The Capital

1,171 words

Everyone stared. Things you rarely saw even at a big market were everywhere here, ordinary as mud.

Gouwa bought a finely made red rattle-drum from a stall, shook it a few times, and a grin spread across his face.

“Grown man, playing with that. Embarrassing.” Lü Xiucai stood to the side, arms crossed, his face full of disdain.

“What I play with is my business. Better than you—your soul’s practically been dragged off by the whores in those brothels. Drool running down your chin and you don’t even wipe it.” Gouwa tucked the rattle-drum into his chest and shot back.

Lü Xiucai was about to retort when Lü Zhuangyuan, at the head of the group, spoke. “Since we’re here, let’s find a place to rest first.”

Lü Zhuangyuan felt he hadn’t done much—just looked around a bit—and already two hours had slipped past.

Seeing no objection from Gouwa, he led the group to find an inn. After searching here and there, they finally settled on the smallest one they could find.

Even though it was the tiniest inn available, when Lü Zhuangyuan asked about the food prices, his eye sockets practically bulged in shock. Too damn expensive.

“Sixteen bowls of plain noodles~”

After the waiter walked away with a look of utter contempt, Lü Zhuangyuan cleared his throat. “Plain noodles are fine, actually. We haven’t had noodles in a while. Nice to switch things up.”

Lü Xiucai’s attention wasn’t on the noodles at all. Frowning slightly, he leaned toward Gouwa. “Well? We’re in the capital now. But the capital’s huge. How are we supposed to find Master and Mistress?”

Gouwa pulled two chopsticks from the bamboo tube and sucked on them. “What’s the rush? A hot guy like me has a brain. You think I can’t figure something out?”

“Hmph. You’re smart. If you’re smart, there’s no stupid people left in the world.” But despite the sarcasm, Lü Xiucai didn’t press further. He reached into his chest and pulled out a half-length copper-coin sword hilt bound with hemp rope, and began threading another coin onto it with focused care.

The plain noodles arrived soon after. Cheap as they were, to people who had been sleeping out in the open, they were a feast.

As the entire Lü troupe noisily slurped their noodles, several people dressed in fine silks stepped into the inn and began exchanging pleasantries with a middle-aged man inside.

“Hey! Manager Wu. What a pleasure!”

“Haha, Old Wang. How’s your theater doing these days?”

“Oh! Isn’t this Squire Zhao? Why the long face? Did your pharmacy go under?”

Lü Zhuangyuan, who had been buried in his noodles, suddenly stretched his neck out long and leaned excitedly in their direction.

After eavesdropping for a while, he couldn’t care less about the noodles anymore. He wiped his mouth on his sleeve, shook the dust off his clothes, and sidled over.

“What’s your old man doing?” Gouwa asked Lü Xiucai.

“Hah! What do you think? The deadbeat’s buying himself a coffin!” Lü Xiucai had barely spat out the words when a burst of loud laughter came from Lü Zhuangyuan’s direction.

“This is the capital! You think your surname is Ji? You think you have what it takes to buy a theater here? Even if you had the money, you couldn’t buy one!”

“That little bit of silver, and you actually dream of buying a theater in the capital? Hahaha! The lead actor in my theater earns more in tips in one night than that!”

Lü Zhuangyuan came back with a dark face. He sat down silently at his old spot and went back to eating his noodles.

After wolfing down the last of it, he stood up sharply. “Let’s go. Find another inn. We’re not staying in this place, no matter how cheap.”

“Ohhh, a low-class actor with a backbone!”

“Motherfucker!” Lü Xiucai cursed, raising the half-length copper-coin sword hilt, but his older brother Lü Juren immediately grabbed him. “Xiucai! Don’t start trouble!”

Once they were outside the inn, Lü Juren let him go—and immediately caught a hard kick from Lü Xiucai.

“Fine! I’m done! I’m not an actor anyway! The insults were for them, not me! I’m a man with divine powers now! Gouwa, let’s go! Find Master!”

Gouwa exchanged a few low words with Lü Juren, then quickened his pace to catch up. “Hey, slow down. What’s the rush? You know where Senior Brother Li is right now?”

Gouwa’s question stopped Lü Xiucai halfway across a stone bridge. Staring at the distant boats with a disgusted expression, he said, “Look at them! Divine powers right in front of them, and they’re too stupid to learn! All they think about is those low-class theaters and troupes! Cocksure with their own people, but when an outsider shows up, they can’t squeeze out a single fart!”

“Heh. Weren’t you going to kill your old man? Now you’re disappointed he won’t shape up?”

“Of course I’m going to kill him!! You think I was joking? I’ll go back right now and kill the old bastard!!”

“Alright, alright. Are we looking for Senior Brother Li or not? You think we came all this way for a picnic?” Gouwa’s words made the fuming Lü Xiucai turn around. “Don’t you have a way to find Master? So where is it?”

“Just follow me. Xiucai, show a little respect. Your master is my senior brother, so by rights, you should call me ‘Uncle.’”

Gouwa led Lü Xiucai through the bustling streets of the capital. He didn’t go anywhere special—just the doorways of inns and taverns.

Before long, he found what he was looking for: a group of beggars eating leftover scraps.

“Sh-sh-sh-sh.” Gouwa jingled a string of copper coins in his hand, pacing back and forth near the beggars.

When he saw he had their attention, he chuckled and said, “I’m looking for someone. Whoever can find them gets this string of cash.”

“This is your plan?”

