I changed the world.

"If I had known, I would have gritted my teeth and bought it earlier..." someone else sighed.

"Stop...stop!" At this moment, a fat man squeezed through, reached out and pressed down on the boss who was about to continue, while looking at Zhang Jing: "Brother, don't wipe it anymore. If you wipe it down and the flesh underneath is bad, then you'll have to smash it. How about this, I'll offer 500 million to buy this jade, brother, what do you think?"

"Six million." At this moment, another voice came from the side. Zhang Jing turned his head and saw that it was the old man who had been haggling by the stall. He had also come over. There was a rather worried look on his face. When he saw Zhang Jing looking over, he sighed and said, "Young man, you really have a lot of guts. I'll pay an extra million for this jade. I'll take it for six million. It will save you the risk later. What do you think?"

As soon as the old man finished speaking, some people around him with active minds started to get restless. After all, most of the people who came here were jade merchants, and the market is always hungry for good materials.

Seeing this, the fat man hurriedly tried to speak again, as if he was about to say something more, when Zhang Jing cupped his hands towards the two of them and the surrounding people and said with a smile, "Everyone, don't be in a hurry. Now that it's been wiped open, it's definitely going to be fully opened. If any of you want to take it, please wait until it's all wiped open."

Seeing Zhang Jing's attitude, the others could only sigh and give up their idea of ​​getting a bargain. In fact, the internal changes of Khotan jade are not as great as those of jadeite, so the most important thing is the first rubbing. After rubbing it open, the probability of getting the same color jade later is extremely high.

So the boss continued to run the grinding machine, and after about half an hour, he selected key areas of the jade stone and polished about two-thirds of the area. He even flipped it over once in the middle so that neither side was missed.

Having polished it to this extent, its texture is completely confirmed, so no further polishing is needed. This is mainly because when carving raw jade, some of the stone skin is usually left to prove its status as a raw jade, so complete polishing is unnecessary.

With a splash of water, to everyone's astonishment, a huge, snow-white jade stone was revealed. One side of the stone, about a third of it, was as smooth and flawless as pure white mutton fat, while the remaining two-thirds appeared slightly less white in comparison. However, even on its own, it was still a very fine piece of white jade.

By this time, as time passed, more and more people had gathered here, to the point that the shop could no longer accommodate everyone, and some people were even standing at the door looking inside.

Many people gathered around the jade material to examine it closely, and some even shone powerful flashlights inside. Zhang Jing didn't mind and let them watch.

"It should be cut from here. This piece is mutton fat jade, and the shape is good. It can be carved into a Guanyin ornament. The rest is all top-grade white jade. It can be carved as a whole or cut into smaller pieces."

"It would be such a waste to cut it open. Find a good craftsman to carve it into a single piece. That would be amazing. Carve a sleeping Guanyin. This piece of mutton fat is just the right size to carve the face."

"This is truly an extraordinary item, a rare find indeed..."

Some people have already started discussing it, though most are just talking, but some who are truly capable are indeed getting ready to fight.

Zhang Jing pulled the shop owner aside, settled the wages with him first, and gave the owner 2000 yuan directly: "Boss, can I borrow your space for half an hour to hold an auction? Is that alright?"

"It's alright, brother, you can take it. I'll help you maintain order." 2000 yuan was far more than the boss's actual wage, so the boss was naturally happy to do this business.

Nodding, Zhang Jing patted the table and then cupped his hands, saying, "Everyone, everyone, please listen to me... It's inconvenient for me to carry such a large piece of jade around, so I'm going to hold an auction right here today. Those who are able to participate can stay, and those who are not planning to participate, please leave for now. The space is limited, I'm sorry!"

After Zhang Jing said this, the shop owner and several jade carving masters in the shop began to help maintain order. Some people started to leave the shop, but most people stayed. Some people who had heard the news even rushed in through the door.

Zhang Jing raised an eyebrow at the undiminished crowd, knowing that most of them were just there to watch the show. He spoke again, loudly announcing, "Also, let me remind you again: money and goods are settled on the spot, no delays. So, for those of you who want to participate, I'll draw a line here: eight million in cash deposit. Show the mobile banking app to the masters here. If it's less than that, there's no point in you staying. Space is limited, so please cooperate. Thank you all for your cooperation!"

These words were met with a chorus of sighs. Some who had originally intended to slack off had no choice but to turn around and leave, while others shouted, "Friend, could you give me some more time? I'll have someone raise the money."

"Okay, the auction will start in half an hour. Friends who need to raise money should do so as soon as possible."

As soon as Zhang Jing finished speaking, many people went to the side and started making phone calls. Some were preparing to raise money, some were informing their friends of the news, and some were even squatting next to the jade to take pictures and then send the photos of the jade to their friends who were not present.

