181 Out of Stock (1/2)
Two hours after Cao Mao had a meeting with Qiang Han, Ma Moxi and Pang Lingming visited the local market. As Cao Mao had predicted, they visited a shop to gather necessary ingredients for special pills and spiritual liquor that Ma Moxi was planning to make.
Per Ma Ping's order, Pang Lingming came to help Ma Moxi deal with the local merchants, so the elder could haggle with the local shop owners to get cheaper pill ingredients.
The first shop they visited was a store of Ma Moxi's friend, Tang Merchant Guild.
When Ma Moxi showed up at the front door of the guild, many employees and store clerks glanced at him with the corner of their eyes in disgust. They didn't think that the infamous good-for-nothing grandson of Ma Ping would buy anything in the store other than borrowing their young master's money to either gamble or buy women again.
A minute after their arrival, a morbidly obese young man, aka the eldest son of the Tang Merchant's guild master, ran toward his best friend. His jiggling belly bounced as he ran. Fortunately, he had a bit of cultivation strength. Or else, he would have passed out from the full-speed sprinting for 10 seconds with over 300kg of body weight.
Tang Fan's round oily face was glittering under the sunlight. His robes were too small to be covered by his clothes even though the size was XXXL. His sweat and his body odor had the same scent as a rotten pig, but Ma Moxi and the guild employees got used to it.
”Moxi! What's up? Wanna go somewhere with me today?” Tang Fan laughed and patted his jiggling belly.
Looking at this fat friend, Ma Moxi laughed. His pretty smiling face dazzled female employees for a moment, ”Fatty Fan, I'm here for a business today. I'm not playing around this time.”
”Oh? Really?” Tang Fan widened his eyes, switching to the businessman mode.
Although Tang Fan often hung around Ma Moxi, he was still a talented businessman. Every spirit stone he spent so far was the money that he had earned himself, so his reputation was not as bad as Ma Moxi's. On the opposite, everyone in his family approved him since he was an adult, unlike Ma Moxi who was still leeching his declining family.
”Are you here to buy something?”
”Yes. Senior Pang, can you give him the list?”
Pang Lingming handed a scroll to Tang Fan. It was the list of Ma Moxi's pill and spirit liquor ingredients, which required basic herbs that could be easily found in any marketplace.
”Plum mushroom, wailing jay flowers, pooping grasses, red salmon's dongs… hmm?”
Tang Fan's face twisted as he found something odd about the list. He turned toward Ma Moxi, ”I'm sorry, buddy. I can't sell you anything.”
”Why, Tang Fan?”
The fat merchant sighed, ”The Qiang Clan contacted my father and bought everything. You guys are an hour late.”
”Huh? The Qiang Clan?”
”Yeah. They bought everything with a marked-up price. My father couldn't refuse the offer, and he sold everything.”
”…”
Ma Moxi and Pang Lingming were shocked. They didn't know why the Qiang Clan wanted these materials since they also had several tons of them in their clan.
Something was fishy.
”Tang Fan, can you import these items from other cities? Your guild has several branches in other cities, right?”
Tang Fan had a wry smile on his face, ”The Qiang Clan also reserved all herbs and ingredients in the list.”
”Wait, how many catties are they reserving?”
”All of them.”
”What!? All of them!?”
”Yeah, everything.”
”As far as I know, there should be over a million catties! Are you sure they reserve all of them!?”
”Yeah, all of them. My father even raised the price by 50%, but they insisted on buying everything.”
”…”
Ma Moxi's face darkened, and his brain stopped working for a moment. This development caught him off guard. Because of the pressure of the upcoming auction event, he got nervous if he would fail to meet his grandfather's expectations.
After a minute of quick thinking, Ma Moxi came up with a few solutions, ”Do you know if the black market is still selling these items?”
”Doubt it. Since the Qiang Clan is adamant about hoarding these items, they should already have extended their hands to the slum by now. All local shops are probably cleaned as well.”
”Ha!” Instead of getting irritated by the Qiang Clan's action, Ma Moxi snickered. He had an idea to obtain these ingredients, ”Tang Fan, do you have a map?”
”What do you need it for?”
”Just give me one. If I can't buy these materials, I can just collect them from the wild.”
”Hahaha! That's right. Give me a second. I'll tell my men to fetch one for you!”
.
Ma Moxi left the Tang Merchant Guild, but he didn't come out empty-handed.
The protagonist got a region map, which displayed the location of all northwest continent cities. The map also revealed small rivers and main roads, which showed potential transportation routes between cities.
After getting the map, Ma Moxi sent Pang Lingming to check the slum district and the black market if they still had the ingredients. As for him, he strolled to the Qiang Clan's merchant house to survey.
Ma Moxi went to the same building that Cao Mao had visited earlier. He asked for the same herbs.
”I'm sorry. The herbs on the list have been sold out.”
”Ho? Sold out?”
Ma Moxi was amused. The Qiang Clan proactively bought all herbs from his friend's store, but their shop also had nothing to sell.
'They're up to something. Are they planning to hoard all basic products to jack up the price? That's impossible, you moron. There will be more supplies to the market soon, and you can't increase the standard price! You all will lose money. What a bunch of idiots.'
After confirming that the Qiang Clan was hoarding all the ingredients, Ma Moxi thought of the upcoming auction event, which Tang Fan's father would hold in a month. From his perspective, he thought that the Qiang Clan might be aiming to increase the average price of all herbs, but their plan was doomed to fail.
Ma Moxi left the Qiang Clan and exited the city in secret. He went out to gather wild herbs and ingredients from the wild. Also, he planned to rob the Qiang Clan and their merchant caravans, hoping to get something for free.
.
.
Evening, the same day
A hundred spatial rings were gathered in front of Cao Mao, who was staying in the Qiang's clan guest courtyard.