Chapter 14:The Price of a Meal

Su Qinghan rested her head on the table, and Lu Hongzhuang’s casual words, though spoken lightly, landed with the weight of a mountain, leaving an inexplicable tightness in her heart.

‘If we don’t hold the line, how can the common folk enjoy their peaceful lives?’

Such a noble sentiment, such a selfless sacrifice.

And yet, Su Qinghan found it all rather tragic.

This girl had been raised by the Demon Exorcism Division since childhood, her mind filled with nothing but slaying demons, eliminating evil, and upholding justice.

Her life, it seemed, was defined by duty, with no room left for ‘herself.’

She lived as if solely for the sake of others.

She was a person, not a tool manufactured to achieve a specific goal.

Su Qinghan sighed softly.

‘Oh, well. I’ll just have to think of it as raising a child who hasn’t grown up yet.’

‘I can teach her slowly over time. Surely, I can correct this deeply ingrained, tool-like mindset.’

The inn remained as boisterous as ever.

After they had eaten and drunk their fill, Lu Hongzhuang waved over the waiter.

“The bill, please.”

The waiter approached, his face wreathed in smiles, the beads of his abacus clacking away.

“Right away! That will be one tael and three mace of silver, ladies.”

Lu Hongzhuang’s hand, which had been reaching into her robes for her money pouch, froze mid-motion.

She went rigid, her mouth slightly agape, and remained that way for a long moment.

“How… how much?”

“One tael and three mace,” the waiter repeated, his smile unwavering.

Su Qinghan, for her part, had no real concept of the value.

In the television dramas she’d watched in her past life, heroes would often slap a silver ingot on the table and declare, “Keep the change!” with a flourish of heroic bravado.

One tael and three mace didn’t sound like much.

But Lu Hongzhuang’s face had already cycled from pale to red, and then from red to a sickly green.

Biting her lower lip, she fumbled inside her robes for a long time before finally retrieving a small, faded cloth pouch that had been washed nearly white.

She tipped its contents into her palm—a single, unevenly cut piece of broken silver and a few copper coins.

With painstaking slowness, as if carving off a piece of her own flesh, she handed the largest piece of silver to the waiter.

The waiter took the silver, weighed it on a small, delicate scale, and beamed.

“This piece of silver has more than enough weight, miss. Here is your change of ninety-seven wen. Please take it!”

With that, he counted out a small string of copper coins and set them clattering on the table.

Lu Hongzhuang silently swept the ninety-seven coins back into her pouch, then walked over to Su Qinghan and crouched down without a word.

“Let’s go.”

Her voice was muffled.

Su Qinghan expertly settled onto her back and was lifted with a steady motion.

“That’s a high-end restaurant for you,” Su Qinghan said, patting her stomach in satisfaction.

“The food and the service were impeccable. We should come here again.”

She distinctly felt the body beneath her stiffen once more.

Lu Hongzhuang’s steps were heavy, her pace slow.

Sensing her foul mood, Su Qinghan cautiously peeked over her shoulder.

“Hey, blockhead… was that meal very expensive?”

Lu Hongzhuang was silent for a long while before forcing a single word through her teeth.

“Yes.”

“How expensive?” Su Qinghan’s interest was piqued.

Her understanding of this world’s prices was purely theoretical.

She pointed to a small stall on the roadside selling steamed meat buns.

“How much for one of those?”

“Two wen each,” Lu Hongzhuang replied, her voice still flat.

‘Two wen for one…’

Su Qinghan did a quick mental calculation.

The meal was one tael and three mace, which was one hundred and three wen.

A bun was two wen.

By that logic, one wen was roughly equivalent to one yuan in her old world.

‘That’s not so expensive, then,’ she mused.

It still seemed well within an acceptable range.

After all, a decent meal out in her past life could easily cost several hundred, even a thousand yuan.

She thought for a moment, then asked another question.

“So, what’s your monthly salary?”

Lu Hongzhuang didn’t speak, but silently held up five fingers in front of her.

“Fifty taels?” Su Qinghan guessed.

“That’s not bad at all. It’s like five thousand a month. You’re just too stingy. You should treat yourself better.”

Lu Hongzhuang stopped dead in her tracks.

She turned her head, looking at Su Qinghan as if she were a complete idiot.

“Five… taels.”

Her voice was faint, tinged with a barely perceptible hint of grievance.

“Five taels of silver a month.”

Su Qinghan fell silent.

The air between them seemed to freeze again.

Five taels of silver was five hundred wen.

That one meal had devoured nearly half a month of her salary.

Suddenly, Su Qinghan felt as if what she had just consumed wasn’t a gourmet feast, but Lu Hongzhuang’s blood, sweat, and tears.

