All of the commoners in the vicinity corrected themselves to say wangfei; Jing-wang’s face color had already recovered a lot, but he didn’t seem to plan to make things right. He also didn’t mention anything to Li Yu.
Li Yu was here thinking if Jing-wang mentioned something, then he can deny it. The two of them didn’t have a husband-husband relationship after all. It’s not good for people to misunderstand. However, since Jing-wang wasn’t mentioning it, Li Yu also couldn’t actively start talking about it to Jing-wang. Nor can he explain everything properly to the commoners. It’d make it seem like he was really offended by the wangfei title. Therefore, Li Yu very sullenly accepted being called wangfei by many, many people and couldn’t refute it at all because of a variety of reasons.
Li Yu was even starting to regret coming out to the marketplace. QQQ, why didn’t the big scoundrel express anything? He was being dragged along by the nose!
Wang Xi had scouted out this marketplace once before. He quietly made a brief introduction to Jing-wang and Li Yu. If the masters were interested, he could lead the way. The imperial guards were responsible for protecting Jing-wang while Jing-wang protected Li-gongzi. Therefore, even though there were a lot of people here to enjoy the bustling atmosphere, all in all, Jing-wang’s group didn’t encounter any collisions.
Jing-wang handed over the simple map that Wang Xi drew to Li Yu, as if saying, you’re in charge.
Li Yu can only wander around for 2 hours at most. He didn’t waste any more time on being polite and accepted the map without protest.
The map that Wang Xi drew was simple and self-explanatory. Li Yu understood it with one glance. So this marketplace had two openings at the north and south side. Right now, they were at the north side. Alongside the main road, there were plenty of vendors and small shops on the street. There was also a restaurant that had invited JinJue entertainers. Li Yu knew that they couldn’t visit every single corner in one trip. Then it’s best to just head towards the most lively places to take a look. The restaurant was supposedly the biggest restaurant in the area. Although it was opened by natives, the chefs came from JinJue. It’s said that JinJue people were very good at cooking sheep and cattle. Therefore, the signature dishes of the restaurant were roasted lamb and all sorts of skewered meats. These made Li Yu very interested.
Li Yu couldn’t resist sucking in his saliva: “Your highness, we can just follow the main road and slowly head south while looking at the shops on the side of the street. Then, we can eat a meal inside the restaurant and watch the acrobatic show. Then, once we reach the gate on the south side, we can return. How’s that?”
Li Yu’s plan was very simple and organized. Jing-wang had no objections and indicated to Wang Xi to go take care of it. Wang-gonggong immediately brought an imperial guard and jogged off to the restaurant to reserve the best private room. Plus cooking an entire lamb and such difficult meats took time. He had to tell the restaurant to start making it ahead. Li-gongzi and his highness looked like they were going to wander around for a bit first. By the time they reached the restaurant, the food would be ready for them.
Li Yu and Jing-wang followed the plan and started to wander.
Wang Xi was very correct. There were many special JinJue merchandise being sold in the marketplace. Li Yu only read about them before in a sentence or two in the original novel.
JinJue people loved things that were shiny and sparkly. They had a lot of gold ornaments with bold impressive designs. Bracelets were the accessories and face masks were the centerpiece. The bracelets and face masks often had images of JinJue’s golden crow.
Li Yu also loved things that shined brightly. With these things being placed out in the open in the stalls, Li Yu would stop at every vendor and look around curiously.
Jing-wang discovered a white jade hairpin. The tail of the hairpin was made into a rarely seen fish shape. The fish’s eyes were embedded with black jade. Jing-wang thought this hairpin was pretty well made. Although the materials used were a bit crude, it carried some of Xiao Yu’s spirit. Therefore, he asked for the hairpin for a closer look.
As Jing-wang looked at the hairpin, Li Yu laughed giddily inside. So the big scoundrel also liked head ornaments huh?
While Jing-wang focused on looking at the craftsmanship, Li Yu slipped away to another vendor. Jing-wang noticed immediately and gave the fish shaped hairpin in his hands to Wang Xi to deal with. He himself brought the guards and followed Li Yu from a distance.
He knew that ever since arriving in this marketplace, Xiao Yu’s eyes were practically stuck to the trinkets on the side of the road. Jing-wang thought letting the carp demon play on his own for a while was harmless.
