Chapter 4

Translator: Zayn_

“You want to block me? Maybe in your next life.”

At around four o ‘clock in the afternoon, Su Xiaofan lowered his sunhat and walked out of the back door of a shop in the antique city. He had long noticed Wu Chuanbao and his men blocking the street in and out of the antique market, but there were more than two doors to enter and exit the market. Many shops had opened their back doors. Without a hundred or so people, it was impossible to block them here.

After passing through a few small alleys, Su Xiaofan came to a vegetable market in the residential area and bought half a catty of meat, an old hen, and a few vegetables. He thought about it and weighed half a catty of his sister’s favorite chicken feet before carrying them back to his place of residence.

The cost of living in Luochuan wasn’t very high. Su Xiaofan’s rented place was not far from the city and his sister’s high school. It was built in the 1980s in the Laocheng District. It was not much older than Su Xiaofan, so the rent was naturally not expensive. Two rooms and one living room only cost 900 Yuan a month, and the electrical appliances and furniture were included. Although his sister came back once a week, Su Xiaofan still left the room empty for her.

It cost five Yuan to kill a chicken in the market, but Su Xiaofan was reluctant to do so. He boiled a pot of water, and Su Xiaofan was very skilled at killing the chicken and removing its feathers. He cleaned the chicken in a few minutes, then put the chicken in the pot and put in the seasoning to stew the chicken soup. Su Xiaofan would cook this meal for his sister every week. In his words, the chicken soup had all the nutrients. The chicken was shredded and mixed with ginger, soy sauce, and vinegar to satisfy her craving. It was perfect for his sister.

Su Xiaofan turned on the fire in another stove, stir-fried some garlic with shredded meat, patted a cucumber salad, and turned off the fire for the chicken soup. He then returned to the living room and turned on the fan to cool down. He looked at the time and estimated that his sister would be home in another half an hour, which would be just in time for dinner.

‘The number you have dialed is not in service. Please try again later.’

Su Xiaofan hung up helplessly when he heard the voice of the telecommunication lady on the phone. He had been calling his father several times almost every day, but he didn’t know which ocean his father had sailed to. He couldn’t get through. However, it was common to have no signal on the sea. Su Xiaofan wasn’t worried about his father’s safety, but he was worried about his sister’s tuition fees.

Even though he had earned 8,000 Yuan from that Wu guy, Su Xiaofan only had 85,000 Yuan on hand. He was 15,000 Yuan away from the 100,000 Yuan. According to Su Xiaofan’s plan, he would have to prepare at least ten or twenty thousand Yuan for his sister in case of emergencies in addition to her school fees. As the saying went, “A poor family can also be rich.” It didn’t matter if Su Xiaofan ate a little, but he couldn’t let his sister, who was studying abroad, suffer.

“There’s nothing valuable left in this house.” Su Xiaofan looked around the living room gloomily, but there were no other objects except for some molds for making bronze.

“By the way, I wonder if this thing is worth anything?”

Su Xiaofan suddenly undid his collar and pulled out a pendant with a gold chain around his neck. The pendant was oval and black with an irregular hole in the middle that the gold chain could pass through. The pendant looked unremarkable, and if it was thrown on the ground, only a trash picker would pick it up as a piece of junk.

According to his father, this was something he had chanced upon when he was traveling a few years ago.

When Su Weixuan’s cruise ship was passing by the Bermuda sea, he happened to encounter a cruise ship that had accidentally hit a reef and was about to sink. Naturally, he couldn’t just leave it in the lurch. Under Su Weixuan’s command, more than 500 people on the cruise were rescued. The pendant was given to Su Weixuan by one of the rescued guests as a gift to thank the captain.

The guest was a very famous meteorite collector and was quite rich. However, he had escaped from the cruise ship and had nothing with him, so he gave the pendant on his neck to Su Weixuan.

According to the customer, he found this pendant in a desert thirty years ago when he was searching for a meteorite shower that had landed on earth. It was strange that the man saw a basketball-sized meteorite on the sand, but as soon as he touched it with his hand, the meteorite turned into sand particles that were even finer than sand. This was what was left in the middle of the meteorite.

After the meteorites collector brought this small piece of meteorites back, he also did various tests. However, no matter how he analyzed it, he could not detect the attributes of this piece of meteorites. He could not even be sure if it was made of metal.

Although the item was not very good-looking, the collector thought that it was not easy to get it, so he put it on a chain and hung it around his neck for decades. If he had not been rescued by Su Weixuan with nothing else, the collector might not have been willing to give it away.

Su Weixuan didn’t care much about this thing and threw it to his son when he got home. Su Xiaofan thought it was fashionable to wear a pendant around his neck, so he kept it on. Now that he was short of money, he couldn’t help but think about it.

“I’m afraid no one would believe it even if I said it came from a meteorite. Dad was most likely tricked.” Su Xiaofan played with the pendant in his hand and smiled bitterly. It was neither gold nor iron, and it had nothing to do with stone. He had asked someone to look at it in the antique city, but they only gave it the words “scrap metal”.

