I can’t believe I’m being threatened! Me, a majestic millennium-old tree demon.
The person across the table is smooth-skinned with fine features. He tilted his head and glared at me like an arrogant idler. His bangs covered half of his eyes and he wore an expression of cold arrogance that kept people at a distance. Unfortunately, his black high school uniform betrayed his fake maturity.
"Find me the purest water in the world," he said, assessing my dessert shop named "Unceasing" just ten minutes ago. There was nothing but disdain in his beautiful eyes. "If you can find it, besides the service fee, I'll give you ten storefronts, each ten times more luxurious than this lousy little store now."
"What if I can't find it?" I crossed my legs gracefully and blew away a tea leaf floating on the dark-green tea in front of me, mocking this ignorant[1] brat[2] N times.
"I'll demolish your shop." He picked up the taro milk cake on the plate, frowned as he sniffed it, and then threw it back.
When I used the words "See the visitor out!" to express the greatness of this shop owner who was "uncorrupted by wealth and honors, and would not yield to power[3]," the two security guards I’d hired, Fatty and Skinny, were drooling over the Maserati parked in front of the store. Skinny even took out a calculator and was earnestly calculating how long it would take him to afford such a car on his salary.
I yelled these two shameful guys back to the kitchen.
"The information I received is that you love money the most," he said, turning a deaf ear to my dismissal and looking up at me. "You have no reason to refuse." Finally, he took a sip of the tea I had made for him, visibly wrinkled his nose as if he wanted to spit it out but forced himself to swallow it, and then sneered defiantly, "There is nothing impossible for my family to do. You should know that."
I also sneered and snorted disdainfully. I know his name is Cangtong Kai. Of course, I also know the secrets of the Cangtong family. But what of it? Threatening a senior demon is not the right way to go about it. Young people always make this kind of mistake.
"I like money, but I don't like you. So, the door is that way." I stood up and left, my back resolute.
Little brat, trying to challenge my character?!
Suddenly, I heard a muffled thud from behind. When I turned around, Cangtong Kai was actually kneeling on one knee.
"Please, save her," he pleaded, his voice filled with suppressed frustration.
On the table between us, aside from teacups and pastries, there was a small fish tank. Inside the clear glass, there was a white fish with fin and tail fringes that resembled lace, swimming slowly.
The water in the fish tank was a pale shade of red. When Cangtong Kai brought it in, the water had been colorless. There was a wound on the left fin of the fish, and blood was slowly seeping out, spreading through the water.
"I've used the most expensive medicine and sought the world's top experts, but I can't heal it," Cangtong Kai's beautiful eyes clouded with a layer of depressed gray. He traced his fingers over the fish tank, his expression pained. "Its wound won't heal. Someone told me that only the purest water can save it."
"I have a whole bucket of purified water here, you can take it if you like," I said, moving my eyes away from the fish tank and pointing to the water dispenser in the corner. I’m sure my expression is a hundred times more repulsive than when he had threatened me earlier.
"You..." He suddenly raised his head, his fists clenched so tightly they creaked. His fair face turned as red as a tomato, angry to the extreme yet unable to erupt.
As if I can’t deal with you, brat?! I evilly made a V for victory sign in my mind.
"Get up," I said, feeling quite satisfied, putting away my witch-like viciousness. I walked around the table and smiled as I took his arm. "How about we have tea and you tell me a story? About you, and about that fish."
Footnotes:
[1] bù zhī tiān gāo dì hòu: Idiom, to have an exaggerated opinion of one's abilities; to think one knows everything; to be ignorant.
[2] Xiǎopìhái: (derogatory) brat; wimpy kid; an unintelligent and unreasonable kid.
[3] From Mencius’s 富贵不能淫，贫贱不能移，威武不能屈: not corrupted by wealth and honors, not shaken by poverty/ to preserve one's ambitions although destitute, unyielding to power.
Translator:
New story~
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