Chapter 144 No prairie fire can destroy the gra.s.s
Lin Luoran goes to the city to order a batch of jade boxes.
She has decided to sell all the century-year-old fleece flowers. A saying goes like this, “The tailor makes the man”. Therefore, spirit herbs should be packed in jade boxes, which is helpful for maintaining Reiki and the expensive look as well.
As for the cost of the jade boxes, well, whatever you’re given, you pay for it. Lin Luoran doesn’t want to give fleece flowers for free, so the price buyers pay contains the cost of packaging.
She is not short of money. For one thing, she’s got real estate. For another, even if she is short of money, she can sell a lot of things, starting with jade. The “Skin Beauty Boluses” she made is far more effective than all the essence sold on the market, which claims to “contain 24k gold” and is worth ten thousand yuan. If she is willing to sell the boluses, she can call the shots in price-fixing as all women love to be beautiful and there are a lot of rich ones who don’t care about money.
Lin Luoran also wants to find a primary school for Luodong. He has recovered a lot from autism and it’s not good for him to be isolated with his contemporaries… Even though he has Taoist root and will become a cultivator in the future, he still needs to experience a social life and communicate with people. The cultivation world seems to be very peaceful today, but no one knows what will happen in the future.
Even for Lin Luoran herself, she dares to expose her fleece flowers only because of her “master” that doesn’t exist. Moreover, she lets people know that she has something good from time to time, and that’s why people believe that her “master” actually exists. In a word, the safety of her and her family is actually at stake.
As soon as Baojia arrives in the city, she wants to go shopping. On second thought, however, she thinks of Commander Qin, who is living alone in the military compound. Baojia, therefore, decides to be a filial granddaughter. She ignores the temptation of shopping and goes back home to visit her grandpa.
Lin Luoran can’t say “no” to her decision; rather, she is willing to offer a gift to Commander Qin, that is, a bag of vegetables. Baojia has Taoist root and young Master An never avoids her in saying anything, so she knows a lot about the cultivation world. For example, she knows that it is common for something like Lin Luoran taking out a bag of vegetables —
“Luoran, I’m always wondering… Where do you take all those out from? You are hiding so much from me, aren’t you?”
Lin Luoran is speechless. She was going to share the secret of the bead with Baojia before. However, as she gradually knows what the bead is able to do, she gives up the idea. She is not being stingy, she just knows very well the story of “the precious stone lands its innocent owner in jail”. There must be a reason for the story to be popular.
Baojia cannot protect herself if she confronts with any cultivators. If someone wants to use Baojia to deal with Lin Luoran, the less Baojia knows, the better.
Lin Luoran thinks for a second and takes out the Universal Sack given by Wen Guanjing.
“Look, this is the bag they are talking about!”
Knowing that this small bag with gold fabric patterns is the storage bag that can hold a lot of things, naturally Baojia wants it so bad and she looks at Lin Luoran piteously. Lin Luoran cannot reject her requirement when Baojia plays cute, so she answers reluctantly,
“It’s not mine. It’s just provided for the mission and I a.s.sume I will have to give it back… I promise I will get you one when I have the opportunity.” Lin Luoran sighs. Even if someone is willing to exchange a Universal Sack for her fleece flowers, how much will it take? Lin Luoran is shocked after doing the math — if she wants to take the whole family into the cultivation world, the expenditure for necessities such as elixirs, magic weapons and Universal Sack is very big.
Lin Luoran sighs, no one can rest on their laurels!
She gave gifts to the Superior of the Qingcheng Taoist Temple to thank him for taking care of the Lin family for the past three months. If others want to have her spirit wine and spirit herbs, they can wait until the herbs and wine are more than enough for the Lin family and that’s when she may consider selling them. Lin Luoran will only give gifts to people who she is really close to.
She doesn’t prepare for a formal visit today, so Lin Luoran puts Baojia at the gate of the compound and decides to pay a formal visit to Commander Qin later.
As soon as Lin Luoran stops the car, however, Liu Zheng walks out of the gate. Seeing Lin Luoran and Baojia get out of the car, he is shocked for a moment but calms down quickly.
Liu Zheng, Baojia’s fiancé, the man accompanied Lin Luoran when she broke up with Li Anping, picked her up the night Lin Luoran went to solve problems with Zou Yaowei. It seems that they have not met each other after that night.
It’s been four months since that night. Liu Zheng gets a little thinner, but he seems to be in a good spirit. At such a distance, however, Lin Luoran sharply finds dark eye circles hidden under his gla.s.ses.
Liu Zheng does not avoid Lin Luoran’s look at all. He says h.e.l.lo to Baojia and turns to Lin Luoran,
“It’s been a long time. How are you?”
Lin Luoran doesn’t know what to do but nods her head. She feels that a lot of emotions that she does not want to respond to are hidden behind that leisure expression. She feels too awkward to say anything.
Fortunately, Liu Zheng is always considerate. After greeting, he says that he has something to do and just leaves. Lin Luoran lets out a sigh of relief and says goodbye politely. Baojia looks at them, feeling complicated and sighs quietly. They are perfectly matched both in character and in appearance, but they are separated by a lot of invisible factors and gaps.