“Shh! Don’t interrupt.” Gouwa dangled the coins in front of the beggars. “I’m looking for two people. A male Daoist in a red robe with two swords on his back. And a woman—skin so white it’s like a dead pig’s.”

“I know! Six days ago, Little Pomelo said he was delivering a letter for someone south of the city!! The person was wearing a red robe!”

“Oh? And Little Pomelo? Is he here? Where was he delivering it?”

“He didn’t come back after the delivery. The south side is taken by other beggars. I didn’t dare go looking for him.”

A filthy hand reached for the coins, but Gouwa lifted them higher. “That’s nothing. Vague and empty. What do I need that for? I’m asking where they are now.”

“See them in person. Take me to them. Then the money’s yours.”

Driven by the prospect of the coins, the beggars scattered, starting their search.

“Alright, Xiucai. Let’s head back. Now we just wait.” Gouwa’s face was full of smug satisfaction.

“This is really going to find Master?” Lü Xiucai was half-convinced.

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Reading Guide Decoding

Noodles, Insults, and a Beggar Net — Losing Face in the Big City

Cultural / Xianxia Notes

The Nine Classes (九流) and Social Mobility: This chapter is a brutal reminder that in the Dao-Twisted World, your profession determines your place in the cosmic hierarchy, and that place is nearly impossible to escape. The “low-class actor” (下九流) insult isn’t just a slur—it’s a legal and social reality codified in traditional Chinese class systems. Actors, prostitutes, and entertainers occupied the absolute bottom tier, barred from owning certain properties and subject to casual contempt from merchants who were themselves only one rung higher. Lü Zhuangyuan’s dream of buying a theater in the capital isn’t just ambitious—it’s laughable precisely because the system is designed to keep him out. This isn’t merely prejudice; it’s structural violence dressed in polite laughter.

Beggars as Intelligence Networks: Using beggars as spies and informants is a classic trope in Chinese martial arts and Jianghu fiction. In a society where the poor are invisible to the wealthy, beggars can move through streets, alleys, and back doors without drawing attention. A string of copper coins—a pittance to the rich—is a fortune to them, making them the most cost-effective and far-reaching intelligence network available to outsiders like Gouwa. This tactic appears in countless wuxia stories, from Louis Cha’s Demi-Gods and Semi-Devils to underdog heroes in modern web novels. Gouwa may be lazy and sly, but he knows how the world’s forgotten people work.

The Copper Coin Sword (铜钱剑): Lü Xiucai is still repairing his half-finished copper coin sword by threading coins onto a hemp-bound hilt. In Daoist ritual, a sword made of 108 old coins strung on red cord is a powerful exorcism tool, used to cut through evil spirits, negative energy, and demonic influence. Each coin represents a unit of yang energy (from circulation and human touch), and the red cord represents life force. That Lü Xiucai is painstakingly repairing his—even while griping about his father—suggests that despite his bratty demeanor, he takes his cultivation seriously enough to maintain his gear in the middle of a city street.

Chapter Overview

Our ragged band of wanderers finally makes it to the capital, and the culture shock hits like a faceful of cold reality. Lü Zhuangyuan’s dream of buying a theater gets laughed into the gutter by local rich men who treat his life savings like pocket change, forcing the old actor to confront just how far down the social ladder he really is. Meanwhile, Gouwa unveils his brilliant plan for finding Li Huowang in a city of a million people: bribing beggars. It’s a chapter of simmering resentment, class humiliation, and the quiet desperation of people who know they don’t belong here—but have nowhere else to go.

Key Plot Points

The capital’s sheer scale and wealth are established through small, crushing details: market goods that would be rare anywhere else are utterly commonplace, and even the cheapest inn is extortionate.
Lü Zhuangyuan overhears local merchants and squires discussing theater properties and makes a pitiful attempt to join the conversation; he is ridiculed for his lack of money and status as a “low-class actor,” and returns to the table in silence to finish his noodles.
Lü Xiucai’s simmering rage at his father boils over after the humiliation; he threatens to go back and kill the “old bastard,” but his older brother Lü Juren physically restrains him from starting a fight inside the inn.
Lü Xiucai declares himself a “man with divine powers now” and disavows the acting profession entirely, claiming the insults were for his family, not for him—a fragile, self-serving distinction that reveals his growing delusion of superiority.
Gouwa calms him down and takes him on a tour of the capital’s tavern and inn doorways, where he uses a string of copper coins to recruit beggars as informants, dangling the reward for anyone who can lead him to a red-robed Daoist and a white-skinned woman.
One beggar recalls that “Little Pomelo” delivered a letter for someone matching that description six days ago, but Little Pomelo never returned from the south side of the city—an ominous detail suggesting that Li Huowang’s presence has already disturbed the local underworld.
Gouwa sends the beggars out to search, then turns back with smug satisfaction, leaving Lü Xiucai half-convinced but deeply uneasy.

Reading Guide

This chapter is a palate cleanser and a positioning move—no epic battles, no cosmic horror, just the quiet, grinding misery of class warfare inside a noodle shop. But don’t let the mundane setting fool you. The real tension here isn’t between Lü Zhuangyuan and the merchant who laughed at him; it’s between Lü Xiucai’s growing sense of superiority (he has divine powers now!) and the cold reality that those powers didn’t change his family’s social standing one bit. He can kill his father if he wants to, but that won’t make the city let him in. Keep an eye on that resentment—it’s a fuse, and Li Huowang might be the one who lights it next time these two paths cross. Also, Gouwa using beggars as an impromptu spy network is the smartest thing anyone in this troupe has done all arc. Respect the hustle.