In the noodle shop, a huge stove was on, with a large pot on it emitting white steam.

The noodle master, the father, held up the dough to his shoulder with one hand, while the other hand continuously shaved with a knife blade, like a hidden martial arts expert among the common people.

Noodle slices, strip by strip, flew into the pot, each of appropriate thickness.

The noodles were served in a bowl, then a spoonful of tender beef and broth were poured over them. Though simple, it was delicious.

The stove fire and cooking smoke created the most authentic market atmosphere of this world.

Shizi waved to the waiter in the noodle shop: “Waiter, one bowl of dao xiao mian, please.”

The waiter recognized him and immediately laughed: “Alright, Shizi, please wait a moment, it will be right up!”

Chen Ji was surprised: “Shizi, the waiter here recognizes you.”

Shizi sat down at a wooden table in the noodle shop and casually used his fine silk sleeve to wipe the tabletop: “I often came here when I went to the Donglin Academy. While at the academy, I often thought of this taste.”

“As a Shizi, how do you come to this small noodle shop to eat?”

Shizi took out a pair of chopsticks from the wooden bucket on the table: “In the Prince’s Manor, it takes a full stick of incense to walk from the kitchen to the room with food. By the time the rice reaches you, it’s already cold. When I was young, I said I wanted to eat in the kitchen, but they said I had no manners… It’s not like here, where the noodles are still hot when they reach you. Add some vinegar, break two cloves of garlic, and eat comfortably.”

“The noodle shop waiter doesn’t seem to care about your Shizi identity either.”

“Haha,” Shizi said proudly: “Father taught us to be kind to people and not to hold our identity high above others. Don’t you see that the neighbors all like me? This is the prestige my father has accumulated in Luocheng over ten years!”

Chen Ji didn’t ask further. Such a Shizi and Jing Wang were truly uncommon in a world where people were divided into different classes.

The waiter brought Shizi’s dao xiao mian to the table. Shizi rubbed his chopsticks, pouring vinegar into the bowl while looking at Bai Li: “Bai Li, give him ten taels of silver. That half-sentence poem belongs to me… Bai Li?”

Bai Li snapped back to reality: “What happened?”

Shizi asked curiously: “What were you thinking about? You were completely lost in thought.”

“Oh,” Bai Li replied: “I was thinking about that half-sentence poem by Chen Ji just now… I can’t really say what’s good about it, I just feel it has a strong artistic conception.”

Shizi laughed: “Then we are the same. I also feel it’s good, but I can’t say why. Pay up.”

Princess Bai Li glanced at Chen Ji. This time she wasn’t unwilling. She straightforwardly opened her purse and took out a gold melon seed from inside: “Here you go, pure gold and full weight. You can exchange it for ten taels of silver at the money shop.”

Chen Ji found it interesting. Princess Bai Li’s purse contained gold melon seeds and silver peanuts, all edible.

Shizi looked at him and asked curiously: “Do you have any other poems? Take them all out and sell them to me, for my collection.”

“Why so many?” Chen Ji was puzzled.

Shizi laughed: “You don’t understand this, do you? Sometimes one sentence isn’t enjoyable enough. You need ten sentences, or even a hundred sentences at once, to truly shock those literati.”

Chen Ji thought: “Good lines are heaven-sent, a stroke of serendipity. Writing poems isn’t that easy; you have to wait.”

To recite entire poems, he only knew “goose, goose, goose,” “Quiet Night Thought,” and “Pity Farmers”… But he knew many half-sentences.

Having gone through nine years of compulsory education, who didn’t know dozens of sentences?

But he couldn’t take out too many at once; if he did, they wouldn’t be valuable…

Shizi was anxious: “You must have written some before, right? Take them out and sell them to me!”

On the side, Princess Bai Li actually spoke up for Chen Ji: “Brother, writing poems isn’t that easy. Let him wait until he has good lines. Forcing out poems is meaningless.”

“Alright,” Shizi said, still not satisfied. He muttered, “People walk in the world, suddenly like a far traveler,” feeling that the more he thought about it, the more flavorful it became.

Thinking that this sentence of poetry was now his, he immediately took a silver peanut from Bai Li’s purse, slapped it on the table, and shouted: “Boss, this Shizi is happy today! I’m treating all the guests eating noodles in your shop!”

Chen Ji raised an eyebrow. How come he never saw Shizi pay for anything himself, always letting Princess Bai Li pay?

No wonder Shizi always brought Princess Bai Li wherever he went. Perhaps Jing Wang was worried about him learning bad habits, so he didn’t give him pocket money. So, he just relied on his sister’s small stash?

Possible, very possible!

In that case, Shizi was a fake rich person, and Princess Bai Li was the real little rich lady!

