Chapter 139:113, a big bargain? A jadeite raw stone worth 30 million!_4
Want to score a bargain at a street stall? It’s possible, but extremely difficult.
Actually, in this day and age, finding a bargain is very rare, since information is transparent and opportunities are scarce almost like looking for a needle in a haystack.
The golden years for bargain hunting were in the seventies and eighties, and the nineties of the last century.
Of course, for Lin Mo with his Intelligence System, these were not issues.
As long as there were goods in the market, spending ten or eight days there would always yield some useful information.
After browsing for a while and finding nothing worth buying, the family of three headed to a nearby market that specialized in raw stones, where the items on the stalls had changed from a variety of antiques to all kinds of stones.
Lin Xiaoxiao immediately felt puzzled, “Mom, why are they all selling stones? Can stones be exchanged for money? Let’s go gather some stones to sell too!” Li Jinwen tugged at the corner of her mouth, kids say the darndest things, but she didn’t understand much about these either, and shook her head, “Mom doesn’t really understand, your dad often watches these stone videos, you should ask your dad.”
In fact, even before activating the system, Lin Mo often browsed short videos to learn about antiques and watched live streams related to treasure appraisal, not for making money, but purely out of interest. After activating the system, Lin Mo would often search for information on the topic, partly to obtain intelligence from the system and partly because he genuinely wanted to learn about this field—after all, it was a quick way to make money.
Lin Xiaoxiao looked at Lin Mo, who was gazing all around, and asked loudly, “Dad, what are you looking at? Do you know why they are selling stones? Are these stones different?”
“Alt, this…”
Lin Mo smiled, squatted down at a less crowded stall, casually picked up a piece of jade raw stone that looked ordinary, no different from a roadside stone, and said with a smile, “Honey, these aren’t the common stones you find by the roadside.”
“Do you remember the jade pendants that Auntie and Uncle Zhang Li wear around their necks?”
Lin Xiaoxiao nodded vigorously, “Mhm! I remember, they’re green and very pretty!”
Li Jinwen, too, listened intently like a curious child.
“The green jade stones come from these kinds of stones,” Lin Mo fiddled with the stone in his hand and continued to explain, “But not every stone contains beautiful jade; you need to use experience and discernment to tell, and that’s how you make money.”
After a pause, Lin Mo added, “Simply put, it’s like opening blind boxes.”
When blind boxes were mentioned, both Lin Xiaoxiao and Li Jinwen, who had been a bit confused, suddenly understood.
Lin Xiaoxiao pointed at the stone in Lin Mo’s hand and asked, “Dad, does the stone you’re holding contain jade?”
“I don’t know about this one, I don’t have X-ray vision,” Lin Mo said as he waved to the stall owner, “Boss, could I borrow your flashlight for a moment? I want to take a look at this stone.”
The stall owner nodded and rolled a powerful flashlight over.
Lin Mo turned on the flashlight and pressed it against the surface of the stone, explaining to his daughter and the attentive Li Jinwen, “Do you see it? There’s a bit of green here, which means there is jade inside, but how much jade is there, and whether the jade has cracks, we can only know after cutting it open.” “If the content is low, then it’s not worth much, and if it’s cracked or has impurities, it’s also not valuable. Cracks mean you can’t make large items from it, and impurities don’t look nice.”
Lin Mo spoke with authority.
But these were just common knowledge things that anyone could understand after a bit of research.
To really use the strong flashlight to judge the quality of the jade inside, or even to determine if jade could be extracted, that was asking a bit much.
He was really just a novice who knew a bit of theory but no practice.
The more Lin Xiaoxiao listened, the more interested she became, “Dad, after looking for so long, did you figure it out? How about the stone in your hand? Should we open it up?”
As she spoke, Lin Xiaoxiao even made a motion as if breaking something open. “I’ll ask the price first; if it’s cheap, we can give it a try,” Lin Mo returned the flashlight to the stall owner and casually asked, “Boss, how much for this stone?”
The stall owner was a middle-aged man in his fifties with dark skin, giving off an honest vibe.
He glanced at Lin Mo and his family and smilingly said, “You really have a good eye, sir, picking out the best raw stone from my stall. I can see that your family has a connection with this stone…”
“Alright, alright, stop right there!” Lin Mo didn’t even want to hear him finish, cutting him off, “Just give me the price. If it’s too outrageous, I’m leaving. There are plenty of stones in this market, and I don’t necessarily need this one.”
“Besides, do I look like a sucker to you?”
The stall owner’s pitch—he had already seen countless times in various short videos.
How could he be fooled?
Moreover, in such a market, you had to be bold in speaking up, or you would definitely be taken advantage of.
Many here were slick talkers who made their living by their wits!
The stall owner, not upset at being interrupted mid-pitch, merely smiled and said earnestly, “I got it for 1100, a flat rate. You give me 1500, and I’ll cover the cost of cutting the stone. If that’s okay, then you can transfer the money.”