A buzz went through her head as the numbers clicked into place.

‘Five taels of silver… risking life and limb all month long for that paltry sum?’

“Are you…” Su Qinghan was silent for a long moment before finally forcing the words out.

“Are you some kind of masochist?”

“Huh?” Lu Hongzhuang didn’t understand.

“Why would you risk your life for five hundred a month?” Su Qinghan was utterly exasperated.

“My lady, this is just taking advantage of an honest person! Is the pay at your Demon Exorcism Division really that terrible?”

Lu Hongzhuang was dazed by the string of incomprehensible words.

She only understood the last sentence.

“Not everyone in the Demon Exorcism Division serves just for money,” she mumbled in her defense.

“Alright, alright,” Su Qinghan waved a dismissive hand, not wanting to argue the point further.

As they spoke, they reached the entrance of Bluestone Town.

However, the scene before them brought them to a halt.

Where the entrance had once been open, several rows of barricades now stood.

Squads of soldiers, armed with long spears, guarded the post with expressionless faces, and the atmosphere was grim and forbidding.

A wooden plaque stood beside the barricade, a few large characters written on it in black ink.

“Martial Law. Entry only. No exit.”

Lu Hongzhuang’s expression darkened instantly.

With Su Qinghan on her back, she strode up to one of the guards and produced her Demon Exorcism Division waist token.

“Official business for the Demon Exorcism Division. Let us through.”

The guard glanced at the token, a troubled look on his face, but still bowed respectfully.

“My lady, this is a direct order from the town magistrate. As of today, Bluestone Town is under martial law. No one is permitted to enter or leave without authorization. I implore you not to make things difficult for us.”

“Why the sudden lockdown?” Lu Hongzhuang pressed.

“I do not know, my lady. I am only following orders.”

‘Well, that’s that.’

Su Qinghan sighed from her perch on Lu Hongzhuang’s back.

“Everything was fine when we came out, and now we can’t go back.”

Lu Hongzhuang pursed her lips, saying nothing.

She knew this sudden lockdown was, in all likelihood, related to that skin-flaying demon.

It seemed their only option was to find lodging in town for now.

The two turned back and found what looked to be the cheapest inn in town.

“One room, thirty wen.”

The innkeeper’s words sent another pang of pain through Lu Hongzhuang’s heart.

Once in the room, Lu Hongzhuang set Su Qinghan down on a chair before slumping onto a stool by the table herself.

She upended her small pouch.

A pile of copper coins clattered onto the table.

She lowered her head and, with one finger, began to carefully count her entire fortune, one coin at a time.

In the lamplight, her profile was etched with a forlorn loneliness.

Su Qinghan gazed out the window at the deepening night, a sense of unease stirring within her.

“Three taels… and sixty-seven wen…”

Lu Hongzhuang’s voice drifted over, faint and trembling on the verge of tears.

“This is all we have left for the month. We’ll have to be frugal…”

She looked up, forcing a smile onto her face.

“It’s alright. I have some vegetables planted in my courtyard. When we get back, we can eat vegetarian. We should… we should be able to last until next month’s pay.”

Seeing her feigned cheerfulness, Su Qinghan felt an unfamiliar pang in her own heart.

“This job of yours really has no future.”

Her voice was calm and even.

“When my legs are healed, or when I get my bearings here, I’ll figure out a way to make money.”

Lu Hongzhuang stared at her, the usual righteous fire in her eyes now replaced with confusion and doubt.

“That would be for the best,” she replied weakly.

The night grew late.

Without changing her clothes, Su Qinghan used her hands to help arrange her legs into a cross-legged position on one of the chairs.

She assumed a meditative posture, her palms facing upward as she prepared to cultivate through breathing exercises.

“You go to sleep,” she said to Lu Hongzhuang, who had already removed her outer robes and was about to climb into bed.

“I’ll be fine like this for the night.”

Lu Hongzhuang froze.

She looked at the narrow, hard wooden bed, then at Su Qinghan, who had already closed her eyes and entered a state of meditation.

“What?”

“You’re not planning on sharing the bed with me, are you?”

Lu Hongzhuang’s voice shot up an octave.

Su Qinghan opened her eyes and sighed.

“That’s not what I meant.”

Lu Hongzhuang took a deep breath and pointed to the floor beside the bed.

“If you get tired of sitting, you can sleep on the floor!”

With that, she turned her back and pretended to fall into a deep sleep.

Su Qinghan just shook her head and began her meditative breathing.

She had just completed a single cycle when she heard the sound of hurried footsteps, thudding up the stairs.

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