CH 1.1

Chapter 1-Down and out

The crescent moon was like a hook, and the cold white moonlight was as faint as the light of a firefly, dripping on the vermilion glazed tiles and reflecting the loneliness of the entire imperial city.

A burst of chaotic footsteps suddenly sounded on the empty palace road, startling several birds.

A fluffy golden figure suddenly appeared on the wall, and upon a closer look, it was a golden kitten the size of a palm. He paused slightly at the highest point and tapped the smooth glazed tile with the tip of his claws, as if hesitating.

The sound of footsteps behind him was getting closer and closer, and so the kitten flattened his ears and jumped down the palace wall that was three feet high.

The tall city wall was still too high for his small body, when he landed, he stumbled and rolled, then shook his ears, got up quickly, and quickly disappeared into the dense grass in a blink of an eye.

“Look carefully, don’t let it run away!”

The voice of the commander of the guards was deafening, and the rest of the guards responded in unison, turning around the spear in their hands and using the end without the tip to stir the grass.

It was dark at night, and it wasn’t easy to find a kitten the size of a palm in that sloping field full of tall grass and rocks. After a while, another team of guards came holding a ten feet pointed fork and roughly stabbed it deep into the grass.

“No, that’s the emperor’s cat!” The commander of the guards hastened to stop them.

“What are you afraid of? It’s just a beast!” The guards that just arrived shouted, their spears moving without stopping, and the sharp blades slid across the moonlight with an astonishing cold light.

“Stop!” The commander of the guards turned the head of his spear and firmly blocked the prongs that were trying to stab the grass again.

When the other guards saw this, they also placed their spear horizontally to stop the prongs that were constantly stirring. The atmosphere between the two groups of guards quickly became tense.

In the grass not far away, a pair of amber eyes narrowed slightly, taking in everything that was happening in the darkness, pausing for a moment, then turned and left silently.

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The early spring in the capital was still warm and cold at first.

Su Yu drove the donkey while holding the wooden barrel on the cart to prevent the water inside the barrel from spilling too much. That water was the seawater from his family house, if it was spilled, the sea fish in the bucket would die in a moment.

At the place where the daily stalls were set up, Su Yu skillfully tied the donkey, unloaded the wooden barrel and racks from the cart, next he set up a cutting board with a few knives in two to three steps, and finally took out a low stool from the corner of the donkey cart, he then rolled up his sleeves and sat casually beside the barrel.

“Brother Xiaoyu, why are you so late today?”

Said a little boy about seven or eight years old, wearing a half-worn cotton jacket, with a dark little face with two red patches because winter had just passed, and he smiled naively.

Seeing Su Yu coming, he consciously gave up his squatting position for him to set up a stall, and then he familiarly took out a bench from the donkey cart and sat beside him.

Su Yu smiled and took out a white cloth-wrapped pastry from his pocket and handed it to him.

“I saw a good thing today, and forgot the time while haggling with the fishmonger.”

The boy’s name was Sanchuan, and he came every day to sell eggs. Because Su Yu had to go to the pier to buy goods in the morning, he was often delayed, so Sanchuan helped him occupy a booth in advance.

“What good stuff?”

Sancuan chewed the dough and leaned over curiously to see it.

Su Yu smiled mysteriously, caught one from the barrel and brought it in front of Sanchuan with both hands, then he suddenly opened his hands and sent it forward.

“Aaah!”

Sanchuan ducked back in fright and fell to the ground with a thud. He saw that Su Yu was holding a strange-looking thing in his hands, it was a large pile of soft things, glowing with a strange pink color, very terrifying.

“Hahahaha…”

Su Yu looked at Sanchuan and couldn’t stop laughing, “Don’t be afraid, this is delicious.”

“This weird thing can still be eaten? What is this?”

Sanchuan sucked air through his nose and got up from the ground, he then sat back on the small stool and looked at Su Yu in disbelief.

“Of course you can eat it, it’s called…squid…”

At the mention of this unfamiliar and familiar term, Su Yu felt a little disappointed. In the time he lived in, squids were only sold on the southern coast, and here they were even on the temperate seaside.

It has been three months since Su Yu traveled here, he still doubts that he was actually dreaming.

Maybe one day he will wake up and return to his original world. He was also the head chef of ChuanXiang Restaurant, joyfully cooking his spicy crap every day.

Before he left work he would send some seafood scraps to the wild cats at the back door. At night, he would go home to watch TV and play games…

Instead of being a poor penniless aristocrat in this inexplicable ancient world.

That’s right, don’t look at Su Yu as a fish seller, his identity in this ancient times was still a nobleman to say the least.

The ancestors of the Su family followed the Emperor Taizu to conquer the world and was made a marquis. Although the title was hereditary to Su Yu’s father, he was already a worthless second-class auxiliary general, but the nobility was after all the nobility, even without war achievements the noble can still rely on his salary to live a good life.

It was a pity that when Su Yu arrived his father had just passed away.

His uncle bullied him when because he was young and wanted to take his title. His aunt controlled the family budget, and because the family was not good at business there was no savings, and the funeral cost most of it, so his aunt used this to treat him harshly.

Not only did he not live the life of a playboy, but he couldn’t even get enough to eat!

In desperation, Su Yu had to go back to his old business, pulling the only donkey in the family and selling fish.

“Come, give me a grass carp.”

Someone came to buy fish, so Su Yu threw the squid in his hands into the bucket and responded with a smile, he then got up and took out the fence, fishing out a fat and strong grass carp in a large wooden basin filled with fresh water.

“Sir, do you think this one is okay?”

“Do you know how to kill fish?”

This was the first time the customer came here to buy fish.

Seeing that the owner of the stall was clean and white, he didn’t look like a fish seller at all, but looked like a handsome and gentle scholar, so he was hesitant for a while.

“Brother Xiaoyu is really good at killing fish!”

Sanchuan saw the man wrinkling his nose and said defiantly.

Su Yu smiled and didn’t answer, he took out the scale and weighed it, placing the stunned grass carp on the cutting board he quickly opened the belly, chopped the head and removed the scales, all of the movements were done in one go.

It was even more skilled than the old fishermen by the sea.

“Good craftsmanship!”

Carrying the slaughtered fish, the customer couldn’t help but admire it.

Su Yu took the copper coin and gave a wry smile, thinking that he had to kill fishes for five years before he could become a chef.

He was glad that he would no longer have to kill fish, but he never thought he would have to start from scratch now. He looked down at his slender hands.

Due to the prolonged exposure to salt water combined with the cold weather they had been frostbitten in several places, and they were no longer as fair as they were before.

If it weren’t for the lack of capital, he would have opened a restaurant long ago, if not why would he bother to sell fish with low cost and low returns. But…

Turning his head to look at the squid that was huddled together into a ball in the bucket, the smile on Su Yu’s lips couldn’t help but rise a little, now, there was a good opportunity for him to accumulate capital.

“Little brother, it’s not that I’m doubting you, but why did you buy this!”

Before the customer left he pointed at the squid in the bucket and shook his head, “No one buys this stuff.”