I'm Just a Beast Tamer

Chapter 18: Chapter 18: Freak

It wasn’t that they were unhappy with Steward Luo for bidding so high and breaking the rules.

In fact, after seeing that Steward Luo was interested in Great Black, they had deliberately bid a modest price, planning to do him a favor.

Great Black was a fine dog, but for the price of two or three thousand silver taels, they could hire a large group of Skin Refining Martial Artists.

Hiring a Skin Refining Martial Artist for a year only cost about two hundred taels.

Aside from its sense of smell, no matter how capable Great Black was, it couldn’t compare to a Skin Refining Martial Artist.

They would have been happy to see Steward Luo buy Great Black.

But the price Steward Luo offered gave them a bad feeling.

This staggering price meant the County Magistrate was determined to have Great Black.

As the County Magistrate, he was the safest person in Red Fox Town.

But for the County Magistrate to be willing to spend so much money to obtain Great Black showed that he and Steward Luo believed it was necessary.

The situation in Red Fox Town might soon turn dire!

Big trouble was coming!

If even the County Magistrate was this concerned, what about them, who were merely wealthy individuals with a bit of money?

...

"This fellow has a big appetite. At least one of his meals a day needs to have meat or bones. You can reduce his food intake a little, but don’t cut back too much, or his stamina and other abilities will decline."

"His food must be placed in this wooden tray. Unless he’s starving, he won’t eat anything outside the tray. If a stranger tries to feed him, he’ll bark as a warning."

"Also, it’s best to give him some commands every day. It doesn’t have to be special training; playful commands are fine too. Just like people, if he gets too lazy, his abilities will gradually diminish."

In the County Magistrate’s Office’s Inner Courtyard, Jiang Zuo instructed a few servants on the key points of caring for Great Black.

After he finished speaking, Jiang Zuo thoughtfully handed over a piece of paper with what he had just said written on it.

"Great Black, this is your new home now. Be a good boy and listen to your new master."

After explaining everything, Jiang Zuo patted Great Black’s head and turned to leave.

Great Black watched Jiang Zuo with longing eyes, letting out a few reluctant whimpers as his tail wagged nonstop.

But Jiang Zuo didn’t look back; he just walked away quickly.

’Hesitating will only make it harder for Great Black to adjust to his new home.’

Great Black was without a doubt the most intelligent and docile of all the black dogs Jiang Zuo had ever raised.

But that was precisely why Jiang Zuo was even more reluctant to keep him.

If he were raising fish or mice, Jiang Zuo wouldn’t mind keeping a large group of them around.

But he couldn’t do that with dogs like Great Black.

Their lifespans were too short. A mere thirty years, and even for a bloodline-enhanced dog like Great Black, it was only fifty.

If he kept them, Jiang Zuo would never abandon them partway through their lives.

His bond with them would grow closer and more intimate as time went on.

However, just as their relationship deepened, their lives would gradually approach their end.

The thought of them dying one by one before his eyes was unbearable to Jiang Zuo.

At this moment, Jiang Zuo couldn’t accept such a scene.

Perhaps his mindset would gradually change with the passage of time.

But for the current Jiang Zuo, unless it was a Pet Beast with great Longevity, he wouldn’t consider keeping one by his side.

"A very impressive young man. To have such skill at his age, and to be so humble, meticulous, and steady... he has a promising future! If he had Cultivation Talent, his prospects would be limitless. He might even be the next Venerable Red Fox."

Steward Luo said with great admiration as he watched Jiang Zuo’s receding figure.

Although their interaction had been brief, Jiang Zuo didn’t feel like a seventeen-year-old at all.

He admitted to himself that at that age, he couldn’t have compared to Jiang Zuo.

"Having Cultivation Talent is easier said than done. Even if the Da Xi nation tested every one of its subjects for a Spirit Root, only one or two would appear every hundred years."

Zhang Bingjun shook his head.

In the past, the Da Xi nation had also conducted large-scale, secret Spirit Root tests on some children.

But after discovering how difficult it was to find anyone with a Spirit Root, they gradually stopped doing it.

Now, only a few places like Red Fox Town still tested for Spirit Roots every few years.

Discovering someone with Cultivation Talent was practically impossible.

"My Lord, the matter of you buying this large black dog at such a high price will soon be known by everyone in Red Fox Town."

"Sigh. I hope spending this much money will make those who are planning to stir up trouble think twice."

The two of them then began discussing the auction.

Besides ensuring he could win Great Black, Zhang Bingjun was also sending a message by bidding such an exorbitant price.

He would do whatever it took to protect himself.

Those who came looking for trouble, wanting to drag him down with them, had better weigh whether they were prepared for a life-and-death struggle against him.

...

"So this is a one thousand-tael silver banknote from the Worldwide Bank? Mmm, it has a unique ink fragrance."

Back home, Jiang Zuo took out five one thousand-tael silver banknotes and examined them closely.

It was his first time seeing banknotes of such a large denomination.

Five thousand taels. His net worth had instantly multiplied several times over.

Before today, Jiang Zuo had only managed to save up a little over one thousand taels of silver in total.

And more than half of that was earned in the last two years.

He remembered his first Great Black dog; he had struggled to sell it, barely breaking even with no profit or loss.

