Chapter 489
Old Fei saw how he was acting and didn't get angry. Instead, he burst out laughing. To the citizens of Yucheng, who had just survived a war and were still enduring a drought, his laughter sounded somewhat jarring and out of place.
"You two noticed? Little brother here really isn't short on water right now." He patted the cart behind him. "This time I made a trip to Fengcheng, and I only brought back one thing."
"Old Fei, you went to Fengcheng? How are things over there?" This was asked by Shopkeeper Liu, whose eldest daughter had married into Fengcheng two years ago. Ever since he and his old wife learned that Fengcheng had been taken by the Dayan army, they had been worried sick.
Shopkeeper Qian, on the other hand, was more concerned about the water problem. "Old Fei, give your big brother the straight truth here—does Fengcheng have water? What goods did you bring back from Fengcheng? Considering how our two families have gotten along in the past, your big brother wants to reserve some in advance."
By saying this, Shopkeeper Qian was essentially planning to pay for the goods as a fee for the information.
Old Fei saw the two of them staring at him expectantly, so he didn't drag it out. "To be honest with you two, the only goods I brought back this time is water—water brought all the way from Fengcheng."
Old Fei glanced at the squads of Dayan soldiers passing by. He wasn't afraid these two would swindle him, nor was he afraid the desperately thirsty citizens of Yucheng would try to seize his water. He had seen how the Dayan soldiers in Fengcheng conducted themselves, and he figured those in Yucheng couldn't be much different.
He wanted to quickly trade the water for silver and supplies, then flee with his family.
The Divine Maiden had said heavy rain would come in ten days, and two days had already passed. Time was running out for him.
"Brother Fei, are you telling the truth? The cart really is full of water?" A greedy glint flickered in Shopkeeper Qian's small eyes, and his address shifted from "Old Fei" to "Brother Fei."
He wasn't thinking about robbing Old Fei of his water, but his eyes were full of calculations as he wondered how he could get his hands on more water. Even if the price were higher, he'd accept it.
Shopkeeper Liu's focus was slightly different from Shopkeeper Qian's. Upon hearing about the water, his eyes also lit up. "Brother Fei, did you haul this water all the way from Fengcheng? If Fengcheng isn't short on water anymore, then where did the water come from?"
Just a few days ago, he had received a message sent by his daughter. Fengcheng was in the same drought as Yucheng. His two grandchildren, a boy and a girl, didn't even dare cry anymore—every tear was water!
How could Fengcheng suddenly have water just a few days later? Where did it come from? Did it fall from the sky?
Just as the thought crossed Shopkeeper Liu's mind, Old Fei's voice reached his ears. "Of course it fell from the sky. The Divine Maiden herself came to Fengcheng and brought down sweet rain from the heavens!"
"The Divine Maiden?" Shopkeeper Qian froze with his hand halfway to lifting the cart's curtain, then turned around to stare at Old Fei, trying to read his face for any signs of lying.
"Isn't the Divine Maiden the deity of Dayan? For the past few months, everything we've heard is that She only brings rain and blessing to the people within Dayan's borders. Why would She come to our Nanyue?"
Shopkeeper Liu also nodded vigorously. He thought Shopkeeper Qian had a point. Had Old Fei mistaken cheap wine for water and drunk too much, making him spout nonsense to fool the two of them?
"Old Fei, be straight with your big brother. My friend and I will buy all the water on your cart. We'll pay twenty percent above market price—guaranteed you won't lose out."
Old Fei looked at the two of them, their faces utterly refusing to believe a word he said, and his expression was full of helplessness. How was it that the rare times he actually told the truth, no one believed him!
"I tell you both, never mind Fengcheng—even Weicheng on the border doesn't lack water now, and that's all thanks to the Divine Maiden."
His voice rose slightly, and the words happened to reach the ears of a squad of Dayan patrol soldiers who had just passed by them.
"Fengcheng and Weicheng are now under Dayan's rule. The Divine Maiden, in Her benevolence, appeared in the sky two days ago to relieve that drought and brought a great downpour."
His eyes suddenly sparkled. "This little brother saw it with his own eyes!"
"The Divine Maiden rode a flying chariot pulled by heavenly horses across the sky. She wore a beautiful celestial gown, stepped on lotus blossoms, and with a single wave of Her sleeve came the rain. It rained in Fengcheng for a whole day, and presumably in neighboring Weicheng as well. Before I left, the crops on the outskirts of Fengcheng had all revived!"
It was lucky that Nanyue had never been short of water before. Eight months without rain had dried up the rivers, but by luck, one could still find springs in the mountains that hadn't fully run dry, which preserved a little bit of the crops in the fields. But thinking about the great flood that would come with the rain in a few days, those crops wouldn't last much longer anyway.
Old Fei gestured wildly as he spoke, not noticing that as he described the Divine Maiden bringing rain to Fengcheng, more and more people had slowly gathered around him.
Besides the Dayan soldiers, there were far more ordinary citizens of Yucheng.
Apart from Old Fei's voice, the crowd was eerily silent. Everyone seemed to hold their breath, afraid of missing a single word of his story.
From the video, Yue Fuguang also noticed that when Old Fei mentioned how Fengcheng had rain for a whole day, many people involuntarily swallowed their saliva.
"And there I was with the citizens of Fengcheng, standing right on the main street, looking up and seeing the Divine Maiden descend from the sky, one lotus bloom at a time! She—"
What followed was a string of praise so effusive that Yue Fuguang herself began to doubt whether the Divine Maiden he was describing was really her.
You'd need at least ten layers of filter to say all those things!
"System, how does a traveling merchant come up with so many words of praise?"
[Probably learned it from those scholars at the Fengcheng Academy! After you left, those scholars wrote countless essays praising you, and they even burned them as offerings in front of your shrine!]
The smile that had been blooming on Yue Fuguang's face suddenly cracked. "Burned them to me? As if I could receive those!"
Yue Fuguang snorted twice and went back to watching her video.
The crowd remained silent. The Dayan soldiers listened to Old Fei's unbridled flattery of their Divine Maiden with looks of shared pride on their faces. Some of the younger soldiers couldn't help puffing out their chests when the people of Yucheng glanced their way.
The squad leader even unconsciously reached toward the pouch at his waist. This fellow talked even better than the storytellers at the teahouse. He deserved a reward!
Shopkeeper Qian saw that Old Fei had finally paused after talking himself tired, and couldn't help confirming, "Brother Fei... are you... are you saying it's true? The Divine Maiden really brought rain down on Fengcheng and Weicheng?"
"Would I lie about this?!" Old Fei confidently patted the carriage behind him. "And I might joke about other things, but when it comes to the Divine Maiden, even if you lent me three hundred guts, I wouldn't dare!"
His mother had been the most devoted follower of the Divine Maiden these past two years. If she ever found out her son was taking the Divine Maiden's name in vain, she wouldn't even need to lift a hand herself—his two older brothers would beat him so badly he could barely take care of himself.
Not because his brothers were going easy on him, but because neither of them wanted to be the one stuck taking care of him afterwards!
On that point, Fei San had plenty of experience!
"The Divine Maiden... why doesn't She come to Yucheng? Isn't Yucheng also under Dayan's rule now?"
As a young man said this, he unconsciously glanced at the Dayan soldiers standing in the crowd.
Following his gaze, the others also cast look after look at those Dayan soldiers, as if hoping that if they nodded, the Divine Maiden would come and bring rain.
"Is it because we haven't been under Dayan's control for very long, so the Divine Maiden doesn't know yet that Yucheng is also under Dayan's rule?"