Chapter 1155: Mr. Moneybags!
“Fellow Daoist, w-what did you just say?” The young woman’s eyes went wide, and her heart began to thump with disbelief.
“I said those are the seven I DON’T want. The rest, I’ll take.” Meng Hao remained as cool as ever, but when he saw the look on the young woman’s face, a feeling rose up in his heart that he had never felt before. He thought back to one time in Yunjie County when he had happened to walk by a shop and catch sight of Steward Zhou buying things in just the same way he was doing right now.
The expression on that salesperson’s face, and his tone of voice, was exactly the same as this young woman’s right now.
She was panting, and even felt a bit dizzy. Throughout all the years she had worked at his place, she had seen many, many types of cultivators. However, this was the first time she had encountered anyone like Meng Hao.
“S-Senior… not including those seven, there are a total of 124 magical items on display.” Without even thinking about it, she began to explain further. “If you bought them with spirit stones, it would cost at least 40,000,000…. That would be about 4,000 in Immortal jade….”
Meng Hao lifted his chin and asked, “Well, are you selling, or not?” He currently had hundreds of millions of Immortal jades in his bag of holding, which meant that, if he wanted to, he could buy not only this collection of magical items, but actually, the entire shop, or even, the entire bazaar. He even had enough to buy the whole asteroid field.
After his escapades in the Nine Seas God World, Meng Hao was probably one of the richest individuals in all of the Mountain and Sea Realm. However, even that level of wealth didn’t provide him with any comfort. When he thought about how much the copper mirror liked to consume spirit stones and Immortal jades, he was left with a constant feeling of anxiety.
Even still, the look on the young woman’s face made him feel wonderful. Finally, he could enjoy the life of a rich person. Waving his hand, he sent 4,000 Immortal jades flying out, where they piled up into a small mountain on the ground.
Immortal qi instantly swelled out, filling the entire shop, making it like a celestial paradise, complete with floating mists and clouds.
To see so much Immortal jade nearly caused the young woman’s eyes to pop out of their sockets. This was the most wealth she had ever seen in one place. At the same time, the other people in the shop stared over in amazement, and even greed.
There were a few cultivators who first started trembling at the sight of the Immortal jade, then looked over at Meng Hao’s bag of holding. Eyes glittering, they quickly scurried off.
Meng Hao glanced at them out of the corner of his eye, and then a slightly bashful expression appeared on his face.
“Senior, please wait a moment. Just one moment, sir. This… this exceeds my authority. Junior will go ask the shop Elder himself to come over.” Panting, the saleswoman quickly edged backward. However, before she could even turn, a blast of wind flew in from the courtyard behind the shop, which quickly materialized into an old man.
He was dressed in extravagant, luxurious clothing, and had the demeanor of a transcendent being. He quickly clasped hands and bowed to Meng Hao.
“I am Shui Motian. Greetings, Fellow Daoist. Please, consider me a good friend, and allow me to throw in those seven extra items as a gift.” The Elder laughed heartily, quickly performing an incantation gesture and pointing. Instantly, the invisible restrictive spells on the wall vanished, and the magical items flew over to circle around Meng Hao, who instantly began to radiate the aura of jewels and treasures.
Meng Hao glanced at the Elder and nodded slightly, then made a grasping motion, causing the items to fly over into his bag of holding.
“Shui Motian, I’ll remember that name,” he said, turning to leave. The Elder nearly went wild with joy at the last of Meng Hao’s words, and he quickly followed, escorting Meng Hao all the way out of the shop, bowing and scraping the entire time.
To see him acting like this left all the salespeople in the shop in complete and utter shock. Although the transaction they had just witnessed involved a sum of money that was completely unheard-of, they still found it hard to believe that Elder Shui Motian, who was an Ancient Realm expert, would be so polite to a mere Immortal Realm cultivator.
The pretty young woman, who happened to be very close with Shui Motian, leaned over and whispered: “Elder Shui, if that guy easily forked over 4,000 pieces of Immortal jade, then his bag of holding must–” Before she could even finish her sentence, Shui Motian suddenly turned, eyes burning with rage as he slapped her across the face. Blood sprayed out of her mouth, and she staggered backward.
“Shut your mouth!” he said icily. “Do you know who that was? If you dare to say things like that, then considering his status, he could kill you, and me, and even the whole Heavenly Ink Sect! He could even obliterate the entire Heavencloud Bazaar in the blink of an eye!” He ended with a cold harrumph.
As soon as Meng Hao had produced the 4,000 pieces of Immortal jade, he had been certain of his identity. Although he had felt a sense of familiarity when he had scanned him with divine sense earlier, it took him a while before he had sudden realized who he was. It was then that he decided to offer the seven magical items as gifts.
“Who… who is he?” asked the pretty young woman.
Were it any other person, Shui Motian wouldn’t even answer her question. However, considering that she had attended to Meng Hao, he leaned over and whispered into her ear: “The Crown Prince of the Fang Clan, the only joint disciple of all of the Three Great Daoist Societies. He’s in the Immortal Realm, but can slaughter Ancient Realm experts. That was… Meng Hao!”
