Immortality begins with exchanging talent attributes.

Tonight was peaceful. Li Mazi and Xiao Liuzi still found various excuses to make Zhou Yan go on patrol by himself.

He calmly agreed, which was fine; it would also give him the opportunity to confirm the identity of the serious offender once again.

Although no one has noticed that he went in, he decided to take another look just in case he might have missed some details due to his emotional state last night.

Even at the deepest part of the death row, the serious offender was still unconscious.

Zhou Yan stared intently and saw that the other person had the "innate remnant vein" that originally belonged to him on his head, and a strange feeling arose spontaneously.

It may seem like they just swapped some terms, but to him, it was no different than exchanging his life.

Fortunately, the other party was a notorious criminal who had killed countless people; otherwise, Zhou Yan might have felt a little bit of guilt.

After checking once again to make sure there was nothing missing, Zhou Yan quickly retreated and continued his patrol.

……

Nothing happened overnight, and dawn broke.

Zhou Yan followed Zhu Asan to the door of Zhu's house in Green Willow Lane in the west of the city.

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Compared to Zhou Yan's house, the house in front of them was larger, and the street in front of it was also cleaner. After all, this wasn't a slum, so it was normal for it to be cleaner.

Zhou Yan was carrying a bag of fruit and a box of pastries.

It wasn't expensive; the two items only cost three coins in total, which was just enough to use up the money left over from buying grain yesterday.

Although Zhu Asan kept saying that he shouldn't spend money casually, and that the family had everything they needed.

But as a modern person who traveled through time, he couldn't possibly go to someone's house empty-handed.

The courtyard gate had just been pushed open.

A series of light footsteps approached, followed by a sweet voice.

"Is that Father back? Oh? Brother Zhou Yan is here too."

Zhou Yan looked in the direction of the sound and saw a girl with pigtails looking at him with great joy.

The girl's face was rosy, and she was probably only three or five years old. When she saw him looking at her, she grinned and revealed two rows of big white teeth.

"Little Pearl, do you miss your Brother Zhou?"

Zhou Yan picked him up and spun him around.

The girl's eyes crinkled with laughter as she giggled:

"Haha, I've thought about it."

Just then, a gentle-looking lady came out of the house and said in a soft voice:

"Zhuzhu, come down quickly. Your brother Zhou Yan just finished his shift; let him rest." Then, noticing what Zhou Yan was carrying, she said with a slightly reproachful tone:

"You just came, why did you bring anything?"

Zhu Asan then spoke up:

"That's what I said too. This kid has the same stubborn temper as his father."

Upon hearing this, Zhou Yan, holding the little girl, said to the woman:

"It's nothing, sister-in-law. It's just a small token of my appreciation. It's nothing expensive."

"Alright, let's eat. I'm starving."

Zhu Asan took the little girl from Zhou Yan, teased her with his beard, and said casually.

The meal was very plentiful, with four dishes and a soup. Zhu Asan's wife's cooking skills were truly superb, although the seasoning differed somewhat from Zhou Yan's previous life due to the different world.

But the taste was really good.

Especially the braised pork knuckle, which was so tender that it fell off the bone. Even Zhou Yan, who had been used to countless delicacies in modern society in his previous life, was amazed by it.

Of course, it's also possible that he's been eating cured meat and brown rice these past few days, which makes everything taste delicious to him.

Most of the food ended up in Zhou Yan's stomach, which made him feel a little embarrassed.

……

After the meal, and after resting for a while, Zhu Asan led Zhou Yan out the door.

During this time, Zhou Yan even went home to retrieve the remaining two taels of silver.

As soon as the two stepped out of the west gate, the scene outside the city stunned Zhou Yan.

Unlike the peaceful life within the city, as far as the eye could see, dilapidated straw mats and thatched huts stretched far along both sides of the official road.

Men, women, and children, dressed in rags, huddled together. Some were tending a broken pot to cook porridge, while others lay motionless in a haystack.

The air was filled with a sour smell, the smell of smoke, and the indescribable putrid odor emanating from the bodies of those who had been ill for a long time.

Zhou Yan frowned.

"What's going on outside the city?"

Zhu Asan sighed and said, "Several counties in the south suffered from floods, and I heard that many people died. It's terrible. These refugees were lucky enough to escape to Qingzhou City."

No wonder Zhou Yan found that the price of grain had risen a lot when he went to buy rice yesterday. He even spent a long time negotiating the price with the seller.

"Isn't the government doing anything about it?"

"Aren't there soup kitchens at the city gate? Two bowls of thin porridge a day won't starve them. After all, there are too many people, so the government can only keep them hanging for now."

Besides, what year doesn't have a few disasters? It's just that a few counties in the south have suffered more this year.

Then he heard Zhu Asan lower his voice and say:

"And don't go outside the city unless you have to. I've heard that several groups of people have already gone missing."

"Missing?"

"Who knows? Some say he went into the mountains to work and never came back, while others say he went with a caravan."

"They're refugees, nobody cares about them, so who can really understand them?"

Zhou Yan nodded and didn't ask any more questions.

He looked at the numb eyes on both sides of the road and sighed inwardly.

In this world, natural disasters and man-made calamities are frequent, and ordinary people live in constant fear, never knowing when they might encounter a major catastrophe or disaster.

The only way he can think of to change things is to practice martial arts.

Thinking of this, Zhou Yan's gaze became exceptionally firm.