Over the next half hour, people kept coming into the room. Of course, some people tried to get close to Zhang Jing, handing him their business cards and exchanging Qianluo numbers. Zhang Jing greeted them with a smile, but when someone asked him about relatively private matters, he would change the subject and simply listen.

Half an hour passed quickly, and 16 people remained in the shop. Some of them even received the news in the last five minutes and rushed over. To be honest, the number of participants exceeded Zhang Jing's expectations. He originally thought that since there was no prior publicity, this was just a coincidence, so he would have been satisfied with ten people participating.

The shop owner had already closed the door at Zhang Jing's request, effectively keeping the onlookers out. Those present were all jade merchants who had been proven to be wealthy, and many of them had already handed Zhang Jing their business cards.

"Ladies and gentlemen, let's begin now." Zhang Jing cupped his hands in greeting to everyone present: "It's just a temporary auction, not going to be too formal. There are two points: first, the highest bidder wins; second, payment must be made in cash."

"I'm sure everyone has seen the item clearly, so I won't say much more. The starting bid is 800 million. If you have a higher bid, you can start bidding."

"1000 million!" The fat man was the first to make an offer, speaking up impatiently.

"........."

The price went up quickly, reaching 20 million after a few rounds. However, once it reached 20 million, all parties became much more cautious with their bids, and the increments decreased significantly. Zhang Jing noticed that the fat man had stopped speaking and looked disappointed, while the old man who had spoken first hadn't said a word from the beginning.

Finally, when a middle-aged man shouted out 2300 million, everyone fell silent.

After waiting for a while and seeing that no one spoke, Zhang Jing announced the deal.

"Congratulations, Mr. Chen." Zhang Jing clasped his hands in congratulations. He remembered this man. He still had a business card that this man had just given him. His surname was Chen, and he was the manager of Jieyu Pavilion. He was said to be a well-known jade merchant in the north.

"Congratulations to you too!" the man said with a smile, bowing to Zhang Jing.

"Congratulations, Mr. Chen!"

"Congratulations!" People around also came forward to offer their congratulations.

After a brief exchange of pleasantries, the man began transferring money to Zhang Jing via mobile banking. He made three separate transfers: the first two were 10 million each, and the last one was 3 million.

A moment later, Zhang Jing's phone rang. He picked it up and saw that it was a notification text message from the bank informing him that the funds had been deposited into his account.

“Received. Then we’re done with the payment.” Zhang Jing cupped his hands in a respectful gesture to Boss Chen again. “If Boss Chen has nothing else, I’ll take my leave.”

"Okay, Mr. Zhang, please go ahead. Let's keep in touch in the future..." Boss Chen warmly came up to shake hands with Zhang Jing, exchanged a few pleasantries, and then saw Zhang Jing to the door.

There were still some people gathered outside the door who wanted to see what was going on. When Zhang Jing came out, they all crowded around and asked him a lot of questions, mostly about the price the jade had sold for.

Zhang Jing simply smiled and cupped his hands in greeting to those around him, ignoring the noisy inquiries, and strode towards the market gate.

Just as Zhang Jing was walking away quickly, two young men dressed as locals, with short swords in the style of the border regions at their waists, exchanged a glance, stood up, and followed behind Zhang Jing out.

In their sight, Zhang Jing didn't linger at the surrounding stalls any longer, but walked straight out of the indoor trading market. However, after exiting the market, Zhang Jing didn't leave immediately, but instead headed towards the public toilet next to him...

The public restroom only had one door, so the two young men didn't plan to go in. They just waited outside, chatting and watching the restroom door. However, after about twenty minutes, they still hadn't seen Zhang Jing come out.

The two men seemed a little anxious, and their gazes changed from casual observation to fixed intently. However, after another five minutes, Zhang Jing still hadn't come out.

Finally, one of the young men muttered a curse in the local dialect and strode toward the toilet, with the other man immediately following him.

Upon entering the restroom, they found only one man dressed as a foreign merchant urinating; the rest of the people were nowhere to be seen. There were three open squat toilets without doors, and two people were currently squatting there, but neither was Zhang Jing, the man they were looking for.

The two exchanged a glance, hurriedly left, and rushed into the women's restroom next door. Immediately afterwards, a series of screams rang out from inside the restroom...

..............................

Meanwhile, Zhang Jing had already left the Grand Bazaar and was walking slowly towards the train station. He had noticed someone following him when he came out, but he had easily shaken them off with a little trick.