“That was him!?!?” The young woman gasped, and her eyes went wide. She turned her head to look for Meng Hao, but he had already disappeared from sight outside.
Suddenly, the young woman seemed to think of something, and she blurted, “Oh no, this is bad! Just now, there were some customers who snuck out after seeing his Immortal jade. They’re probably planning some sort of treachery!”
“Don’t worry about it,” said Shui Motian with a cold chuckle. “They’re just digging their own graves.” Shui Motian knew that considering Meng Hao’s identity, not even Guru Heavencloud could afford to let anything bad happen.
Meanwhile, in a relatively remote location within the bazaar, there was a building that few people liked to go near. When people did pass by it, they would glance over with anxiety and dread, then quickly bow their heads and hurry past.
Four middle-aged cultivators sat cross-legged outside the building, all of whom wore garish red robes and had cultivation bases at the peak of the Immortal Realm.
Inside the building, it was very quiet, and the only thing that could be heard was measured breathing. The cadence of the breathing made it seem as if it were in sync with Heaven and Earth, and caused the entire building to occasionally become blurry.
Currently, two cultivators were hurrying toward that very building. They stopped in front of the red-robed cultivators and kowtowed, and when they looked up, one of the two men said something to one of the red-robed men.
The red-robed cultivator immediately stood and entered the building, eyes glittering. After a moment, he emerged and said, “Go shadow him secretly, no matter where he goes. Let’s see exactly how much more Immortal jade he has. If it’s under 10,000, then it’s not worth it for his Majesty to get involved.”
The two cultivators who had just arrived looked very excited. They quickly bowed, then hurried away.
The red-robed men continued to sit there in meditation, and everything was quiet once again. On the second floor of the building, an old man sat there cross-legged. He had some brown blotches on his face, but when he opened his eyes, they glittered brightly, and the fluctuations of the late Ancient Realm rolled off of him.
“Elder Brother runs things too carefully,” he said coolly. “The whole purpose of the Heavencloud Bazaar is to make it convenient for us to practice cultivation. Since Elder Brother is in secluded meditation, I’m in charge. 4,000 Immortal jades, huh…. I don’t care who he is, with that much Immortal jade, he… will have to fork some over if he wants to leave alive!” With that, he closed his eyes again.
Meng Hao continued to stroll through the bazaar, acting very rich and imposing. He walked into every shop he saw and bought anything that looked good. Magical items, medicinal pills, medicinal plants, magical technique manuals, and all sorts of other items. He even bought things that weren’t for sale. One such item was a huge, paneled room screen decorated with a White Tiger, which he liked mostly because it looked amazing and exuded spiritual energy. He waved his hand, sending out so much money that the shopkeeper could only stare in shock.
Meng Hao pointed at a throne made of numerous flying swords and said, “This thing looks nice! I bet dad will like it. I’ll take it!”
He saw a statue made entirely from spirit stones, which in itself was actually a magical item. “This is wonderful too. I’ll take it!”
“This too!
“This armor looks pretty good. I want a thousand sets!
“These Daoist robes are nice. I’ll take them!
“How much for all of the jade scrolls in your whole shop? I want them all.” When Meng Hao thought about how his father couldn’t leave Planet South Heaven, he decided that buying him a whole scroll-shop worth of reading material would make it very easy for him to keep up on his reading.
Meng Hao wasn’t too confident when it came to things that female cultivators liked. Since he wasn’t sure what things his mother preferred, he also decided to buy an entire shop!
“This is a pretty good set of puppets. I’ll take them!”
Wherever he went, the shops nearly went mad with joy. Soon, everyone in the entire bazaar knew about the young, rich cultivator who was making the rounds.
Some people even began to follow him and keep track of how much he had spent. Eventually, he had spent the equivalent of about 1,000,000,000 spirit stones, which was about 100,000 Immortal jades.
The cultivators who had been sent to shadow him had eyes bloodshot with madness. They began to report back to their superiors, and soon, the sensation that a storm was brewing spread out through the whole bazaar.
Meng Hao apparently didn’t notice, and continued to rampantly sweep through the shops and buy everything he fancied. He even started looking through the various vendor stalls, and whenever he saw something he liked, he took it, which sometimes even included entire stalls.
He was exactly like a Mr. Moneybags. Normally, spending money gave him a big headache, but considering he was buying gifts for his parents, he didn’t mind at all.
He also bought some gifts for his sister. Soon, he had bought up nearly a third of all the items available at the bazaar, and had spent nearly 300,000 pieces of Immortal jade.
As for the two cultivators who had originally been sent to shadow him, they returned to the distant building and reported in. The old man who sat there cross-legged opened his eyes, and they shone with killing intent.
“300,000 Immortal jades…. For him to be willing to spend so much indicates that he must have more than 1,000,000 total in his bag of holding. Heavens! 1,000,000 Immortal jades….” The old man started panting, and a look of mad greed appeared in his eyes. However, he immediately began to doubt himself. Considering this mark had so much money, he was clearly someone with an extraordinary background, a person not to be trifled with casually.