In the bag, the so-called "private money" hidden by his cheap father amounted to twelve silver snakes.
Through memory, Ed knew the surrounding monetary system very well. Although this was not a huge sum, it was definitely enough for a poor ghost like him.
One silver snake could be exchanged for an average of 200 'Copper Swallows'. The rate would fluctuate slightly, but generally by no more than ten. One kilogram of ordinary bread, the islanders' staple food, cost one copper swallow, roughly an adult's daily food intake. An ordinary sailor's long knife cost more than 100 copper swallows on this island.
A carpenter who had completed his apprenticeship could earn about five silver snakes in a year.
In other words, the private money in his hand was worth two years of a carpenter's wages, which was a fortune for a jobless guy like Ed, who had long ago run out of his savings.
For ordinary families, having their children become carpenters was a good choice.
The cheap father in Ed's memory was about that level—maybe slightly better, but not much better than a random carpenter. By the way, he wasn't a carpenter.
"Private money" equivalent to two years' salary? Was it really okay to hide this amount? With so much money suddenly gone, was he really not beaten to death by his wife at the time? If he remembered correctly, the original host's mother didn't seem to be a lady with a good temper. She was a kind and caring woman, but also very strict in some cases, especially when it came to money...
"Oh my God, Ed, what are you doing?!"
While Ed was lost in thought and playing with the small leather pouch in his hands, a woman in a linen shirt and a slightly yellowed apron over her long skirt stood at the entrance of the courtyard and exclaimed with a worried expression on her face.
Seeing Ed's weird behavior of digging in his courtyard, she hurried over. She patted the dust off his body vigorously, then held his head with both hands and carefully checked him up and down.
"You just got better from your sickness, and you should be resting well in bed. There is no treasure for you to dig at home, my little treasure hunter."
In response, Ed could only smile awkwardly.
For the past few days, to recall all the memories of his original body without being exposed, Ed had been lying in bed, pretending to be sick during the daytime and trying not to communicate too much with former acquaintances. Only in the evening, when everyone returned home, did he go outside to fool his new girlfriend into getting inside her skirt, the only one who knew he was pretending to be sick.
The person in front of him was his neighbor, who had been very close to his late mother and could be regarded as a relative.
During this period of feigning sickness, she had visited Ed most frequently and cared for him like her own son. She spent half the day with him, telling him various things to pass the time, bringing him breakfast, lunch, and dinner without any delay every day. If he wasn't mistaken, she had also come to bring him lunch today. But unexpectedly, she had caught him in the act of digging for treasure.
Ed's brain was working wildly, trying to think of an excuse to explain the situation.
But after thinking for a moment, he decided to tell her directly. "Aunt Marcy, I just remembered that my father left some money here for me, and since I've run out of my savings, I decided it was the best time to use it... Hehehe..."
After speaking, he gave an embarrassed smile and started laughing while rubbing his nose.
"Okay, okay, congratulations, you've found treasure again. Now move your ass and let's go back inside."
Aunt Marcy, the kind lady, spoke perfunctorily with a smile. She picked up the bag of silver coins, wrapped in a layer of dirt, and then grabbed Ed's shoulders and pushed him into the house, muttering, "But for now, you should lie on the bed and have a good rest."
F*ck! She's so damn strong, Ed thought. I'm quite strong myself, but compared to her, I'm like a child. Damn, I have to ask her for the secret behind her strength.
Pushed into the room without any resistance, he could only sit on the bed helplessly and wait for her to leave.
Aunt Marcy patted the bag of silver coins in her hand, and almost all the dirt fell off. Seeing that it was relatively clean, she nodded with satisfaction and casually placed the bag on the bedside table.
Ed watched this series of actions, and truthfully, he wasn't the slightest bit surprised.
"Your ungrateful father finally did something human; he left you a small fortune, at least."
When she had taken the bag, she had sensed the approximate number of coins inside through its weight and the sound of their collision.
The reason Ed had been direct was that this amount of money wasn't enough to tempt anyone to rob an orphan, let alone Aunt Marcy, who had been taking care of him like her own child for years. There was no need to hide it from her.
Aunt Marcy went to the kitchen on the side of the room. The kitchen of the stone house was open. She placed the food box she had brought with her there and started preparing lunch for him.
"With this money, you can learn a skill. You could be a stonemason or a carpenter. Hans and Thomas are quite skilled; they could teach you well. Maybe you could go to an outer island to learn cooking. The food in the taverns on our island tastes terrible. But going to an outer island..." Her voice took on a nagging tone, and a hint of hesitation crept in as the sounds of her cooking filled the air.
"If you don't like that, you could learn smelting, or just work the land. We'll help you with the two plots your mother left you. With this money, you could even buy two more plots. The golden wheat every year would be enough for you to live cheerfully without a care, except for finding a good girl."
"All this is thanks to the protection of the Stone Mother."
Hearing this, Ed, who had been silent and was on the verge of shedding tears, replied while wiping a non-existent tear from the corner of his eye. If my mother in my last life had been one-third like Aunt Marcy, my life would have been perfect.
