A convoy of six carriages wound its way along a narrow mountain path through the forest. On the lead carriage’s lantern, a cyan phoenix drifted and swayed with each gust of wind.

The wheels had sunk deep into the rain-softened ground, leaving a clear trail of ruts all the way behind them.

Without warning, the lead carriage pulled back on the reins and brought the horses to a halt.

Li Que looked ahead at the two dozen or so ragged refugees who had materialized in the road, and with practiced ease twisted back toward the carriage behind him.

“Second Brother,” he called out, “your work’s here!”

Li Kun, nine feet tall and carrying two broad, heavy iron axes across his back, leapt down from the carriage.

He landed with a thunderous boom, leaving two craters in the earth that could rival wheel ruts for size.

He strode to the front of the convoy, sweeping his fierce gaze across the scrawny refugees clutching their kitchen knives, wood-chopping blades, and hoes. The refugees stirred uneasily, many pairs of feet already edging backward.

Li Kun let out a low growl, clenched his right fist, and drove it into the trunk of a nearby tree.

The wood splintered around his knuckles. Li Kun withdrew his fist, leaving a cavity four inches deep.

He turned to face the wide-eyed mob of refugees and from his core released a lion’s roar.

The makeshift band of highway robbers — all two dozen of them — had their nerve shattered on the spot. They flung down their misshapen weapons and fled.

In an instant, the road was clear again.

Li Kun dusted off his hands and sauntered back with an air of supreme self-satisfaction, mumbling to himself:

“Li Diao… crab walk…”

Scenes like this had played out many times along the road. In most cases, Li Kun alone was enough to settle things.

Shen Zhuxi had long since stopped being surprised.

While Li Kun intimidated whatever unsavory refugees they came across, she and Li Wu would be inside the carriage tallying the silver earned from selling grain along the way.

The loose coins and silver fragments were so plentiful they filled nearly every inch of the carriage interior, and Shen Zhuxi even slept atop copper coins.

“We’ve sold off most of the rice by now. Not only did we recoup our three thousand taels of principal, we’ve turned a profit of another ten thousand taels on top,” Li Wu said, threading a string through a thousand copper coins and tying a slip knot.

Shen Zhuxi nudged away a coin that had landed on her cushion with her foot. “Fine — but do these copper coins absolutely have to be kept in the carriage? The whole thing reeks of money——”

“Next time we reach a town, we’ll exchange them for banknotes at a money exchange,” Li Wu said, picking up the coin and threading it onto another string.

Shen Zhuxi leaned her back against the cushion, then immediately frowned. She lifted the cushion to find the sack of gold ingots they had dug up in Luzhou pressing into her.

“Will these gold ingots be exchanged for banknotes too?” she asked.

“No — gold is hard currency. If I trade it for paper, I lose out.” Li Wu answered without hesitation.

Shen Zhuxi, with a look of distaste, moved the gold under Li Wu’s cushion instead.

“Big Brother, Shouchun is nearly in sight.”

Li Wu acknowledged this and quickened the pace of his coin-threading.

When the Shouchun gate soldiers threw open the carriage door to inspect it, Li Wu had just finished threading a string of coins and tossed them under the carriage floor. The guard looked over Li Wu’s easygoing face, then at Shen Zhuxi sitting quietly with her head down. Outside, Li Que smiled and slipped a pouch into the guard’s sleeve.

“…Move along.”

The guard lifted his chin.

“Thank you, sir!” Li Que said with a grin, cupping his fists in salute.

Once the carriage entered Shouchun, Li Wu stopped a passerby and asked which money exchange houses were in the city.

“There’s a Huizhou-merchant-run exchange called Wanmin on Pingjiu Road, and on Yongsi Road there’s the Bai Family Silver House — the one connected to the Yangzhou Bai Family that produced Noble Consort Bai. There are a few other smaller exchanges nearby, but none compare to those two.”

Li Que thanked the man and saw him off, then turned back to the carriage window. “Big Brother, which one shall we go to?”

“The Bai Family——” Shen Zhuxi said before she could stop herself.

Li Wu cast her a half-amused glance. “You really do have a deep and abiding affection for that half-sister of yours.” He said to Li Que, “Let’s go. To the Bai Family Silver House.”

The carriage clip-clopped forward.

Li Wu closed the carriage window. “What exactly did Princess of Yue ever do for you, that you still think of her like this?”

“…Princess of Yue is a good person,” Shen Zhuxi said. “Don’t believe the rumors you’ve heard.”