After he gained some renown, the price of his Great Black dogs gradually increased.

But it was still only one to two hundred taels. In a year, he would only make a profit of a few dozen taels.

It was safe to say he was living on a very tight budget.

Until two years ago.

Jiang Zuo had become somewhat well-known, and he had also started selling meat buns.

After deducting costs, the two sources of income brought in a surplus of about four hundred taels a year.

The thought that all the money he had painstakingly earned over the past ten years was far less than the profit brought to him by a single thief left Jiang Zuo speechless.

He was starting to understand what people meant by "even a pig can fly if it’s standing in a whirlwind."

Carefully hiding the silver banknotes in a very secret compartment, Jiang Zuo looked at the empty house and felt a faint sense of loss.

This was the downside of Beast Taming. Every time he sold a well-raised Great Black dog, he couldn’t help but feel a little bit empty.

Shaking his head, Jiang Zuo decided to go to Blacksmith Li’s to forge some iron.

It was crowded and lively there. Besides, the piece of iron he had been working on was almost ready.

It was a good time to go and forge the item that afternoon.

...

"Jiang Zuo, here to forge iron?"

Blacksmith Li was very surprised to see Jiang Zuo arrive.

The news that Great Black had sold for five thousand taels had already spread.

Blacksmith Li and the others had been paying close attention and got the news right away.

Hearing the astonishing price, Blacksmith Li was also dumbfounded.

He had thought that selling for over one thousand taels would have been a lot, but who knew the final price would be so terrifyingly high.

Five thousand taels. That was an amount of money many people could never hope to touch in their entire lives.

They couldn’t even touch it, let alone earn it.

And Jiang Zuo had earned it just by selling a single dog.

If it had been him who earned such a huge sum, he probably wouldn’t have been able to resist going out to celebrate.

But here was Jiang Zuo, coming over to forge iron. He was truly an oddball.

"My iron is almost ready. I’m going to forge that cooking utensil in a bit."

Jiang Zuo smiled, took out his piece of iron—which had shrunk another size—and placed it in the forge.

If he hadn’t been busy trying to gain more Beast Taming Reputation these past few days, this cooking utensil would have been finished long ago.

The iron ingot quickly heated to a fiery red, and Jiang Zuo lowered his head and began to hammer.

After his strength had surged, smithing had become very easy for him.

Watching the completely focused Jiang Zuo at work, Blacksmith Li couldn’t help but sigh with admiration internally.

’With such a temperament, what couldn’t he achieve?’

The apprentices in the shop watched Jiang Zuo one by one, their eyes filled with envy.

But they couldn’t understand why Jiang Zuo, who was so rich now, would still come to the shop to do blacksmithing.

Blacksmith Li saw this but only shook his head slightly, not saying much.

「A little over two hours later.」

With each fall of the hammer, the iron ingot had been beaten until it looked as soft as a ball of dough.

"Hundred-refined Fine Iron!"

The apprentices were inexperienced and didn’t know what this represented.

Blacksmith Li, watching from the side, felt his expression tighten.

Hundred-refined Fine Iron. This was an extremely rare material. Weapons forged from it were not only incredibly sharp but also possessed excellent elasticity and resilience. They could kill without a single drop of blood sticking to the blade.

Its only weakness was its low hardness.

Many blacksmiths could only hope to produce Hundred-refined Fine Iron by sheer luck.

However...

Blacksmith Li watched, utterly speechless, as Jiang Zuo split the piece of Hundred-refined Fine Iron in two and proceeded to hammer them into two flat, square trays.

"That’s what you wanted to make? What a colossal waste of a precious material!"

Blacksmith Li couldn’t hold back his complaint any longer.

Using Hundred-refined Fine Iron, which could be used to forge a supreme weapon, just to make two large trays was an incredible waste.

"I told you I was making a cooking utensil," Jiang Zuo said with a chuckle.

They were two steaming trays—exactly the cooking utensil he wanted.

What were steaming trays for?

’To make rice noodle rolls, of course.’

Now that he had some spare cash, Jiang Zuo’s mind was preoccupied with recreating the delicacies of his past life to satisfy his own appetite.

In this world devoid of entertainment, this was pretty much his only hobby now.

Among them, rice noodle rolls, a delicious and seemingly simple snack, was at the top of Jiang Zuo’s list.

In truth, if Jiang Zuo had been willing to compromise, he could have made them long ago.

But Jiang Zuo’s principle was to either not do something at all, or to do it as best as he possibly could.

’In my past life, the videos I watched showed rice noodle rolls being made with thin, stainless steel steaming trays.’

So Jiang Zuo had decided to simply forge stainless steel steaming trays himself.

It also happened that he wanted to learn blacksmithing. Learning an extra trade would be useful if he needed to change his identity in the future.

After learning how to forge, it would be much more convenient to create tools or weapons that didn’t exist in this world.

And so, he had happily set this as his goal.

"Do as you please."

Blacksmith Li sighed.

Jiang Zuo didn’t rely on blacksmithing to make money, and he had forged the iron with his own hands. He was free to do whatever he wanted with it.

But as a blacksmith, he couldn’t help but feel a sense of regret seeing Hundred-refined Fine Iron being used to make strange cooking utensils.

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