Chapter 159 Changxing Inn (I)

The ninth day of the first lunar month, Xingyuan Prefecture.

In the morning, the Changxing Inn was quiet. The waiter, who kept yawning, rubbed his sleepy eyes and lazily removed the door panel and opened the store door to start a new day of business. However, he did not expect that he would have guests as soon as he opened the store.

As an inn, there are usually few guests coming in early in the morning.

Seeing this, the waiter hurried forward and asked with a smile: "Dear guests, are you here to stay or just to have a meal?"

The two people who came were an old man and a young girl, a man and a woman. The old man was blind and his steps were slow. The young girl was still childish, holding a guqin wrapped tightly in rags in her arms.

They were the "Lutheran and Dancing Demons" who had narrowly escaped disaster in a ruined temple outside Luoyang City not long ago.

"Waiter, I want to ask you about someone."

Old man Liu spoke slowly, and at the same time handed a few pieces of silver to the waiter. The waiter was overjoyed when he saw the unexpected fortune, and nodded quickly and said, "Who do you want to inquire about, sir?"

"How many 'Changxing Inns' are there in Xingyuan Prefecture?" asked Old Man Liu.

"Look at what you said. Changxing Inn is the only one in Xingyuan Prefecture, not to mention in Song Dynasty. Hehe..."

Old Man Liu nodded with satisfaction and said with a smile, "Okay! Waiter, let me ask you again, can you accommodate a guest named Song in your inn in the next two days?"

"Song?" The waiter frowned slightly and smiled bitterly, "The shopkeeper has instructed that we are not allowed to ask any questions to the customers in the store. As for who is surnamed Song? Who is surnamed Li? I really don't know...

"He's from the south, about forty years old, seven feet tall, with regular features and fair complexion." Meihua reminded, "He's well-dressed, and his speech and behavior are quite elegant..."

"Right!" the waiter suddenly woke up and said, "According to the description of this girl, I have indeed seen a man, but he only booked a room in our store, but he did not live here. He once said that he was waiting for two friends from Luoyang. Could it be...his friends are you two?"

"That's right! Where is he?" Old Man Liu asked hurriedly.

"That old man said that if you come, please go to the room and rest for a while, and let me just treat you to good food and drink. He also told you not to worry about looking for him, he will come here to find you." The waiter was delighted when he saw Old Man Liu admit it, thinking to himself, "Another reward has been settled."

"lead the way!"

Old Man Liu didn't say anything more, just responded lightly, and then, with the help of Meihua, he carefully followed the waiter to the second floor.

The servant was taking money and helping others to get rid of disasters, so he should be extra attentive. Although he was walking in front leading the way, he looked back every few steps and flattered Old Man Liu and Meihua from time to time.

At this moment, a guest happened to come down from the second floor and bumped into Old Man Liu and his two companions on the stairs.

The man who came was a fat man nearly nine feet tall, about twenty-seven or twenty-eight years old. He had a bun on his round head with a small braid hanging down the back. The rest of his hair was scattered around randomly, looking very unruly.

He had a big, white, fat face, but his facial features were unusually small, with small eyes, a small nose, and a small mouth. In comparison, his big face looked swollen and very wide. Although his facial features were extremely asymmetrical, his appearance was not ugly, but rather quite pleasing, and he looked a bit simple and cute, giving people a feeling of being pleasing to others.

Looking down, the protruding belly was even more prominent than that of a pregnant woman, and his limbs were also very fat and strong. His forearm alone was as thick as a ten-year-old child's thigh, and his five fingers were like five carrots inserted in his palm.

This person was wearing a linen shirt and linen pants, cloth shoes, and a grey linen coat. The coat was much larger than his body, so it made him look less fat. He walked unsteadily, and from a distance, he looked naive and funny.

But the most eye-catching thing is the long sword that he slung diagonally at his waist, which was barely visible behind his long gown. The sword was nearly six feet long and seven or eight inches wide. If it was in the hands of an ordinary person, it would definitely be a big sword that was difficult to control, but on this man, it looked quite small, complementing his huge body.

"Uncle, are you awake?" The waiter greeted the man with a smile as soon as he saw him. "Did you sleep well last night?"

The fat man grinned and said, "It's okay, it's just that the bed is a little small and I can't roll out, so I can't sleep well!" His voice was just like him, very loud and full of confidence.

"Master, you are lucky to be able to sleep." The waiter said with a wry smile, "Little did you know that after you fell asleep last night, you were like a god descending from heaven, making the entire inn restless."

"What do you mean?" the fat man asked in confusion.

"Sir..." the waiter explained awkwardly, "Your snoring is as loud as thunder, shaking the earth. I couldn't sleep well downstairs last night. At first I thought it was a fight in the sky!"

"Hehe... I'm sorry! I'm sorry!" The fat man had a rather generous temper. After apologizing several times, he casually threw a large silver ingot to the waiter and said with a smile, "Bring a few jars of good wine, cut three to five pounds of beef, and the rest will be yours."

