Chapter 149: Blue Jadeite, Sui Yi, Strike a Blow!

Obviously, after unwrapping Old Tang's rough stone, it was time for Sui Yi's.

Old Tang naturally knew his own taste wasn't great and held no expectations for this piece of rough stone, but...

"How could this piece of mine compare to Boss Li's? Yours cost 5.8 million, while mine was only 500,000—not even a tenth! If I can actually cut out any jadeite from this, it'll purely be blind luck!"

Old Tang started self-deprecating while thoroughly mocking his opponent in the process!

Li Yuan's complexion indeed turned dark, but he said nothing more, merely letting out a few cold, mocking chuckles.

Zhang Guangbiao had already drawn the cutting lines on Old Tang's rough stone. At this moment, Sui Yi found it true that ninety-nine percent of what Old Tang and the others said about gambling on stones boiled down to luck. Take Zhang Guangbiao, for instance. When she first encountered him, she thought he was quite capable, but judging by these few attempts at drawing lines, she could only conclude that he didn't possess exceptional talent for stone gambling, as his line trajectories weren't very accurate.

Well, perhaps that was precisely the charm of stone gambling.

——You never truly know what lies inside.

Crack! With a single cut, nothing was revealed except chalk-white stone.

Zhang Guangbiao glanced at Old Tang again and made the next cut!

Uh, still chalk-white...

Sui Yi couldn't help but sigh inwardly.

This was too coincidental; it had managed to completely miss the jadeite and land squarely on waste rock.

Although Old Tang had anticipated this, he still felt a minor twinge of disappointment. Li Yuan on the opposite side smiled and casually tossed out a couple of sarcastic remarks...

Old Tang grew annoyed and retorted in kind, but that rough stone seemed destined for the scrap heap...

No, to be precise, the two cut pieces of stone were now about to be auctioned off at a low price, going for just a few hundred or a few thousand, left for others to try their luck as lottery tickets.

This was the most helpless choice for those who had lost their bets, a way to salvage whatever little loss they could.

"Such a large piece of rough stone, yet abandoned after just two cuts—isn't that a bit too wasteful? Why not make a few more cuts?"

Sui Yi's voice was pleasant, and her abrupt interjection didn't sound particularly grating. Everyone turned to look at her, and Li Run directly sneered, "Do you think you're slicing up Chinese cabbage, hacking a few times and guaranteed to find the heart?"

"At least there are no black blemishes, isn't that so... It's still worth looking forward to," Sui Yi replied calmly.

Damn it!

The people on the Li family's side felt an immediate tightness in their chests. This young girl's words were razor-sharp!

She had struck right at their fatal weakness.

5.8 million—how heartbreakingly painful!

"Making another cut costs a pretty penny, you know..." Qian Shuangyu sneered.

Sui Yi glanced at her and said, "No rush, isn't there that 200,000 of yours?"

Her tone was quite flat, just like speaking of everyday matters.

Puff!

Qian Shuangyu also spat blood internally and fell silent.

Well, seeing Sui Yi effortlessly defeat the opposition with just two simple sentences, Old Tang was delighted. This disciple of his was fantastic—capable of both offense and defense, adorable yet stunning!

"Alright, keep cutting! Even if you chop it into stone powder, that's fine. I've already lost the 500,000, do I care about a little more money? This old man isn't as thrifty and frugal as certain people."

Old Tang glanced sideways at Li Run and the others.

Thrifty and frugal...

A chorus of muffled laughter rippled through the crowd.

Li Yuan: "..."

Perhaps he shouldn't have come to Nanxun; it was utterly heartbreaking!

Zhang Guangbiao was also happy to have more business, and upon hearing this, he smiled and said, "Alright, then I'll make a few more cuts. Who knows, the next cut might just hit jadeite!"

With that, he brought the blade down with a *crack*.

Just like Sui Yi had thought, it looked just like chopping pork.

And then...

A clear, ethereal blue instantly caught everyone's eyes.

"Ah!"

"It's blue!"