There were many people surrounding the vendors on the main road. Li Yu finally found a place with fewer people and walked over. This shop specifically sold bracelets and face masks. Li Yu’s appreciative gaze loitered on the rows of masks hanging up high. This shop’s masks were painted with a heavy layer of gold powder. On the forehead area, there was a golden crow. The golden crow’s tail was decorated with peacock feathers, making it look simple, but mysterious.
We’re sorry for MTLers or people who like using reading mode, but our translations keep getting stolen by aggregators so we’re going to bring back the copy protection. If you need to MTL please retype the gibberish parts.
Li Yu finished looking at the masks and then went to see the bracelets. Learning from Jing-wang, he excitedly picked up a golden bracelet and examined it carefully under the sunlight. Sure enough, he saw a golden crow carved inside the bracelet, just like the legends say. Li Yu touched the golden bracelet with his fingers and felt that the gold bracelet was polished very smoothly. Other than the golden crow inside, there were no other decorations. Li Yu put it on for a try. The rough and heavy gold bracelet encircled his slim wrist, giving him a feeling of being a nouveau riche. After trying it, Li Yu felt it didn’t suit him very much so he tried to take it off.
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This merchant had a tough and stocky build with a face full of sideburns, looking like someone from JinJue. As soon as he opened his mouth, he wanted Li Yu to buy the gold bracelet, saying the price was 50 silver. Li Yu felt faintly distressed. Why did he have to buy it just because he tried it on? And it was so expensive. Did he encounter one of those forceful sales of ancient times?
Far away, Jing-wang saw something was wrong and wanted to step forward immediately. However, he suddenly saw Li Yu scratch his cheek and give a slightly mischievous smile.
Jing-wang: “……”
Jing-wang halted his footsteps. He seemed to have accidentally discovered Xiao Yu out to stir trouble.
Jing-wang silently said to himself: Xiao Yu was a carp demon after all. As long as he wasn’t in any danger, then just let him do whatever he wanted.
Li Yu carefully recalled for a moment. The merchant never told him that he couldn’t try out the bracelet. Li Yu then looked at the other vendors. A pile of customers were all trying out bracelets, but the other merchants didn’t say anything either. Only this shop was different. Li Yu immediately understood. He probably accidentally encountered a black shop and was being swindled by this black shop.
In order to deal with this kind of person, Li Yu didn’t feel nervous at all. He said unhurriedly: “Uncle, when I put it on, you never mentioned that I’d have to buy it if I put it on. Why say it now?”
“It’s not too late to say it now.” The merchant started to act shamelessly: “My gold bracelets are objects embedded with spiritual energy. After you put it on, its spiritual energy is absorbed by you. If you don’t buy it, how can I still sell it to other people?”
Li Yu: “……”
He can even make up with this kind of twisted nonsense?
Li Yu weighed the gold bracelet in his hand. Pretty heavy. It probably cost quite the money, but definitely not 50 silver. Li Yu heard Wang Xi say before, normal families can survive the year on 10 silvers. How can he use 5 years of money to buy this kind of ornament?
And plus, he didn’t even have any money. Inside the Jing estate, he was responsible for raising fish. The duties he needed to complete everyday were rather simple. Food and clothes were both provided by the Jing estate. Li Yu completely forgot to ask for a monthly salary. Why would a transmigrated fish like him care about this kind of material stuff? Even his interdimensional space was saved to store other important things.
Although fish used a gold silk grass blanket everyday and woke up on a wide silver stone bed, in actuality, he was penniless without any savings at all. He was a penniless fish. No matter how he thought about it, he couldn’t buy this gold bracelet. He also didn’t want to spend pointless expenses to encourage inappropriate behavior. It’s best to teach this merchant a lesson.
“Uncle, very sorry, but 50 silver is too much.” Li Yu said straightforwardly.
You can talk all you like, but what can you do if I refuse to buy it?
The merchant’s eyes opened wide as he glared. It’s impossible for him to have misjudged. The clothes that this youth wore were made of top quality silk from ice silkworms. Even the series of jade pearls that was casually tied around his waist were all very well made. Because of this, he guessed that this youth was the son of nobility. But why would a son of nobility not be able to take out a mere 50 silver? Not to mention, he was even putting on a kind of I’m bored enough to bargain down the price attitude?
The merchant said with a blackened face: “At least 45 silver, no less.”
Li Yu sighed: “Uncle, I can’t even afford 45.”
The merchant still held on to hope and decreased the price by 5 each time until it was down to 25. Yet this gongzi still didn’t plan to pay the money. The merchant visibly started to panic.
“How much can you afford then?”
“Uncle, very sorry, but I forgot to bring money today.” Li Yu smiled and stuck out his tongue.
