Chapter 12

Looking up, Jerry saw Shang Fei's hand on his shoulder and suddenly a smile appeared on his face. He then straightened his legs and breathe a breadth of bad air out then walked forward. At the gate of the city, there was a long line snaking for tens of meters from the entrance. Occasionally there were gentlemen with dragon patterns in their backs staring at everybody in disdain and walking straight into the city without being stopped whereas everyone else was lined up. Nobody dared to look at them or talk back at them. Seeing this situation, he immediately adjusted himself and also followed everyone else's pattern.

He had decided to stay low-key till he understands the situation in the city. After a few hours, he finally reached the front as the morning coldest had completely disappeared. He finally saw the dressing of the military in this world: long spears with a silver color and extremely sharp ends, wooden polished greaves, segmented armor in a red thick color, a weird motorcycle-like helmet without the front glass. The entire garb was painted with a thick velvet color, like the paint was taken from hundreds of enemies and permanently smeared on their gears like a proud brand. Strangely enough, the color formed a strange dragon pattern like an angry dragon wanting to upturn the heavens. There was nothing extra on them like uniform garments, it somehow seemed unnecessary. For the first time, Jerry was impressed by the clothing in this ancient period.

He got out of his stupor and heard Shang Fei shouting for him to come back to Earth. He felt it was weird why Shang Fei would know that expression, and kept that in his heart. Then he heard the question by the guard.

"Papers, please."

At this point, Shang Fei spoke up for him.

"This kid is an orphan and I'm bringing him to work in the city. He's so poor he never had chance to get an official identity and has always been in the village being taken care of by his neighbors. Please let us in this time and I will go straight to the magistrate's office to get one for him."

Listening to this, the guard gave both Jerry and Shang a stare and spoke once more before letting them in.

"10 cabbat for guests each day until you get an identification. I trust you Shang but them's the rules. I can keep it for you for today but remember to invite me when you get some dragon wood wine."

"Thank you."

After being let in, Shang mumbled to himself how shameless this guard has been, for a meager 10 cabbat and he wants his precious wine. It's like he doesn't know how hard it was to swindle some from Shi and every time he eats a huge loss just for a few jugs.

He walked around the city, feeling proud of his great city and trying to show it off the the shy kid behind him. He kept pointing out the vital areas along the way and off zones since he will be staying in this town for a long time. It took half an hour to get to the magistrate office but the line was much shorter and the price for an identity was a meager 2 cabbat. This time, Jerry returned on a different route with Shang and saw more of the scenery and vital places he must remember such as repair shops, essential stores, medicine halls and official buildings. As soon as he met up with the guard again, it was the guard's break time so Shang entered a deep conversation with him and was totally ignored by both. He didn't dare move anywhere but kept staring around and through a window, he could see outside the city and observe all kinds of people entering the city. The people were more civilized than he thought in a fantasy backward world. The so-called snorts and disdain were mostly among enemies as opposed to nobles looking down on civilians. People walked patiently and waited for each other at intersection without acting like arrogant young masters who can't stop at any point on their paths.

He pulled out some dried jerky and some water from his satchel and continued to observe the people while eating. It wasn't until noon that the conversation ended between the guard and Shang that they stopped and separated. He couldn't help but think to himself how lazy the guards are that they can take a three hour break and none's the better. What followed next was a long walk towards the city manor straight in the middle of the city. A poor location he thought to himself. It felt like anyone with a strong arm could throw a stone from outside the city and still accurately hit the building but when he got there, his three views were completely altered and how massive the manor was. There was a wooden fence spanning about 10 li around the manor and most of the space was filled with all kinds of crops, including precious medicines.

Lots of horses and strange beasts galloped throughout the fields and men with horses followed them closely. There were people working in the fields like herders on horses, some taking care of crops, others bringing in water from another side of the mountain to the manor and they looked the worst since one can imagine the distance from the stream carrying a huge pot of water in their heads. In all this disorganization, there was some strange order in it since the servants had different garbs with different demeanors and a price difference on them, creating some kind of social hierarchy.

Then he started to compare the clothing of Shang to the people near him and found out he saw none with the same confidence, he immediately judged that Fei must be a high ranking worker in the manor. What started to annoy him was that he started to get envious eyes directed at him. This made him uncomfortable all over. He started worrying that he might get bullied.

Knowing that he wasn't a main character and no plot armor could defend him, then the fear intensified by a notch. He started using his brain again to figure out how he might survive in case those barbarians tried to "express their thoughts to him", almost burning up his brain.

He was woken up by a slap on his shoulder and a voice informing him something.

"We're here."