“Don’t, don’t, don’t!!
Stop right there!”
Looking at the three bundles of wild vegetables placed on the stove, Nicole hurried forward, grabbed Fu Hua anxiously, and tightly knitted her brows.
“Fu Hua, listen to me!
You must have been scammed.
How much did you spend on that vendor?”
Fu Hua stood beside the stove and replied with a calm expression,
“Four thousand each, I bought three.”
Nicole instantly widened her eyes, her voice pitching up by several degrees, filled with disbelief.
“Four thousand Dennies!”
She instinctively covered her forehead, groaning inwardly, her mouth twitching uncontrollably a few times as she wailed in her heart,
It’s over, it’s over, why did it have to be the most ruthless rip-off artist…
For a brief moment, Nicole forcibly suppressed the panic in her heart, cleared her throat, put on an experienced look, and looked at Fu Hua seriously.
“Ahem!
Fu Hua, listen to me!
You must have been scammed!
I, Nicole, have mixed around the New Eridu vegetable market and the Hollow for so many years, and I’ve never seen any ‘Chunbulao’ from Mount Yungui mature in this season.”
Hearing this, Fu Hua’s originally peaceful expression immediately turned serious.
She straightened her body, her words carrying a bit of resolute confidence.
“Impossible!
These three bundles of ‘Chunbulao’ were all bought from a regular market!
Fair to young and old alike!”
“Oh my!
Fair to young and old?
Isn’t that just bullying an adult like you!” Nicole stamped her foot anxiously on the spot, her tone growing increasingly impatient as she reached out to point at the wild vegetables on the stove.
“Take a close look yourself!
Does it feel a bit damp when touched?
Truly fresh ‘Chunbulao’ should feel crisp!
It snaps with a single bend!
How can it be so limp and soft!”
Nicole leaned forward, pointing at the leaves of the wild vegetables with a look of exasperation at her failure to improve.
Fu Hua slowly closed her eyes, recalling the appearance of the wild vegetables in detail, and her tone instead grew even more confident.
“But they look just like mustard greens!
Every single root is plump, green, and has those iconic folded edges.”
“Vegetables soaked in water all look like that!” Nicole waved her hands anxiously, explaining at a flying speed, “There are so many wild vegetables on Mount Yungui!
Look at the edges of the leaves; these edges are not natural leaf margins at all, they’ve been artificially trimmed!
Someone must have used them to impersonate ‘Chunbulao’ and recommended them to you to earn a commission!”
Speaking of this, the expression on Nicole’s face could barely hold together, her brows twisted into a ball, and her heart was filled with anxiety.
Fu Hua’s fingertips moved slightly, her closed eyelashes trembled lightly, and the confidence in her tone quietly decreased a bit, carrying a hint of hesitation.
“But those iconic folded edges are also pretty much the same as ‘Chunbulao’…”
“Aiyah!
Soak it in potion, Chinese cabbage turns into green vegetable, and wild grass turns into spiritual herb!
I often do…
uh…”
Nicole was so anxious that she spoke without thinking.
Halfway through her sentence, she suddenly stopped, hurriedly changed her words, and the panic of almost slipping up flashed past.
“I mean!
I’ve seen a lot!
They’re all tricks like this!
Listen to my word, stop your losses in time, don’t cook it anymore and upset your stomach.
How about I go buy some new vegetables?
I can buy even better ones!
And cheaper too!”
Nicole quickly restrained her expression and earnestly persuaded her.
Fu Hua still pressed her lips together, unwilling to believe this fact, but her originally firm tone was obviously a bit weaker as she spoke with lacking confidence.
“But the market boss also issued me relevant appraisal documents, and there are no problems at all.”
“Printed by himself!”
Nicole blurted it out almost instantly, her tone extremely certain.
“The appraisal document even has a stamp on it!”
Fu Hua immediately retorted, trying to prove she wasn’t scammed.
“Carved out of a radish!”
Nicole didn’t hesitate at all either, replying resolutely, her eyes full of the certainty of “you really were scammed.”
The last shred of luck in the bottom of Fu Hua’s heart hadn’t dissipated yet as she said in a soft murmur,
“That person looked very professional too.”
“Wearing sunglasses to fake it!”
Nicole immediately took the words, her tone crisp and neat.
Fu Hua was suddenly stunned.
This time she was truly surprised; her originally tightly closed eyes slightly opened a slit, full of confusion.
“How do you know he was wearing sunglasses?”
Seeing this, Nicole smoothly fished out a pair of thick sunglasses from her pocket, put them on her face, put on a pretentiously profound look, and raised her chin.
“Hey, look and see if this is how he looked!”
After a brief silence, Fu Hua abruptly widened her eyes, her pupils slightly shrinking.
Her tone was filled with shock and disbelief as she pointed at Nicole, her voice even trembling slightly.
“You!!!
You’re the ‘Chunbulao’ market boss?!”
Nicole yanked the sunglasses off her face, irritably grabbed her hair, her tone both excited and full of helplessness, and said with a paralyzed face,
“Boss my foot!
Aren’t I just a wandering charlatan!”
Fu Hua’s whole body stiffened, the blood draining from her face.
Her tone intertwined terror and disbelief, her voice pitching up quite a bit.
“…You!
You cheated me of my Dennies!
You pushed fake ‘Chunbulao’ on me!!!”
“Hah, consider it my bad luck.
I’ll return the Dennies to you later, alright?”
Nicole waved her hand, completely giving up defending herself, only thinking of quickly solving the mess in front of her.
She reached out to grab the fake wild vegetables on the stove, urging anxiously, “Hurry up!
Throw them away!
Otherwise eating them will really give you a stomachache!”
Fu Hua snapped back to her senses, panting heavily, both angry and regretful, a string of words blurted out,
“No wonder I saw your stall surrounded by a crowd when I came back!
So you ran away after scamming the Dennies!
No wonder you said it was the last bunch!
If I didn’t buy it, you’d leave in ten minutes!”
“Ain’t that right!
If I stayed there any longer, after today there wouldn’t be a tomorrow!”
Nicole wore a bitter smile, full of helplessness, her tone even carrying a trace of a plea and a shallow crying voice.
“I beg you!
Stop eating it, change to something else!”
“No way!
You must explain this clearly to me today!!
”
In Fu Hua’s usually gentle tone, there was a rare trace of anger.
She clenched her fists and fiercely slammed a punch onto the wallet Nicole had casually placed on the stove.
Bang!!!!
With this punch, the two of them froze simultaneously.
In the next second, four heartbroken voices rang out in unison——
“Chunbulao!
My Chunbulao!!!”
“Dennies!
My Dennies!!!”
“Kitchen!
Our kitchen!!!”
“Kitchen!
Our kitchen!!!”
It might not seem tempting right now but who knows what the future holds?
“And If you’re enjoying it, drop a Power Stone for me!”