Chapter 3597 — Consolation
The Blossom Guardian · Page 2 of 2
By the Spirit Jade Hall's rules, even waste jade could be counted toward a reward if enough of it was collected, but the ratio was enough to kill anyone's hopes. Even for decent-quality waste jade, it took at least a hundred pieces to match the spiritual energy of one good stone; and for the worse sort — the kind with only half a skin of spirit jade wrapped around a worthless core — the ratio was a thousand to one. Put simply, if you meant to make your fortune that way, you might as well settle in here for your retirement, because in the short term there was absolutely no hope of it.
Thus, for that worst grade of waste jade, at a thousand to one, you would need a hundred thousand pieces to exchange for a single spirit jade. So these people simply gave up on them altogether; by long-standing custom, they were tossed into the public waste basket.
Still, even that added up over time. Gathered together, such waste jade could eventually be exchanged for rewards — except that certain people quietly pocketed it. Those two people were Dai Wuchang and Meng Jueming.
But this sort of thing happened in the mining zones of the other two pavilions as well. Offering tribute to the stewards here and to the senior brother in charge of the Yingxin Pavilion was customary, not robbery, so no one would say anything even if they knew.
Watching the expressions on these faces, Wei Zhao shook his head in speechlessness. Just how deep did these creatures' inferiority complex run, that they had to keep finding consolation at his expense? The Qingyun Pavilion had grown this feeble, generation after generation — clearly there was a reason for it!
At this moment, Wei Zhao rather wanted to see what expressions these people would wear once the quality inspection and storage results came out. It promised to be quite a spectacle!
Under everyone's gaze, Wei Zhao took the spirit jade off the weighing platform and put it back in his basket, then followed the signs to the quality inspection station nearby. There were no fewer than five specially trained inspectors there, responsible for grading the spirit jade, recording each person's daily yield, and sorting the jade into the storerooms.
Compared with the weighing, the inspection work was clearly heavier. Even with five men working at once, a line of baskets still stretched ahead of Wei Zhao. Reading the names on them, they belonged precisely to Meng Zhou and the other newcomers of the Qingyun Pavilion.
Just then one of the inspectors called out, "Li Zhengming, six good jades, twenty-two waste jades!"
At once the newcomers looked at Li Zhengming with envy. For a newcomer still unfamiliar with the tricks of mining on his first day, finding more than five good jades in a day was considered quite good.
Several other newcomers had already finished inspection, and the best of them had only four good jades. Of course, those men had been assigned to Mine Zone Eight, a notch below Li Zhengming's Zone Seven, so it was only natural that their haul fell short of his.
And right after, another inspector announced, "Meng Zhou, seven good jades, twenty-three waste jades!"
"Child's play!" Facing the envious looks directed at him, Meng Zhou curled his lips in smug satisfaction and shot Wei Zhao a provocative glance. This feeling of showing off — damn, it felt good!