Chapter 59: Heavy Expenditures Prompt the Search for New Financial Sources

Li Shi followed Lu Wu and the others as they strolled about. While the others grew more cheerful with every step, Li Shi grew increasingly anxious.

Observing his surroundings carefully, he indeed noticed several suspicious irregularities.

In a wine shop to the west, a gray-robed man sitting by the window kept glancing toward their group, only to quickly look away whenever Li Shi met his gaze.

On the second floor of a pawnshop to the east, a woman pushed open the lattice window, her eyes darting left and right as if merely watching the bustling scene, yet her gaze lingered on them longer than anywhere else.

Further along, an old man who had set down his carrying pole and sat by the roadside to rest was wiping away sweat with a towel while casting furtive glances in their direction.

The more Li Shi observed, the more panicked he became. Unable to ignore his unease any longer despite disturbing the master’s leisure, he hurried to Lu Wu’s side and whispered a warning, "Lord, the surrounding situation appears somewhat abnormal."

"Indeed, so many people are staring at us again. It is quite annoying," Yu Lan remarked.

Since even Li Shi could perceive it, how could the others fail to notice?

In truth, leaving aside martial arts born purely for slaughter, genuine orthodox martial arts focused fundamentally on self-enhancement. This was especially true for the *Golden Bone and Jade Marrow Iron Cloth Shirt*, adapted by Lu Wu from the *Golden Beam Supporting the Sea*, a divine art that strengthened the practitioner step by step from the inside out.

Every single member of Lu Wu’s group possessed sensory awareness far superior to Li Shi's.

"No murderous intent," Qing Zhu stated concisely.

"Merely curious onlookers—who can blame them when we are all so tall and traveling in such a large group?" Red Plum smiled.

"Especially Eldest Sister, who looks like a Black God standing among a herd of donkeys," Chrysanthemum concluded.

Autumn Paulownia glared fiercely at Chrysanthemum and hissed in a low voice, "Talk less, it's not going to kill you to keep quiet!"

Chrysanthemum shrank her neck and quietly took a step backward.

When Eldest Sister truly grew angry, she resorted to physical punishment.

Having finished glaring at Chrysanthemum, Autumn Paulownia turned her gaze toward Lu Wu.

"It's fine, everyone continue strolling. Just now on the river, I killed four Innate-level experts and nearly a hundred expert archers. Innate experts do not grow like cabbages; it will be very difficult to mobilize another elite force like that in the vicinity anytime soon. We will be safe here for at least seven or eight days," Lu Wu said casually.

The maidens immediately brightened up.

Reassured by Lu Wu's guarantee, Autumn Paulownia turned around and instructed, "Don't just focus on playing; keep some thought on our financial resources. We left in a hurry, carrying only a little over a thousand liang of gold and three hundred odd liang of silver. In just these few days, we've spent nearly three hundred liang. Young Master is traveling the world, and there will be countless places where money is needed. If we don't secure some sources of income soon, we will be in trouble."

"Ah, Eldest Sister, have we really spent that much?" Red Plum asked, thoroughly startled.

"Really? It didn't feel like we used all that much," Chrysanthemum, Qing Zhu, and Yu Lan were equally astonished.

Even Lu Wu pricked up his ears.

"You girls, you don't run a household so you don't know the cost of firewood and rice. In these eight days alone, we have spent three hundred and thirty liang of silver. If we don't go out and find some revenue sources, our funds will run out in less than three or four months," Autumn Paulownia shook her head and explained.

*(Gold purity was not very high in this era; generally, one liang of gold could be exchanged for ten to eleven liang of silver, though some regions offered slightly more.)*

The scale of expenditure during this period had astonished even Autumn Paulownia herself.

Back at home, eggs, bean powder, oat flour, and salt were fried with grease and kneaded into the dry feed eaten by Black God—ingredients produced right there at Wutong Manor, costing nothing.

However, once on the road, preparing these items required a considerable sum, meaning Black God alone consumed a liang and a half of silver every single day.

The other eleven warhorses ate somewhat less than Black God, but their fodder was no ordinary grass; it consisted primarily of beans and oats, supplemented with small amounts of eggs and salt. Combined, this cost three liang of silver daily.

The upkeep of these twelve horses alone rivaled the provisions for an entire merchant caravan of men and beasts.

And that was just the minor expense.

