Chapter 323: The Name Rings A Bell!
Translator: Nyoi-Bo Studio Editor: Nyoi-Bo Studio
One hundred taels for a pair of grilled chicken wings!
Everyone was astounded as Xu Que yelled out these words.
The woman hugged her child closer to her body. She was speechless as her head went completely blank!
One hundred taels! That much money would be equal to three to five years' worth of living expenses for an average family! As for the hardworking mother and son, this money would be enough for them to live on for up to a decade!
Was he really going to sell a pair of chicken wings at that exorbitant price? Had he lost his mind?
Many people were disgruntled and shouted, "are you kidding me? This is daylight robbery! Who'd pay one hundred taels for worthless scraps like chicken wings?"
"That's right! You're clearly conning people! You should be reported to the authorities and get dragged into jail for this!"
"His greed must've clouded his judgement. Who'd be foolish enough to put the price of chicken wings at one hundred taels?"
The crowd was buzzing with shouts and murmurs of discontent.
...…
Xu Que remained calm and unperturbed. He shook his head with a smile and said, "chicken wings may be worthless scraps, but my recipe is definitely not! Look, this bottle of spice is called chili powder. Have any of you ever eaten anything with chilli powder before? I've brought it over from overseas and it cost me more than ten thousand taels a bottle!"
Xu Que then picked up the bottle of chilli powder and showed it to everyone. People in thr crowd were staring at it with eyes full of doubt.
It was true that they had never seen chilli powder before, but they had definitely seen and eaten chilli peppers before and there was no reason a small bottle of chilli powder would cost that much!
"And this is honey! Well, obviously you've all had honey before so I'm not going to dwell on that. But what about this one? This is cumin powder! I bet none of you have even heard of cumin powder! You wouldn't be able to buy this abroad even if you had the money! This is a special spice exclusive to the Exploding Heavens Faction! Do you get it now? We're not just selling the chicken wings, we're selling the extraordinary techniques and high-quality ingredients that go onto the chicken wings!"
Xu Que kept a straight face all the while as he explained it to the crowd.
The crowd stared at the cumin powder with skepticism and curiosity.
This was their first time hearing the name of such an exotic spice. They had also indeed smelled a striking aroma coming from the chicken wings which was unlike anything they had ever smelled before.
Now they knew that it was because of this strange spice!
All of a sudden, their eyes gawked at the bottle of cumin powder with greed—if they could just get a hand on the spice, they'd certainly make a fortune in the future!
"Did you say a hundred taels a pair? I'll take them! I'll take them all!" said one person from the crowd who was wearing what looked like the livery of a rich household. He had a haughty air about him.
The crowd turned to him in surprise, but once they saw his face, their shock instantly vanished.
"Ah… it's the servant of the city's richest merchant family!"
"Well, if it's the Liu family then they'd have no problem paying thousands of taels anyway!"
"What's a thousand taels to the Liu family? I heard they have enough silver to cover the whole Imperial City!"
The crowd now rustled with whispers about the merchant.
But then, another man came out and said, "excuse me, but my young master wanted all of these chicken wings!"
Gasp!
The whole crowd drew in a sharp breath. They knew who this man was as well!
"That's the Senior Minister Wu's clerk!"
"Who'd dare to compete with the powerful Minister Wu?"
"That's right, it doesn't matter how much wealth the merchant Liu has, he's no match for Minister Wu's power!"
...…
"Wait!" shouted a squeaky voice among the crowd. "No one gets the chicken wings! They're all going to the palace!"
It was a fair-skinned man with an oddly gentle demeanor. Some people immediately recognized him as a eunuch—and a high-ranking one at that!
"Holy shit, I know him! He's the eunuch serving the Third Prince!"
"They say he's a cruel man who must not be provoked!"
"No shit. Don't you know how powerful the Third Prince is these days? Provoking this eunuch would be the same as provoking the prince himself!"