After walking westward for about half an hour, the outline of a small mountain village came into view.

Qingmang Village!

According to Zhu Asan, this mountain village got its name from the Qingmang Mountain, a deep mountain range that stretches for over a thousand miles, which it is backed by.

Because the mountains are full of medicinal herbs and wild animals, everyone in the village, regardless of age or gender, knows how to hunt and identify medicinal herbs.

As a result, many medicinal herb merchants who come from far and wide will come to buy medicinal herbs at low prices.

This also made the small mountain village exceptionally lively, and with people coming and going, a market gradually formed.

As the two walked in, various vendors' cries could be heard everywhere they looked.

Beside the teahouses, steamed bun shops, and butcher shops, there were hunters and herb gatherers setting up stalls and hawking their wares.

"Ayan, go and see for yourself, but remember, no matter what price they ask for, just cut it in half."

I'll go over and find out about the latest market trends.

After saying that, Zhu Asan walked towards the teahouse next to him.

Zhou Yan nodded and then walked towards the stall area next to him.

Most of the stalls in the market are very simple.

Those with better conditions had a table to use as a display stand, while those with less favorable conditions simply laid a straw mat on the ground, and some even just dumped their baskets on the ground.

The stalls had almost everything, such as oddly shaped medicinal herbs, furs of unknown animals, and hunting tools.

The mixture of various smells made Zhou Yan, who had worked in death row for many years, wrinkle his nose.

Zhou Yan casually squatted down in front of a stall.

The stall owner was a young man in his early twenties with bulging eyes that darted around quickly.

Seeing Zhou Yan stop, he immediately smiled.

"A customer wants to buy medicine? You've come to the right place."

Zhou Yan didn't reply, but glanced at the items on the stall and pointed to one of the medicinal herbs that resembled ginseng, asking:

"How much is this?"

The young stall owner's eyes lit up, and he immediately said:

"Sir, you have a good eye! This is genuine wild ginseng, just dug up from the mountains this morning. If I weren't in such a hurry for money, I would have sold it for at least five taels. But I'll give you a discount today, three taels of silver."

Three ounces?

Zhou Yan looked up at the stall owner with some confusion.

Wild ginseng, so cheap?

A ray of white light appeared.

[Inferior goods passed off as superior goods (white)]

[Target status is stable...]

Zhou Yan immediately understood.

He glanced down at the so-called "mountain ginseng" again.

It has many roots, and their shape is similar to those in pictures of medicinal herbs he had seen in his previous life.

"Is this ginseng?"

The smile on the young stall owner's face immediately faded.

"Sir, what do you mean by that?"

Zhou Yan stood up and patted the mud off his hands.

"It didn't mean anything, I was just asking casually."

The young stall owner's face immediately fell.

"If you can't afford it, don't ask. Don't you recognize ginseng? You don't know its value."

Zhou Yan got up and left.

He was initially unsure if it was fake, but the other party's attitude made it clear, so he didn't say anything more.

He turned and left, then looked at several more stalls.

I do have medicinal herbs, but I can't afford the good ones, and I can't verify the authenticity of the cheaper ones.

After all, those stall owners were either full of empty boasts or were just pretenders, which gave Zhou Yan a real headache.

He originally thought that since he could see the entry, it wouldn't be difficult to buy some cheap blood-tonifying herbs.

But it was only at this point that they realized things weren't as simple as they had imagined.

Talent attributes can only tell him whether a person is reliable or not, but they cannot directly tell him the authenticity and effects of medicinal herbs.

Some of these stall owners are deliberately deceiving people, while others only have a superficial understanding of the business themselves.

Just as he was considering whether to go to Zhu Asan and ask him if he had any reliable herb gatherers to recommend, a quarrel suddenly broke out not far away.

"Twenty taels? My twenty-year-old red ginseng alone would cost fifty taels."

Zhou Yan paused, looking in the direction of the sound.

A girl dressed in a dark green dress stood behind the medicine stall, her face slightly pale, but she was tightly protecting the medicinal herbs in front of her.

Above her head, two beams of white light were exceptionally clear.

[Knowledgeable about all herbs (white)]

[Target state is stable, exchange and feedback lifespan is 5 years]

Basic acupuncture treatment (white)

[Target state is stable, exchange and feedback lifespan is 5 years]

Zhou Yan's eyes flickered slightly; one person actually possessed two entries at the same time!

This discovery immediately astonished Zhou Yan. This was the first time he had ever discovered that someone else besides himself possessed two entries.

Although both entries are white, given the strong directional nature of the talent, Zhou Yan guessed that the other party should be a doctor, barring any unforeseen circumstances.

After a moment's thought, his gaze fell subtly on the girl's face.

The girl appeared to be seventeen or eighteen years old. Although her appearance was ordinary, her bright eyes, which held a hint of stubbornness, were particularly striking.

Zhou Yan narrowed his eyes and walked over there.

"You little brat, I kindly accepted your medicinal herbs, how can you be so ungrateful? One hundred taels? You really dare to ask for such an exorbitant amount! Do you believe I'll smash your stall?"

Opposite the girl were a slightly overweight middle-aged man dressed as a medicine merchant and a burly follower. At this moment, the overweight man gave his follower a wink.

Without saying a word, the attendant raised his hand to overturn the mess.

Just then, a hand suddenly reached out from the side.

……