The northern port of the Skochenya Empire, Ceylon City.

A heavy rain suddenly came and poured into the gaps in the fort. The sky was as dark as if dyed with dragon blood ink. The fishing boats shrank in the harbor, huge waves washed the embankment and hit violently, splashing water mist more than ten meters high, with a loud bang.

The rain accumulated and quickly spread across the slums, and the water on the streets became deeper and deeper. The drainage system that had not been repaired for at least five years could not play any role. In an instant, the slums were already vast.

Ceylon City in Magnolia Bay is no longer the same as before. The withered fishing industry has limited income, and the city lord is powerless. If you want to repair the drainage system, you need at least a magician who knows how to alchemy and a large number of magic apprentices. Just drawing drawings requires thousands of gold coins. Ceylon City has not had a magician for at least two hundred years, and the Municipal Department Hall has almost become a decoration.

Lightning teared the sky, and thunder came only after a while. The electric snake flew, illuminating the city under the storm. On the empty streets, a boy about ten years old wades through the water and shrank forward.

The boy was very thin, with his short brown hair being unevenly cut. The rain rushed through his eyelashes, making his eyes unable to open. The boy's mouth and nose burst into his mouth, and his legs were shaking. He held a greasy bag tightly, which was the meal he asked for today.

Boom!

With a loud thunder, the boy finally couldn't hold on and fell to the ground. His face was buried in the water and he was soon choked and coughed. He struggled desperately to stand up again. But his thin body could not hold on any longer. He just turned over and fell into a coma. Until he lost consciousness, the boy's hand was still holding the oil paper bag tightly.

The heavy rainstorm lasted for nearly two hours, and the sky cleared. The accumulated water slowly receded, and pedestrians appeared on the street. The unconscious boy was washed under an eaves and leaned against a horse-tethered stone.

The door was pushed open, and a guy dressed in a servant saw the unconscious boy, ran up and kicked hard, and said angrily: "Begging for food, get out quickly, don't die here."

His voice was sharp and shrill, like a castrated actor in the court of the Tanggulas Empire. The boy woke up with moans and coughed violently. He felt hot all over and knew he had a fever. The greased paper bag in his hand was still tightly grasped by subconsciously. The boy breathed a sigh of relief, turned over and crawled into the distance for two steps, and struggled to open the greased paper bag.

The oil-paper bag was covered with moldy Chen Mi. He originally planned to cook it and eat it after he went home, but he couldn't wait at this time. If he didn't eat, he didn't even have the strength to walk.

Chen Mi was like sand in the boy's mouth, chewed and swallowed into his stomach.

"Unfortunate!" The vicious servant saw that the young man could not stand up, so he spat hard, and then turned around and entered the door.

The boy lay on the cold ground, barely swallowing half of the rice dumplings, then he shaking up and walked towards the east of the city without looking back. His home was outside the city. If it was dark and he would not go back, another rain would freeze him to death on the street.

Behind him, an obese businessman walked out of the vermilion door. He was wearing inferior silk and had oil on his hair, as if he had been wet in the rain.

"Huh? Isn't that guy from the Metatterin family? What's his name?" The fat businessman looked sharp-eyed and asked the two servants behind him as he looked at the boy's back.

"Salin, Master, his name is Salin." The servant smiled flatteringly, his voice like a chicken pinched his neck. The master and servant described it as vulgar, and his eyes looked at the boy were extremely unkind.

"Why isn't he dead yet?"

"Who knows, I don't know what that bastard is willing to give him food." Another servant replied angrily.

"Hmph, please be careful. If he dies, buy the house quickly so that others will not take advantage of it." The fat businessman said casually, twisting his burdened meat, and turning around and walking in another direction.

"Yes, lord." The servant followed carefully behind him, and almost both of them could hide in the shadow of the fat businessman.

The night was as cold as water, and a boy named Salin dragged his tired body out of Ceylon City. He left the road with a greased paper bag, and took a break and moved back to his ancestral house.

This huge stone house was the last property of the Metattering family. Salin opened the door and swayed into the house.

The stone walls were covered with moss and were filled with chill. All the windows outside the two floors had no glass, making the lonely stone house look gloomy and cold.

Salin took a breath and finally returned home. He almost climbed up the stairs and returned to the bedroom, falling head-on on the bed. The bed was like the wall, wet and cold and hard.

The clothes were poured through the rain. After blowing the air all the way, the half-dry and undrying were stuck to their bodies. This was Salin's only piece of clothing. Salin struggled to get up, took off the clothes, and spread them on the bed. The oil paper bag was placed next to his head, and the waist was very painful. He looked down and saw that it was already blue.

This was kicked by the servant. Salin gritted his teeth and lay down. As long as he fell asleep, the pain would be gone.

The moonlight and cold wind poured in from the window, without any poetry. Salin felt hot all over and had a split headache. If he continued to burn like this, his life would be lost. He struggled to get up and pulled out a box from under the bed.

The lock on the box had been removed, and the silver locks were exchanged for a week for food. No one bought the insect-proof camphor wood box, so Salin planned to use it to burn the fire one day.

