After Li Xian finished asking the "Three Martial Arts Questions," he roughly understood the gist of it, and after thanking Pang Long, he couldn’t bear the hunger in his stomach any longer and started to devour the food joyfully.
A few chunks of greasy fat meat went down his stomach.
With his belly filled, he gained strength, and quickly cleaned up the plate, rare to have his stomach full, his mood brightened up.
But he couldn’t help thinking:
"I’m full now. But I wonder how my brother is doing out there alone now."
"Five hundred Wen Coins is not a small amount. Occasionally having a meat meal shouldn’t be difficult. If there’s a chance, I should go back and see my brother."
...
After coming out of the Vegetarian Restaurant, Pang Long suddenly heard a ring, it was the lady’s summon.
He dared not linger and had to see the lady, but leaving Li Xian here alone was not an option.
Just then, a Nursing Home guard came face to face, and he called out, "Zhao Han, this kid is new, take care of him and help him get familiar."
After saying this, he hurried away.
"Hello, little brother, I saw the previous fight, really didn’t expect it, the winner was you."
The guard named Zhao Han, with a kind smile, didn’t look down on Li Xian for his servant background.
Li Xian cupped his hands and said, "Brother Zhao, from now on, we will be working together, I hope for your guidance."
"Hahaha, naturally, naturally." Zhao Han laughed heartily.
He saw Li Xian’s clothes were tattered, hair messy, face with dirt, and said, "Commander Pang asked me to take care of you, naturally I will do it thoroughly, follow me quickly."
Brought new clothes for Li Xian.
"I’ll take you to the bathhouse, have a wash, and change into new clothes."
"The Nursing Home clothes are more resilient, far better than the servant clothes. You don’t need to wear these clothes anymore."
"After taking them off, just throw them away."
Li Xian was delighted to hear he could wash up.
Since traveling here, he hadn’t washed his body once, filthy, no different from a beggar.
The Nursing Home has a big bathhouse specifically for this purpose.
Inside are individual cubicles, Zhao Han took Li Xian to the bathhouse, then realized he didn’t have a bath bucket, and said, "You don’t have a bucket yet, use mine first."
Next to the bathhouse is a water well, and the bathing water all comes from this well.
The well water is warm in winter and cool in summer, but the so-called "warm in winter" is only relative to the air temperature, once poured on the body, it is very cold.
Li Xian took off his clothes, picked up the wooden bucket, and poured it over from top to bottom. The cold water instantly drenched him.
By this time, it’s already winter, although it hadn’t snowed, it was very cold.
But soon, the chill began to fade away, a warm feeling came back, invigorating his spirit.
Li Xian braced against the cold, scrubbing the dirt off his body, tidying his messy long hair.
"Geez, is being a servant this tough?"
"This kid... is somewhat enviable."
Zhao Han, who was watching from the side, couldn’t help but marvel, lowering his gaze and comparing with his hand.
Then looked at himself, unconfidently comparing, and felt a slight sense of inferiority.
After pouring seven full buckets of water, Li Xian’s skin was frozen red, but at last, he was clean.
Then dressed in the Nursing Home clothes.
"Good lad!"
Zhao Han’s eyes lit up, clapping his hands in praise.
Clothes make the man, in this half an hour, the dirty servant transformed into a graceful young man.
"Brother Li, you’re actually quite handsome."
Zhao Han said.
"Am I?" Li Xian touched his cheek, seemingly not bad.
"Now you look like a Nursing Home guard, come, I’ll show you around. Let’s talk about the ways of our Nursing Home." Zhao Han guided Li Xian out by his shoulder.
"Our Nursing Home is divided into four classes: A, B, C, and D. You just started, so you are D-class."
"And I am C-class; the higher the class, the better the monthly salary and benefits."
"For instance, a D-class Nursing Home guard earns 150 Wen Coins a month, which isn’t small."
Li Xian asked, "How do you raise the Nursing Home class?"
"Smart question, getting to the point." Zhao Han clapped his hands and said, "In our place, the Nursing Home holds competitions at intervals. The hierarchy is reassigned based on the competition rankings."
"So, the competition among the Nursing Home is very fierce, practicing martial arts is quite hard."
"Moreover, advancing the Nursing Home class not only increases the monthly salary but also raises the authority within the estate."
"You’ve been to the Vegetarian Hall, right? It also has four classes of meals, and the higher the Nursing Home guard class, the better the food they can enjoy."
"Such rights and benefits are numerous. I won’t go into details; you’ll experience it yourself."
While they were talking.
The two came to a row of houses.
"Here is where we live." Zhao Han stopped.
Looking around, the rows of houses were neatly arranged, extending in all directions. Red bricks for walls, blue tiles for the roof, all were in the same design.
Each house could accommodate four people.
"This is what a human dwelling should be like." Li Xian couldn’t help sighing, thinking to himself, "But it’s still just for the employees."
The buildings were only one zhang high, with four beds inside, very narrow and cramped.
Each room had a plaque with a number on it.
"Brother Li, live with me. There’s just one vacancy with us." Zhao Han smiled.
"Great! I’d love that." Li Xian laughed cheerfully.
"Haha, I’ll introduce you to everyone."
Arriving at room 113, Zhao Han pushed the door open.
"Boss, you’re back?"
"Whoa, who’s this, really handsome."
"Yeah, I haven’t seen him before either."
Immediately, two people approached, one skinny and one fat, named ’Wang Chun’ and ’Zhuo Yilei’ respectively.
Zhao Han introduced each other, recognized each other’s names, then asked, "Brother Li, how old are you this year?"
Li Xian said, "Just turned fifteen."
"Fifteen years old... You’re the youngest, so we’ll call you Old Fourth." Zhao Han said, "Wang Chun is twenty-one, he’s Old Second, Zhuo Yilei is nineteen, he’s Old Third."
Zhao Han patted everyone’s shoulder and said:
"Old Fourth, from now on, we’re grasshoppers tied to the same string, we must help each other."
"If you have any questions, feel free to ask us."
...
At night.
During the day, Zhao Han guided and introduced Li Xian to the basic rules of the Nursing Home.
He lay on the bed, no more pushing and shoving from the servants around.
Although a faint smell of feet and sweat still lingered, unavoidable, Old Second Wang Chun had smelly feet, but it was much better now.
"In one day, the world turned upside down."
"But even so, it’s just the Nursing Home."
Li Xian felt complicated, not knowing if he was happy or something else.
On one hand, he personally experienced the hierarchy among people, the differences in noble and humble ranks;
On the other hand, he was fortunate his life improved.
Zhao Han turned over and saw Li Xian staring blankly at the ceiling, saying, "Old Fourth, aren’t you going to sleep? We’ve got morning training tomorrow."
"Hmm."
Li Xian closed his eyes and went to sleep.
Next day.
At dawn, the rooster crowed.
"Get up, get up."
Zhao Han rolled out of bed, dressed, slapped Wang Chun on the face, and kicked Zhuo Yilei on the back.
The two slept like dead pigs, without moving a bit. Zhao Han sighed, then thought:
"Right, last night Old Fourth took a while to sleep, better wake him too."
Turning his head, he saw Li Xian already up, dressed, sitting quietly on the bed.
"Old Fourth, not bad, up pretty early." Zhao Han said in surprise.
"When I was a servant, I had to get up earlier, already used to it." Li Xian shrugged, stretching his muscles.