Big Data Cultivation

Chapter 231: The Appetite of a Cultivator (Third Update, Requesting Monthly Passes)

Upon hearing Feng Jun’s “youthful as a flower”, Zhang Caixin felt somewhat contemptuous. She glanced at him, then at her sister, and sighed softly, “Ah, such poor vision… and you dare to speculate in stocks?”

Feng Jun didn’t want to argue over such petty matters, as he was well aware that the problems in his relationship with Sister Hong weren’t on his side.

In any case, for him, women were always troublesome. A quick fast-food meal was okay, but getting involved in deeper interactions could easily lead to unnecessary complications.

So, Feng Jun stood up without hesitation and left. He could feel Sister Hong seemed somewhat inclined to keep him there today.

But if you want something, you have to say it. If you don’t say it, how would I know you want it?

In fact, he didn’t think today was convenient. Aside from himself and Sister Hong, there were three other women spectating.

Interpersonal relationships always required a bit of fate. Forcing it would not only hurt others but also oneself.

Sister Hong did not try to keep him; she just watched him leave with Li Xiaobin.

Sister Shen stood up to see him off, taking a few steps before stopping upon realizing Sister Hong made no move—despite Feng Jun being a jade supplier, Sister Hong was the person she directly dealt with.

Unnoticed by herself, the fingers gripping her cup slightly whitened.

Zhang Caixin, however, noticed this little detail. “Sis, if you fancy him, just go after him. Not to be blunt, but you’re not getting any younger.”

Sister Hong shot her an annoyed look, “He’s already an old man, and your sister is practically buried in the ground…”

“I’m just worried for you. A potential stock like him is rare,” Zhang Caixin said with a smile, “A villa built of mutton fat white jade; surely you don’t want to let someone else benefit?”

“You believe everything he says?” Sister Hong replied skeptically, reaching for the straw in her juice, “He says he has a villa on Mars, can you even get there?”

Though she said this, her hand trembled slightly.

“Is he bluffing?” Zhang Caixin’s eyes roamed, “Has he ever had a history of doing that before?”

Sister Hong finally grabbed the straw and took several slow sips before speaking slowly, “That… I’ve never really heard about.”

“There you go,” Zhang Caixin raised her voice a bit, “Do you really want to concede the jade villa to that Ms. Yu?”

“Yu… Qingzhu?” Sister Hong frowned slightly, “Between them, it seems there really isn’t much. Caixin, what are you rushing for when the jade house deal isn’t even close to being settled?”

“You’ll lose it to someone else if you’re not careful!” Zhang Caixin glared at her fiercely, “He’s comparing you two, right?”

“Ah,” Sister Hong sighed softly, her eyelids drooping, “In relationships, there must be some fate…”

Actually, she felt a bit eager for him today, wanting to use the business as an excuse for a deeper chat, but unfortunately, her intention was perceived by Caixin and Sister Shen as soon as it emerged.

What made it worse was that he had brought his assistant along. Under these circumstances, even if she had some thoughts, she still had to maintain her dignity.

This is probably what they mean by fate not having arrived…

Zhang Caixin was oblivious to her sister’s thoughts and huffed in dissatisfaction, “Only an old-fashioned person like you would act this way. If it were me, and I had eyes for someone, I’d directly drug his drink…”

“Cough cough,” Sister Hong’s juice sprayed across the table as she began coughing violently.

“Sister Hong, are you okay?” Sister Shen quickly approached from a distance…

After leaving the café, Feng Jun couldn’t be bothered to go anywhere else and drove straight back to Peach Blossom Valley.

The following day, he observed the stock market for half the day and finally bought shares in a Roc City Stock Market company just before the close. It wasn’t the one he had been optimistic about, but a stock heavily invested in by Good Scenery.

The stock price noticeably surged after his purchase, rising from seventeen yuan to seventeen yuan and sixty cents plus, a gain of about three percentage points. For ten or so minutes towards the market’s close, this gain was quite decent.

He bought three hundred lots, thinking at least this price could provide some buffer when the market opened tomorrow.

After purchasing the stock, he continued to observe until the closing bell and found that this single operation hadn’t affected the closing price much, leading him to make some guesses.

Since he bought the stock about ten minutes before closing, earlier and in not such a large quantity, it didn’t influence the main force behind the stock.

There are indeed many key points to ponder over in the stock market, but Feng Jun didn’t want to waste more time. After the market closed, he wolfed down a meal in fifteen minutes and then entered the mobile phone space.

Time was still halted on this side. Having stepped out of the jade house, he saw Lone Wolf explaining surveillance wiring to Tian Lewen.

Tian Lewen was a rising star in the Tian Family with an intermediate-level martial master’s cultivation level. Near Mount Zhige, he was, without question, the Tian Family’s second in command. He was mainly in charge of managing the Tian Family members here, and as an elder, Tian Yangni often didn’t handle specific affairs.

