Chapter 102: I Am Also a Non-Professional Treasure Hunter! Part 2

He glanced subtly at Xie Jianxun. Luckily, his young boss found everything novel.

Soon, Tuls spotted the stall selling Rare Mineral Ointment and called out, “Here!”

Xie Jianxun and Ela walked up to Tuls’s stall and looked at the goods on the wooden board, their gazes landing on a jar slightly to the left.

It was a discontinued jar of Rare Mineral Ointment—exactly one of the items on the materials list!

It had already been used down a layer, so by the rules, the price should be discounted accordingly.

Tuls cleared his throat, rubbed his hands, ready to shine with his bargaining skills and snag the best value materials at the lowest price for his boss.

All the earlier mishaps were just mistakes. Now was his time to shine!

Tuls picked up the jar of Mineral Paste, examining it pretentiously with sunlight and a mineral magnifier to check the patterns.

Satisfied, he asked politely, “Sir, how much for this Mineral Paste?”

The stall owner, head down playing on his Light Brain, replied lazily without looking up. “This one? Three thousand for you.”

Tuls jumped. No matter how premium, this small jar couldn’t be three thousand—one thousand five at most.

He quickly composed himself and haggled. “Sir, that’s not the market price. For this quality and expiration, it’d be under eighteen hundred on the shelf. No seal, no strip—it’s been used. Fifteen hundred tops.”

The stall owner slowly stood. Tuls froze. “It’s you?!”

The stall owner sneered and suddenly swung his fist. “I’m selling it to you for three thousand, you dumbass!”

Bang. The punch landed on Tuls’s face, sending him flipping backward. He ended up squatting on the ground, clutching his face.

Xie Jianxun had been checking another stall and had no time to intervene.

He sucked in a breath, baffled at how Treasure Hunter Tuls had sparked a conflict, and hurried forward, standing in front of Tuls. “Sir, why’d you assault someone?!”

“I’m beating him!”

The stall owner pointed at the face-hidden Tuls. “He wasted a woman’s youth, insisted on playing private detective like a stubborn ox when he couldn’t make money that way. His wife couldn’t afford the hospital and died in difficult labor at home!”

Tuls staggered to his feet, one hand over his left eye, choking out, “I… I changed careers… brother-in-law…”

Xie Jianxun was dumbfounded, at a loss for words.

The world felt truly fantastical.

“Changing now is useless! You weren’t ambitious then—regretting it now?”

The stall owner spat toward him, quickly packing up to flee. Before leaving, he pointed at Xie Jianxun. “If you call the cops, you won’t get off easy either.”

Xie Jianxun paused his hand from opening his Light Brain, noticing the surrounding stall owners stop what they were doing and eye him warningly.

He took a deep breath, but his sleeve was tugged by Tuls.

The Treasure Hunter, half-crouched on the ground, reached up to pull him.

“Don’t, don’t hit him,” Tuls said with a wry grin. “It really is all my fault. Boss, you shouldn’t get involved in this mess.”

Standing in the middle of the alley drew too much attention, so Xie Jianxun helped him over to a stone ledge in the corner, where Tuls could sit down more comfortably.

Xie Jianxun asked, “How are your eyes? Do you need to see a doctor?”

Tuls replied, “No, no need…” Only then did he slowly release his hand, and the thin, brittle contact lenses slipped from his eye sockets, shattering on the ground.

He tried to play it off casually. “The lenses just broke. No big deal. I can get a new pair.”

Xie Jianxun squatted down, resting his elbows on his knees.

He didn’t dare say much else, afraid of rubbing salt in the injured Treasure Hunter’s wounds. “Can you see the road?”

Tuls sighed. “Sigh… mind giving me a hand? Thanks, boss.”

After resting for a bit, he stood up from the ledge, his steps a little unsteady. With a wry smile, he said, “I’m severely nearsighted. Without glasses, I can’t tell people from animals… Looks like I need to hit up an optician shop quick. Boss, do you want to wait here or…?”

Xie Jianxun said decisively, “I’ll go with you.”

Truth be told, after that scene, he wasn’t comfortable letting Tuls go out alone—who knew if he’d get beaten up again!

