"Alright!"
The black-clad traveling merchant readily agreed, casually slipping the silver-white ring onto his finger. His small eyes, hidden behind the mask, darted around as if searching for something. Suddenly, he spotted a beautiful receptionist passing by, and his eyes lit up. He gestured toward Xu Mo before snapping his fingers.
"Ah~mm!"
A few meters away, the uniformed beauty suddenly opened her mouth wide, nearly letting out a scream. Her ample chest abruptly sagged and shifted to the sides. Her face flushed red, and realizing that no one around had noticed, she hurriedly covered her chest and rushed into the restroom.
Uh… What the hell is this guy selling? Why are all his products so perverted?
"Sigh! Fake cleavage! Another fake one…" The black-clad merchant clicked his tongue in disappointment. Then, removing the ring, he enthusiastically praised it to Xu Mo. "I call this the 'Snap Ring.' As the name suggests, it can instantly break apart the weakest connected part of a designated target within three meters. Not bad, right?"
"Can this thing snap open a belt buckle?" Xu Mo asked with a half-smile.
"Uh… no."
"What about shoelaces?"
"Uh… that's unlikely too…" The merchant's voice was laced with guilt, but he stubbornly defended his product. "But it has a 100% success rate at snapping bra straps!"
"What the hell is the use of that?!"
If this weren't his first time here and he wasn't trying to avoid trouble, Xu Mo would have walked away immediately. He could already tell—this merchant was the kind of scam artist who tricked newbies with worthless shards.
"Wait! Hold on!"
Seeing that Xu Mo was about to leave, the black-clad merchant shamelessly clung to his arm, almost begging. "Brother, don't go! Alright, I admit I tried to scam you at first, but I had no choice! My five-year-old daughter has leukemia, and I need money for her treatment. I really don't have any valuable shards left, so I was just trying my luck with newcomers. Every word I've said is true! If I'm lying, may I be struck by lightning!"
Playing the sympathy card again?
Xu Mo chuckled faintly and asked, "Do you really think I'd believe that?"
"Uh… But I'm telling the truth."
Seeing that Xu Mo was completely unmoved, the merchant looked disappointed. After a moment of silence, he suddenly raised his head and spoke sincerely. "Fine, I'll be honest with you. This kind of deal always involves a bit of gambling—whether it's worth it depends entirely on your choice…"
As he spoke, the black-clad merchant deconstructed the silver ring back into its Apocalyptic Shard form. Only then did Xu Mo notice that it was actually a mix of green and orange shards. That meant the earlier "bra strap snap" effect was actually a special skill derived from the orange chain reaction and had nothing to do with the green shard itself.
No wonder… I've never heard of an artifact-type shard coming with an innate skill…
The merchant reformed the shard into a ring and then pulled out a pack of "Da Qianmen" cigarettes from his pocket. With a quick flash in his palm, the pack vanished. Then, as he opened his hand again, the cigarettes reappeared out of thin air.
"If your brain capacity were enhanced enough, you'd see that this isn't magic," the merchant sighed. He lit a cigarette, rubbing the ring between his fingers. "In fact, this is a spatial ring."
With Xu Mo's keen eyesight, it was almost impossible for someone to pull off a trick like this right in front of him. So, he believed the merchant's words to some extent, though he was still puzzled. "If this is really a spatial ring, it should be quite valuable. Why didn't you just say so instead of covering it up with that useless ability?"
The merchant exhaled a puff of smoke, smiling self-deprecatingly. "It's easy to guess… because this thing is even more useless than its linked skill."
"Useless?" Xu Mo was surprised.
The merchant nodded and formed a hollow square with his hands, about ten centimeters on each side.
"A spatial ring that can only hold two packs of cigarettes—would you want it?"
"Uh… That is pretty…"
Xu Mo had considered that the issue might be with the ring's internal space, but he hadn't expected it to be this small.
"Apocalyptic Shard-generated weapons, artifacts, and even their derivatives can all be stored directly within one's body. So, for most Apocalyptic Shard wielders, spatial rings are completely unnecessary. Paying 500 or 600 fruit coins for something that can at best hold keys and a wallet? Not many people would be that foolish…"
The merchant smiled indifferently and put away the silver ring. "Forget it. You sound young, and saving up fruit coins isn't easy. I'll try my luck with someone else… Oh, by the way, if you ever make some money, remember to be good to your parents. They go through a lot for you."
As the merchant turned away, Xu Mo caught a fleeting glimpse of deep exhaustion and guilt in his eyes. His heart trembled for a moment, and he instinctively called out, "Wait! That ring… Can I take another look?"
Hearing this, the merchant stopped in his tracks and turned back in disbelief. "You… really want to buy it? The lowest price is 500 fruit coins. No discounts!"
"500 it is."
Xu Mo smiled casually, shaking his membership card and pointing toward the nearby transaction machine.
The full 500 fruit coins were transferred to the black-clad merchant's account. His eyes finally revealed a trace of relief as he gratefully asked, "Brother, I still don't get it. I tried to scam you earlier—why would you trust me so easily now?"
Xu Mo took the "Spatial Ring," now in its shard form, and casually pointed at the "Da Qianmen" cigarette pack in the merchant's hand. Smiling, he said, "Even the old man who picks up scrap near my house doesn't smoke those two-coin-a-pack cigarettes anymore… Your business ethics might be questionable, but you're a good father."
The black-clad merchant looked at the cigarette pack in his hand in surprise. After a moment of silence, he gave Xu Mo a deep bow before turning and disappearing into the crowd.
At that moment, Du Zhizhang and Chang Zitong returned. Chang Zitong glanced curiously at the merchant's retreating figure and asked with concern, "Xu Mo, what did you buy just now? You didn't get scammed, did you? Nine out of ten of those traveling merchants are swindlers—you have to be careful!"
"It's fine. It's something I happened to need. That guy was actually pretty decent," Xu Mo replied, not intending to elaborate. He changed the subject and asked, "Did you and Brother Du manage to sell your shard?"
Chang Zitong huffed angrily. "Original shards always sell, so that wasn't an issue… But that damned merchant was so annoying—he kept insisting on 450 fruit coins and wouldn't budge. If we weren't in a hurry, we wouldn't have let that swindler get such a good deal!"