Chapter Thirty-Two: Rush Purchase

  This chapter is a bit late...

  Of course, Wen Fei wouldn't forget to buy a stab-proof vest online to add an extra layer of protection for his own life. After all, Wei Jue's three great treasures for navigating the jianghu - dagger, anaesthetic, and bulletproof vest - were etched in Wen Fei's memory. The problem was that the anaesthetic wasn't easy to buy, mainly because such a powerful knockout drug only appeared when you needed it. As for those anaesthetics advertised on the back of small magazines, who knew if they were reliable or not!

  Everything was ready, pushing a cart, Wen Fei disappeared again in the modern air of his house in the countryside.

  This time the mule team was exceptionally lively, with all sorts of colorful tents and simple houses set up everywhere, looking like they were going to be stationed here for a short period. The air was filled with a foul odor. No wonder, there were herds of cattle and horses everywhere, how could there not be such a smell?

  The price of horses in the Northern Song Dynasty was extremely high, but it was even higher in the Southern Song Dynasty. Since the late Tang and Five Dynasties, the Central Plains court had lost all its horse-breeding grounds, so the price of horses became an astronomical figure, and even the imperial court could not afford to raise many cavalrymen. Ordinary people who could ride horses were definitely at the level of wealthy tycoons, comparable to owning a Mercedes-Benz or BMW in later generations.

  These things are meaningless to Wen Fei. If it were in the past when he was so naive, Wen Fei would have thought about buying a good horse and bringing it back to modern times to show off. Unfortunately, once Wen Fei brought a live chicken through time to modern times, he found that the chicken had no external injuries but still died.

  And that chicken, it's simply inedible, even worse than the taste of those industrially farmed fast-growing chickens nowadays. It's like chewing on wax. After repeated experiments, Wen Fei came to a conclusion: it seems that only this one living creature can survive the space-time leap, while all other creatures not only die but also become extremely bad-tasting, just like plain water without any flavor at all...

  It's not yet the day of the donkey and horse market, but many merchants have already gathered, most of whom are from afar and mostly large businessmen. Ironware, medicinal materials, salt, tea, wine... all kinds of goods piled up like mountains, although in Wen Fei's eyes, they were just some primary agricultural products.

  There were even more people from the Fan Department, driving large herds of cattle and sheep, often numbering in the thousands. They occupied big and small places, making the mule market a chaotic mess. Wen Fei directly understood for the first time how the name "Mule Market" originated!

  Wen Fei pushed a cart of goods, completely unremarkable. Although some people seemed to take an interest in Wen Fei's cart and took a second glance, after all, this was the oldest mode of transportation that Wen Fei could find, but it was vastly different from the carts of the Northern Song Dynasty. Other than that, no one cared what Wen Fei had brought with him.

  After all, Wen Fei's goods on this car are not even in the eyes of those big merchants.

  "Bad luck!" Wen Fei cursed under his breath, having not seen him for several days. Even the broken house left by Chen Niwan had been occupied by someone else. The idea of making Wen Fei stay a few more days was directly dashed, as he had brought only goods this time. However, he hadn't brought any tents or sleeping bags that took up space.

  "Over here, over here!" The strange and discordant Chinese words caught Wen Fei's attention. He saw a group of foreigners, who upon seeing Wen Fei, rushed over without saying a word. Frightened, Wen Fei's heart was racing wildly as he recognized these people - they were the same foreigners with whom he had exchanged his compressed cloth for gold sand last time.

  Let these guys know they've been cheated and come find me, Dao Ye, to reason with them? If it's just a matter of talking, I'm not afraid. But if it's physical... Wen Fei tightened his grip on the slingshot in the special bag at his waist. In that case, I'd better hurry up and compensate. After all, this slingshot was bought from Taobao, who knows how powerful it is? Besides, there's only one arrow loaded, while dozens of foreigners are charging over.

  "Uh..." Wen Fei forced a smile, not having spoken yet. He was suddenly grabbed by the collar by an anxious-looking person: "Uh... this... fabric... is there any left? They've bought up all of it outside..."

  This man's strength was extremely great, but his Mandarin was not very fluent. When he got anxious, he became even more tongue-tied. Wen Fei was choked to death and desperately shouted "Let go! Let go!" The man chuckled stupidly twice and put Wen Fei down.

  The other dwarves were so excited that they immediately rummaged through the wagon and actually found a few pieces of cloth. Suddenly, they cheered and looked at the fabric with great enthusiasm.

  People love to watch the excitement, even if it's across thousands of years. They were so excited over there that they startled some idle people, who also came over to watch the commotion. Seeing those foreigners fighting over a few pieces of fabric, in the sunlight, the colors of the fabric were vibrant and almost seemed to be visible from afar. It was even lighter than silk, and suddenly everyone became interested. They started asking questions with seven mouths and eight tongues.

  Everyone likes to show off, these barbarians grabbed the fabric and were in a great mood. They then told the story of what had happened, although their Chinese was not fluent, stumbling over words, but they managed to get the point across clearly.

  It turned out that the fabrics those barbarians bought back last time were extremely popular among their tribes. Even the young barbarian who grabbed Wen Fei's collar, the girl he had been liking for a long time agreed to his proposal because of this beautiful fabric...

  It can be imagined how sensational this fabric would be in their tribe. This time, they came to the Mule and Horse Gathering early, just to buy such beautiful fabrics from Wen Fei again.

  "Not bad, not bad. This fabric is extremely good, and I've seen my fair share of things in my life, even the Shu brocade can't compare to it. It's almost as good as the snow-silk woven by the Flowing Light Silk Weaving Workshop in Tokyo City. If this were sold in Tokyo City, it would definitely fetch a good price. However, I'm just an old man with limited knowledge and experience, so I don't even know what to call this fabric?"

  Wen Fei knew at once that this old man was a worldly person, but it's not good to fool around. He just smiled and said: "These materials seem to be from Tianfang, brought by a Muslim merchant to our Song Dynasty, but they are not produced in our Song Dynasty."

  The old man suddenly enlightened: "So that's it, so that's it. No wonder I've never seen it before... Hmm, is this the aroma of wine?"

  It was at this time when Wen Fei and the old man in the crowd were talking that someone, out of curiosity, opened the wine barrel brought by Wen Fei.

  This time, Wen Fei brought a bucket of loose white wine, weighing as much as 100 kilograms. It was packed in large white buckets, and when opened, a strong aroma of wine wafted out.

  Gulps all around, a sea of swallowed saliva sounds.

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