Tuls didn’t want to splurge on permanent glass lenses, so he planned to grab some temporary ones to tide him over.

He hastily picked out a nearby optician stall and selected lenses that matched his prescription.

When it came time to pay, he opened his Light Brain, then abruptly pulled his hand back and closed the account interface.

“No, I can’t touch this money.”

He reached into his pants pocket, rummaging from left to right, and pulled out a few steel coins for bus fare.

He’d rushed out too hastily this time, with hardly any cash stuffed in his pockets—not even enough for a pair of temporary lenses.

He glanced down at his empty pockets and silently walked away from the optician shop, sitting back down on the stone ledge.

One blow after another landed on his face, leaving him a bit dazed… Had that huge windfall order sucked away all his good luck?

Tuls sniffed.

A hand reached out, and Tuls looked up.

Xie Jianxun handed him the temporary lenses—he’d already paid. Tuls silently took them and put them on. After a moment, he said, “Boss, I’ll note this money down and pay you back later.”

Xie Jianxun joked, “Don’t worry. I can’t have my Treasure Hunter running around blind.”

Tuls gave a wry chuckle, twisting the hem of his pants with his fingers.

“You’ve probably figured it out by now. I’m no professional Treasure Hunter at all.”

The man, who still looked somewhat elite on the surface, now appeared as bedraggled as a drowned rat, his voice choked with emotion. “I’ve just picked up a mishmash of skills. I happened to run errands for Dobin before, so I pretended to be his apprentice… His real apprentices are way better than me.”

Xie Jianxun thought for a moment and comforted him. “I think you’re pretty impressive. You act whatever role perfectly. If Ela hadn’t pointed it out, I probably wouldn’t have realized you were faking it.”

Tuls asked, “How did you two figure it out?”

Xie Jianxun pointed at his pant leg. “In the light, you can see the shape of the patches on it.”

It was thin and patched up—hardly high-end suit material.

Tuls said awkwardly, “I had no choice. I didn’t have the money to rent a fancy suit. This was the best I could muster.”

He rubbed his hands together, then looked up at Xie Jianxun with a fawning smile. “Boss, I know this counts as me breaching the contract. I was supposed to provide professional Treasure Hunter services, but I botched it like this. I’m really sorry… How about this: I never got the deposit, so I’ll return it later, and you don’t charge me the breach fee, okay?”

Xie Jianxun sat down beside him, mimicking his tone. “The breach fee is a big sum. If I don’t agree, I’d be missing out on principal and interest.”

Tuls bowed his head, clutching the lapel of his suit in despair, crumpling it into wrinkles.

Xie Jianxun switched back to his normal tone. “Alright, get up, sir. I never planned to make you pay. Our contract is still in effect.”

He stood up and beckoned Ela over. Tuls looked up at him in a daze, unable to believe what he’d just heard.

Xie Jianxun jerked his chin, signaling him to get back to work. “Didn’t you say you used to run errands? Perfect, I’m short an errand boy—or rather, whether you’re a Treasure Hunter or an errand boy, it makes no difference to me.”

“Help me sort out the missing materials, line up whatever channels you have, organize them, and take me to check them out… Think you can handle that?”

Xie Jianxun said with a smile.

Tuls was pulled to his feet and staggered forward. Though he was quite a bit taller than the youthful Xie Jianxun, he went along without any resistance.

“Oh… oh, sure thing, boss.”

“I have to say, you look like a dejected drowned rat right now.”

“Got it! Boss!”

…

“The guy I saw at the market—was that you? The one in the brown coat. No mistaking it.”

“Ah… Boss, can we not talk about that?”

“From the contact point to the Central Business District, not even half an hour passed. How did you manage to switch personas in the blink of an eye?”

“Don’t underestimate me, boss. I used to be a private detective. For intel gathering, you have to change disguises fast—sometimes while running!”

“Not doing the private detective gig anymore?”

“Sigh, boss, you heard it yourself—no money in it… And yeah, these days Intelligent Mecha are too smart. They catch a cat ten times faster than me. My proud tree-climbing skills are obsolete now. What a shame.”