Chapter 235

The caravan travels a full day and camps for the night in a valley, having clashed with three small groups of beasts along the way, killing two and driving the third off for a net profit. After camp settles, a small evening bazaar opens where mortals trade among themselves, separate from the caravan’s weekly market for Gu Masters. Fang Yuan and Bai Ning Bing set up their cart there, since the withering purple maple leaves are losing value by the day and keeping them any longer only invites thieves. Bai Ning Bing hopes to reach the Gu Masters’ own bazaar for an investigative Gu; Fang Yuan says he already has something specific in mind, though he judges it too early to act on it. ^{ch. 235}

A beaten, ragged servant, refused milk by a nearby stall, comes begging to their cart instead. Fang Yuan kicks him to the ground three times, the last simply because he dislikes the man’s expression. The servant crawls away without another word. Bai Ning Bing, puzzled that a caravan would even have beggars in it, is told this is ordinary: a servant who errs, or whose master is simply in a bad mood, gets beaten and denied a meal. ^{ch. 235}

Two more groups try to buy the cart cheap: a sharp eyed old man Fang Yuan takes for a task supervisor, and a silk clad woman he judges to be a Gu Master’s mistress. Both are refused, and both leave unhappy, one with a veiled threat and the other cursing. ^{ch. 235}

A commotion follows as “Lady Zhang” arrives to hand out steamed buns to the hungry servants, an old Gu Master beside her threatening to cut down anyone who pushes forward or shouts. She is strikingly beautiful and gentle, and a stall owner tells Bai Ning Bing that Zhang Xin Ci is a caravan vice leader herself, a mortal with no aptitude for cultivation but strong clan backing, who brings food to the servants almost every evening. ^{ch. 235}

Watching her, Fang Yuan silently wonders whether she is in fact Shang Xin Ci, a young master of the Shang clan he remembers from his previous life: the clan’s worst businesswoman, endlessly kind, easily cheated, and reprimanded more than once for buying up whole slave auctions. Bai Ning Bing remarks only that all sorts of people exist in the world. She notices, when he does not answer, that Fang Yuan is staring at the girl with his brows locked tight. ^{ch. 235}