Chapter 1: Caught a Beautiful Male Fish
"Second Young Miss, the waves in the South Sea are really big~ ugh~" A wave hit, rocking the ship. Lan Qian leaned over the railing, vomiting profusely.
Jiang Yang lay on the soft couch, turned over, and covered her ears with a pillow.
After a while, Lan Qian returned, covering her mouth. She had been vomiting from morning till night, her legs weak from it. She collapsed beside Jiang Yang's soft couch and complained pitifully, "Second Young Miss, what kind of situation is this? The national treasury has no money, so they're sending you to find money."
"What can be done?" Jiang Yang sighed.
The emperor was an extravagant and debauched old hag, forcing rebels to revolt. The national treasury was almost depleted, and unable to find money, they set their sights on ocean-going merchant ships.
The Jiang clan had lived in Lingnan for generations, relying on the mountains and facing the sea. This task naturally fell to them. Jiang Yang's elder sister commanded troops in the Lingnan area, a powerful figure in Lingnan. The Jiang family naturally wouldn't let her go to sea.
After much consideration, this task fell to Jiang Yang.
But she didn't know how to do business at all!
She had transmigrated to this matriarchal world. Before transmigrating, she was just an ordinary 9-to-5 worker with little pay and a lot of work. If she knew how to do business, would she have been working a job in her previous life?
That damned emperor should be overthrown soon. Jiang Yang put on a pained expression.
"Yang'er, you're grown up now. It's time for you to learn to stand on your own. Go, set sail, and earn some money," her father cried profusely as she was leaving, while her mother patted her shoulder and said earnestly.
Jiang Yang forced a smile: "But Mother, I don't know how to do business." Besides, she couldn't speak foreign languages. Do the foreigners in matriarchal countries speak English too? After not using it for so many years, her English level was now limited to 'how are you, I'm fine thank you, and you'.
Her mother lovingly patted her and pointed at the ocean-going ship, saying, "It's fine as long as they know how to do business."
"They?" Jiang Yang looked back at the big ship. The largest ship was over a hundred meters long and could carry nearly hundreds of people. It had 10 large sails, like a castle on the sea. But after looking around, she couldn't figure out who her mother was pointing to. She looked at her mother with a confused face: "Who?"
Her mother's loving smile cracked a bit, and she pointed again.
Jiang Yang squinted her eyes and finally noticed that there were cannon positions on both sides of the ship hull. The black muzzles looked cool and intimidating.
Good grief, it turned out she wasn't going to earn money, but to rob money.
"Ah—" Jiang Yang sighed deeply.
Lan Qian thought she was worrying about making money and said, "Second Young Miss, you don't need to worry. We're very well-prepared this time— ugh~"
Jiang Yang lazily said, "If we're using the cannons, we're certainly well-prepared."
Lan Qian humbly scratched the back of her head: "In business, it's quite reasonable to bring some cannons and hand cannons~ ugh~"
"I told you before, if you're not good with water, don't come along. Look at yourself now." Jiang Yang opened one eye and glanced at Lan Qian's face, which looked like death from vomiting.
Lan Qian said resolutely: "I am the Second Young Miss's~ ugh~ personal maid. Wherever the Second Young Miss goes, I go."
"Don't stick so close to me now." Jiang Yang disgustedly pushed her face away: "Don't vomit on my bed."
Lan Qian hugged the spittoon pitifully: "It's also the Second Young Miss's first time at sea. How come you're not seasick?"
"Probably natural talent." She stretched lazily and got out of bed. She picked some dried insects from the bird food box and fed them on the windowsill: "Eat, Angry Bird."
A ball of white fluff on the windowsill moved. Its head, like an owl's, turned 360 degrees, then lowered to peck at the food.
Angry Bird was a communication bird given to her by her elder sister Jiang Qingzhou for the sea voyage. Its name was Hua Xiao.
Jiang Yang could never figure out what species this thing was. It usually didn't call or fly, quiet as a chicken. Its head was like an owl's, its feathers like a snowy owl's. Its two big black eyeballs stared at you motionlessly, quite scary. What's funnier was that its eyebrows were just like Angry Bird's, so she simply called it Angry Bird.
After playing with Angry Bird for a while, Jiang Yang pushed open the wooden lattice window. The magnificent sea view was in full sight. The azure sky connected with the deep blue sea water, merging into a line at the horizon. She could almost feel the moist sea air in her nostrils.
The ocean-going ship had seven levels in total. The lower four levels were used for ballast and storing food. Sailors and the like lived in the forecastle, with more than a dozen people crammed into one cabin.
Jiang Yang lived in the wheelhouse at the stern, enjoying a three-story luxury standalone with a 360° panoramic sea view and an overview of the entire deck. Being well-connected was awesome!
The sea breeze blew in gusts, waves surged. Jiang Yang said boredly: "I wonder where we've sailed to?"
Lan Qian, holding the spittoon, stood up with determination despite her weakness: "I heard the crew say yesterday that we've reached the center of the South Sea."
Jiang Yang rested her chin on her hand: "I've heard there are merpeople in the South Sea?"
