I Only Want to Lie Flat But Am Forced to Cultivate Immortality-Chapter 261 - 147: The Avenger of My Father

Thirty years ago, outside the West Gate of the Capital City, Guangning Temple.

Not far from the temple, there was a street called West Guard Street. Near the street, there was a family with the surname Jin.

This family consisted of three people. The head of the family, Jin Rengui, was a carpenter who usually made tables, chairs, benches, doors, windows, cabinets, beds, and other such items for a living.

Jin Rengui’s wife was the daughter of Butcher Zhang. Butcher Zhang lived within the city gates and was a well-respected local of the capital, which is why he always looked down on his carpenter son-in-law.

The carpenter’s wife had a fiery temper, while Jin Rengui was simple and honest. After getting married, they had a child. This child took after his mother, never afraid of anyone since a young age.

The gossiping old men and women at the street corner, the idle hooligans wandering around all day, the busybodies seeking new things in the city...

No matter who they were, he would strike up a conversation with them.

However, as the saying goes, "Proximity to cinnabar makes you red, proximity to ink makes you black." This carpenter’s child mingled with these people all day, what good could he learn!

On this day, Jin Wanshan, the child of Carpenter Jin, turned fourteen. Butcher Zhang sent an oiled paper package, inside which was a pound of chicken hearts.

"Daughter, take these chicken hearts and fry them for Wanshan to eat."

Jin Rengui wondered, "Father-in-law usually slaughters pigs and sheep, rarely chickens. How did he get so many chicken hearts today?"

Butcher Zhang replied coldly, "You are a useless fool. Even if someone defecates and urinates on your face, you wouldn’t get angry. I don’t want my grandson to be like you in the future!"

After saying this, Butcher Zhang turned to Jin Wanshan and instructed, "People say ’sly as a chicken,’ showing that chickens are smart and shrewd. Your grandfather has no other wishes, just that you don’t grow up to be as spineless as your father."

"Eat these chicken hearts and be a clever person in the future. Don’t become like those laborers at the door who toil their whole lives and earn nothing but grievances!"

"Grandfather, I will remember!"

"Remember what? Tell me."

"I’d rather be a sly, clever person than an honest man like my dad!"

Hearing these words, Butcher Zhang smiled with satisfaction. He reached out his greasy hand and ruffled his grandson’s hair.

"Xiaoshan has been smart since childhood. He will certainly achieve great things in the future!"

At this time, Jin Wanshan was fourteen. Butcher Zhang’s words gave him great confidence. Previously, when he mingled with those hooligans and idlers, Jin Rengui had preached to him a lot. But now, with his grandfather’s words, it was like having a Treasure Sword, no longer being restrained at home.

When he was fifteen or sixteen, Jin Wanshan rarely stayed home. He would leave at dawn each day and return only when the city gates were about to close, sometimes not even at night, occasionally staying out for two or three days.

Carpenter Jin asked him where he had been messing around. Jin Wanshan replied that he had found a way to make a fortune. With good luck, he could earn as much silver in a day as Carpenter Jin could in ten years!

Jin Rengui didn’t believe it. Could there really be such an easy thing in this world? If there was, would it come to their family?

Every time, Jin Wanshan would talk back to him, "You’re just a carpenter. Besides shaving wood and knocking nails, what do you know about anything?

Don’t bother with me. Even Grandfather praises me for being smart. How could I suffer a loss..."

On the eighth day of the twelfth lunar month, snowflakes began to fall in Luojing City.

From inside the West Gate of the Capital City, a few gambling house thugs drove a carriage out. Once they reached outside the gate, a coarse cloth sack was kicked off the carriage.

"Jin Wanshan, you have three days to repay the hundred taels of silver you owe. If you don’t repay on time, we’ll tear down your house for debt and send you to the palace as a eunuch!"

The black-and-blue Jin Wanshan hummed and crawled out of the coarse cloth sack, the words of the gambling house thugs still echoing in his ears.

These days, being a eunuch was not easy. In the past, eunuchs only underwent ’half-castration’ and could keep a pair of bells as a memento afterward. Thus, in the previous dynasty and even earlier, being a eunuch was a sought-after profession, with ordinary people even competing for it.

But Dayong was different.

In the Dayong dynasty, when the Cleansing Room performed the castration ceremony, they wouldn’t leave a memento. It meant complete removal from the root to the fruit.

This was called "emasculation," also known as "full castration."

The castration technique at this time was still relatively primitive. In the previous dynasties, the survival rate for half-castration was six or seven out of ten.

But being a eunuch in the Dayong dynasty, if two people survived, that would be considered a high survival rate. Sometimes, only one or two out of a group of seven or eight would survive.

Jin Wanshan was only fifteen or sixteen years old and didn’t want to die, much less become a eunuch.

What should he do then?

It’s no wonder Butcher Zhang said Jin Wanshan was smart from a young age. Crawling out of the coarse cloth sack, Jin Wanshan wandered around the city gate for a few laps, and a plan formed in his mind.

On the bulletin board at the city gate, there was a criminal bounty notice, offering a reward of three hundred taels of silver for a notorious bandit!

"Good, good, good! Truly, Heaven never bars the way!" Looking at the portrait, Jin Wanshan clapped his hands together three times in excitement.

The person on the bounty notice bore some resemblance to his carpenter father!

With a plan in mind, Jin Wanshan hurried home, intending to share the good news with his father.

Not far from the West Gate, there was Guangning Temple, bustling with worshippers. A few days ago, Jin Rengui, along with other carpenters, took an assignment for woodworking at the temple. Jin Wanshan found his father at the temple, persuading the overseer to give them a few taels of silver.

When Jin Rengui asked what he needed the money for, Jin Wanshan mysteriously said, "I have something great to tell you, Dad. Come home early today, and we can have a good drink together."

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