Daily Intelligence: From Water Snake to Jinghe Dragon King

Chapter 72: Heart of Water, Jade and Stone
[Today's Intelligence: Red-grade. Bearded Catfish brought back a batch of water jade from the Water Jade Pond. Among them is a bright yellow, millstone-sized piece. It contains abundant Heaven and Earth Source Qi and is a low-grade river treasure.]

The intelligence treasure box, which had been silent for a long time, suddenly emitted a red light. Liu Qing was delighted and hurriedly followed the instructions of the treasure box and looked at the pile of water jade stones.

This pile of water jade stones, some as big as millstones and some as small as bowls, are of different colors and extremely gorgeous. Their surface is translucent with colorful jade, but the inside is a chaos.
At this moment, the reflection in the water is like a pearl produced by an old clam, emitting brilliant colors and covering the lake water with a rainbow.

The water jade produced in the Water Jade Pond is rich in the source of heaven and earth, and most of them are high-quality river treasures. They are all put into the warehouse by the master of the mansion on time.
As for the batch brought back by the bearded catfish, it was originally the leftovers picked by the lord of the palace and was sent in advance by the mandarin fish witch as dowry, to be used for the future construction of the water palace.

Originally, low-grade water jade shouldn't exist, but a piece got mixed in and was discovered by the intelligence treasure box.

It is possible that the Palace Master could use his Yin Spirit to penetrate the surface of the water jade to check, but if the source of heaven and earth energy is hidden too deep inside, he might not be able to find it.

Liu Qing, with a smile on his face, meandered down from the crooked mulberry tree and found the water jade stone that was mentioned in the intelligence.
He flicked his tail whip and smashed it to pieces. He peeled off the outer layer of water jade and suddenly saw an oval stone core the size of a chicken egg.
The whole body is jade-colored and emits a translucent water vapor. This appearance is worthy of being a low-grade river treasure.

Although the low-grade river treasures only provide a few dozen points of heaven and earth source energy, it is roughly equivalent to the amount of energy accumulated by Liu Qing himself by absorbing and exhaling the moonlight for three or four days.
This unexpected fortune that he found by chance surprised Liu Qing.

Originally, the catfish was going to use it to gamble on stones, but he never thought that he would get the advantage first. Otherwise,
In a few days, the rumor will spread all over the lake market that some ghost spent only a penny of incense silver and actually found a low-grade river treasure.
With this rumor, the reputation of the catfish's gambling stone business will surely soar. It's a pity that Liu Qing intercepted it halfway. The catfish still needs to work harder.

The catfish was shocked when he saw the master of the house randomly picked one and opened a low-grade river treasure.

While being shocked, he also felt sincere admiration for his master's great fortune.

After calming down, Bearded Catfish looked at the pile of water jade in front of him, his eyes burning with anger. His master could easily produce low-grade river treasures.

This shows that the quality of this batch of water jade is extremely high. It plans to gamble on the stones later at night and double the amount of money.

After sending the catfish away and collecting the water jades into the swim bladder space, Liu Qing swam back to the crooked mulberry tree again, lying lazily, squinting his eyes while basking in the sun and absorbing the source of heaven and earth in the hearts of the low-grade water jades.

[Heaven and Earth Source Qi +22]

The sun was half past midnight, around noon, when Eel Wu and Knife Loach Daozi came over to call for dinner. Liu Qing yawned and meandered across the water, heading towards the cave on the east bank of Snake Pond.

The white snake followed behind them like a tail. When the three scarred carps saw it, their eyes widened, especially the female carp, whose face turned red. She was the most indignant.
He whispered to Scar Carp and Bearded Carp, "Now that the Master has White Snake, I'm afraid he's forgotten Sister Honggu?"

These three were originally gifted by Hong Gu to open their spiritual intelligence and become spirits. Naturally, they were close to Hong Gu. And because they were all carp, they had long considered themselves as her family.

Now seeing the appearance of the White Snake, how could he feel resentful and blame the master for forgetting the old fish and getting a new snake?

