Zhang San, please behave yourself!
Chapter 217 - 210: Fengdu County Magistrate

Chapter 217: Chapter 210: Fengdu County Magistrate

Zhang San, continuing his journey, decided to take the waterway.

The further south he traveled, the more abundant the water became. Traveling by waterway was actually more convenient.

As luck would have it, just as Zhang San arrived at the ferry, he saw a rather large passenger ship waiting for guests to board.

The cost for one person to board was only fifteen wen, which wasn’t expensive.

However, seeing that Zhang San also had Hei with him, the other party immediately said that such a large horse would need thirty-five wen.

Zhang San looked at Hei helplessly and left with him.

After a short while, Hei, having transformed into a humanoid form, lined up with Zhang San again.

But by that time, many people had already lined up ahead of them.

As Zhang San waited to board the ship, he suddenly noticed an old woman in the queue ahead was stealing the purse from the waist of a woman in front of her.

The Town Martial Office could manage martial artists, but it was not their place to intervene in ordinary people’s affairs.

However, seeing an ordinary person stealing a purse, Zhang San felt he couldn’t just ignore it.

Yet he was worried that if he accused the old woman of theft, she might instead make a false counter-accusation against him.

Just then, a middle-aged man dressed in scholarly attire in front of Zhang San approached and seized the old woman’s wrist.

"Madam, it’s not easy for anyone to be away from home. How can you steal someone else’s purse?"

As the middle-aged man spoke, the woman in front realized that the old woman behind her had stolen her purse.

She turned around and started cursing vehemently, from the old woman’s ancestors to her descendants before finally leaving off.

Fortunately, the old woman was mentally resilient and didn’t succumb to the accusation; instead, she played the sympathy card.

"I didn’t want to steal! If there was any other way to survive, who would choose to be a thief? My family is truly out of food. I can starve; it doesn’t matter if I die, I’m old anyway. But please think of my little grandson, he’s only three years old!"

The middle-aged man’s face showed pity as he loosened the old woman’s wrist and returned the purse to the woman ahead.

Even though the insults were severe, hearing about the old woman’s dire family situation, she let it go and turned to continue lining up.

At this moment, whether those still in line or others who had already boarded, everyone was observing the commotion.

The middle-aged man took out his own purse and pulled out some copper coins, around three hundred wen, and handed them to the old woman.

"Elderly madam, your difficult life is assuredly the local officials’ failure to do their duty. It’s their responsibility, so this incident is not all your fault."

The old woman, upon seeing the man give her money and even speak on her behalf, although she had been caught by him, felt that the scholarly middle-aged man was a good person. She was about to kneel down to thank him,

but was quickly helped up by the middle-aged man.

"However, the fact that you stole is true. Take this money back and ensure your family takes good care of your little grandson, and then... go to the government office and turn yourself in."

The knees of the old woman, who was about to kneel, suddenly stiffened back into place.

Yet, she still expressed her gratitude to the middle-aged man.

"I thank you! I truly thank you!"

With those words, the old woman turned and left.

Zhang San watched the old woman’s retreating figure, not sure if she would indeed turn herself in now that she had the money.

He turned his head back to the middle-aged man who had resumed his place in line,

and the eyes of the woman in front of him and several young girls were filled with admiration.

Clearly, these people seemed to be a family, apparently a master and his wife with two daughters and a maid.

Judging by the family’s attire, they should be considered wealthy.

Zhang San couldn’t help but be curious. People of such character who travel outside, aren’t they supposed to have been swindled out of even their underpants?

Of course, he wasn’t interested in the man’s underpants; he just felt that this person’s way of doing things was quite different from anyone else he had seen in this world so far.

After boarding the ship, Zhang San noticed that the other party’s two daughters and maid began to chatter on deck, while the woman watched them from a not too distant spot.

The middle-aged man turned and looked off in the northeast direction.

Zhang San followed the man’s gaze and saw nothing but a harbor that wasn’t very spacious and a somewhat dilapidated inn not far away.

His gaze had the look of someone worried about the country and its people. What was he looking at?

Suddenly, Zhang San realized that the northeast direction from their location was where the Capital Region Road is situated, leading to Daxing City, the capital of the Great Sui.

With this in mind, Zhang San became quite interested and walked over to the man.

Hei, who had transformed into a human, had nowhere else to go, so he could only follow behind Zhang San.

Zhang San approached the middle-aged man with a fist-and-palm salute and spoke softly, "I am Zhang San, may I inquire how to address you, sir?"

"Zhang Pu. A resident of the Capital City."

Zhang San thought to himself: Sure enough! I knew this style of conduct didn’t seem like that of someone accustomed to traveling abroad.

Therefore, Zhang San fully utilized his verbal artistry and deceptive abilities and quickly extracted all sorts of information from the other party.

The Zhang Pu family lived in Daxing City of the Capital, with fairly good conditions. From a young age, he studied and was eager to serve the country.

Before the Kaihuang ascension to the throne, the nation was not yet the Great Sui, so at that time, many viewed it as a usurpation of power.

Zhang Pu had once vehemently cursed it, but later, when Kaihuang introduced the imperial examinations, it gave someone from the lower echelons like Zhang Pu the opportunity to become an official, and he thought he had been wrong.

After some more thought, he felt he was not wrong after all.

Even if it was Kaihuang, any faults should be called out.

So, the straight-forward Zhang Pu, after several years, finally passed the examinations and became an official in the Great Sui.

Because he was among the first group of people who relocated to the newly constructed Daxing City, he was viewed favorably by his superiors.

Thanks to his personal efforts, after ten years, he was dispatched outside of the Capital, and now, he had been assigned to serve as the County Magistrate in Fengdu County of Lingzhou down the Chuan-Yu Road.

At this moment, Zhang San listened with a slight frown as Zhang Pu talked about his grand ambitions, how he hoped for the Great Sui to be peaceful and the citizens to live in prosperity.

Zhang San didn’t understand. After being an official for such a long time, hadn’t he realized that his direct and not particularly profitable method of governance wasn’t working?

So, Zhang San asked softly, "Mr. Zhang, I’m a bit curious, once you get to Fengdu County, how do you plan to ensure the citizens have enough to eat and clothes to wear?"

Zhang San hoped that this guy wouldn’t turn out to be purely theoretical, and actually knew nothing in practice.

However, the four words that Zhang Pu said next caught Zhang San off guard.

"Adapt to local conditions."

After saying this, Zhang Pu added with a smile, "I’m not familiar with the situation in Fengdu County. So if you ask me now, I couldn’t possibly just come up with an answer off the top of my head. I can only wait until I get to Fengdu County and see with my eyes, listen with my ears, and walk through the fields and rural areas with my feet, to truly understand how the people of Fengdu County live and what their demands are in order to be a good County Magistrate."

Zhang San originally thought that Zhang Pu was somewhat old-fashioned and stubborn, yet it turned out that the man was indeed not purely theoretical.

At least from what he’d heard so far, the man’s words seemed quite sensible.

But just as Zhang San was about to compliment Zhang Pu, he suddenly heard a chorus of girls’ screams coming from the bow of the boat.