Lin Luoran drives away, but she doesn’t notice that Liu Zheng, who claimed to be leaving earlier, is staying in his car stopped at the corner, watching her. He has never expected to meet Lin Luoran like this and no one knows the waves in his heart at that moment… Liu Zheng grasps the steering wheel more firmly. He has visited many people and tried to do many things, but still, he fails. Maybe this is what Commander Qin meant when he said “there is a gap between immortals and ordinary people”. No matter how wealthy the Liu family is, the door to the cultivation world will not open even though he is the young owner of the Liu family.
No one says that he can’t have the “Taoist root”, but how to open this door to the Lin Luoran’s world?
Liu Zheng is now feeling depressed and complicated. Looking ahead, the traffic light at the crossroad is flas.h.i.+ng like stars in the sky… It reminds him of her eyes, so close, yet so far away.
Even if Lin Luoran knows what Liu Zheng is thinking about, she cannot give any response or promise to him. It’s better for everyone that she pretends to know nothing.
Lin Luoran drives directly to Fatty Cui’s store. w.a.n.g Miao’e is not there as she is just pregnant for two months and she is still in the “critical days”. However, Lin Luoran will not bother her no matter she is there or not.
Lin Luoran calls Fatty Cui before she arrives. Fatty Cui rushes to meet her, which causes a guess of Lin Luoran’s ident.i.ty. The worst guess is that Lin Luoran is Fatty Cui’s “kept woman”. The a.s.sistants are wondering, “Why is the boss not afraid of her wife now?” “She has changed a lot lately, has she received plastic surgery in Korea?”… Such topics are their favorites and their voice is a little high, even Fatty Cui hears the discussion.
Lin Luoran just laughs it off but Fatty Cui feels uneasy. After that day in Qingcheng Mountain, Fatty Cui has already seen Lin Luoran as a master living in the secular world. He feels that he is flattering Lin Luoran when he calls her “sister”.
With such thought in mind, hearing what the shop a.s.sistants are talking behind his back makes him uneasy.
Lin Luoran, however, doesn’t appease him or show an unhappy face. She calls him “Brother Cui” warmly and treats him just like before. Fatty Cui gets relaxed a little. Actually, w.a.n.g Miao’e has told him last night that Lin Luoran will not leave old friends behind when she becomes successful. Fatty Cui now truly admires his wife’s ability of understanding people!
“What kind of jade do you want, sister?” Fatty Cui takes Lin Luoran directly into the office. Many small pieces of jade samples are on display on the shelf, some of them are very good, and some are not. They are all s.h.i.+ning warmly under the light.
Lin Luoran doesn’t know what standard the jade box needs to achieve in order to maintain Reiki, so she checks the jade samples by herself. She finds that, as long as the work is good, jade at less than medium cla.s.s is enough for fleece flowers.
The value of jade lies in its flawless and moist beauty. Looking at the samples Lin Luoran chooses, Fatty Cui laughs, “This is cheap, so how do you want to use them?”
If the spirit herb itself rather than its fruit is used in making medicine, most spirit herbs are not very tall. Lin Luoran gesticulates a box sized 20cm* 10cm and orders 100 of them. Considering that she may have to use some in the future, Lin Luoran chooses a better kind of jade and orders another 50 boxes.
Fatty Cui is a little embarra.s.sed. Even if the jade she chooses is not in a good quality, making that amount of big jade boxes is impossible for his store. It may be possible if he collects all the jade on the market in the southwest of Huaxia.
In fact, among the people Lin Luoran knows, the Liu family can help her easily. However, she doesn’t want to owe Liu Zheng anymore, so she can only ask Fatty Cui to help.
Fatty Cui feels happy that he can help Lin Luoran. He is now experiencing the complex feeling of mixed happiness and embarra.s.sment.
Fatty Cui sees Lin Luoran off and goes back to the store. Lin Luoran suddenly realizes that they haven’t reckoned the price yet — even the jade used is cheap, with that large amount and delicate handicraft, it cannot be cheap. Since she made fortune by gambling stone, she has sold jade worth over 20 million yuan. She spent most of them buying Master Jia’s old mansion. After that, she bought the rough stones at Ruili and her car. Lin Luoran realizes that she has less than one million yuan with her.
Obviously, it is not enough to pay for the jade boxes. Fortunately, she doesn’t have to pay it right away. There’s still time to collect money.
If she changes the t.i.tle of her post into selling fleece flowers, how much will she get?
Lin Luoran recalls the address she found online and goes straight to the primary school she finds for Luodong.
When Lin Luoran is negotiating with the school director, she doesn’t know that at this moment, an acquaintance of her arrives at her villa. The acquaintance is now wondering around Qings.h.i.+ Dock, thinking about how to investigate on the Lin family.
Elly is in her sportswear with a towel around her neck and a pair of sneakers, just like someone exercising. If the sun is not blazing, she really looks like some guests of other villas who accidentally breaks into the range of the Lin’s villa.
Through the railings, she sees a handsome young man arguing with a girl in a Tang costume. Rich people these days do a lot of strange things, so wearing ancient costumes is not a big deal. Therefore, Elly hides the strange feeling and raises her tone,
“h.e.l.lo? Is anyone home, please?”