She Deng Ke reminded him: “Chen Ji, we should go back. It’s almost time to close, and Master is too busy on his own.”

“Okay,” Chen Ji stood up and said goodbye to Shizi and the others: “Shizi, Princess, we’ll head back first. We’ll prepare a ladder for you all early tonight.”

Shizi: “…Tunnel, martial arts people!”

After Chen Ji and the others left, Bai Li looked at Shizi: “Brother, I increasingly feel he’s not like a gambler.”

“Indeed, he’s not like one.” Shizi looked at the little monk quietly reciting sutras on the side: “Little monk, Father says you have the divine power of ‘He Xin Tong.’ What do you say?”

The little monk smiled: “Donor Chen Ji has a gambling nature, and it’s a very strong one. But he gambles not with money, but with his life. This kind of person is born to walk on the edge of a knife.”

Bai Li muttered: “The more you say, the more mysterious it is, little monk. Change your habit of pretending to be mysterious!”

The little monk was helpless: “I’m not pretending to be mysterious, I just don’t know how to describe it to you all.”

Bai Li no longer paid attention to him and turned to look at Shizi: “Brother, why did you also come out?”

Shizi swallowed a mouthful of noodles, bit into a clove of garlic, and mumbled indistinctly: “Nothing, I just followed along to see.”

……

……

The night was deep and quiet. The originally spacious large bed seemed a bit crowded because of Liang Gou and Liang Mao.

Chen Ji quietly got up, took a bamboo tube and a piece of bamboo to the courtyard, and scraped off the layer by layer of white frost from the wall.

The wall frost accumulated over the years in this small siheyuan alone could fill half a bamboo tube. This huge Luocheng, who knows how much gunpowder it could produce…

Tonight was the day for Yun Fei and the Military Intelligence Department of Jingchao to trade goods. Chen Ji had already passed the intelligence to Si Cao in the backyard of Bailu Pavilion when he went to the East Market to buy clothes in the morning.

As for whether their trade would be successful, that was not Chen Ji’s concern.

Now that Yun Yang and Jiao Tu were in prison, and the new person in charge of the Secret Spy Department had yet to arrive, Chen Ji also had a rare period of leisure.

He practiced his knife, made gunpowder, living comfortably like an ordinary person.

Chen Ji was just scraping saltpeter from the wall when there was a light knocking sound at the door.

He frowned. Were these the martial arts people waiting for Shizi to come out and play? But Shizi hadn’t come yet.

Chen Ji hid the bamboo tube behind the water jar and lightly approached the door: “Who is it?”

Someone outside said amiably: “Golden Pig.”

Chen Ji’s heart became alert.

Secret Spy Department’s twelve zodiacs, Golden Pig?

How did he come so quickly!

He had originally thought that the new person in charge of Luocheng would arrive at least a month later, giving him a month to prepare slowly.

But Golden Pig came very quickly, not only beyond his expectation, but probably also beyond the expectation of the Military Intelligence Department and the Liu family!

Chen Ji thought for a moment, took a deep breath, slowly pushed open the main door of the medical hall, and welcomed him with a smile: “May I ask if you are Secret Spy Department’s Adult Golden Pig?”

Standing outside the door was a plump young man, wearing straw shoes on his feet, a bamboo hat on his head, and coarse cloth clothes on his body, looking like a tenant farmer who had just come to the city from the countryside.

The smile opposite was warm, completely lacking the gloomy killing aura of Yun Yang and Jiao Tu: “It is I, Secret Spy Department’s Golden Pig, original name Song Qian. The first thing I did when I came to Luocheng was to find you.”

Chen Ji, unmoved, stepped aside: “How did Adult Golden Pig come? Where are Adults Yun Yang and Jiao Tu?”

According to logic, as a medical hall apprentice, he shouldn’t know that these two had been arrested by the Ministry of Criminal Justice, so the act had to be complete.

Golden Pig walked into the medical hall, looking at the environment of the main hall as he spoke with a smile: “Yun Yang and Jiao Tu made a big mistake and are now in prison… Didn’t anyone inform you?”

“No,” Chen Ji shook his head: “Adults Yun Yang and Jiao Tu treated me well. Why did they go to prison?”

Golden Pig shook his head: “You misunderstand Yun Yang and Jiao Tu. You probably don’t know that they robbed your merit. Rest assured, this time I’m here, and no one will be able to rob your merit.”

Chen Ji probed: “Adult Golden Pig came from the capital?”

“No, when Yun Yang and Jiao Tu came to Luocheng, I was already in the Mengjin camp outside Luocheng’s Jiefan Guard. You know, the Yellow River big carp in the Mengjin area is truly delicious, especially with the local red braised sauce, it’s very fragrant.”

Chen Ji was surprised: “Adult Golden Pig has always been in Luocheng?!”