Damn it, I'm in the garbage book I wrote

Chapter 74 This is really the case

It takes about ten minutes to walk from the Cape of Good Hope to Xinping Township. This section of the road becomes wider and flatter as you go down. Even though the road is so good, there are still people working on paving the road and compacting the roadbed. This place is much more comfortable to walk on than the loess after being splashed with water.

The prince walked into the tofu lane with his hands behind his back. There were many people walking on the bluestone road, and many of the neighbors were used to dragging their own things here to sell.

But even so, the road was still clean. The prince bent down and picked up a bunch of wild delicacies from a vegetable basket. He couldn't tell what it was, but when he smelled it, he could smell the fragrance.

"This place is strange, too. It's rare that it's so clean even though there are so many people here."

The prince stood up and said with a smile that he was born clean and what he hated most was the market place, which was smelly and filthy and really disgusting.

But the market in Xinping Township is interesting. Although it is a bit dirty, it is generally clean and makes people happy.

"Master, this is under the care of someone."

Xiao Cui lowered her voice and tugged at the prince's sleeve, pointing at two men with swords not far away. They didn't look like good people at first glance, but the word "co-management" was painted on their clothes.

"These assistants are all scoundrels from all over the place. Lord Xia said that they would be trouble if they were kept alive, but they can't be buried alive, so we can only find something for them to do." Xiao Cui also seemed to be quite afraid of these people: "These people are ferocious and scary."

"Don't be afraid, don't be afraid as long as I'm here." The prince's heart was suddenly filled with pity, and he patted Xiao Cui's hand and said, "I won't be afraid even if the king of heaven comes."

At this moment, the two "assistants" walked up to a vegetable farmer and pointed at the sewage he had dumped next to him and started yelling and cursing. The vegetable seller just smiled and quickly cleaned up the mess.

The prince understood something when he saw this, and thought that Xia Lin, this little bastard, really knew how to make the best use of things. These wastes would cause a headache wherever they were placed, so it would be better to let them use their strengths here. Although this would also cause some other problems, sometimes when one's feet are covered with sores, one would not care about the mosquito bites on his legs.

Going further ahead, the place became relatively high-end. Vegetable sellers were no longer allowed to enter this area. The shops on both sides were all beautifully decorated. The prince walked into a rouge shop at random. There were more than 300 kinds of rouge alone, as well as perfumes of different scents, scented powders and scented cakes. The prince didn't like this but still let Xiao Cui pick a lot of them.

But Xiao Cui was so sensible that she chose two grades, one was the sandalwood series with a more rustic scent but also the most expensive, and the other was the ordinary series. She asked the boss to pack the two grades separately and put the high-end sandalwood series in a precious box. After she came out, she handed the box to the prince and said, "Master, take this to the lady. This perfume powder is unique in Xinping Township. No other place can make this scent. The lady will definitely like it."

The prince looked at the sensible little girl in front of him and couldn't help but sigh: "You take it, I will buy her a set when I go back."

"No, sir. The price is too high. People like me are not worthy of using these things."

"If I say you are worthy, then you are worthy." The prince suddenly became a domineering boss: "If you are told to take it, then take it."

Xiao Cui naturally thanked him profusely, and her eyes and tone were full of gratitude, which seemed to have aroused the prince's desire to protect him. He kept buying things along the way and didn't care about money at all. In the end, he even bought a house for Xiao Cui in the alley.

He was really infatuated and really rich. He went around and found none of the faults he should have found, but he spent every penny he should have spent. If the princess knew about this, she would have had a fight with him at home. After all, the prince was famous for his frugality. To put it bluntly, he was stingy. The clothes he wore were ten years old, and the shoes he wore were twenty cents a pair. Even his daily diet was mostly light and peaceful. The two largest sums of money in his life were one hundred thousand taels for Xia Lin to keep him away from his daughter, and the other was the two thousand seven hundred taels he spent on buying a house for the little girl he met at the club...

