Chapter 5043 — Taken for a Ride Over a Meal
The Blossom Guardian · Page 2 of 2
"Just so, sir. Take this mango conch you ordered—marked at ninety-eight. There are sixty in a plate, so that comes to five thousand eight hundred and eighty. And this top-grade immortal shrimp, marked at seventy-two, also sixty to a plate, so that's four thousand three hundred and twenty. Those two alone already come to ten thousand two hundred. Add the other dishes, and twelve thousand eight hundred is quite fair and reasonable, wouldn't you say?" The proprietress smiled warmly and kindly, and even gave one a faint impression of sincerity.
"You call that fair and reasonable?" Leng Leng was on the verge of erupting. She did not understand such things and had no clear sense of prices in the mortal world's currency, but from Wei Zhao's words she knew they were being fleeced. It had been only three hundred and ninety-six, and in an instant it became twelve thousand eight hundred—what kind of business operated like that?
She had rather liked this seafood restaurant for its distinctive flavor, and had felt a touch of goodwill toward it; now it turned to full-blown fury in an instant. This was no seafood restaurant—it was plainly a den of thieves!
"Mind your tone. Every price in this establishment is written plainly on the price list. You surely looked at it before ordering, and since you ordered these dishes, naturally you must pay the corresponding price. How is that not fair and reasonable?" The proprietress's face went cold.
"Hey, you two aren't thinking of dining and dashing, are you? Boys, keep an eye on them for me!" The ferocious-looking owner immediately bellowed a threat, and several petty thugs at the door answered with chuckles, each hefting a wooden bench and eyeing Wei Zhao and Leng Leng with ill intent.
Leng Leng was about to strike at once—a few small-time mortal thugs were naturally nothing in her eyes—but Wei Zhao, without any change in expression, held her back and looked calmly at the proprietress. "Fine. Twelve thousand eight hundred it is. I can afford that much."
As he spoke, Wei Zhao drew out a thick wad of cash and paid. Across from him, the owner and proprietress exchanged a glance, and their eyes lit up at once. Beaming, they said, "Now that's more like it. Anyone can see at a glance that you're a man of means, sir—how could a trifling sum like this be beyond you?"
So they said aloud, while inwardly laughing at the fool who was putting on a brave front, pretending to be fat when he was swollen—for fear of losing face before his female companion, he would grit his teeth and obediently comply even knowing he was being slaughtered. This time they had picked their mark perfectly.
The seafood restaurant the husband and wife ran was not actually a den of thieves. Ordinarily they did honest business; only when they encountered an outsider like Wei Zhao—with a provincial accent—and one accompanied by a woman, would they cut deep.
Yet they never cheated locals. Otherwise, even with a gang of thugs to keep the peace, the business could not have lasted—locals could easily rally a crowd to make trouble. Only outsiders with no connections made the ideal fat sheep, especially those rich types trying to play the big shot. Every one of them was timid to the core and preferred to avoid trouble rather than seek it, so they were practically a sure thing with every shakedown. (To be continued.)
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