Scar Carp was the most ferocious. A murderous look flashed in his eyes as he said fiercely, "How about I do it when the master is not around?"

Bearded Carp was the calmest of the three carp, but even he was startled when he saw Scar Carp's appearance. "Second brother, shut up! This is Master's family affair. Even if you and I are upset, we shouldn't interfere, let alone call for violence!"

The bearded carp has always been taciturn, but also the most prestigious. He is the eldest brother among the three carps. After it spoke, the scarred carp dared not say anything more.

Although they were no longer discussing the lord's family affairs, the three carp, remembering the kindness of Hong Gu, were extremely disgusted with White Snake's taking advantage of the situation. Therefore, they did not go to eat, not wanting to meet White Snake. They just flicked their tails and went to patrol the river in Xiaolugou. Brother Zuoshou brought six shrimps and crabs and crawled back to the cave. As soon as he came in, he collapsed to the ground, foaming at the mouth.
They had spent the entire morning climbing up the cliffs to dig rock salt, but they were exhausted.

Brother Zuoshou had just recovered some strength and complained to Liu Qing, "Master, my left hand is almost dead from working all day. Look, my pliers are all worn out from chipping the rock salt—"

The other shrimps and crabs, fearing Liu Qing's authority, dared not complain, but they also quietly stretched out their claws, revealing their blunt claw tips and their shells smashed by the fragments of rock salt, with a look of grievance on their faces.

Liu Qing felt a little embarrassed. In order to make salt, he almost became an evil capitalist. It was really heartless to treat his subordinates like beasts of burden.

But right now we are short of manpower, the garrisons are under pressure, and we also have to keep a portion for Li Shimin, so we really can't stop.

"Master, I know how hard you've worked. It hurts my heart to see it, but for the sake of the growth of our Snake Pond and your future deification, I have no choice but to do this."

"Brother Zuoshou, starting this afternoon, if you dig a hundred kilograms of rock salt every day, I'll give you one ounce of silver as a gift. How do you think?"

One hundred kilograms of rock salt can produce about five kilograms of salt, which is worth ten taels of incense silver. Liu Qing took out one tael as labor fee. Uh, not too low, right?
Upon hearing this, Brother Zuoshou's eyes suddenly bulged out and he exclaimed in surprise, "Master, is this true?"

Brother Zuoshou's journey to becoming a monster is almost complete, and he is about to transform into a demon. Having heard about the importance of incense and silver, he naturally has to make plans for the future.

Liu Qing nodded, and Brother Zuoshou immediately jumped up. With the promised incense money, the fatigue of the morning disappeared in an instant, and he became much more energetic.

"Hey boys, hurry up and eat and drink. We're going to work hard this afternoon and try to dig at least 500 kilograms of rock salt each!"

Brother Zuoshou was excited by the incense silver, and other monsters such as Short Tail, Four-Ring and Five-Ring Cauliflower, Ji Ping'an, Eel Boom, Knife, etc. also looked at Liu Qing pitifully.

Liu Qing was a kind-hearted man and could not bear to see his subordinates suffer injustice, so he waved his hand and offered corresponding silver wages to the monsters in other links of salt boiling.

Suddenly, all the monsters expressed their gratitude and shouted "Long live the master".

For monsters, how can they work for the master of the house and get paid?

For Liu Qing, how could he make a fortune without providing grass for his cattle and horses?
So the master and servant ran in both directions, and the atmosphere was harmonious.

After the meal, Liu Qing still meandered back to the crooked mulberry tree, dozing off from time to time. Bai Sheer was ordered to patrol the snake pond to check on the reproduction of fish, shrimps, turtles, crabs, clams and snails, so as to prevent these guys from being attacked by other creatures when they were most relaxed in reproduction.

Not long after, Liu Qing heard Bai Sheer scream.

Liu Qing quickly raised his snake body and looked in the direction, only to see a huge black bear grabbing the white snake and putting it into its mouth.

(End of this chapter)