Chapter 38: The Foolish Mo Chuan

Xie Jiuniang grinned, revealing her small white teeth. She held up the wooden hairpin and said, “Come, come, come. According to the market rules, when multiple people compete for an item, the highest bidder wins! The starting price is one spirit stone, and the minimum increment is one hundred.”

The onlookers exclaimed at the shamelessness. 

“I bid fifty spirit stones,” the little boy was the first to make an offer.

Cheng Huaixin said, “Then I bid one hundred and fifty.”

“I bid 250… no, I bid 500.” The little boy held up five fingers and looked at Cheng Huaixin smugly.

Cheng Huaixin made another bid.

The two went back and forth, and the price soared to 15,000.

The onlookers were stunned.

Were these two fools? It was just an ordinary wooden hairpin, yet they were willing to pay an exorbitant price for it.

When Cheng Huaixin shouted 18,000, the little boy showed a conflicted expression.

“I bid…” The little boy opened his mouth again.

However, he could only open his mouth without uttering a word, which made him so anxious that fine sweat appeared on his forehead.

Those with insight could see that the little boy had been placed under a silencing technique.

Soon after, a fragrant breeze swept by.

A beauty in white robes descended on a flying sword, her skin like ice and bones like jade, as if she were a celestial being. With a single move, she picked up the little boy, threw him onto the flying sword, and turned around to leave on the sword with an air of detachment.

The beautiful woman came and went in a hurry.

It took a while for everyone to come back to their senses.

Then, they all looked at Xie Jiuniang.

No one was competing anymore.

Moreover, an ordinary wooden hairpin being sold for 18,000 spirit stones was unimaginable.

Several divine senses swept back and forth over the hairpin, but none of them found anything unusual. It just appeared to be an old item.

Xie Jiuniang’s face remained very calm.

She was not elated by material things, nor saddened by personal matters.

This caused some people who were secretly observing her to nod, including Elder Chaoyan.

Xie Siniang, on the other hand, was not so calm!

At that time, she had watched Xie Jiuniang buy the wooden hairpin, which only cost ten spirit beads. Now, the hairpin was about to be sold for 18,000. How many times had the price multiplied?

Xie Jiuniang was truly calm.

This was nothing. She had even exchanged one spirit stone for a hundred thousand before.

Then, Xie Jiuniang glanced at Gan Long in the corner of her eyes.

Gan Long was anxious and kept looking at her second brother. When she came over earlier, she had already asked her second brother to notify Mo Chuan using a voice transmission talisman.

Just then, Gan Meng received a reply from Mo Chuan. A celestial crane carrying a storage pouch filled with spirit stones came over, telling the siblings to bid as they pleased.

Mo Chuan was an alchemist and had no shortage of spirit stones.

Cheng Huaixin smiled and said, “Then this hairpin is mine…”

“Wait, I bid 50,000.” Gan Meng suddenly came over to bid.

Cheng Huaixin and Gan Meng’s eyes met and sparks flew in between.

After confirming with a glance, did they have the same goal?

Cheng Huaixin clenched his fists. Suddenly, he received a familiar voice transmission in his mind: Bid 500,000.

“500,000.” As soon as Cheng Huaixin said this, a commotion arose around him.

The people present were all small fries at the Qi Refining stage and rarely witnessed such an exciting scene. The main point was that a high price was offered just to buy a wooden hairpin. Did they have so many spirit stones that they didn’t know where to spend them?

Xie Jiuniang was excited in her heart, but she still managed to maintain a calm appearance.

Here it comes, here it comes! The big spender has arrived!

“Xiao Jiu, Xiao Jiu…” Xie Siniang’s face was flushed with excitement, and she unconsciously grabbed Xie Jiuniang’s arm, saying, “We’re going to be rich, we’re going to be rich…”

The corners of Xie Jiuniang’s small mouth curled up.

Gan Meng said, “I bid 550,000.”

As everyone was waiting for Cheng Huaixin to make a bid, he received a voice transmission telling him to give up. It had to be said that Cheng Huaixin breathed a sigh of relief.

