a moment longer, the reason being simple, last night's corpse made him feel terrified. He still needed time to buffer these stimuli, but he couldn't just squat on the side of the road. The newly graduated Du Le had a proud spirit in his heart that did not allow him to sit by the roadside like a beggar, and he didn't even want to pretend to be one.

  Du Le didn't know where he had arrived, everything around him only reminded him of the ancient costume dramas on TV. Although it was unfamiliar, he couldn't help but feel a little curious. Du Le carefully observed the people walking and doing business on the streets, apart from being busy, their faces were almost all filled with worry, as if a great disaster was about to strike.

  Du Le looked around cautiously and quietly walked to the side of people who were chatting, he found that the language used by these people was not much different from his own, so he could understand. Du Le's heart slightly relaxed, then he began to intervene in people's conversations, wanting to understand the local human environment. However, every time when Du Le opened his mouth, for some reason, the people in the conversation would stop talking and disperse.

  After several attempts, Du Le finally gave up. After some thought, Du Le decided to observe and listen more for the time being.

  After nearly an hour, Du Le finally roughly understood that the city he was in was called Jinyang City, which belonged to a country called Chu. The state of Chu is similar to the ancient Chinese empire on Earth, it's a feudal imperial nation.

  Now, Chu State is suffering from the joint attack of Qi State and Jin State. Countless refugees are pouring into the capital city of Chu State, Jinyang City, to seek refuge. This is also why Du Le saw many beggars on the streets, after all, in a feudal country, rich people are a minority. As long as peasants leave their land, they become vagrants, which is not much different from beggars.

  What interested Du Le most was the information about buying and selling goods. In addition to the ceramics, jade carvings and other exquisite handicrafts in the shops, there was also a special area in the city for buying and selling goods, where all kinds of goods were available, from daily necessities to luxury goods.

  Perhaps it was because of the national crisis, the prices of grain, vegetables and other agricultural products in Jinyang City were extremely high, while some things that couldn't be eaten as rice were extremely low. Even Du Le, who wasn't particularly interested in art, could see that several ink paintings had extraordinary craftsmanship, even surpassing the value of tens of thousands of yuan per piece of Chinese painting he had seen in an art museum. However, the prices of these treasures were so low that they were only enough to buy a bunch of white vegetables. Du Le really wanted to buy a few and take them back. Unfortunately, he didn't have any money on him.

  The currency used here is actually quite easy to find out. Gold coins, and they are indeed using gold coins. Gold coins are the general currency here, the most common currency. Gold coins of different sizes represent different values. Roughly categorized, there are one-yuan gold coins, five-fen gold coins, one-fen gold coins, etc.

  Du Le thought for a while and then strolled around.

  He walked into a relatively large fruit shop. On the fruit stand in front of the fruit shop, there were only a few kinds of fruits that looked like bananas and apples, but they looked very poor and not many in quantity.

  Du Le took a glance at the people inside the store. There were two of them, one was a middle-aged woman in her 40s who had put on some weight; the other was a thin and small man in his 50s. The two were sitting in the store sighing and lamenting, and they didn't even notice Du Le walking in.

  "...The refugees, the northern road is blocked, and the south can't transport goods. Our fruit stand will probably not be able to open. Why don't we close the shop and go to my younger brother's house in the south? If we wait for the Qi and Jin states' armies to arrive, we won't be able to leave. Besides, although the city is heavily guarded, I also believe that Chu state will win, but can't stay here to suffer, right? Look, grain prices have risen to one yuan of gold per three catties, last month it was only one fen per catty." The middle-aged woman said to the thin man.

  "Hmm," the thin man seemed to be thinking of something and nodded his head in response.

  "Are you a man or not? You're still dawdling when it's time to make a decision!" the middle-aged woman shouted at the small, thin man.

  "Isn't that what I'm thinking?!" the thin man shouted with a look of impatience, "I know everything you said! But this shop, we spent 50 gold coins to buy it, and now no one is willing to take over even for 10 gold coins!"

  Du Le Xin Si together, took stock of this store. The front shop is not large, about ten or so square meters, the back shop should be the owner's living quarters and storage for goods.

  "Hey, you two! Stop arguing!" Du Le interrupted the two people inside, "We have a customer!"

  "We're all out of stock, just these are left." The middle-aged woman stood up with an apologetic expression and said in a businesslike tone, "And the price isn't cheap either, three gold coins for one, choose whatever you like."

  "I have a batch of fruit and I'd like to find you to act as an agent for sale. Is that possible?" Du Le said in a low voice as he walked closer.

  "Agency?" The thin man looked puzzled.

  "I'd like to rent a stall from you and sell the fruits I've brought." Du Le explained.