The restorative supplements used by the sisters—such as ginseng, velvet antler, polygonatum, and fleece-flower root—were usually taken from the internal stock of the Lu Family's mercantile house, costing mostly three to five liang. Now, upon checking their prices in public shops, Autumn Paulownia had felt a strong impulse to commit robbery.

In an era of difficult transportation, local specialties often varied in price by tenfold between their place of origin and their target market. Since the Lu family possessed their own merchant and transport fleets, their shipping costs were naturally low, so purchasing such items had never previously felt expensive.

Yet once away from home, everything truly became exorbitant. Even trivial items like toilet rags cost twenty wen a piece, while tooth powder and various seasonings were sold by the ounce, with sales starting at half a liang.

Furthermore, Young Master feared that they might wear themselves out, so he had taken in Li Shi's caravan retinue to handle chores—incurring yet another continuous expense.

Although they had brought a substantial sum when departing (having slain Lord Jiu, the Empress Dowager had gifted them three carriages of wealth) and could sustain themselves for a while longer, living off past reserves without replenishment was never a wise course.

"But we are strangers in a strange land here, and we haven't seen many beggars with broken limbs along the road. How are we supposed to find sources of income?" Chrysanthemum peered left and right, failing to spot any targets, and fretted aloud.

"Sister Chrysanthemum, what do little beggars have to do with sources of income?" The blue-robed girl, Li He, asked in confusion, lowering her voice.

"They have everything to do with it—" Chrysanthemum started to explain, but Autumn Paulownia shot her another glare, forcing her to swallow her words mid-sentence.

"Eldest Sister won't let me tell you," Chrysanthemum said with a wronged expression.

Li He dared not ask any further.

Her current status was somewhat awkward. If she were considered a young miss of the Li family, her Second Uncle Li Shi addressed Lu Wu as his lord, meaning she likely no longer held the status of a young lady.

Yet if she were considered a member of the Lu household, her Second Uncle had never instructed her to serve the Lu family's young master, and there were still people from the Li family caravan attending to her needs, while her Second Uncle encouraged her to grow close to Chrysanthemum.

"I can tell you later, just not right now," Chrysanthemum comforted her.

Li He nodded, understanding only half of it.

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Back at the Lu residence, Lu Wu could slip away, but the maids rarely had the chance to go out and play on their own—after all, maids were merely maids.

By the time they moved to Wutong Manor, the five maids were finally freed from their slave status and gained their freedom, but they were far away from Songjing, making casual outings inconvenient.

The number of times they had gone out for leisure in Songjing paled in comparison to the times they had ventured out at night alongside the young master to kill people—whether it was the Child-Abduction Gang, the Flower-Snatcher Sect, the Poison Hand Society, or the Fierce Dragon Hall, all of them had served as sources of silver used to forge blades and armor and purchase medicinal materials.

Although the *Golden Bone and Jade Marrow Iron Cloth Shirt* emphasized internal cultivation, the maids after all lacked the miraculous cultivation realm of the young master and still needed to rely heavily on potent medicinal ingredients.

Having performed such deeds frequently, the southern suburbs of Songjing had gradually given rise to the legend of the "Night-Walking Long Saber, Gate-Smashing and Sect-Exterminating." This moniker arose because whenever the young master led everyone into action, they invariably stormed through gates holding long blades, adopting a style of absolute annihilation with no survivors left behind.

Lu Wu could hardly be described as someone who harbored a righteous hatred for evil, but acquiring travel funds from those who had broken through the absolute bottom limits of human morality—while incidentally making a modest contribution to raising the average human moral standard—was something he was quite happy to do.

Each operation claimed anywhere from a dozen to forty or fifty lives, depending entirely on the population of the targeted gang stronghold.

Moreover, whenever Lu Wu, Autumn Paulownia, and the others struck, with the sole exception of rescued abducted children, every single gang member present in the stronghold that night was executed without exception.

Because everyone was tall and draped in wide black robes over half-body armor, no one ever suspected that a band of young women was behind the deeds. Consequently, this business had been carried out for nearly two years without a single soul discovering the identity of the culprits, though the chief constable and magistrate of Baishi County had been replaced three times within those two years.

Later on, as their killings grew too numerous, even Uncle Lin's Longshui Camp suburban cavalry was alerted, with mounted patrols scouring the area day and night. Only then did the group exercise restraint and cease using this particular source of income to subsidize their household expenses.