Now, carrying a large sum of money, and knowing that the auction would likely become the talk of the town in a short time, Zhang Jing knew he would inevitably be noticed by many people, intentionally or unintentionally. Therefore, although he still had many stalls to look at, he decided not to continue. While he wasn't afraid of trouble, he didn't want to attract any foreseeable problems. After all, he wasn't the type of person in some novels from his previous life who would go around trying to scam people, show off, and get humiliated.

Looking at the time, Zhang Jing realized that since he had come out early, it was only around 15:00 PM, and there was still a long time before dinner. He looked around and saw that although Khotan was not a large city, only the size of a small county town, it had developed some service industries because of the large number of merchants gathered near the Grand Bazaar. For example, Zhang Jing saw a nicely decorated teahouse.

The teahouse has a sign outside that says "Internet access available." In cities where signal strength is generally poor, such a sign can attract some business customers.

Strolling into the teahouse, Zhang Jing heard several merchants speaking with southern accents conversing as soon as he entered. The southeastern region had always been the most fertile part of the empire's economy, a hub of wealth, and consequently, a high demand for luxury goods. Many merchants from the southeast came here to purchase goods.

The teahouse was filled with soft, traditional Chinese music, creating a quiet atmosphere. To ensure privacy, each seat was separated by a screen.

Guided by the service robot, Zhang Jing found an empty booth, ordered a cup of black tea and a plate of melon seeds, then took out his phone and connected to the internet provided by the teahouse according to the instructions on the table. Sure enough, the internet speed was much faster.

He first carefully checked his bank account, opening the mobile banking app of Southern Bank. Currently, his account held a quiet balance of over 2306 million yuan. While this amount wasn't enough to elevate him to the top tier of wealth in the empire, it was certainly no exaggeration to say he was financially secure and had no worries about food or clothing.

Adding to the wealth accumulated in his previous life, Zhang Jing had never possessed such a large sum of money before. Although he had been prepared and everything had gone as expected, Zhang Jing still couldn't help but feel a little smug when the money actually appeared in his bank account. He took a deep breath, picked up his teacup and drank it all in one gulp, then picked up the teapot next to him and refilled his cup.

His main purpose in coming to Khotan was to make money using the pupil technique he had acquired. After all, in this society, money, to some extent, serves a similar function to wish points.

According to Zhang Jing's plan, once he has enough money, he can use the power of capital to systematically organize, identify, and collect ancient artifacts on a large scale. This would be many times more efficient than him collecting them by picking up bargains in the market on his own.

However, achieving this requires two prerequisites. First, he needs a lot more money; he needs at least hundreds of millions in wealth. Second, during this period, he needs to control the way and frequency of "stirring things up" to obtain wish points. This is because once the nation and certain conglomerates or organizations link the gradually emerging supernatural powers with "ancient relics," the difficulty of implementing his plan in the future will increase exponentially.

In a sense, he's racing against time. After all, the emergence of supernatural beings is an unstoppable trend, and everything he's experienced these past few days—from the "old man" ghost he encountered when moving into his new house to the subsequent "cat demon" incident—has confirmed this fact. He can imagine that at the national level, there will only be more such incidents, and it's impossible for interested parties in various countries to remain indifferent.

Similarly, one day, those who are interested will notice the value of those "ancient relics." Zhang Jing even speculates that, given the efficiency and intelligence of modern humans, this day may come sooner than imagined.

Therefore, what he needs to do is complete his plans before that day arrives. At the same time, he needs to increase his own power as much as possible to support his actions in the next stage. According to his plan, he will eventually gain control over the interpretation of "Transcendental Manifestation," which will allow him to fundamentally reap a large number of wish points.

Besides, jade itself seems to play a significant role in the extraordinary system, as evidenced by the fact that many magical artifacts and magical treasures are made of jade. Therefore, Zhang Jing needs to learn more about this and may even need to stockpile some in the future.

After turning off his mobile banking, Zhang Jing first went to the railway ticketing app and booked a return ticket for 19:15 PM tonight.

Chapter Seventy-Nine: I'm not telling a story!!!

Next, Zhang Jing opened Wuyai.com and found the design task he had posted earlier. He then discovered that there was a long list of job applications below the task. He glanced through them and found that about fifty IDs had submitted applications to him, trying to take on the job.

It seemed that the salary he offered was quite attractive, Zhang Jing thought to himself. He then began to read through the applications one by one. Apart from a very few applications that were purely a matter of luck and didn't even have any attachments, most of the applications had attachments of varying lengths, which were basically like job application resumes, describing their professional backgrounds, and many even included past design cases.

Zhang Jing first eliminated those who were just trying their luck, and then eliminated those who lacked professional backgrounds, leaving 39 applications. These were mostly from students with backgrounds in architectural engineering, design, or related fields, including several applications from students who were currently pursuing master's degrees.

