PDLP Chapter 168 My Water
Chapter 168 My Water
"By the way, how do we get to Liangzhou City?" Xia Qingqing asked.
"Liangzhou City is quite far away," Shopkeeper Fang stood up and gestured, "You should first go around Jinzhou and then go east."
Jinzhou?
We really have arrived in the desert.
The two were sleeping soundly at night when they were woken up by the noise outside.
"Get up, get up, it's time for rounds."
The loud knocks on the door startled Xia Qingqing. She had indeed become much more fragile since she had a child.
Mulan was very dissatisfied. She put on her clothes and angrily opened the door. Seeing several people outside dressed as officers and soldiers, she asked, "Why are you checking the room so late at night?"
The two officers looked up and were shocked to see Mulan's large frame: "She's really tall."
One of the officers cleared his throat, then remembered his business and said, "We're here to check the room. You're all from out of town, so we have to check. What if it's a fugitive or something?"
Mulan glared at the two of them. "Do you think we look like fugitives? Even if you wanted to investigate, you should have done so when we entered the city. Why did you have to do it in the middle of the night? What exactly do you want?"
The two were stunned by the question. It was the first time they encountered someone who challenged them.
After thinking for a moment, he stood up and said, "We are the government investigating the case. Do you want to rebel?"
The tense atmosphere frightened Shopkeeper Fang, who quickly ran up to the two officers and soldiers, bowing and saying, "You two young ladies from other places don't know the rules. Gentlemen, take this little money and buy some wine."
The two men laughed as soon as they got a few coins. They weighed the silver and said to Mulan, "See? Now you know the rules. Otherwise, we would have to go in and check the room."
When Mulan heard that the person was asking for money, she didn't know what to do when she heard Xia Qingqing's voice.
"Let them come in for rounds, and we'll cooperate."
"Hey, this is the first time I've seen a man take the initiative to check the room," one of the chubby officers laughed playfully, "Then let's go check it out."
When they entered the room, they were stunned to see Xia Qingqing sitting upright on the chair.
This was the first time they had seen such a pretty woman. She was so beautiful.
Unlike the women here, who all have yellowish skin, some are even dark and ugly.
Xia Qingqing reminded them, "Check it out."
The two men reacted and immediately pretended to check. They picked up the bag and opened it, and a pile of things fell out.
There were also two pieces of clothing they had never seen before, and the materials looked somewhat special.
"Third brother, why do these clothes look a bit like the county magistrate's?"
"And this dress, why does it look so much like a royal princess's attire?"
The third brother burst into laughter immediately after hearing this: "Eighth brother, please stop teasing me. She's wearing a princess costume. It's so funny."
The eighth brother looked solemn. He lowered his head and picked up a few seals on the ground. He held them under the candlelight and looked at them together with the fourth brother.
"This is the county magistrate's seal, and this is the princess's seal!"
The two men recognized the seal's material and knew it was genuine. Their eyes went dark and they immediately knelt on the ground, begging for mercy: "The Princess and the County Magistrate have arrived. We are blind and ignorant. Please forgive us. We are wrong."
Manager Fang was confused, and so was the inn's servant.
"Is it the county magistrate or the princess?" One of the servants rubbed his sleepy eyes and said excitedly, "I actually met the princess."
"Is it really the princess?" Shopkeeper Fang lost his balance and knelt down, muttering, "Greetings to the princess, this humble servant is here to greet the princess."
"I really don't want to cheat you out of that hundred taels of silver. I was wrong."
Shopkeeper Fang burst into tears, his heart sinking into fear and despair. In the past two years, he had cheated such a great guest, who was actually a princess.
It was too unfair for him.
"Alright, stop making noise," Xia Qingqing frowned slightly and asked, "What kind of mentality do you have? Why do you deliberately create all this trouble?"
The eighth and third brothers immediately became dispirited, and faced with Xia Qingqing's questioning, they had no choice but to tell everything.
"We are really short of money," Lao Ba said aggrievedly, "I don't want to cheat people, but buying water and vegetables is too expensive, and we don't have the money."
"Ah? You also have to spend a lot of money to buy water?" Mulan asked in confusion.
Seeing the two nodded, Xia Qingqing turned to look at Shopkeeper Fang who was kneeling outside and said, "Shopkeeper Fang, please stand up. What they said is true."
Shopkeeper Fang was startled, and stood up cautiously, answering, "What they said is true, it is indeed true."
"Whose pocket did all this money go into?"
Xia Qingqing looked at a few people. They all lowered their heads and dared not speak. They stammered and could not utter a word.
Snapped!
Xia Qingqing slapped the table next to her, and it instantly shattered into ruins. Several people were stunned and stood there.
"It's Magistrate Huang! Huang Shiren!"
"Who Huang Shiren?" Xia Qingqing thought she had misheard, and after confirming it again she realized that the prefect's name was Huang Shiren!
What a man Huang is, he is so greedy for money.
"Don't tell anyone about what happened tonight. If you tell anyone about my identity, I'll chop off your heads."
Xia Qingqing frightened a few people, and they immediately trembled and shouted, "We will definitely not say anything. We will follow the princess's orders!"
After everyone left, Xia Qingqing and Mulan continued to sleep, and she didn't get up until noon.
A long line had already formed outside. Mulan walked in with food and said, "Manager Fang prepared breakfast."
"And he returned this banknote. What should we do with it?"
Xia Qingqing took a quick look and saw buns, porridge, eggs, some pastries, and pickles, so she started eating.
"Give him the banknote."
Mulan responded and went out. After a while, she heard the sound of Shopkeeper Fang crying loudly.
"Thank you, Princess, for your reward. Thank you, Princess, for your reward."
Then came the sound of Mulan scolding him to keep his voice down.
After breakfast, Xia Qingqing took Mulan out. They drove the carriage around Yaocheng in a full circle, even outside the city.
By the time we got back to the city, it was already noon and even hotter.
"Sister Qingqing, this place is truly desolate. Everything is barren and yellow, without even a single green leaf or tree..."
Xia Qingqing sighed and said, "The desert is naturally like this. It would be better if it were properly managed. It's such a pity."
When they were almost at the prefectural government office, the horse started in panic, and Mulan only heard a loud cry of "Whoa!"
A child holding a jar suddenly fell down, and the jar fell to the ground and broke into pieces.
"My water! My water!"