"Thank you for the protection of the Stone Mother."
This phrase was imprinted in the memory of the previous body's owner, almost an instinct. In simple terms, it was this island's version of thanking their god.
However, Ed's silence gradually stopped Aunt Marcy's nagging. She surely misunderstood his silence—which was really him complaining about his mother from his previous life—as him rejecting her advice.
She was washing plates and turned her head to stare at Ed beside the bed, who was looking at her with moist eyes. With a little unknown emotion in her tone, she said with a forced smile, "I know your dream has always been to become a treasure hunter on the sea, but you have to know that the sea is too dangerous, especially for so-called treasure hunters."
"Pirates, storms, sea monsters, betrayal—anything can easily take your life. In many cases, you won't even know how you died."
"If you are in danger, your mother's soul will not rest in peace, and neither will your damn father's."
After cursing Ed's father angrily, grinding her teeth, the whole room became quiet. Only the sound of cooking and a spoon hitting plates could be heard.
In Ed's memory, his parents had disappeared when he was about ten years old. First, his mother, then his father came to him, did something to him that was so extreme Ed couldn't remember it clearly.
Although no bones were found, the very next day, his father suddenly left the house without saying anything about his mother. Aunt Marcy came to him and said that his parents were dead.
People on the island said so. Although their deaths were so sudden and unexpected, it was hard to believe, the original owner of the body was just a ten-year-old ignorant brat who couldn't understand many things and simply accepted that his parents were dead.
Since then, although he still lived alone at home, Aunt Marcy next door had basically become his second mother.
In his memory, the original owner seemed quite afraid of her.
Aunt Marcy was not short in stature. It was said that a few ordinary men might not be her opponents on the entire island. She had personally bedridden more than a dozen people with her bare hands, to the point that they couldn't get out of bed for months, which was enough to show her temper and strength.
Ed, who was used to his originally gentle mother, could imagine what kind of punishment the boy would have received for his mischief.
However, through his memory, Ed learned that although Aunt Marcy's temper was a bit bad and her strength was sufficient to beat a few fully healthy men as if they were children, all in all, she was a really good person.
She was just a little bit too violent.
Well, really just a little.
...
A few minutes later, Aunt Marcy brought the prepared meal to the small table, which served as both a study and a dining table.
"Eat quickly. Sigurd will be back soon. I have to go back to cook for him as well; otherwise, if he doesn't find me, he'll have an excuse to go to the tavern and drink."
After saying that, she wiped her hands on her apron and pushed open the wooden door without waiting for Ed to answer. However, as if she remembered something, she stopped by the wooden door, turned her head, and said with a complicated expression, "Take a good rest today. There's still food in the kitchen, enough for you tonight. And don't even think about wandering around the island at night like a ghost. If I hear about it, you're done for... Sigh. If...if you feel fine tomorrow, you can go on your treasure hunt game, okay?"
There was a little seriousness in her tone, but anyone could see that she didn't want Ed to waste his time on this meaningless treasure-hunting game.
"Yes, and you take care of yourself too, Aunt Marcy."
Ed nodded quickly and replied with a smile while eating the wonderful food she had made. This tone was so familiar to him—his unofficial second mother, strict on the outside but soft on the inside.
"I will, sweetie," Aunt Marcy replied before walking out with a satisfied smile.
After she left, Ed first closed the door before sitting back at the table. He took the bread, dipped it in the thick meat stew, and began to eat. The bread was unexpectedly good, with a bit of honey on it, but the stew was bland, only a little salty. After all, all kinds of seasonings in this era were simply too expensive for a commoner to buy without blinking. The vegetable soup, however, was very tasty and one of the few things he could drink without any complaint or getting bored.
While eating his lunch, Ed turned the treasure-hunting manual to the page with the map and started reading. This was one of his bad habits from his previous life; he couldn't eat without doing something else, whether it was using his phone, watching TV, or reading the newspaper. He needed a distraction; otherwise, he always felt something was missing, and his appetite would decrease.
In his field of vision, the small white dot next to his house on the map had completely stopped glowing and had dimmed to the point of becoming a gray spot. This clearly meant the treasure had been found.
Ed reached out and tried to click on it, and its data still appeared before him.
[ Hidden Private Money (Harvested)
Difficulty: Teenager
Popularity: 2
Treasure Information: Something buried by your father many years ago.
Treasure Harvest: "Silver Snake" x 12. ]
"It's not much different from before, except this time there is an additional word '(Harvested)' after the title. There's an additional entry that shows the harvest brought by the treasure."
Seeing the gray dot, Ed suddenly felt an inexplicable whim. He picked up the feather pen on the table, dipped it in the black ink, and ticked the position of the white dot on the map.
Seeing this tick, he smiled like an idiot. Ed reacted instinctively, and a great satisfaction rose in his heart.
Then, he couldn't help but move his eyes to the last white dot he hadn't checked. This white dot was at the end of the island, which should be on the edge of the cliff by the sea.