"Surely the senior minister wouldn't offend the Third Prince just for these chicken wings?"
"I never thought I'd see anything like this in my life! The rich and the powerful of the Imperial City are all fighting for some chicken wings!"
...…
The crowd was abuzz with murmurs and whispers. Judging by the current situation, the reputation of the Exploding Heavens Faction would surely spread across the Imperial City by the break of dawn.
Meanwhile, Xu Que remained as expressionless as ever as he stood at the stall with his chicken wings, paying no attention to the tense atmosphere in front of him.
Then the eunuch stomped up towards Xu Que and glared, saying, "what are you waiting for? Are you deaf? I told you that the chicken wings will all go to the palace!"
"Pah!"
Xu Que spat out a piece of bone and raised an eyebrow as he swept a glance up and down the eunuch's body. "You're not getting any fucking chicken wings!"
The night market went as silent as a graveyard.
Everyone was stupefied. Their jaws dropped, and their eyes bulged out.
What… what had this kid said?
He wasn't getting any fucking chicken wings?
Shit, had he lost his mind?
Didn't he know that crossing the Third Prince's servant was tantamount to suicide?
The woman who owned the stall was so scared that all the blood drained from her face. She had never expected Xu Que to be so brazen and disrespectful to the palace eunuch!
"You… you impudent fool, how dare you speak that way to me?" shouted the eunuch, pointing his finger at Xu Que. He was seething with rage, so much so that his whole body shook. Ever since he had become the Third Prince's personal servant, he had never been treated this way before and he wouldn't stand for it!
"Shut up, eunuch! How dare you raise your voice at me! Go to hell! If it weren't for this kid here, I would have slapped your bitchy face!" yelled Xu Que as he stared the eunuch up and down. He was only at the Golden Core Stage... in other words, completely unworthy of Xu Que's precious time at all!
"You...you..." The eunuch pointed at Xu Que in so much shock and anger that he seemed to be on the verge of blowing up. He couldn't even complete his sentence.
But Xu Que was getting impatient with him.
"What 'you'? Are you stupid? Didn't you hear what I said? I told you to queue up and that everyone can only buy a pair of chicken wings a day! Did you think that just because you've got a little bit of money you could just step over everyone else?"
"Y-you…" The eunuch flapped his flowy sleeves in fury and yelled, "fine! Just you wait, I'll teach you a harsh lesson for daring to cause such a ruckus in the Imperial City!"
"I'll wait! What's so great about this Imperial City anyway? We at the Exploding Heavens Faction can easily blow you up in no time! If you don't believe me then just ask around, you'll see what the Fire Country has become thanks to our faction!" sneered Xu Que, completely unperturbed by the eunuch's threat.
He couldn't wait for the incident in Fire Country to finally spread to the ears of these people in Metal Nation. Once that happened, he could easily use the Exploding Heavens Faction's reputation to act tough any time!
Unfortunately, due to the vast distance separating the two nations and their hostile relationship, news from Fire Country rarely traveled to Metal Nation. It would probably take another month or two before anyone here got wind of the incident in Fire Country.
"Humph!" The eunuch harrumphed pompously and left the scene with a scowl on his face.
Then the crowd fell into silence for a few moments and just stared at Xu Que. They thought he'd be dead meat soon for sure!
The shouting match he had had with the eunuch was definitely going to land him into hot water! Offending the eunuch was just as bad as offending the entire royal family after all!
Still, that didn't stop him from conducting his business! The moment the eunuch left, the senior minister's clerk and the wealthy Liu family's servant rushed up and ordered the chicken wings from Xu Que.
A hundred taels a pair to them was nothing. What was most important was that they'd completed their masters' commands.
"Give me a pair of chicken wings!"
"I want a pair as well!"
"So do we!"
By that point there was a long line in front of the stall!