"Damn, we hit something!"

"Hey, why is it blue?"

Sui Yi was also surprised. Blue jadeite existed too? She had previously assumed jadeite only came in green, and never expected...

Sensing Sui Yi's puzzlement, a voice suddenly came from behind her: "Actually, regarding jadeite, there is a widespread saying: green is the orthodox color, known as 'cui' [emerald], while other colors—yellow, red, blue—all exist and are collectively known as 'fei' [kingfisher]. Generally speaking, green emerald is the orthodox color. If the green is intensely pure, it's top-tier jadeite and considered supreme, such as Imperial Green. However, other colors, like top-grade yellow jadeite or red jadeite—such as bright yellow jade or blood jade—are also worth a king's ransom and are exceptionally rare."

Sui Yi turned her head to look and saw it was Lü Haobai, standing behind her with a beaming smile.

Didn't this guy run a shop? Why was he here watching the excitement?

The concurrent voices caused Old Tang to widen his eyes, and he couldn't help stepping forward briskly, almost bumping into the blade.

Anxious, Zhang Guangbiao laughed and said, "Whoa, Boss Tang, be careful! This is a stone-cutting blade I'm using, not a guillotine!"

His remark drew hearty laughter from the crowd.

Old Tang couldn't care about saving face anymore. He leaned forward to examine the palm-sized piece of blue water-tinted jade material, his expression shifting myriad times before his face split into a wide, booming laugh.

"Ha! It's blue jadeite! I've cut out blue jadeite!"

That smug posture left Lao Lin, Yu Quan, and the others green with envy, let alone Li Yuan and his cohort.

They were practically on the verge of suffering from stress-induced fury.

Good grief, there was no justice in this world!

Five million went down the drain, while 500,000 hit the jackpot!

Did things have to be like this?

Amidst the commotion, Zhang Guangbiao and his crew deftly extracted the blue jadeite. Because the cut directly exposed the jade flesh, and it clearly measured about the size of a palm, everyone could see it very clearly.

"The transparency is quite high. This blue jadeite is exceptionally beautiful, and with such clarity, the underlying mass of flesh is definitely not small."

The so-called transparency was something many people knew referred to the clarity of jadeite, but very few understood the meaning of 'flesh mass,' which referred to the base substance of the jadeite block—or more colloquially, how large the piece of jade meat actually was...

After a short while, the jade meat was completely dug out, and everyone finally realized just how large this piece of blue jadeite was.

It was about the size of a honeydew melon, exactly as Sui Yi had described earlier.

It was by no means a small amount.

The jewelers present pondered over the blue jadeite for a moment before beginning to place their bids. Old Tang wasn't particularly fond of jewelry; he dealt in antiques, after all. He liked historically significant items like jade cicadas, but he wasn't very enthusiastic about jadeite, so he decided to sell it.

After a competitive bidding process among several individuals, it fetched a high price of 2.2 million!

"The younger generation in recent years has deep pockets and a strong preference for exotic jadeites like blue jadeite. Prices are rising, and whoever buys this won't be taking a loss!"

Sui Yi mentally noted this point. It seemed that no matter what the item was or its intrinsic value, it ultimately depended on market demand...

Old Tang had secured a strong opening victory for his local Nanxun chamber of commerce, leaving the entire group overjoyed and full of high spirits. Consequently, they held an extremely favorable view of Sui Yi, who had spoken up to support them earlier.

The praises were endless.

Sui Yi didn't pay much attention to this; instead, following Zhang Guangbiao's suggestion, she placed her own rough stone onto the stone-cutting machine.

Actually, the piece of jade meat inside this rough stone was not small at all. After all, the green had appeared just two centimeters beneath the surface. Based on Sui Yi's measurements, if the jade meat inside were completely excavated, it would probably be about the size of a volleyball.

The color was also pure.

Unless she had peeled and rubbed the stone from the very beginning, no matter how she made the cut, she was bound to damage a portion of the jade meat.