“Forget it. If it really doesn’t work, I’ll open Brother Gang’s mouth in a few days.” Su Xiaofan hung the pendant back around his neck. He could think of a way to pay for his sister’s tuition fees. With his friendship with Zheng Dagang, it was not a problem to borrow tens of thousands of Yuan for a year and a half. However, Su Xiaofan was used to being independent and was unwilling to ask for help from others unless it was absolutely necessary.

“Xiaofan! Su Xiaofan, I’m back!” A crisp shout interrupted Su Xiaofan’s thoughts. The door opened from the outside, and a 1.7-meter-tall girl skipped over to him.

“You’re so rude. Call me big brother.” Su Xiaofan pushed his sister to the side and said in a bad mood, “How old are you? Why are you still jumping around when you’re walking? You’re acting so crazy. What if you can’t get married?”

“Hmph, there are so many suitors in school. People write love letters to me every day. How can I not get married?” Su Xiaoxiao chuckled and sniffed. She ran to the kitchen and shouted, “The food in the school canteen is really terrible. Big brother is still the best. I hope to go home every week to replenish my blood.”

“Who would be so blind to chase you? I’m telling you, you have to study hard, and don’t have any crooked thoughts.” Su Xiaofan refused to admit it, but his heart skipped a beat. His father was not around, so he had to take good care of his sister and not let her get into a relationship at such a young age.

“I know, I don’t like those little kids.” Su Xiaoxiao snorted and lifted the lid.

Although she didn’t behave demurely, Su Xiaoxiao was very beautiful. Not only was she 1.7 meters tall, but her figure was also fully developed. She had an oval face and willow leaf-like eyebrows, big bright eyes, and a high nose bridge. She was 50 to 60 percent similar to Su Xiaofan. Speaking of which, the Su family’s genes were really good. If the siblings went on the street together, they would definitely cause a scene on the street.

Su Xiaofan sighed. His sister was good at everything, except that she had followed him in the countryside since she was young to dig for bird eggs and fish in the river. She was a little wild, and most men probably couldn’t control her.

“The chicken soup is almost ready. Don’t burn yourself. I haven’t mixed the chicken shreds yet. What are you so anxious about?” Su Xiaofan followed behind and smacked his sister on the head. “You’re such a foodie. It’d be great if you could use your energy to study.”

Su Xiaoxiao’s grades were not bad, but she was above average in the class and not the top student. Compared to Su Xiaofan, she was much worse. Su Weixuan felt sorry for his son. With Su Xiaofan’s grades, it would not be a problem for him to repeat a year and get into a top university. However, Su Xiaofan had been very upright since he was a child. Once he had decided on something, even Su Weixuan, as his father, could not change his mind.

“Hehe, I’m lucky. I didn’t need to study to get into a famous school.” Su Xiaoxiao shrank her head, but then she frowned and said, “Brother, 100,000 a year is too expensive. Why don’t I just take the college entrance examination as usual? With my current results, I can get into a first-tier University without a problem.”

Su Xiaoxiao knew her family’s situation. Her father wasn’t very reliable. He spent all day on a naval ship, and sometimes they didn’t even see each other for a year or two. It was all thanks to her grandfather and brother that she could safely study in her third year of high school. After her grandfather passed away a few years ago, Su Xiaoxiao and her brother had been relying on each other. She knew a little about her family’s situation.

“You don’t have to worry about the school fees. I’ve already prepared 100,000 Yuan for you.”

Su Xiaofan pulled his sister away, took the chicken out of the pot, and placed it on a plate. He then ladled a bowl of chicken soup for his sister and said, “My business is doing fine now. I can easily save up 70,000 to 80,000 Yuan a year. Plus, we still have our dad. He makes a lot of money. I think Dad has at least a million or so. He’s not giving us any money because he’s afraid that we’ll spend it recklessly.”

Although his father didn’t mention his income, with the advancement of information technology, Su Xiaofan found out that the first mate of an ocean ship could earn two to three hundred thousand a year. His father had been a captain for several years, and a million was just a small amount for someone of his position.

“Then, then I’ll go first. If Dad doesn’t have money, I won’t study.” Su Xiaoxiao didn’t want to let go of this opportunity. She helped Su Xiaofan put the dishes on the table and said, “I’m the only one who got in. The teacher said that the school will give us a bonus, but I don’t know how much it will be.”

“You’re the only one who got in? That’s not right, how did they test you guys? Your grades aren’t that outstanding in class.” Su Xiaofan was taken aback. He had been too happy the last time to ask for details.

“We took the exam for Language, Mathematics, English, Physics, Chemistry, and Politics. I heard that even the first and second-year students took the exam. I’m amazing, right? I’m the only one who was accepted.” Su Xiaoxiao had always been a big-hearted person. She never thought much about things that she couldn’t understand, so she lived happily every day.

“That’s not right. Xiaoxiao, tell me what else you took?” Su Xiaofan was different from his sister. He had been in the antique market for two years, where people from all walks of life were mixed up, and he naturally understood how low the probability of such a thing was.

For example, the old men who strolled around the antique market all day long came with the mentality of picking up a treasure. But Su Xiaofan had been doing business in the antique market for two years and had never seen anyone really pick up a big treasure. Most of the “legends” were deliberately spread by the stalls in private to enhance the enthusiasm of the old men.