Chapter 228 I Don't Want This Last Stone Anymore
Purchasing Manager Alfonso Car also looked around and said, "Most people buying stones at these stalls are outsiders, but there seem to be locals too."
"Don't the locals understand how this works either? Why are they foolishly throwing money away?"
"It's not that locals don't understand, they just want to try their luck," Casey said. "Although these stones aren't great quality, good finds do happen. Last year, a tourist casually bought a stone from a roadside stall and it turned out to be a top-quality sapphire. That tourist got rich overnight!"
"So no one can guarantee 100% accuracy when identifying gemstones. Even rough stones rejected by the market might contain exceptional gems."
"The only ones who can guarantee 100% accuracy are probably those people from Novaria with gemstone identification abilities. But since the early 19th century, those people haven't been seen in the rough stone market."
While they were talking, they passed another stone stall.
This stall had more people around it than the others, and the stones displayed were also larger.
Casey glanced over and nodded, "The stones at this stall look better quality than the others!"
Naturally, the rough stone prices were higher too.
The stones were clearly priced - some at ten thousand dollars, twenty thousand, thirty thousand, and even a hundred thousand dollars.
Different sizes, different colors, different shapes.
Most people gathered around this stall were locals from Veridian.
When Casey saw the owner's face clearly, he said in surprise, "No wonder there are so many people here - the stall owner is Francis Vasquez! That tourist last year found the top-quality sapphire at his stall!"
Dealers who actually traded rough stones in large quantities rarely appeared on this street. Francis was the only one, but having produced a top-quality sapphire on the tourist street naturally made him famous, so many locals came hoping to try their luck with him.
A fat man was selecting stones.
He picked out seven stones from the stall and said loudly, "I'll take all of these!"
Francis looked them over, "Five at fifty thousand dollars each, two at a hundred thousand, total of four hundred and fifty thousand dollars!"
The fat man took out his phone to transfer money, "I'll transfer the money and you open one stone at a time!"
"Alright."
Opening the rough stones on site.
So even more people gathered to watch.
Everyone wanted to see what would come out of these four hundred and fifty thousand dollars.
When fifty thousand dollars arrived, Francis called the cutter to start cutting.
The cutter worked efficiently - one cut!
The inside of the stone was completely white, nothing there.
The fat man frowned slightly, but wasn't too discouraged - after all, not finding gemstones was normal.
He pointed to the second rough stone, "Open this one!"
He transferred another fifty thousand dollars to Francis.
The cutter made another cut.
Again, nothing.
The third stone... still completely white.
The fourth one, again nothing.
By this point, the watching tourists had started discussing.
"Two hundred thousand dollars gone in just ten minutes!"
"Such a scam! What couldn't you do with two hundred thousand dollars, why spend it on this fraudulent thing!"
"So tragic."
"Better not to touch this stuff. How is this different from gambling? It's just throwing money away."
"..."
Looking at the two hundred and fifty thousand dollars left in his bank account, the fat man's mindset was already starting to crack.
Half his money thrown away with nothing to show for it.
Three stones left.
He gritted his teeth, wiped the cold sweat from his forehead, and pointed to the fifth stone, "Keep going."
After speaking, another fifty thousand dollars transferred.
Under everyone's expectant gaze, the fifth stone was opened - still nothing.
The fat man's vision blurred and he almost couldn't stand steady.
Only two stones worth a hundred thousand dollars each remained.
The cutter had already placed one of the hundred-thousand-dollar stones under the blade, just waiting for the fat man to transfer the money.
The fat man hesitated, but still transferred the hundred thousand dollars.
The hundred-thousand-dollar stone was more expensive than the previous ones - it must contain a gemstone!
Everyone's attention was on this hundred-thousand-dollar stone.
Isabella crouched down in a corner and picked up the waste material from these opened stones, closing her eyes to feel them carefully.
She was certain she had Inner Energy in her body.
Many times, it was this strange power that allowed her to burst out with strength and speed beyond ordinary people. Although her master never told her what this power was, through the books she'd read and what William told her, she could roughly guess that this was the foundation of ancient martial arts professionals - Inner Energy.
William said that people with deep Inner Energy could use it to sense what's inside objects through their exterior, which is why those people had gemstone identification abilities.
She had never tried it and wasn't sure if her Inner Energy was deep enough.
So she held these stones, trying as hard as she could to circulate the power in her body and sense them.
But she didn't sense anything.
Isabella picked up another stone and felt it - still nothing.
She went through all the cut stones one by one, but still came up empty.
Isabella threw the stone aside, somewhat speechless.
Looks like she was overthinking it - she wasn't strong enough yet.
Just then, a chorus of sighs came from the crowd.
"Again nothing - what a loss!"
Everyone looked at the fat man with some sympathy.
"From his clothes, he doesn't look rich, yet he spent four hundred and fifty thousand dollars on this. He's really gone crazy. I say, this kind of thing is fine to look at, but you can't get addicted, or you'll really lose everything and destroy your family!"
The fat man's face was deathly pale, with large beads of sweat on his forehead.
Even the cutter was sighing, "Your luck is terrible - six stones and nothing at all! I've really never seen anyone this unlucky."
The probability of finding gemstones at this stall was actually pretty good, given the prices.
Several stones in a row with no gemstones at all - this was a first.
"They say when things reach an extreme, they reverse. After bad luck comes good luck. Fat man, maybe this last one is a good stone!" Francis consoled him.
Francis then handed the last hundred-thousand-dollar stone to the cutter.
The cutter took it, ready to cut.
The fat man watched the cutter's movements nervously and suddenly shouted, "I don't want it!"
"I don't want this last stone!"
There won't be any gemstones at all!
All those previous rough stones were just ordinary rocks. He'd already lost three hundred and fifty thousand dollars. This hundred thousand was his last asset - he couldn't spend it!
When he said this, both Francis and the cutter looked at him, "You don't want it?"
"Yes! I don't want it!" the fat man said. "This stone hasn't been opened yet, so it's not mine!"
Francis was somewhat speechless, "Although the stone hasn't been opened, you did say you wanted it."
"Can't I change my mind now?" the fat man said righteously. "This is my last hundred thousand dollars, I can't afford to lose it! I don't want the stone - it hasn't been opened anyway. Whoever wants to buy it can buy it!"
Francis frowned, but there was no reason to force a sale. If the other party didn't want to buy, he couldn't force him, so he had to take the stone from under the blade and toss it back into the pile of stones.
Isabella walked over and picked up that stone. Suddenly, her eyes paused.
She could feel that this stone was different from the ones she'd touched before. When she slowly channeled that power in her body into it, she felt a strange sense of clarity.
So this was how those talented people from Novaria identified stones?