Sui Yi wasn't too obsessive about perfection, and she knew she shouldn't expose her abilities too much. Perhaps, after this piece of jadeite was cut open, she would still need to offer some verbal explanation...

Zhang Guangbiao still held high hopes for Sui Yi. "Miss Sui successfully cut a profit before, and she's also well-versed in antiques and the like—a rare talent indeed. Of course, her fortune is also exceptionally good. I wonder if she'd like to step up and make the cut herself?"

Having failed to hit anything in the first few cuts on Old Tang's rough stone, he felt he had lost face and feared messing up again and losing all his dignity, which was why he invited the owner herself to step up.

Of course, his previous remark was also entirely sincere.

Hearing this, Sui Yi was slightly stunned. "I can do it myself?"

"Of course you can, just consider it satisfying your own craving for a hands-on experience. I see Miss Sui is blessed with boundless fortune; if you make a cut yourself, you're bound to hit green!" Zhang Guangbiao asserted with absolute confidence.

Old Tang and the others were also in high spirits, having successfully suppressed Li Yuan's faction. Even though they didn't hold any expectations for Sui Yi's rough stone, they knew she would eventually walk this path, and building up her nerve now would be good practice.

"Go ahead and cut it, Sui Yi... Just treat it as training. Young women sometimes lack a bit of boldness," Elder Han said with a smile.

Sui Yi smiled upon hearing this. Indeed, in almost any industry, most young women lacked daring, and true career women were still relatively rare.

"Alright." Sui Yi was a decisive person by nature and disliked beating around the bush. She readily agreed, stepped forward, and arrived in front of the stone-cutting machine.

Lifting her gaze, she found nearly a hundred pairs of eyes staring directly at her. *Heh, this certainly is great training for one's nerve.*

"Sui Yi, you do it like this, like this..." Zhang Guangbiao offered an explanatory guide from the side, and just as he was about to say more,

Sui Yi had already decisively and neatly operated the stone-cutting machine and brought the blade down!

Crack!

It wasn't a clean cut slicing it in half, but merely trimming off an edge.

A corner slice about three or four centimeters thick.

Crisp, neat, and without a shred of hesitation.

Everyone was first startled and admired her decisiveness, followed by a collective shock at the thin sliver of green visible on the newly cut surface.

Of course, what was even more startling was the cut surface on the main body of the large rough stone, which displayed a vast expanse of verdant green...

Although the color was still relatively light, but...

The outer crust was only a little over two centimeters thick, and the entire interior was completely green!

"My goodness!"

"Holy crap!"

"Good grief!"

Old Tang was dumbfounded, and Li Yuan and his group were equally dumbfounded. Even more stunned was Zhang Guangbiao, whose hand hovered frozen in mid-air as his eyes bulged.

Wait a minute, did he see that right?

While the saying went "better to buy a single line than a whole sheet," but damn!

This sheet of green was remarkably pure!

It was pure from the very beginning, free of other impurities, with only a hint of mist lingering on the outer periphery...

Any experienced jeweler could immediately determine that the probability of this stone containing a massive chunk of jade meat was exceptionally high.

Before Old Tang and the others could react,

"I'll buy it! Miss Sui, I'll buy this rough stone, I'm bidding one million!"

"One million five hundred thousand! Miss Sui, you can already make a hefty profit!"

They already knew from before that Sui Yi's rough stone was bought together with Old Tang's, both costing around 500,000.

Naturally, if Sui Yi sold it now, she would already be doubling her profit!

"One million eight hundred thousand!"

"Two million!"

Sui Yi shook her head. "Let's see it through to the end. Cut it all open, Mr. Zhang. Sorry to trouble you."

With a single sentence, she dismissed all of these bidders, leaving quite a few people feeling rather displeased. This young girl was far too bold; making a free profit of 1.5 million wasn't enough for her, and she actually wanted to cut the whole thing open...

What if the jade material underneath turned out to be meager, or riddled with blemishes?

Qian Shuangyu and her cohorts silently cursed her endlessly...