The Silly Alchemist

“He stopped breathing? Bury him then,” said Ye Lang calmly, “we’re entering the town now. Look for the businessmen of the town, tell them to bring me their goods. I’ll buy them.”

Ye Lang’s calmness calmed some of them down. At the same time, what he said raised a tiny, tiny question.

“Sir, what sort of businessmen? What do you want to buy?” asked the thin dark man, representing the crowd again. He’d been an active member of the group, many people looked up to him.

“All of them,” replied Ye Lang.

The crowd was stunned for a moment, then repeated, “?? All?”

“Yep, that’s right. All of them,” Ye Lang nodded. He thought to himself, “Even if I buy everything in this town, it might not be enough. I might need to head to the next town after that.”

“Sir, you mean we should gather all the businessmen of the town, to buy every product they have?” the thin dark man asked again to confirm.

“Yep, that’s exactly it. Is there a problem?” asked Ye Lang, looking at everyone.

“Is that even possible?” Of course everyone thought there was a problem. What are you trying to do, buying everything? Also, do you have enough money?

From an ordinary person’s perspective, perhaps they’d never be able to fathom that a person could buy everything in a town. This was ridiculous to them, it was impossible!

“Of course it is. Your questions must be about money. I’ll show you.” Ye Lang poured a pile of gold and silver coins onto the ground. Although it was a much smaller pile than the last few times he did this, the reactions it triggered was still as huge as before- perhaps even more dramatic.

Think about it. The past two groups of witnesses were robbers and rich people. Their tolerance for such extravagance was definitely higher than these commoners. These people had never seen so many gold and silver coins in their lives.

“Sir…”

At this moment, almost everyone was certain Ye Lang wasn’t a regular aristocrat. At the same time, the townsmen were relieved to have not offended Ye Lang in any way. The rations officer probably died for nothing though.

Well, he did deserve it to a certain extent. No one dared press the matter- or rather, to the refugees, this aristocrat would have a way to settle this problem.

However, they now had another question. Why was a person like this with a crowd of refugees? And without an entourage too. That girl didn’t seem like a servant either, she looked like a girl from a rich family too, although it seemed like she couldn’t speak.

“Bring some gold coins over. Tell the store owners I want everything they’re selling. The gold coins are waiting for them here,” said Ye Lang. He’d suddenly realised he didn’t even need to enter the town. Let them come to him instead.

Instead of collecting the goods from every shop, he might as well wait for them to bring their goods to him.

“Also, for the commoners, anyone who wants to sell something can also bring their things here,” added Ye Lang.

After this, except for a small portion of people, everyone entered the town.

In a moment, the entire town was in a flurry. News of this incident spread like wildfire.

Once the people knew Ye Lang was waiting to buy everything with his pile of gold coins, everyone started to surround him. Some didn’t even have anything to sell, they were only there to watch.

The town erupted in motion, and the gate Ye Lang was waiting at grew crowded as ever…

At this point, the soldiers and the refugees who’d stayed behind surrounded the pile of gold coins to ensure it was not stolen by anyone.

This was a peculiar scene. Why were both parties suddenly working together?

The main character of this commotion, the one who started the storm, was straightening his clothes. Ye Lang used a purifying alchemy formation to cleanse the dust on him. This revealed his original appearance- an aristocrat even richer than the Duke himself.

If only the ration officer had seen him like this, perhaps he wouldn’t have died. Perhaps he wouldn’t have been so rude in front of Ye Lang.

The Duke of the little town was still having a dilemma. There had been countless disaster victims who’d come seeking asylum in recent times. Although they’ve mostly been shut out, the town still brought in a very small group of them who were at the brink of death.

That was of course still not a problem yet. The problem was in accepting more people.

The Duke of the town was cursing someone. He cursed Gomera’s district head. Even if it was the worst drought in a hundred years, it shouldn’t have turned out like this. Some other places also had droughts but they didn’t have a single refugee because they’d worked it out internally.

Sigh, this disaster wasn’t natural, it was the consequence of human actions.

“What’s going on outside? Why are they so loud?” very soon, the Duke heard the rumblings of a crowd outside. He was about to send someone to look when someone came running to report.

“My— My lord, the refugees, the refugees…” The person was panting hard from running too fast.

“Speak. What is the matter? Are the refugees coming in?” frowned the Duke. If that were the case, then he’ll have to conduct a serious investigation among the guards.

“Yes, yes they’ve entered,” huffed the messenger, patting his chest.

“What? What are all of you doing? How could you let them in? Aren’t you all supposed to distribute some porridge and send them off?” the Duke didn’t actually think they’d entered the town.

“We distributed the porridge, yes, but they’re not regular refugees. They… They’re here to buy everything. They want everything,” reported the messenger, puzzled.

Refugees here to shop? Everything?

The Duke stared at the messenger with a confused look. He suspected…

“Did you say something wrong, or did I hear something wrong?”

“No, no one is wrong. I heard the person leading this batch of refugees is a very rich aristocrat. He has dumped a pile of gold coins outside our gates, saying he wants to buy everything we have in the town,” said the messenger.

“Prep the horse, I need to meet this person at the gates. I need to see who he is, to be able to buy everything in our town,” cried the Duke. He knew staying in his residence was useless. He had to head to the gates to speak to this Ye Lang.

If he were to stay, he believed Ye Lang wouldn’t come in to meet him either because to Ye Lang, a Duke of a little town was a minor character.

Then again, even if he was someone prominent, Ye Lang might not come to meet him either unless there was something important.