Chapter 11 Preparing Tuition Fee_1

The two walked to the corner of the path, and Zhao Yan asked with a furrowed brow:

"Junior Brother Huang, can my father... can my father be cured?"

Her voice trembled, and Huang An looked at her through the bright moonlight to see a glimmer of tears on her face.

Feeling a pang of sympathy, Huang An hesitated before deciding to conceal the truth. He lowered his head and said:

"My medical skills are modest, I can only do my best."

Zhao Yan still stumbled at his words, even though she was somewhat prepared. She leaned against a pillar, forced a smile, and said:

"Your medical skills are excellent, my Zhao Family's sisters are deeply grateful. Tomorrow morning, you may enter the house."

Huang An's heart lifted at her words, but he wore a sorrowful expression. With a sigh, he bowed slightly and said:

"Thank you, Senior Sister."

Zhao Yan paused before nodding in agreement.

The two stood in silence.

Both were intelligent. There was no need for more words.

Zhao Yan knew the severity of her father's injury when she helped clean the pus earlier. It was not something that could be cured with one clean up.

Even after the procedure, his condition may not have improved much. She had never seen someone with such a severe injury survive, nor had she heard of such a case.

Now, Huang An could only promise to do his best, and Zhao Yan reciprocated by allowing him into the house tomorrow.

Despite feeling somewhat reassured about her father's condition, Huang An did not dare voice his thoughts yet.

Suddenly,

"Junior Brother, the news of Master's difficult recovery must not be revealed to others."

Zhao Yan cautioned with a sincere tone.

When Huang An looked up, he saw the pleading in her eyes beneath her slender eyebrows and an almost imperceptible warning.

"Yes, yes, it's a secret."

A voice came from behind. Da Zhao Le had arrived unknowingly, although it was unclear if she had heard the conversation between Huang An and Zhao Yan.

Zhao Yan gave Huang An a look, and he subtly nodded his head, signifying that he understood and wouldn't tell anyone.

"Junior Brother?"

Zhao Le urged. The martial arts school was at a disadvantage, and the news of their father's severe injury had to be kept secret.

Huang An felt uneasy. He looked at both women in turn, then fixed his gaze on Zhao Yan, nodding his head to promise solemnly.

"I will keep this to myself. I promise!"

He agreed verbally, but his heart was weighing over some thoughts.

So far, three people had advised him with similar privacy warnings. By observing their tones and attitudes, he concluded that Zhao's martial arts school must have competitors in the city.

And the competition was fierce.

Huang An silently cursed his luck. Would the Zhao Family's martial arts school turn out to be unreliable?

But now that he'd boarded this sinking ship, he could only keep going, step by step.

Despite having met the Zhao sisters today, they were not familiar with Huang An. Given their various thoughts, there was nothing else to talk about.

After having a simple dinner and declining their offer of gratitude, Zhao Le led Huang An to a small courtyard.

The courtyard arranged for Huang An was very close to Master Zhao's sickroom, and Huang An understood the sisters' intentions without any objections.

After delivering bedding to Huang An and reminding him once again, Zhao Le left to take care of her father.

She wouldn't have been able to smile if she had heard the conversation between Huang An and Zhao Yan.

Huang An escorted Zhao Le to the door, and only when her figure completely disappeared did he close the door and bolt it from the inside. Then, he circled the small courtyard a few times for a preliminary understanding of the area not more than fifty square meters.

After entering the house and securing the windows and doors, Huang An sat on the bed and began to think deeply.

Prioritizing safety, Huang An became extremely cautious when it came to his own livelihood.

What's more, someone at the Zhao martial arts school was behaving suspiciously and ‎had raised Huang An's alertness. That was the head disciple of the martial arts school, Pang Han.

This man had been hostile toward him since he woke up, often scolding him and even once tried to kick him out of the school.

Even after he eased Master Zhao's injury, Pang Han still thanked him with a gloomy face, clearly showing his irritability and animosity towards Huang An.

Confused by Pang Han's behavior, Huang An naturally became alert.

Therefore, after returning to his room, he blew out the oil lamp, but he didn't use this time to earn the twenty taels of silver he needed to formally become a disciple the next day.

He was waiting, waiting for Pang Han to come.

Although the possibility was small, Huang An still patiently waited until three o'clock in the morning.

Until around five o'clock in the morning, after an exhausting night wait, Huang An counted silently to three, and then entered the Different World Garbage Yard.

He was indeed overly cautious.

At today's dinner, Huang An learned that he had been unconscious for two whole days and nights. Today was his third day in Feng'an County.

Fortunately, he had become a regular employee of the Different World Garbage Yard and was not required to clean up garbage every day. Otherwise, based on his two-day absence alone, he would have been forcibly eradicated.

Looking at the lump of gold placed not far away, Huang An furrowed his eyebrows, then quickly relaxed them again.

So far, including the gold kept in the office drawer, he still had around six kilograms.

The amount of silver was comparatively less, around ten kilograms.

After much thought, Huang An wanted to do some calculations, but unfortunately he still didn't understand the cost of living in Feng'an county.