The task of laying the wiring was originally assigned to Lang Zhen and the Deng Family Brothers by Feng Jun. However, the workload was somewhat substantial, and after consulting with Feng Jun, Lone Wolf decided to distribute some tasks to the Tian Family.

As for the detailed explanation, which might reveal some secrets, Lang Zhen didn’t see it that way. He had analyzed it, and understood that it was a complete set of equipment; grasping just some of the details wouldn’t affect the whole system in any way.

At most, it might just expose the location of a few cameras. So what? As long as they could ensure that there were no blind spots in the surveillance, then it wasn’t a big deal.

Could the cameras be damaged? Certainly, but Feng Jun had set up this monitoring system primarily as a warning. Indeed, no one expected to fend off enemies with cameras alone… So even if they were damaged, as long as they could serve as an alert, it was fine.

Tian Lewen was extremely interested in this, eagerly listening for a long while before expressing that the Tian Family could start by following along on a few wiring tasks. Once they had mastered the process, it would not be too late for them to take over independently.

That was exactly what Lang Zhen and the others hoped for—to lay the wires as soon as possible was their greatest wish.

With the cooperation of the Tian clan members, the work suddenly became much easier, and they had almost completed a quarter of the workload that day.

Feng Jun didn’t use the Tian Family’s labor for free. Although the Tian Family didn’t want to charge him, he always preferred to “settle accounts clearly among brothers.” If he could choose, he didn’t want to owe the Tian Family any favors.

The most expensive things come for free—that was something he understood long ago.

Aside from the wages, Feng Jun also stated that he would provide the meals.

It must be said that in a small-scale farming economy, filling one’s stomach is the most basic survival need, and the Tian Family was no exception.

Compared to other ordinary people, the Tian Family was quite powerful, owning a vast expanse of land which was very fertile and produced a considerable yield.

But even so, most Tian Family members saved food by eating only two meals a day—breakfast and lunch—on ordinary days.

There was no helping it; no matter how abundant the Tian Family’s resources were, they couldn’t ensure everyone had enough food, because… there were simply too many cultivators in the Tian Family.

Cultivators had large appetites. An ordinary martial artist of intermediate level could eat as much as three people. Martial artists refine their bodies and circulate their qi and blood and rely on the sustenance from food. When their cultivation reached a critical point, they even needed to prepare a lot of meat.

The Tian Family martial artists who came to Mount Zhige could ensure their food supply, but some Tian Family members without the ability to cultivate still ate only two meals a day. The gruel for the afternoon meal was mixed with quite a lot of wild vegetables and grain husks.

Feng Jun’s willingness to provide meals prompted the Tian Family members to promptly accept after a slight hesitation.

Soon after, people came to sell grain, but the price… was a bit high.

In a society without abundant production, the price of food would certainly not be low. With thousands of people gathered in this wilderness, the fragile balance of food supply and demand had already been disrupted.

It was impossible for the surrounding area within tens of miles to provide enough food for so many people. Not to mention the land here was barren and mostly mountainous, and the population was sparse as well.

Here, the price of grain was now thirty percent higher than the market price. Although the Tian Family dominated here, those selling grain didn’t care about that—if you want to buy, that’s the price; otherwise, we won’t sell.

The Tian Family didn’t have much of a choice in this regard. After all, they were from another county and had to keep their assertiveness within limits. Even if they were willing to forcibly take it, the locals didn’t need to retaliate; simply refusing to sell grain here was enough.

The Tian Family could transport grain from Dongmu to this place, but transporting grain itself involved consumption and would require a lot of labor and resources.

The people who came to Feng Jun to sell grain offered a price forty percent higher than the market price, and the quotations from several vendors were identical.

This was purely taking advantage of him as a foreigner—Dongmu was just a neighboring county, and even his accent wasn’t from Fushan County.

Anyway, everyone knew that he was buying stones, and if nothing else, he had a lot of money.

As for the grain sellers’ asking price, Lone Wolf had one attitude—we have enough grain and don’t need any for now.

This time, Feng Jun brought a lot of stuff from the real world, including large quantities of flour and rice.

Actually, he was fed up with the food in this world. Although it was green and natural without pollution, the drawback was… there was just a bit too much coarse grain, which was rough on the throat and extremely expensive.

Even such coarse grain, when converted into silver yuan, was twice as expensive as in the Earth Realm.

And the food provided by Feng Jun shocked the Tian Family members on the first day.

Even though Divine Doctor was in charge of the meals, he was severely short on cooks. That Feifei, a seven-year-old child worker, was able to cook for four adults as well as for hers and her brother was quite impressive. In the Earth Realm, she probably couldn’t avoid being accused of “child abuse.”

So the flour Feng Jun brought was handed over to the Tian Family’s chefs to make meals—if it came to it, he would even take care of the chefs’ meals.

The pure white flour from the Earth Realm made its first appearance and caused a huge shock among the locals—this world had no such thing as bleaching agents.

(Third update, calling for monthly tickets.)