After buying a house, the prince has arrived at the dock. The dock is different from the commercial district. That place is full of life and luxury, but at the dock, it is filled with the atmosphere of labor. The straw sandal gangs on the dock shuttle back and forth to transport goods. They pack porcelain with straw, and then unload the goods from the cargo ships for transportation. Although it is hard work, it is different from the hard labor in other places. Although these straw sandal gangs are full of suffering, their faces are full of hope.

The prince found these people interesting, because it was boring to see the high-level people in one place, and he had to go to the poor people to see the real thing. So he took Xiao Cui to sit in a wonton shop on the pier. It happened that he felt hungry at this time, so he ordered two bowls of wontons and started eating.

It's not time for dinner yet, but the shop owner is busy steaming rice and buns, and preparing some pickles and salted fish into dishes. Everything is very organized.

The prince took two bites of wontons and raised his head to ask, "Sister-in-law, let me ask you something."

After hearing what the prince said, the old woman who was cutting vegetables raised her head and pointed at her mouth and made two "ah-ah" sounds. The prince then realized that she was mute... But soon a younger woman next to her came forward and asked, "What do you want, sir?"

The prince nodded and asked: "Is it hard to work here?" "Look at what you said, of course it's hard to work. Look at those people at the dock, they all work like cows." The sister-in-law smiled and said: "Nothing compares to the old men in the city."

The prince's face turned red when he heard this. Wasn't he the great master from the city? But he continued to ask, "But I saw that they were quite happy, and there was no sign of suffering on their faces."

"They, they are living happily. Oh, I can't explain it either." The sister-in-law called out to the dock: "Niuzi, come here. There is a master who wants to question you. Come over here."

Not long after, a man with four fingers missing came over. He wiped the sweat off his face with a towel and asked, "What happened to sister-in-law?"

"This gentleman is from the city and wants to talk to you."

The prince looked the man up and down, then said to the sister-in-law, "Give him a bowl as well, and add another pot of tea."

The man naturally thanked him profusely, and the prince asked directly: "Your finger?"

"I was addicted to gambling in the early years. I lost all my family property and my parents were so angry that they died. When I ran out of money, I thought about stealing. When I was caught, four fingers were chopped off." The man named Niuzi raised his palm and laughed: "Don't blame others, it's all my own fault."

The prince nodded and said, "So are you okay working here?"

"It's... it's OK. People like us don't have any skills, so we can just do some hard labor to make a living, which is better than begging outside."

At this moment, the prince was like a reporter doing random street interviews. He continued to ask with curiosity in his heart: "I heard that your township head is very harsh to you coolies?"

“That’s too harsh!”

Upon hearing this, the prince became excited. He had come here with the intention of causing trouble for Xia Lin. I finally caught the little bastard, right?

Then his eyes sparkled: "How? Tell me in detail."

"He gave us a lot of rules, such as no fireworks on the dock, no one is allowed to stand under the grab bucket when the tower crane is rotating, and three people must be present at the same time when hanging ropes on large ships. Oh, you don't know, this is too troublesome. But the foreman on the dock is very strict and made us wear this rattan hat. It's very annoying when it's hot."

Niuzi took out a rattan safety helmet and put it on the table. The prince picked it up, looked at it and knocked it with his hand. The rattan was so strong that it could be used as armor. It was also soaked in tung oil and was very expensive.

The prince understood the problem that the boy mentioned. It was obvious that human life was more important than anything else. How could this be considered a problem? So he began to guide him: "Did he withhold your money and food?"

"Withholding? Who? Lord Xia? No, Lord Xia is a little troublesome, but the money is still very generous. In addition to what we earn at the dock, he also gives us some subsidies or something. I can't explain it clearly, but every year during the three hottest and three coldest days, there will be a few taels of silver."

The prince still hadn't given up: "Did he scold or abuse me, or did he make an unfair judgment?"

Now it was Niu Zi's turn to react. His face turned ugly. He stood up and looked at the prince warily: "Are you afraid that Lord Xia's rivals are here to catch him?"

"No, no, no...you misunderstood."

But Niu Zi didn't care about that and whistled directly: "Come on, brothers, there is an old man who wants to harm our Lord Xia!"

(End of this chapter)