"Yes, the oil for the eternal lamps in the imperial tombs of past emperors is made from merpeople's flesh. It's very precious." Rendering oil and such… Jiang Yang felt a chill down her spine and changed the subject: "Come to think of it, I've never seen a real merperson."
Lan Qian thought for a moment and said: "I've seen one, but it was a dead merperson. Because merpeople are mostly fierce and hard to tame, otherwise they would make good pets… But it's fine if they can't be pets, anyway, every part of a merperson is valuable and very popular. Their tears are mermaid pearls worth thousands of gold, their scales can be ground into pearl powder for beauty and skin care, and they can be rendered into oil for eternal lamps. It's said their flesh is especially delicious, hehe." As she spoke, Lan Qian swallowed, actually feeling hungry.
Jiang Yang: "..." Damn, you're so cruel.
Forget it, ancient people haven't been taught about protecting endangered wildlife and not eating them. I won't argue with you.
"Merperson! There's a merperson! Quick, ready the harpoon!"
The crew below suddenly became excited. Jiang Yang looked down. In the endless deep blue waves, something seemed to be flashing faintly. A harpoon tied with hemp rope shot fiercely from the deck into the surging waves. A spot of alarming red gushed out from the deep blue sea.
"Hit! Cast the net!" The crew below cheered. A giant spider-silk net was cast into the sea, engulfing the wounded prey.
The crew shouted in unison, pulling hard on the net. The merperson under the sea surface seemed to be struggling desperately to sink and escape.
"It's quite strong, pull! Don't let this merperson escape!" Lan Qian watched anxiously: "It absolutely mustn't escape. Second Young Miss, I'll go down to help them."
"Come back!" Jiang Yang called her back.
She was deathly ill from vomiting earlier, but now she's not aching or tired when it comes to catching merpeople, so refreshed.
"I just want to go help them," Lan Qian said, fidgeting with her hands.
"I think you just want to eat merperson flesh," Jiang Yang mercilessly exposed her.
In modern times, you'd be in jail for life.
Lan Qian lowered her head dejectedly, but the next second, cheers erupted from the deck: "It's caught! It's caught!"
Lan Qian's eyes suddenly lit up, flashing with the light of a hungry tiger pouncing on food: "Young Miss, it's caught, it's caught! This fish looks so big, it must be able to render a lot of oil, there should be some meat left over too."
Jiang Yang: "..." Damn, calm down a bit, is the Jiang family starving you of meat?
Jiang Yang looked down and saw a beautiful fishtail exposed in the circle formed by the crew. It was the color of deep sea blue like an oil painting, gradually blending into a thin pink like sunset cherry blossoms under the sunlight, shimmering with beautiful ripples as the light moved, drooping powerlessly.
"They're going to do it," Jiang Yang heard Lan Qian say excitedly beside her ear before she could admire the merperson's beauty.
"Do what?"
Lan Qian excitedly leaned over the railing to look down, afraid of missing the fish-killing scene: "Kill the merperson. Merpeople are extremely difficult to capture. After being hauled on board, they're usually killed immediately, rendered into oil and presented to the emperor."
"Why do they have to be killed immediately?"
"Because merpeople are fierce, and very vicious."
Jiang Yang: "..." Sister, you look more vicious right now.
"Didn't you just say that merperson tears are priceless? Wouldn't it be more profitable to keep the merperson and make it cry constantly rather than rendering it into oil immediately?"
"Second Young Miss, you don't understand. Only tears shed when merpeople are emotionally moved are priceless. Tears shed under other circumstances turn into ordinary pearls that aren't worth much. Besides, how could a merperson possibly be emotionally moved by humans? So it's more convenient to slaughter them immediately." Lan Qian made a throat-slitting gesture.
As they spoke, the crew on the deck had already raised their knives. The cold light on the blade gave off a chilling air.
At the moment the crew raised their hands, she finally saw the full view of the merperson surrounded by them. His upper body was completely identical to a human's. He wore the unique silk gauze of the merperson tribe, helplessly lying on the deck with his face unclear. His wet long hair was like spilled ink, thickly spreading over his pale, sickly skin.
Undoubtedly, this was a breathtakingly beautiful creature.
Jiang Yang's holy mother's heart, controlled by appearances, began to glow: "Tell them to stop."
"Huh? Why?" Lan Qian asked in surprise: "Second Young Miss, merpeople are very rare and precious. We can only catch one or two every few years. If we don't kill it quickly to render oil, the imperial court will blame us when they find out."
"I know." It's just that after living in this matriarchal society for so long, she still couldn't abandon the concepts of modern society.
If it was just killing a fish, she wouldn't have such a big reaction. She might have even been planning whether to braise it, steam it, or chop it with chili, making several dishes from one fish.
But the merperson had half a human body, which made her unable to treat it as an ordinary animal.
However, if she just let the merperson go like this, with so many people on the ship, someone would definitely go back and report to the emperor. Ah, may the dog emperor step down soon.
"Didn't you say earlier that merpeople can be kept as pets?" she asked.