When I opened the box, there were a pile of messy notes. Most of them were debt documents. Salin found a metal badge from it and put it on his forehead. A cool feeling came from his forehead, and the headache seemed to be much better. Salin sat on the ground, looking at the notes in the box and shed tears.

The Metatriline family was once a nobleman, and this surname was once a symbol of wealth in the north of the empire. However, by the Salin generation, the Metatriline family had nothing. These debt proofs also became waste paper. Those who owe money back then had already died. The rights change and wars gradually made the Metatriline family decline.

If the debtor is still alive, Salin will be enough to buy ten Ceylon cities with these loan notes.

The badge pressed on the forehead is the logo of the Mettrin family, and this badge, the size of a palm, was not sold. Like these notes, the badge is a relic left to him by his father.

When Salin was six years old, his parents died, leaving only this box and his ancestral house for him. The six-year-old Salin had no living skills and had to make a living by selling the things in the ancestral house. The unscrupulous businessman naturally would not miss the opportunity to get rich. What does the six-year-old child know? In less than half a year, Salin sold the things in the house clean.

Salin is now twelve years old. Because of his malnutrition, he looks only ten years old and thin and weak.

He did not sell this ancestral house. It was not that he did not want to sell it, but that the property had to be processed in the city hall and could not be faked. Several merchants who covet his house simply refused to buy it, just waiting for Salin to starve to death. Once Salin died, the house became a homeless thing, and only needed to buy land, which was almost not considered a price.

But Salin was desperate and relied on begging and lived until he was twelve years old.

Salin fell on the bed, and the cool feeling brought by the family badge spread throughout his body, and the pain in his waist was relieved a lot. Salin fell asleep. He didn't know if he would wake up after falling asleep this time.

Bang bang bang!

Salin suddenly opened his eyes and sat up. The sunlight outside the window shone into the room and dust all over the floor.

It was a very strange thing that someone knocked on the door early in the morning. Salin's ancestral house was not close to the main road, but was at the foot of the mountain, and even had to pass through a small forest. Since Salin had nothing to sell, no one had come to him again.

Bang bang bang!

The knock on the door continued, and Salin jumped out of bed. He felt much lighter and no longer had a fever. He put the family badge back into the box and stuffed the box under the bed. Salin walked down the stairs to open the door.

I came back in a daze yesterday and forgot to latch the door. Salin was a little scared that there would be wild animals in this place. If I touched it in, I would be eaten in my sleep.

With a creaking sound, the sun shone on the face, a little warm. The shadows of the trees were gloomy, and a middle-aged man stood in the scattered light and shadows, with long black hair, gray robe, and a wooden stick in his hand.

This man is less than forty years old, with sword eyebrows, long eyes, and no beard. He wore a huge ring on his hand holding a wooden stick, and the silver and black ring was engraved with complex symbols. Salin was a little lost in his mind. This middle-aged man dressed in a weird way. Could it be a priest from the Holy See?

The middle-aged man's expression looks gentle, but this gentleness is like the demeanor of a nobleman. It's just his habit and has nothing to do with you.

The begging career made Salin sensitive. He knew who could speak and who should be far away. But the middle-aged man who knocked on the door was completely different from the people in Ceylon City. He was standing in front of him, but Salin couldn't feel the existence of this person.

The middle-aged man smiled and said to Salin, "Where is your adult?"

This person came from another place. How could the people from Ceylon City not know that they were the unlucky person? Salin's heart calmed down, rubbed his forehead with his hands, and said, "There is no one here, sir, what's wrong with you?"

Salin asked politely, trying her best to make herself look calm. If you want to live, don’t make people feel annoyed. This is Salin’s life experience over the past twelve years.

"Oh." The middle-aged man looked at Salin in surprise. Salin hurried out, wearing only shorts and naked. There was also a palm-sized mark on his forehead, which was left by the family badge.

"Is this house yours?" the middle-aged man asked gently.

"Yes." Salin's eyes looked at the ground, and his brown pupils contracted. Could this person be a robber, is it?

"That's right, I want to buy this house. Can I go in and talk about it?"

The one who bought a house? Salin was a little overwhelmed by the news. He had long wanted to sell the house and go to work in the city. Even if he helped people handle fresh fish, he could make a living. But the apprentice was in charge of food and food. If he went to work, he would starve to death in the first month. Salin turned sideways in a daze: "Come in."

When middle-aged man walked into the stone house, the dust under his feet disappeared without a trace. The breeze blew, and the smell of dampness suddenly disappeared in the living room. Salin resisted his excitement, closed the door, and carefully calculated how much it would cost.

The middle-aged man's eyes swept gently, and everything in the room fell into his eyes. Salin could be said to be a bare-sized house with nothing to appreciate. The middle-aged man was very satisfied. He turned around and asked Salin: "Do you say this house belongs to you, do you have a deed?"

"I have it." Salin nodded, but did not go to the bedroom to look for a house deed. Now that he is older, he naturally understands that the businessmen cheated on him when he was a child, so he became much more cautious in doing things.

The middle-aged man smiled, reached out and touched Salin's head, and said, "Don't worry, I'm a magician and won't cheat you of money. How many gold coins do you think this house is going to sell?"
Chapter completed!