Xu Que was insistent on his 'hunger marketing' strategy where he'd reduce the production and only sell one pair of chicken wings to each customer so that the demand would shoot up and he'd be able to sell them at a sky-high price. This way he could easily put a spotlight on the reputation of the Exploding Heavens Faction!
Some people were smart to get around Xu Que's rule, though. They paid some common folk to get in line for them so they could get more chicken wings!
Xu Que couldn't be bothered about it, though, now that his Acting Tough Points were shooting up steadily.
"Don't worry, Ma'am," said Xu Que. "I'll be guarding the situation here so no one will dare to cause you any problems! You go on and keep grilling these chicken wings here, after a few days you'll have enough money for the rest of your life so you can just stay home raising your kids!"
Xu Que then took all the spices bottles and sauces and replaced them in his storage in the system. He pulled out a stool and sat beside the stall, wearing a cool and intimidating expression befitting a man who would be 'guarding the situation'!
The woman's face was still full of doubt and worry, but she nonetheless pulled her child close and started to grill the chicken wings the same way that she had seen Xu Que going about it.
Soon, they had sold more than ten pairs of chicken wings and made more than a thousand taels. The woman stared at the money incredulously and pinched herself to make sure that she wasn't dreaming.
Xu Que wasn't just going to take advantage of this hapless woman. He would guard the stall and make sure that she could make some money for as long as possible. In any case, she would make enough money soon enough to ensure a comfortable life for her and her child!
But soon afterwards, Xu Que's eyebrows furrowed as he noticed something wrong!
He was sure that the woman had grilled no less than thirty pairs of chicken wings so far and had only sold about fifteen or sixteen pairs, yet right now the grill was completely empty!
"Fuck, there's a thief!"
Xu Que immediately stood up and walked around the stall.
Sure enough, there was a dark shadowy figure hiding under the stall, gnawing on the chicken wings. As he looked more closely, he realised that it was none other than Buttface!
"Buttface! You shameless petty thief! Are you so heartless that you would even steal from a powerless woman? Pay up, you son of a bitch!"
Xu Que was now enraged and started to go after Buttface, demanding payment for the chicken wing.
Buttface didn't dare to expose his talking abilities in front of such a huge crowd, so all he did was bark "oww!" Then he turned and ran!
"Where do you think you're going, Buttface?"
Xu Que then chased Buttface around with an empty skewer in his hand.
The crowd watched as Xu Que chased a dog round and round the stall, perplexed by his strange reaction to a dog stealing his chicken wings.
So what if a stray dog stole your chicken wings? A normal person would just chase him away and leave it at that. Who in their right mind would demand the dog to pay up?
This kid was definitely insane!
Better not provoke him further…
...
Meanwhile, in an inn near the night market, the eunuch who had demanded the chicken wings from Xu Que earlier suddenly returned!
In front of the princes and princesses, his demeanor changed, and he was now playing the role of the poor, bullied character, aggrievedly wailing and complaining of how cruelly he'd been treated.
"Your royal highnesses, you should have seen how aggressive the man acted towards me. He pointed at my nose in front of everyone and declared that he would blow up the entire Imperial City! Then he refused to sell me any chicken wings, saying that they were a hundred taels a pair and that everyone could only buy one pair of chicken wings each!"
Bam!
The Third Prince banged his fist on the table and his face turned dark.
"What a brazen commoner! Does he think that he's the most powerful man in this city? This behavior is unacceptable!"
"It sounds like there's more to it than meets the eye. Could he be deliberately causing a scene?" asked another prince with furrowed brows.
The eunuch knelt down and hurriedly explained, "I did tell him that these chicken wings were going to be served to the princes and princesses, but that man claimed he didn't care because he was a member of the Exploding Heavens Faction!"
"Exploding Heavens Faction?" The princes and princesses frowned. They had never heard of such a faction before!
Only the Seventh Princess turned thoughtful.
"Exploding Heavens Faction…" murmured the princess. "Hmm… the name rings a bell!"