“Is it true that she slept on pillows of gold and beds of jade?”

“It’s true…”

“Is it true that her fiancé spent enormous amounts of money and manpower combing the world to collect rare treasures for her?”

“That’s true too…”

“Then what exactly is rumor?” Li Wu looked thoroughly unimpressed.

Shen Zhuxi was like a mute forced to swallow bitter herbs — suffering with no way to speak.

Yes, she had golden pillows and jade beds, and yes, Fu Xuanmiao had periodically sent rare treasures into the palace — but none of that had been at her request!

That thousand-tael pillow stuffed with pearls and covered in gold and jade was so hard it left her neck in agony — it wasn’t even as comfortable as the cloth pillow she slept on now!

What she wore, what she used, even what books she read — none of it had been her choice. And in the end, she was the one left bearing the label of unbridled extravagance.

Seeing that she had nothing to say, Li Wu didn’t press her, wearing the expression of someone who had exactly expected this. The image of Princess of Yue as the embodiment of reckless luxury had apparently been etched into his mind beyond all changing.

Shen Zhuxi didn’t dare imagine what he would think once he found out she was this very same princess he so despised.

Would he look at her with contempt from that moment on?

“What are you thinking about?”

Shen Zhuxi’s forehead received a light flick. Li Wu had pushed open the carriage door and was looking back at her, where she stood frozen.

“We’ve arrived at the silver house. I’ll go in and exchange the banknotes — wait here in the carriage.”

Shen Zhuxi snapped back to herself and quickly nodded. “All right.”

Two incense sticks’ worth of time later, Li Wu returned to the carriage with a neat stack of banknotes, having exchanged all the scattered copper coins and broken silver for paper currency.

The four of them found the largest inn in the area and settled in. Shen Zhuxi and Li Wu stayed in the room to rest while Li Que took Li Kun out to exchange the remaining rice for silver, and then to sell the now-unnecessary horse and carriage to a livery yard, converting everything to silver as well.

By evening, Li Que and Li Kun returned. To celebrate the ten-thousand-tael windfall earned along the road, Li Wu ordered a full table of fine food and drink.

Milk-braised chicken, mushroom and duck stew, plum-flower sausage, lychee pork, braised pig’s trotters — dish after dish too numerous to take in at once was brought to the table. Li Wu had the innkeeper open a jar of five-year-old liquor and drank it down great bowl after bowl.

“Tomorrow let’s rest a day here in Shouchun before moving on — Second Brother and I will spend the day gathering information around the city, and Sister-in-law can ask Big Brother to take her for a stroll around town.” Li Que smiled. “Shouchun may not rival Xiangyang, but it has its own charm. The Suzhou embroidery sold here in particular is far more authentic than what you find in Xiangyang.”

Li Wu said, “He’s right. You’ve endured enough hardship on this road. Your husband’s pockets are well lined now — I’ll take you out shopping tomorrow. Whatever you want, just say the word.”

Shen Zhuxi was genuinely tempted and was just about to agree, when a sudden crack of a palm on a table cut her off.

“How dare you talk back to me?!”

A young man dressed plainly in the clothes of a manservant dropped to his knees with a thud.

“Master, I truly did not steal anything from you!”

“If you didn’t steal from me, then how did my jade pendant end up in your luggage?” A tall man in fine robes glared down at the servant kneeling before his table.

He had struck the table with considerable force — the blow sent water splashing from the teacup, spreading across the table and surrounding the only two dishes on it: a cube of red fermented tofu, and two or three dozen braised soybeans. The coarse grain porridge mixed with corn grit — one copper coin a bowl — had escaped the spill.

“Master, I don’t know how it got there… perhaps, perhaps Master wasn’t paying attention and put it there by mistake…” the servant said, trembling.

“Nonsense! How would I confuse your luggage with mine? You’ve been caught red-handed and you still won’t admit it. Very well — I won’t be sparing your feelings. Take your things and go!”

“Master——” the servant’s face went white. “Where am I supposed to go?”

“How would I know where you go? I cannot keep someone like you in my household. Today it’s a jade pendant — who knows what it’ll be tomorrow?”

“Master, please have mercy — I truly did not steal your jade pendant…” The servant kowtowed repeatedly.

“If you don’t leave this instant, I’ll have the authorities called!” the man said angrily.

