ITBBS Chapter 11

After dinner, Shen Yao thought about going to the town the next day to use up some ration tickets that were about to expire and also check out the black market. So she headed towards the team leader’s house.

Perhaps because it was dinnertime, she didn’t run into anyone along the way. She reached the team leader’s house without any trouble. It was a standard four-room green brick and tile house with a courtyard a bit larger than the Shen family’s.

“Uncle, Auntie, are you home?” Shen Yao knocked on the courtyard gate and called out a few times.

“Yes, we’re home. Come in.”

“Yao Yao’s here! Come inside.” Shen Qiu came dashing out, opened the gate, and pulled Shen Yao into the house.

Seeing that the family was still eating, Shen Yao said apologetically, “Uncle, Auntie, sorry to disturb your meal.”

“Yao Yao’s here. Sit down and eat with us,” Shen Guoqing and Xu Dani said in unison.

“No thanks, I’ve already eaten. I came to ask Uncle to write me a letter of introduction. I want to go to the county town tomorrow to inquire about the job.”

Shen Yao felt that the job was the best excuse. If she didn’t say that, they would definitely worry, so she had to tell a small lie.

“Of course. The job situation really needs to be settled properly.” Shen Guoqing thought the matter of a job was important and indeed needed to be settled as soon as possible. He stood up and went inside to get a letter of introduction.

“Uncle, please give me a five-day one. I’m worried that if something unexpected comes up, I might need time to deal with it.”

If she were coming back the same day, she wouldn’t need a letter of introduction at all. She wanted to take this opportunity to visit a few more places. The time before the Lunar New Year was the best for selling goods. Besides, with the current hard times, there were shortages of food and supplies everywhere, and prices on the black market were bound to skyrocket. There was no way she could miss out on this.

“Alright, five days it is.” Shen Guoqing didn’t think much of it. He was about to sign and stamp the paper.

“Who needs all that trouble? Yao Yao, take these. You can fill them out whenever you need them.”

Shen Qiu snatched a stack of blank letters of introduction from her father’s hands, stamped them in a few quick motions, and stuffed them into Shen Yao’s hands.

The corner of Shen Yao’s mouth twitched. She found this girl’s personality quite amusing. Was it really okay to pit her own father like this? However, this kind of personality was exactly to her liking.

“Well then, Uncle, Auntie, I’ll head back now. Cousin Xiao Qiu, I’ll bring you something to eat when I get back.” With that, Shen Yao hurried away. She was kidding. With so many blank letters of introduction, she could go anywhere she wanted in the future. Running away was definitely the best strategy.

“Okay, Yao Yao, be careful. I’ll come find you at your place when you get back,” Shen Qiu waved.

Shen Guoqing was both angry and helpless. He felt that his daughter had truly been spoiled. Was this any way to hand out letters of introduction? “You brat, is this how you pit your own father?”

“Enough of you. Yao Yao is not an outsider. It’s just a stack of letters of introduction. Don’t forget that the chicken you ate tonight was given to us by Yao Yao.”

Xu Dani glared at Shen Guoqing. Her old man was good in every way, but whenever it came to official matters, he was especially rigid and by-the-book, going on and on endlessly. Yao Yao was such a good girl. Even when she caught wild pheasants, she thought of them. But this old man didn’t know how to be flexible at all.

“Exactly, exactly. The fact that we had meat tonight is all thanks to Yao Yao.”

Shen Qiu nodded repeatedly. Their family’s meal with meat tonight was all thanks to Yao Yao. That fat pheasant weighed almost three jin¹3 jin = approximately 1.5 kg after removing the feathers and innards. Her mother stewed the pheasant with potatoes and made a big pot. They gave a large bowl to each of her two sisters-in-law and still had plenty left at home. So not just one stack of letters, even two stacks would be nothing.

What else could Shen Guoqing say? If he said anything more, he probably wouldn’t be eating dinner tonight.

Meanwhile, after leaving the team leader’s house, Shen Yao realized it was already dark. She took a flashlight out of her space and hurried back.

When she got inside, she felt a chill. She couldn’t stand sleeping in a cold bed, so she went directly into her space.

Xiao Ling knew Shen Yao had entered and flew over immediately: “Master, are you done with everything?”

Shen Yao hugged the little phoenix before saying, “Mm, I just got back. Xiao Ling, I’m going to soak in the hot spring for a while.”

She had been busy all day and felt a bit tired, so she headed straight for the hot spring, enjoyed a relaxing bath, and then went back to her room.

Xiao Ling saw her master come out and floated in mid-air to ask, “Master, are you going to cultivate now?”

“No, I want to look at the things I stored in the space yesterday first, then get a good night’s sleep.” Since she had time, she decided to take a look.

She went to the warehouse where things were stored and looked at the dozens of chests. Shen Yao first opened the chests she had ransacked from the Ye family.

The first chest was full of gold bars. Three were missing from the top row, which probably meant that the Ye family’s cash was acquired by exchanging gold bars. Shen Yao opened the second chest. It was also full of gold bars but untouched. The third chest contained big yellow croakers²large gold bars. The rest included one chest of jade jewelry, two chests of calligraphy and paintings, two chests of porcelain, several chests of antique items of good quality, and over twenty scattered pieces of gold and silver jewelry.

Shen Yao was speechless with amazement. Where had the Ye family managed to steal so many things? There was no way all this belonged to them.

She counted the cash—2,400 yuan in total, all new big black ten yuan bills, probably freshly exchanged for gold bars at the bank. There were also dozens of ration tickets.

No wonder the lazy Ye family had a house even better than the team leader’s, and every one of them was as fat as a pig.

Nowadays, a single gold bar weighing ten taels could be exchanged at the bank for over 1,300 yuan. And their family had several large chests of gold.

But now, she had taken it all out. Let’s see how arrogant the Ye family could be from now on.

Since the original owner’s memories contained no relevant clues, she would have to set them aside for now. After she got back from town, she would ask Auntie if there had ever been any important figures in the village or something like that.

Next, Shen Yao opened the Shen family’s chests. The first ten chests were all gold bars. Then there were two chests of big yellow croakers, two chests of small yellow croakers, one chest of silver dollars, nine chests of jewelry and ornaments, five chests of rare ancient books, seven chests of porcelain vases, and eight chests of calligraphy and paintings. Any single item would be priceless decades later. The last small chest contained two bags of diamonds, one bag of gold peanuts, one bag of pearls, and several pieces of top-grade jade.

Shen Yao calmed herself down. She had to admire Grandpa Shen’s eye for quality. All the antiques he collected were top-grade. The Shen family had never flaunted their wealth. No one would ever have guessed they had such a rich fortune.

She put all the cash in a box. Compared to those rich folks, her little bit was just small change. She still had to keep working hard.

She could still buy houses privately at this time, so she needed to earn money to buy a house. When school started next year, she didn’t want to live in a dormitory. With her space, living in a large dorm would be very inconvenient. She needed her own private space for safety.

After that, she lay down on the big soft bed in her room and fell asleep instantly…