Reborn As Super Heiress

Chapter 746: Chapter 743 Outsider

”Qi Ge, what’s the price for this rough jade?” Wang Kaiwen asked as soon as he entered the warehouse.

Old Qi, with a smile on his face, replied, ”You and I are old acquaintances, Boss Wang, so of course we can agree on a good price. These are all old mine types, personally sourced by me from Myanmar, so you needn’t worry about the quality. The price for the untouched rough jade is twenty thousand yuan per pound, and those that have been windowed start at fifty thousand. If any of you are interested in a piece, just let me know. The stone cutting machine is right over there, free to use. If you need someone to cut the stone, it’s a hundred yuan a pop.”

Hearing this, Huo Sining couldn’t help but frown. While it was true that these rough stones were transported from Myanmar, the prices seemed outrageously high, hardly any different from the ones she’d encountered at the Pingzhou Public Plate or Ruili jade market.

However, Wang Kaiwen didn’t seem surprised at all upon hearing Boss Qi’s prices. In fact, he appeared to have no objections whatsoever, which left Huo Sining somewhat puzzled.

”Old Qi has some connections in Myanmar, and over the past few years, he’s brought back quite a lot of material. Among these, there are many pieces of rough jadeite with good prospects for high jade, so his high asking price isn’t too unreasonable.”

Appearing to notice Huo Sining’s skepticism, Wang Kaiwen explained to her on the side.

After Wang Kaiwen’s explanation, Huo Sining nodded, squatting down and stretching out her right hand to touch the stones, picking one up and pretending to examine it closely.

Seeing Huo Sining ready to inspect the stones, Wang Kaiwen squatted down as well and got busy. He needed to examine these pieces of rough jade and pick out five that he thought were most likely to yield green, and then have Huo Sining use her expert eye to help.

Even though Wang Kaiwen had said that the chances of Boss Qi’s materials turning out green were high, Huo Sining felt somewhat let down. After looking over seven or eight stones at her feet one by one, she only found a few with a green tint near the surface, showing no real potential for gambling.

This left Huo Sining feeling deeply disappointed inside.

While looking at the rough jade, Wang Kaiwen stole glances at Huo Sining. The more he watched, the more puzzled he became.

Without a flashlight or magnifying glass, how was Huo Sining inspecting the stones? Could she really discern the presence of jadeite inside a stone just by looking at its surface with the naked eye?

Wang Kaiwen’s mind was filled with unsolved puzzles, while Yue Meijun, who was also seriously examining the raw materials, cast subtle glances toward Huo Sining. After only a few looks, a hint of scorn flashed in her eyes.

Without even knowing how to use a magnifying glass or flashlight, this woman obviously had no clue. Posing here, she was truly nauseating.

Yue Meijun regarded Huo Sining as Wang Kaiwen’s lover and assumed that Huo Sining was nothing more than a woman who relied on selling her body and looks, which is why she didn’t take her seriously at all.

Huo Sining didn’t care what Wang Kaiwen or Yue Meijun thought; she was there to gamble on stones, and their opinions of her didn’t matter to her in the slightest.

If she really came across high-quality jadeite, she certainly wouldn’t be foolish enough to cut it open on the street. She would buy it and take it home to be cut. As for the common stones, as long as she didn’t cut them all to raise suspicion, it would be fine. And when it came to deciding how many to increase or break, with her Heavenly Eye Skill, wasn’t it all at her discretion?

They entered the shop across the street, which had the same layout as the first one they had visited, only this time there was an assistant sitting beside the stone cutting machine while the owner was busy inside the inner hall. Knowing guests had arrived, he hurried out to greet them.

”Are you here to gamble on stones?” the owner asked warmly, seeing Huo Sining and her companions evaluating the rough stones. ”These are all newly arrived from the old mines in Myanmar. Feel free to have a look. The prices are negotiable, and I promise fair deals. We have assistants here who can cut the stones for you. If you win, just give them a small tip; if not, it’s on the house.”

The stark contrast between the two shops gave Huo Sining a somewhat amused feeling. Compared to the first shop’s indifference, the second one seemed much more agreeable. Even though Huo Sining was well aware that these stones were far from the old mine types the owner claimed, his words sounded pleasant and weren’t off-putting.

”Hmm, then we’ll just take a casual look around,” Huo Sining said and squatted down to flip through the stones with her right hand, as casually as one might pick a watermelon.

The owner, named Qi, initially kept an eye on Huo Sining from the corner of his eye. But once he saw that she didn’t use a flashlight or a magnifying glass, he looked away.

Boss Qi had seen countless stone gambling experts and had never seen anyone pick through rough stones as one might pick vegetables. Huo Sining’s approach looked amateur to him, and he thought she was just tagging along with Wang Kaiwen for fun, so he lost interest in shadowing her.

Boss Qi never associated the person before him with the mysterious Miss Huo, who was the hot topic in the stone gambling circles recently. He thought Huo Sining was just a girl Wang Kaiwen recently picked up, so he didn’t pay much attention to what she was doing.

Little did Boss Qi know, Huo Sining was comparing goods from different stores. With her Heavenly Eye Skill at work, she separated the stones: pale green, skin green, deep green. None of these greens satisfied her, and she also tossed aside flawed rough stones.

Soon, Huo Sining’s hand, after rifling through a pile of stones, stopped on a square one.

This stone, not more than five kilograms and blackish in color, revealed a strong green hue through its thick outer layer, shining brightly in her mind.

Huo Sining’s body froze for a moment, then she stealthily glanced at the owner with her peripheral vision.

The shopkeeper was busily polishing the glass of his counter and didn’t notice the anomaly with Huo Sining.

Huo Sining breathed a sigh of relief and, pretending to be indifferent, moved her hand away. She went through the remaining stones, spending about ten minutes to review them all.

Having looked at all the rough stones in the area, she was about to stand up when a warehouse worker, gathering the scattered stones, flipped over a spherical stone from behind the door, intending to throw it back onto the stone pile.

That piece of rough stone had been hidden behind the open door all along, and because the door was open, no one had noticed the unassuming piece behind it.

A thought crossed Huo Sining’s mind, and she suddenly called out, ”Hey, could you show me that piece of rough stone?”