The servant raised a dazed face. “And my three months of wages…”

“You stole from me and you still dare mention wages?!” The man’s eyes went wide as he raised his voice. “Keep dragging your feet and you can come with me to see the Shouchun prefect! He and I are acquainted — he will certainly help me deal with a thieving servant like you——”

Having no recourse, the servant rose from the floor with a face drained of color, wiping his eyes as he stumbled, lost in a daze, out of the inn.

Shen Zhuxi watched with a twinge of unease and said softly, “Did he really steal his master’s jade pendant?”

“Probably not,” Li Wu said, without looking up.

Shen Zhuxi stared at Li Wu in surprise — he hadn’t even turned to look at the master and servant, so how had he drawn that conclusion?

“The master said he found the pendant in the servant’s luggage, correct?” Li Wu said.

Shen Zhuxi nodded.

“Does the master have his luggage with him now?”

Shen Zhuxi glanced at the man, who had returned to his table and was eating again. “No…”

“That means the pendant didn’t go missing just now. It could have been when he was packing this morning, or even last night. Either way, it didn’t happen just now.” Li Wu said. “So why did he choose this moment to make a scene?”

A flash of clarity struck Shen Zhuxi.

“Could it be… he was putting on a show for everyone watching?”

“The more guilty a person’s conscience, the more he cares what others think,” Li Wu said. “If I were him — and if I didn’t want to pay a servant’s wages, but didn’t want people saying I went back on my word and broke our agreement — I’d strike first, make sure everyone around knew that the other party had wronged me first.”

Li Wu set down his empty wine bowl and said, as if musing idly, “Of course, that’s only a hypothesis.”

Shen Zhuxi looked again at the fine-robed man’s table — at the red fermented tofu and the braised soybeans — and found Li Wu’s hypothesis very persuasive.

If that was truly the case, then that servant was genuinely pitiful.

The four of them spent well over an hour eating through the laden table, and the tall man sitting by the door ate for just as long.

He consumed four bowls of the one-copper-coin coarse grain porridge. He didn’t leave a single drop of the red oil from the fermented tofu either, soaking it up with the last of his rice until not a trace remained.

In that respect, he bore a striking resemblance to Li Kun.

By the time Shen Zhuxi and the others rose from the table, the man’s table was equally clean.

The four of them, full and satisfied, made their way upstairs — some rubbing their bellies, one letting out a long, satisfied belch — and drifted lazily into the two adjacent rooms.

Li Wu was just unlocking the door when Li Kun, beside him, released an extended belch that popped open the button on his belly, sending a stack of banknotes spilling out.

The wooden staircase let out a creak.

Shen Zhuxi instinctively turned her head — but the staircase below was empty.

Li Que swiftly scooped up the banknotes from the floor. Li Wu held out his hand. “Give those to me. I’ll find a better place for them.”

Once the banknotes changed hands, the four split into two pairs and went into their respective rooms.

“I heard the staircase just now,” Shen Zhuxi said. “Did you?”

“Didn’t notice,” Li Wu said. “Did you see who it was?”

“No — they didn’t seem to come up.”

“Probably a server who started up the stairs and was called back,” Li Wu said without much concern. “Inns are full of all sorts of people. Since we’re only here one night, just stay alert and we’ll be fine.”

“Keeping things stuffed inside clothing like this is far too risky — if they fall out again like today…”

“I was thinking the same thing.”

Li Wu opened the door and stepped out to the landing, calling a server up.

“My sleeve has a tear — go fetch a sewing kit so my wife can mend it.”

He pressed seven or eight copper coins into the server’s hand.

“Right away, sir!” the server said, delighted by the tip, and hurried downstairs. He was back shortly with a sewing kit.

Li Wu shut the door, stepped into the role of his own wife, and took out the fine silk robe he had worn only once. He stitched a concealed inner layer into it with careful, practiced hands.

His technique was so assured, so skilled, that the hidden compartment blended seamlessly into the original fabric — utterly invisible. Shen Zhuxi looked and looked, felt and felt, marveling at his needlework.

Li Wu finished the hidden layer, spread out the stack of banknotes, and laid them neatly inside — unless one ran a fingertip slowly across the inner lining of the robe, no one would ever know that ten thousand-tael banknotes were concealed within a single garment.

With talent like that, what a waste it was that he hadn’t become an embroiderer.

…

In the narrow alley across from the inn, two men dressed as guards watched Li Wu and the others disappear to the upper floor, exchanged a look, then turned and walked toward the far end of the alley.

“Dispatch a long-range courier. The whereabouts of the Jia brothers have been discovered.”