Tianjin Acropolis in January of the seventh year of Chongzhen.
The New Year has just ended, and the weather is still very cold. The howling cold wind blows on the street, making people's faces hurt. The pedestrians on Dongchengheng Street are all wearing cotton-padded clothes, and most people's cotton-padded clothes are full of patches, dark and autumn-like.
It maintains the same tone as the black and gray buildings in the Acropolis. The road is very dirty, with dirt and horse excrement everywhere. The sewers on both sides of the road have long been blocked by garbage, and the dirty water has frozen next to the garbage.
The entire sewer was filled with garbage and feces. Fortunately, the weather was cold at this time, otherwise the smell would have been enough to make Li Zhi vomit while walking on the street.
This is the end of Ming Dynasty.
Li Zhi is a time traveler who just traveled from the 21st century to Tianjin Acropolis in the late Ming Dynasty six days ago. Although Li Zhi has become accustomed to his identity, he has not yet fully adapted to everything of this era.
Before time travel, Li Zhi was an industrial designer.
The strange thing is: Li Zhi's name is Li Zhi in the 21st century, and when he traveled to the late Ming Dynasty, the eighteen-year-old boy his soul occupied happened to be also named Li Zhi. He took over the body of the young Li Zhi.
, the time traveler Li Zhi also obtained all the memories of this young man.
But the situation Li Zhi faced after traveling through time was not very good.
Wearing mourning clothes, Li Zhi walked into Jingbianfang, Dongcheng, where Li Zhi's family is located. He felt that there was less garbage on the road, and there were no piles of human and animal excrement on the street corners. It was obvious that this was a relatively wealthy neighborhood, and every family had a hut. But
Before Li Zhi could catch his breath, he heard the neighbors talking.
The houses next to the road all have shop fronts. When the women and waiters sitting in the fronts saw Li Zhi, they all started talking.
"If Li Cheng throws his hands away, the Li family may be doomed. Now that the stupid and stupid Li Zhi is in charge, how can the Li family survive?"
"Don't talk about it. I heard that Li Cheng spent sixty taels on medical treatment before he died, all borrowed from the Xiao family. In three months, if the Li family still doesn't pay, they will use the Li family yard to pay off the debt."
"Sixty taels? That's a lot of money spent!"
"There's still interest! Five-cent interest!"
"The Li family's pepper business isn't booming either. Now that idiot Li Zhi is in charge, how can we get money? Tsk, tsk, isn't the Li family doomed? Are they going to live on the streets?"
"I won't say it anymore. We have been neighbors for so many years, but I didn't expect that the Li family would end up like this."
Hearing the comments from the neighbors, Li Zhi frowned, stopped unhappily, and glanced at the talkative neighbors. However, Li Zhi's reputation was that he was always stupid, and no one took his unhappiness seriously.
Everyone continued to talk among themselves. Seeing that his protest was ineffective, Li Zhi lowered his head and walked quickly to his home.
Li Zhi's house is located in a courtyard adjacent to Hengda Street. The front of the street is a spacious shop, which is the Li family's pepper shop. Li Zhi's younger brother Li Xing, a sixteen-year-old boy with handsome features, wears a coat full of
The patched and torn cotton-padded jacket sat in the store, bored and guarding two bags of pepper shipped from Southeast Asia.
The goods are there, but there are no customers.
When he saw Li Zhi coming home, Li Xing only glanced at him and didn't even say hello. It was obvious that he had no respect for this older brother who had always been dull and silly.
Inside the shop is a courtyard with two entrances. The entrance is covered with a black-tiled gatehouse and screen wall. The courtyard is paved with blue bricks. The layout is quite particular, proving that the family was once wealthy. However, the courtyard has long been dilapidated, and the bricks and tiles are now in ruins.
They were all somewhat incomplete and lacked their former glory. The Li family did not care about their former respectability, so they opened up an area under the corner of the yard, surrounded by bamboo fences, and raised chickens inside. There was a well in the second yard.
, there are two vegetable plots on both sides. It was cold at this time, so no vegetable seedlings were planted.
A middle-aged woman in mourning clothes, in her early forties, with gray hair and wrinkled face, was busy in front of the loom in the main room. Although the hair on her head was gray, it was pulled up properly.
Although the cotton clothes on his body were worn and patched, they were clean.
This is Li Zhi’s mother, Mrs. Zheng.
Weaving is a tiring job, and you have to work from early morning to night every day to earn a bowl of food. However, your family is in decline, and Mrs. Zheng has to work hard every day to sleep peacefully.
Seeing Li Zhi coming back, Mrs. Zheng dropped the loom in her hand and came out, looking at Li Zhi anxiously.
"Zhi'er, is your second grandfather willing to raise money to save us?"
Li Zhi's trip was to raise money from the patriarch of the family, Li Zhi's second grandfather.
Three months ago, Li Zhi's father, Li Cheng, suffered from a serious illness and he vomited blood every day. At that time, the family was in a panic and went to the doctor for a consultation. He was told that he had heat accumulation in the liver and stomach and blood stasis. On weekdays,
, a family of four in the Li family ran a pepper shop, and the business was bleak. How much savings did they have? But buying medicine required money. In order to save his life, Li Zhi used his own house as a mortgage and borrowed money from the Xiao family, a wealthy family in the neighborhood.
silver.
First five taels, then ten taels, fifteen taels, and finally sixty taels of silver, for a period of six months, with an interest of five cents a month. They had a house as mortgage, and a high interest rate of five cents was agreed upon. The Xiao family was once again
I borrowed it every time. But who knew that after all the money was spent, the medicine was useless. His condition was so bad that Li Zhi's father died a month ago.
Now, Li Zhi's family is unable to repay the money, and is about to use the house to pay off the debt. With the house gone, Li Zhi's family of three will live on the streets. Li Zhi went to the clan leader, the second grandfather, in the hope that the second grandfather could appeal to the clan.
After a while, various relatives were asked to collect dozens of taels of silver for the Li Zhi family and lend it to Li Zhi, and first pay off the debts owed by the Xiao family.
But this is just a fantasy of Li Zhi's family. Two men in Li Zhi's family are about to become adults and are about to get married. There is money everywhere. The family of three is guarding a pepper shop with a bleak business, with little income and many expenses.
, Relatives all know: lending money to Li Zhi will obviously be in vain or not come back.
Long before Li Zhi traveled through time, the patriarch of the Li family had rejected Li Zhi several times. The time traveler Li Zhi knew this situation and originally did not want to ask for help. However, it was only because of Zheng's repeated request that Li Zhi went. But
As a result, it still didn't work.
Li Zhi replied calmly: "Second Grandpa is unwilling to raise money for us."
When Mrs. Zheng heard this answer, her face froze, and tears welled up in her eyes. Holding on to the door frame of the hall, Ms. Zheng said helplessly: "In this time of war and chaos, will our family live on the streets?"
Li Zhi said: "Second Grandpa said that he doesn't have the money, but he can be our guarantee and let Li Xing and I work as servants in the homes of wealthy families."
After saying this, Li Zhi smiled, as if he was laughing at the second grandfather's nonsense.
Being a servant in a rich family is the most humble job in this era. Not only does an ordinary servant have a low social status, he can be beaten and scolded by his master, even if he is beaten to death, no one will care about him. Moreover, the remuneration for being a servant is very low, and he may not be able to afford a wife for the rest of his life.
.
As a time traveler, even if I don't have the bastard spirit to recruit countless subordinates, how can I be reduced to the status of a servant?