The merchant almost fainted because of anger: “If you didn’t bring money, why are you looking around!”
Li Yu said innocently: “Uncle, you also didn’t tell me ahead of time that I needed to buy the bracelet if I wore it!”
The merchant was so angry, he wanted to drive Li Yu away. He was just about to throw away all pretense of cordiality and curse Li Yu out when he saw a big and tall, young man standing behind Li Yu at a distance. This youth had a pile of attendants standing behind him. With a cold indifferent expression, he raised his head and crossed gazes with the merchant, revealing a killing intent in his eyes.
The merchant’s heart trembled as he realized that this was probably the young gongzi’s behind-the-scenes backer. His mouth opened and closed repeatedly as he swallowed back down his insults stiffly.
Meanwhile, Li Yu was completely oblivious that someone was helping him with this situation. Seeing that the merchant stopped talking, Li Yu placed the gold bracelet back onto his wrist.
The merchant was all messed up by his bewildering action and said in a small voice: “You have no money and don’t plan to buy it, what are you wearing it for?”
Li Yu said bluntly: “Uncle, didn’t you say that I absorbed the spiritual energy of this bracelet? So now I’m wearing it for a little longer so that it can absorb my energy in return. Then wouldn’t you be able to sell it to others!”
The merchant: “……”
The merchant just said that the gold bracelet had spiritual energy. If he immediately denied it, it’d be hitting himself in the face.
The merchant glanced at the young man in the distance with an uneasy look. Maybe he was hallucinating, but for some reason, he felt like the young man’s ice cold face looked even colder now.
Unable to do anything, the merchant watched Li Yu roll the gold bracelet all over the place, amusing himself in various ways.
People passing by looked curiously at Li Yu and also started to get interested from watching him play. The merchant thought that business had arrived, yet Li Yu said in a loud obnoxious voice to the side: “Did you guys bring enough money? The merchant’s rule is that if you wear it, you buy it.”
Hearing this, the passersby were outraged, pulled back and walked away quickly.
The merchant was both angry and worried, but he also didn’t dare to explode. In the end, he could only beg Li Yu to return the gold bracelet back to him and go somewhere else.
Li Yu said with a pleasant laugh: “Uncle, I hope your business will thrive and prosper. I’ll come next time too!”
Oh my ancestor, please don’t come again next time. The merchant prayed internally.
Li Yu figured he’d been gone for a while. Jing-wang should be still looking at the hairpin. Li Yu was just about to head back the way he came when he turned around and discovered Jing-wang was standing behind him with a smile, almost like an extremely sturdy iron wall.
“Your, your highness!” Li Yu got tongue-tied. So the big scoundrel has been here all along?
Doesn’t that mean his actions of bargaining prices with the merchant and messing with the merchant were seen?!
Li Yu was the person that Jing-wang liked. But the image of himself inside Jing-wang’s heart probably was completely ruined by now, right?
Li Yu felt somewhat nervous, but Jing-wang only walked over with a smile and rubbed him on the head. From his sleeve, he took out a white jade hairpin that had a fish on one end and carefully inserted it into Li Yu’s hair.
Li Yu: ???
When Li Yu first turned into a human, the system amended his hair once and made his hair a little longer. Therefore, no one had said anything random about his hair. Meanwhile, Li Yu himself thought that this was blending in with the natives and didn’t care too much. Plus, every time he transformed, it was always in a hurry. It was good enough that he had clothes to wear. Having no time to tie his hair properly or put it in a hair crown, he always let his hair drape over his shoulders. Jing-wang thought Li Yu liked it like this so didn’t ask for much.
Now that he received a hairpin, Li Yu looked at the round plump little fish at the end of the hairpin in a daze.
Did Jing-wang gift him a hairpin that had a fish on it because his name was Li Yu?
Jing-wang really must…… like fish a lot.
Li Yu felt the tip of his ears turn faintly red. Should he start learning how to bind his hair now?
Translator Note:
The fish hairpin became canon!!!
Cute cute! I hope that vendor finds out he tried to scam the (future) wife of the (future) emperor!
Thank You for the chapter (๑°꒵°๑)･*♡
thanks for the chapter!
Thanks for the update 🤣❤️🐟
Thanks for the chapter ☺️.
AWHH that was so sweet!! Thank you for the chapter! And the fanart links ❤️
the hair pin sounds very pretty! makes me want to learn how to pin my hair QAQ
ew… kissing while someone eats oily meat???