"Great!" The waiter was overjoyed, thinking that he had really met an important person today. It had only been a short while since the shop was opened, but he had already received a lot of tips.

"Please rest in the lobby first. The wine and meat will be here soon!"

The waiter greeted them and led Old Man Liu and Meihua to the second floor. The fat man also stepped aside to let them pass with a smile on his face and walked downstairs.

However, just as they passed each other, the fat man who was originally in high spirits suddenly stopped, stood still on the stairs, and subconsciously said, "Stop!"

Hearing this, the waiter, Old Man Liu, and Meihua were all stunned. The waiter turned around and looked at the fat man with a look of confusion on his face.

"Master, do you have any other instructions?"

"You two..." The fat man ignored the waiter and walked up to Old Man Liu and Meihua. He looked them up and down suspiciously with his small eyes and said faintly, "Looking at your clothes, you seem a little familiar."

Hearing this, Meihua's face suddenly changed, but before she could attack, Old Man Liu grabbed her arm first, then stared at her with his pale eyes and laughed dryly, "My friend, you may have recognized the wrong person. I don't know you at all, so how can I say I am familiar with you?"

"No!" The fat man narrowed his eyes and looked at Old Man Liu and Meihua carefully. The silly smile on his face turned into a meaningful teasing, "What's in your arms?"

"Guqin!" Meihua replied cautiously.

Old man Liu quickly added: "I and my daughter are helpless and have no one to rely on. We can only make a living by wandering around and singing for a living, so..."

"That's right!" The fat man smiled proudly as if he had suddenly realized something. "Others may not know you, but I do. An old man and a young boy, a blind man and a young girl. In name, they are a father and daughter who sing and dance for money, but in reality, they are assassins who specialize in the murder business. They are called... the Qin Demon and the Dancing Demon. Right?"

The fat man exposed their identities, and Old Man Liu and Meihua were shocked. However, they did not rush to take action, but just waited and watched. Only the waiter of the inn was so scared that he trembled and almost collapsed on the stairs after hearing the fat man's words.

Meihua looked coldly at the fat man with a smirk on his face, while Old Man Liu asked indifferently, "So what?"

"If it's you, then I'm going to be rich. It's like searching for something without any effort, but now I've found it. Hehe..."

At this moment, the fat man's naive look had long disappeared, replaced by a sinister and terrifying look hidden under a thick smile. He laughed and said, "Speaking of it, we are in the same line of work. I occasionally do some business of charging money for lives. But I'm different from you. You are not picky about people and are willing to make any money by doing something unscrupulous. But I'm not like that. I'm picky about who I work for." After that, the fat man winked at Meihua and showed a smile that he thought was handsome.

"Oh?" Although Old Man Liu remained calm on the surface, his right hand had already quietly reached for the guqin held by Meihua, and he asked with a smile, "I wonder who you are targeting?"

"It's almost like you and your daughter. You have a lot of money, so it's easy to kill! Hehe..." The fat man spoke frankly and answered carelessly, "You may not know how much you are worth now? Just two days ago, someone in Luoyang City offered a reward of one thousand taels of gold for your heads. Wow! It's really not easy, one head is worth five hundred taels of gold. I think your heads are even more valuable than pearls and jade. Hehe..."

"you……"

"My daughter is ashamed!" Before Meihua could scold him, Old Man Liu suppressed his displeasure and said in a deep voice, "I wonder what your intention is today? Do you really want to cut off our heads in exchange for a reward?"

"Unless you offer a higher price," the fat man said with a calculating smile, "If you offer more than one thousand taels of gold, then I will naturally not do a business that will lose money. What do you think? Am I sincere enough?"

"Humph!"

Hearing this, Old Man Liu could not help but get angry. He thought to himself, "The one offering the reward in Luoyang City must be the Xianwang Mansion. I know without asking that their purpose of hunting me down is to avenge me for killing Wang Qingshu and then blaming the Xianwang Mansion. Little did they know that we were also entrusted by others to take money and help them get rid of the disaster. Luo Tianjin was really generous. The benefit we got from completing this matter was only a mere 100 taels of gold. Now this guy in front of me asked for 1,000 taels, which is simply abominable. If he really had 1,000 taels, why would my father and I take the risk to offend Luo Tianjin?"

While Old Man Liu was angry, he also felt that it was not worth it. He had thought that one hundred taels of gold was a high price, but he did not expect that this matter would bring them trouble again and again, and even put their lives in danger. Thinking about it this way, the price of one hundred taels of gold was still too little.

"You must know that if you want to do porcelain work, you need to have a diamond drill." Old man Liu was angry, so he threatened coldly in a bad tone, "Since you know the bad reputation of my father and I, how dare you speak so arrogantly here? Aren't you afraid that you will lose more than you gain?"

The fat man chuckled, waved his hand nonchalantly, and said loudly: "If I can't even deal with you two little guys, I don't have to mix in the underworld anymore in the future."

Old Man Liu was startled. He thought that this man must have extraordinary means to be so confident. He could not help but ask in doubt, "Excuse me... who are you?"

“Nobody, Qin Ku!”

……

(End of this chapter)