In "Daming Language", it was stated that the internal values of Daming and Earth are the same, as is their weight class.

An ounce and a pound are the same.

But beyond that, Huang An knew little.

How much silver could an ounce of gold buy?

Huang An didn't know, after all, he couldn't just base it on Earth's prices, right?

After all, on Earth, 1g of gold is worth 400 units, while 1g of silver only needs 4 units, and it could even get cheaper when bought in bulk.

The difference is a hundredfold, but to Huang An, the exchange price between silver and gold in Feng'an county is not so drastic.

Huang An also didn't know the basic prices within Feng'an county.

Besides gold and silver, are there other forms of currency? Huang An was clueless.

The "Daming Language" mentioned it very briefly, using phrases like "one Guan Money, one Wen Money".

To figure out how much silver he needs to bring, Huang An currently had no idea.

He returned to his office, took two kinds of precious metals from his drawer, and started packing up his things.

Six pounds of gold and ten pounds of silver.

As for the beautiful-looking jade and jewelry, Huang An didn't bother with them.

These things might reveal his origin, after all, even on Earth, people who are fond of jade are mostly from East Asia.

If Daming people didn't value jade, Huang An showing it might expose himself and make the people at the Zhao Martial Arts Hall suspect his motives.

Huang An just wants to remain calm and continue practicing martial arts to stay alive, he doesn't want to gamble right now.

Holding silver in one hand and a golden lump in the other, Huang An pondered quietly.

This silver should be enough for his short-term expenses.

When daylight comes, he'll need twenty silver taels as an entrance fee, plus he needs to find a more secluded place to live, and then there are his short-term expenses in Feng'an City.

After a simple estimation, Huang An decided to bring a hundred taels of silver, in other words, he planned to prepare all ten pounds of his silver.

He'll leave the gold untouched for now, and keep it here for emergencies.

In fact, if Huang An was a bit more careless, he could just bring twenty taels of silver, and whenever he needed more, he could just come to the interstellar junkyard and pick up the prepared silver.

Unfortunately, Huang An was cautious by nature, he didn't want to increase his exposure risk, he wanted to minimize the number of times he went in and out of the interstellar junkyard.

Carrying ten pounds of silver on his person, coupled with his loose-fitting clothing, he could hide it well.

Huang An knew virtually nothing about this second anchored world, so he needed to be cautious.

Once he had a plan, Huang An took his hundred taels of silver and went back to his office to prepare for how to safely use the silver.

It was already five-thirty in the morning, and Huang An didn't plan on sleeping. He opened the office door, took the silver and headed to the recycling plant's work area.

On the way, he came across a pleasantly surprised old cat, pet it a few times, and seeing that it had a bulging belly, he didn't feel the need to feed it.

Huang An needed to melt the silver in his hand and add a little low melting point aluminum to reduce its purity, so that it would be similar to the silver in Feng'an county.

Yesterday, at the dinner table with the three brothers and sisters from the martial arts hall, he had touched the silver that Zhao Yan had prepared as a reward, and estimated that the purity of that silver was about eighty percent.

The silver that Huang An had collected himself had already been processed by him, with a purity of around ninety-nine percent.

Therefore, after half an hour of processing, Huang An smoothly got about a hundred and twenty taels of silver.

On the way back, he sent a WeChat message to his parents asking how they were, replied to the WeChat messages, then made a WeChat call to Achang, explaining a few things before hanging up amid Achang's snoring.

After preparations, Huang An, who had not even eaten breakfast, returned to the backyard of Zhao's Martial Arts Hall with a hundred and twenty taels of silver before it was even six in the morning.

Carrying more would be hard to store, but carrying less would increase his exposure risk.

Huang An was careful to this extent.

Huang An had stayed up all night, and wasn't very tired.

Martial artists get up early, as soon as Huang An opened the door, he heard voices from the front yard.

"I need to find an excuse to go out so I can bring out the silver in broad daylight."

Thankfully, it was now just before dawn, with dim enough light, and Huang An, who had a good memory, made his way out clutching his silver without a hitch.

Half an hour before the agreed time, Huang An walked into the martial arts hall gate empty-handed, looking helpless.

He had wanted to buy some breakfast and in doing so, investigate the prices in Feng'an county, but sadly, the vendors refused to sell him buns when they saw him taking out silver to pay, saying they couldn't make change.

With their pretext, Huang An indirectly inquired and was surprised to find that one tael of silver could be exchanged for a thousand Wen of copper money.

And a palm-sized meat bun only cost two Wen.

Huang An got a preliminary understanding of the prices in Feng'an county, and a clear understanding of the purchasing power of his silver.

In a sense, one Wen was equivalent to a dollar in his hometown, Hawk City.

The one hundred twenty taels of silver he held was a fortune!

It seemed that he could soon find time to buy a house to hide his secrets.

Huang An was hungry, but in a good mood, he stepped one foot into the martial arts hall gate, and before he had a chance to turn around and close the door, he was caught.

"Junior Brother Huang, where have you been? Quick, come with me to see my father!"

The voice was very familiar, it was Zhao Le.