After reviewing all the applications, Zhang Jing was most impressed not by the master's applications, but by one from Liu Haitao, a third-year student majoring in Ancient Architecture Engineering at the Beijing Normal University School of Architecture. Liu Haitao sincerely explained in his application that his team was a two-person unit, with him and his roommate undertaking the project together, giving them an advantage in terms of time and efficiency compared to other teams. Furthermore, both he and Liu Haitao were from the Ancient Architecture Engineering program at Beijing Normal University, a relevant major, and the university itself is one of the world's top-ranked institutions in the field. He also introduced some of the ancient building restoration projects he had participated in at the university.

Of course, if it were just the above, Zhang Jing would at most list them as one of the options and wouldn't give them any special consideration. What piqued Zhang Jing's interest was that they directly provided a design drawing. This was a design draft of a classical-style tower based on Zhang Jing's requirements. In addition to the specific structural diagram, a simple rendering was also attached.

The rendering depicts a 15-story brick and stone pagoda with typical Eastern features. According to the designers, they referenced the design style of ancient multi-eaved pagodas, while incorporating advantages from Western and modern design in terms of structure, resulting in a more optimized form and sturdiness compared to traditional Eastern stone pagodas. Zhang Jing found its shape somewhat similar to the Small Wild Goose Pagoda in Xi'an, Shaanxi, which he had seen online in his previous life. He was quite satisfied with the design, especially since it perfectly aligned with his earlier requirements: to minimize the use of wood and maximize the use of brick and stone.

In addition, the design drawings also provided their own suggestions on interior decoration, and included a separate appendix listing the required materials and their dimensions.

After carefully reading the design materials, Zhang Jing finally made his decision: it was him!

Zhang Jing selected the application information of the user with the ID "Liu Jiangren" on the website and clicked "approved." Afterwards, other applicants received an email in their inbox stating that their applications had failed.

After this step, both the task poster and the task recipient can see each other's contact information. As per Zhang Jing's request, they will also need to sign a commission agreement. Tianya.com provides a fixed template for the commission agreement, with freely selectable items, making it very convenient. Zhang Jing's commission agreement also includes a confidentiality agreement, which was attached when the task was posted.

Therefore, Zhang Jing only needed to sign his handwritten electronic signature in different locations on the electronic version of the power of attorney. About two minutes after Zhang Jing signed the power of attorney, the website notified him that the other party had also completed the signing.

Clearly, the other party had been waiting in front of the screen, showing that they were quite interested in this request.

Once the agreement was signed, the commission was theoretically legally established, and Zhang Jing only needed to wait for the acceptance results. Previously, Zhang Jing had given the task of producing a complete preliminary design within half a month, followed by revisions, and then completing the remaining drawings and renderings within another half month. It should be said that this timeframe was rather tight.

Fortunately, the design work in this world makes extensive use of AI assistance, which is much more efficient than in Zhang Jing's previous life.

Soon, Zhang Jing's phone lit up. When Zhang Jing looked at the number, he saw that it was indeed Liu Haitao calling, so he answered the call.

The person on the other end of the phone sounded like a man, and his tone was a little reserved. However, Zhang Jing's gentle manner quickly calmed the other person down. After a brief exchange of pleasantries, their conversation soon turned to professional matters. Zhang Jing, after all, had no professional design experience, so his requirements were rather imprecise from a design perspective. Of course, the one paying the bills is in charge, so there's not much to say about that. However, Liu Haitao still hoped to understand the client's design needs and aesthetic preferences as much as possible.

Therefore, Zhang Jing described the details raised by Liu Haitao according to his own ideas. The communication between the two parties lasted for about half an hour. Liu Haitao finally said that he would start the design work immediately.

Putting down his phone, Zhang Jing suddenly remembered that Keyoubi had notified him that he would receive a special homepage recommendation this week, which should have started yesterday. So, he opened Beike Music to check and was surprised to find that his data had indeed begun to grow at an extraordinary rate. His fan attention had increased significantly, reaching more than 10 people, and the fan comment section below had also become lively. Zhang Jing glanced through it and found that most of them expressed their love for the song, while some hoped that Zhang Jing could write lyrics for the song.

Some fans even left comments in the comment section asking for information, wanting to know more about the specific origin of "Rain Falling on Tianmen". This is mainly because Zhang Jing did not use his own picture as the profile picture in the column's profile picture section, but only posted a picture of a misty mountain scene in the drizzle, so that fans knew nothing about him except that he was male, which added a sense of mystery.

Of course, Zhang Jing currently has no plans to cultivate a fan economy. Overall, his original intention in creating the music column, besides being a hobby, was mainly to try and increase the number of wish points, and he had no intention of putting himself in the spotlight. Therefore, maintaining a low profile is still his main strategy at present.