Competing for a wooden hairpin that had no value made him feel like a fool, and the pressure in his heart was immense.

Cheng Huaixin smiled and said, “Congratulations, I give up.”

Xie Jiuniang looked at Cheng Huaixin strangely. In her previous life, he didn’t appear. She didn’t know who his backer was.

Gan Meng paid 550,000 spirit stones and successfully bought the wooden hairpin. He then took Gan Long and left. The wooden hairpin was placed in a storage pouch and taken away by the celestial crane from earlier.

It was truly an extraordinary event to witness someone spend hundreds of thousands of spirit stones to buy an ordinary wooden hairpin. If they hadn’t seen it with their own eyes, no one would have believed it.

At the Dongxu Hall on the mountaintop.

Elder Chaoyan asked with a smile, “The person who bought the hairpin seems to be from the Alchemy Peak. What do you think?”

“That hairpin… I couldn’t see through it.” The female Daoist smiled faintly. “Daoist Guzheng, you examined it with your divine sense no less than ten times.  Why don’t you tell us what secrets it holds?”

Daoist Gu Zheng’s old face turned red. “I didn’t discover anything either.”

Using divine sense to examine other people’s belongings without permission was not the conduct of a gentleman.

Elder Chaoyan was so curious just now that he couldn’t help but check the wooden hairpin with his divine sense. With his hundreds of years of experience, it was indeed just an ordinary wooden hairpin.

It was just strange why two factions would come to fight over it.

Not only were Elder Chaoyan and the others puzzled, but everyone was puzzled, except for Xie Jiuniang, the person involved.

Xie Jiuniang, who had just made a fortune, was enthusiastically inviting a group of people who wanted to inquire about the hairpin’s origins to eat jerky.

As a result, the crowd dispersed in an instant.

Only Xie Xu took the jerky and asked, “Xiao Jiu, aren’t you worried that the hairpin is a treasure?”

“What treasure? Fourth Sister knows how it came to be.” Xie Jiuniang never thought the wooden hairpin was a treasure. It was just an ordinary hairpin.

She had planned to use it as bait for fishing.

Xie Siniang took a bite of a red fruit. “It was bought at the market in Xian City for ten spirit beads…”

Cough, cough, cough.

There was a burst of coughing around them.

Obviously, many people had heard Xie Siniang’s words. Something that cost only ten spirit beads was sold for 550,000 spirit stones!

Had they ever stumbled upon a great bargain?

Why was it always others who had good luck? The little swindler had already earned a fortune during the assessment, and now she had earned several hundred thousand more today.

Damn it, she had become rich overnight!

Xie Jiuniang didn’t mind that people disdained the jerky. She smiled and put it back into her storage pouch, along with the other items, and retreated into the small isolation formation.

She felt much more at ease without the covetous gazes of outsiders.

On the other side. 

Lin Wangchen learned that Mo Chuan had fallen into the trap and laughed out loud with joy.

“Hahaha…”

“Mo Chuan! You’ve finally met your match today…”

The depression that had accumulated in his heart recently was completely swept away by this.

Mo Chuan spent 550,000 spirit stones to buy a useless wooden hairpin. Lin Wangchen wondered how wonderful Mo Chuan’s expression would be after he got the hairpin.

It was a pity that he couldn’t witness it in person.

Mo Chuan didn’t know that when Lin Wangchen found out Xie Jiuniang had bought another hairpin, he had learned from the previous lesson with the “Broken Sword” and secretly sent someone to investigate the hairpin’s origins first.

They successfully discovered that the hairpin was merely made by an old craftsman and had no connection to any fortuitous opportunity.

Lin Wangchen knew that Mo Chuan’s people were keeping an eye on him, so he deliberately arranged for someone to approach Xie Jiuniang and accidentally leak that they were looking for a wooden hairpin, including a picture of the hairpin.

Mo Chuan indeed fell for it!

Even though Mo Chuan didn’t personally appear to purchase the hairpin and very few people knew it was him, Lin Wangchen still wanted to spread this matter.

The usually haughty and peerless genius alchemist had become a complete fool, turning into a laughingstock within the sect overnight.

He wondered what that person would think.

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