CH 15

After a few days, Bai Fan didn’t feel any sadness in Yin Rui’s letters anymore. This made him quite relieved. Yin Rui is the type of kid who never talks about difficult situations he encounters. However, the problem must have been resolved now, Yin Rui started to open up more.

Yin Nanhan had also changed recently, he would only teach the basics before, but now he started to seriously teach the techniques. Although they were difficult, Bai Fan was happy deep inside. Since these techniques were deemed important by Yin Nanhan, if he was able to master them, then he could easily become a martial arts master. In fact, this also means Yin Nanhan has acknowledged him as his successor, Bai Fan doesn’t need to worry that Yin Nanhan will go and bring back a baby one day and throw Yin Rui away.

Simultaneously, the extra responsibility placed on Bai Fan made him determined to change. His current job was unable to provide many things for him, but took up most of his time in a day. If he continues on like this, he will soon lag behind Yin Rui. Even now, his understanding of boxing and swordsmanship was much more shallow than Yin Rui’s, this difference would only increase in the future. Two people in the same body…if the difference was too great, they would be easily found out. Also, continuing on like this would be too dangerous, the world where Yin Rui lives in was not some peaceful society.

Since his life had become special now, then why would he need to follow how normal people live? This time-consuming work will never suit him anymore.

Previously, the money he obtained through gambling stones was like an opening towards a new life for Bai Fan. For other people, they had a 9 out of 10 chance of losing when gambling stones, but for Bai Fan it was different. People gamble on whether there is jade, however, Bai Fan can know whether there was jade with his qi, all he had to gamble on was the quality of the jade.

Additionally Bai Fan knows, if he doesn’t take a step today, he will eventually take it in the near future. Because the 400,000 yuan he obtained through gambling, has turned into 300,000 yuan in a month’s time. His medicinal bath required a hefty amount of money, the money he received was able to make the situation better, but it was temporary. After a year or a half, when he had used up all his money, then what can he do? Since he will eventually take this step in the near future, why not do it now when he still has resources at hand?

After he became determined, Bai Fan researched a lot regarding jade and gambling stones. During the night, he would also inspect the decorations in Yin Rui’s room, he found out that not only can he freely control the flow of his internal energy inside jade, this also applied to other types of gems.  The purer the jade, the easier it is for his internal energy to flow inside it. However, other than this, he didn’t find anything else. If he checked a bean type and a glass type with the same level of purity, the internal energy will flow with the same level of fluidity, not a single difference. But these two emeralds would have a great difference when comparing their prices in the market.

After experimenting countless days, Bai Fan took the chance to visit R city of Y province. Once again he’s in R city, this time he spent most of his time in the jade market. However, he did not spend a huge amount of money, he often went to the miscellaneous stone area. The area was filled with raw stones or stones with low quality which could not be sold. The chances of finding a jade was quite low, but the prices were cheap.

Bai Fan went through pile after pile, finally he picked out around 30 of them. But this cost him only less than 10,000 yuan. These raw stones were different in size, their prices were all different too. The cheapest was 100 yuan, while the most expensive one did not go over 800 yuan.

These 30 stones contain jade, although he didn’t know the quality, but this still made him feel quite proud. Bai Fan rented a stone-cutting machine and personally operated it. He knew that the experience of an operator was crucial, if he cut it wrongly it would affect the price of the jade. 

Relying on his memories from purchasing his first gambling stone, Bai Fan cut open all 30 of these rough stones.

Through several days of studying and shamelessly questioning shop owners, Bai Fan was finally able to differentiate the qualities of jade.

Bai Fan then divided these jades into groups. There were around 10 Bashan jade, it was a dry white type that was only a bit better than brick material which is a low-grade jadeite, the value wasn’t high. There were 8 bean types, only 3 of them were of good quality, the others either had color that was too dark or cracks on them. There were 5 yellow-brown jadeite, they were of little value similar to the bean type, and can be seen anywhere in the market. The remaining consists of red jadeite, although they were more popular in the market because of its festive color, Bai Fan knew the ones he opened were not of high quality, so the value can only be determined later on.

The thing that made Bai Fan surprised was that he cut open a water type jadeite, one with not many cracks nor blemishes. Though it was not as good as the ice type he got last time, and the size wasn’t that big either, Bai Fan knew that from this one water type, he would gain a lot of money.

A few days later, Bai Fan went back to Z city, since his plan was a success, now he can easily create a bigger snowball* with less cost and effort, so he did not need to stay in this job that cost a lot of his time. Therefore he handed in his resignation letter.

The manager was quite shocked, he even asked whether the pay was too low, if it was, then he could ask for more. Bai Fan felt touched by the manager’s questions, but still decided to resign either way.

With resigning, packing up, and etc. Bai Fan has become very busy these days. After thinking that Y province isn’t as near as Z city to his house, Bai Fan decided to go give his parents a visit.

Finally finishing all the necessary tasks, Bai Fan went to Y province alone and started living there. He rented a single’s courtyard and bought all the equipment needed for cutting open stones. He entered this line of work with the few hundred thousand yuan he had.

R city of Y province was inside the country, but for Bai Fan it was an unfamiliar place. Half of the population in R city were of the minority, it was a very diverse place. This diversity only gave Bai Fan more loneliness. This time he was really all alone, during university due to Luo Shuai’s sudden confession he ran away, he changed his phone number, and even stopped contacting his other roommates. Just like this he lost contact with many people, the only people he could contact were his parents, but now he can’t. Before, he would freely call them to have a meal together, but now he had to hide the fact that he resigned from his job because he didn’t want them to worry. That’s why he had to stop contacting them now. Luckily, he still has a loyal online friend.

He found that friend from the GuWu forum, that friend would immediately reply to his messages regardless of the time. As time passed, the two would discuss topics other than martial arts such as their daily lives. Bai Fan didn’t know whether this friend of his was younger or older than him, but Bai Fan identified himself as ‘Fan-ge’ from early on. Maybe that unknown friend of his was stunned by his theoretical insights, so he obediently continued to call him ‘Fan-ge’. 

Don’t look down on the word *‘ge’. In many situations, the person title ‘ge’  has more power in a relationship.

After getting to know each other for 2 months, this friend of his suddenly said, “Fan-ge, let’s meet!”

Bai Fan paused for a while, then changed the topic of conversation and dealt with it casually. That person probably understood what Bai Fan meant. The two continued to contact each other, but never once again mentioned a meeting.

……

Gambling stones is a crazy and tempting industry. You can become very rich or very poor, countless people fantasize about becoming wealthy overnight.

But Bai Fan had a clear goal, he joined for more free time and to get more funds for his medicinal bath and daily necessities. He had special means to slowly create a snowball without becoming greedy, he didn’t come here to get rich overnight. Therefore, regardless of how crazy this industry was, he will always maintain a clarity in his heart.

Add ons-

*Snowball was a reference to Warren Buffett’s book titled ‘The Snowball: Warren Buffett and the Business of Life’

*Ge哥 means older brother, it’s really respectful to call a guy ‘ge’ in China.

(you all should read more ‘gege’ bl novels, trust me THEY ARE THE BEST) – Robe 

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We’re late once again:))