Chapter 3599 — Pretend, Keep Pretending!
The Blossom Guardian · Page 2 of 3
Seen in that light, their decision about which side to join had perhaps not been quite so wise after all. Leaving everything else aside, at least when it came to mining jade, Senior Brother Kusheng seemed more reliable than Meng Jueming, the senior steward brother in charge!
After all, Wei Zhao was living proof, and Senior Brother Kusheng had hardly anyone under him. If they defected to his side now, they would surely receive the same special treatment as Wei Zhao. Even if they could not dig up eight pieces a day, surely six or seven was something they could count on!
By contrast, Meng Jueming, the ever-dominating senior steward brother in charge, already had the majority of the newcomers on his side. One more would hardly matter, and one fewer would hardly be missed. Even if they joined him, they might not receive much special treatment. In the end, they would inevitably fare far worse than Meng Zhou and Li Zhengming. Perhaps they would manage only four or five pieces a day, which would be scarcely any different from their present circumstances!
For a time, the newcomers who had already swung plainly toward Meng Jueming began wavering once more in the presence of Wei Zhao's living example. At the very least, they were no longer hurling insults at him with the same reckless abandon as before.
A pack of useless fence-sitters! Meng Jueming soon noticed what was happening, and his face turned livid with rage. He longed to hang the bastards up one by one and beat them within an inch of their lives. Compared with a clear-cut enemy like Wei Zhao, these wavering fence-sitters were even more hateful!
But with Senior Brother Kusheng lurking as a potential rival, Meng Jueming could only swallow his anger for the moment. If he lost his temper and drove this pack of fence-sitters into Senior Brother Kusheng's arms, then his days of comfort as the senior steward brother in charge would be over.
Unable to curse out these fence-sitting newcomers, Meng Jueming could only take Wei Zhao to task instead. He snorted. "Hmph. It was nothing but a stroke of dumb luck. What is there to be proud of? I will wager that tomorrow, our grandstanding newcomer will dig up no more than two pieces of good jade! Dumb luck does not last forever. If one could dig up seven or eight pieces of good jade every day, would it still be called Mine No. 10? The Spirit Jade Hall would have reassigned it long ago!"
"Cousin Nine is absolutely right! What is that saying again? Oh, yes: when a petty man comes into his own! I would very much like to see how long our grandstanding newcomer can keep feeling triumphant. I can hardly wait to see the look on this bastard's face tomorrow, when he is reduced to tears! Hahaha!" Meng Zhou chimed in from the side.
Seeing everyone looking at him with complicated expressions, Wei Zhao, who had been too lazy to speak, suddenly smiled. "Oh, if you say it was dumb luck, then dumb luck it was. You really hit the nail on the head. How could a wandering cultivator like me have made it to Cloudstep Island without some dumb luck? Perhaps I will get lucky again tomorrow. Perhaps I will be lucky every day..."
"Hahaha... Pretend! Keep pretending! Let us see whether you can still keep it up at this time tomorrow! We shall all wait and see whether this fellow really does have dumb luck every day!" Meng Jueming, Meng Zhou, and the others scoffed and rolled their eyes. Clearly, they had not taken Wei Zhao's words seriously.
They had already decided that Wei Zhao's eight pieces of good jade that day were a once-in-a-thousand-years fluke. After all, dead mines went largely unworked year-round, so it was not impossible for a few pieces of good jade to turn up every now and then. But what happened once could not happen again. How could anyone keep having such absurd luck? This bumpkin from the mortal world was no child of destiny. By tomorrow, he would inevitably be exposed for what he truly was!