《Otherworldly Merchant》Chapter 103: Ji Bu and his Promise Worth One Thousand in Gold
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Then, acting as if he trusted his wife, the ship owner slipped the USB-Key under the door.
He then turned to me and asked worriedly, “Will it work?”I nodded. “Don’t worry. She won’t endure past tonight. She will open the door unless she wants to die.”
However, one hour passed, then another…
Still, the ship owner’s wife hadn’t opened the door for us.
My heart was chilled.
This wicked woman didn’t keep her word, so why hasn’t the Ban Liang’s curse taken effect?
However, I had underestimated the Ban Liang coin.
When it was almost dawn, we heard someone crawling outside the door. It seemed that someone was coming.
The ship owner asked, “Have you transferred the money?”
The other side didn’t answer, just the sound of crawling towards the door.
I knew the woman was trapped. I hurried to the door, waiting. As soon as she opened the door, I would rush out.
When the sound came closer, I saw blood seeping into the room from under the door.
What happened?
I was baffled.
While I was wondering, the door opened. And what I saw made me completely terrified.
The ship owner’s wife was missing her nose. Every time she breathed, blood would ooze out from her nostrils. Her entire face and even her hair were dyed red from her blood.
She was possessed, indeed. Her eyes were blank and her movement was stiff, descending the stairs on all fours. I scurried to move aside and give way to her.
She didn’t seem like she was in her right mind and knew what she was doing. After she got to the remote area in the storage chamber, she stood up but didn’t move. At that moment, she looked as though she was a corpse.
When the ship owner saw his wife in that state, he didn’t want to take revenge. We all rushed out of this narrow underground chamber.
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After we were all out, I saw the ship owner trying to close the door and stopped him. “What are you doing?”
“What else should I do?” raged the ship owner. “That bitch schemed so much against me. If we keep her alive, she will be a constant threat.”
“You’re trying to kill people in broad daylight,” I scoffed. “Have you ever thought about the consequences?”
“I have,” the ship’s owner snorted in reply. “She killed herself. It has nothing to do with me or with you guys. You better stay away from this.”
After saying that, the ship owner didn’t hesitate to close the door. He even used sand to seal the slits.
I sighed. They were truly a married couple. The man was even crueler than his wife.
Although the ship owner’s wife was black-hearted to the point that she couldn’t pay for her sins even if she died, we didn’t have the right to deprive her of the right to live.
So, I gestured Li Mazi to sneakily call the police.
Less than ten minutes later, the police arrived at the scene and arrested the ship owner. And eventually, they also rescued the ship owner’s wife.
When the police carried the ship owner’s wife out, blood kept dripping along the way. She lay completely still, and we didn’t know if she was alive.
The ship was also sealed. All the guests were arranged to stay in another place.
We didn’t hurry to leave because we hadn’t received our commission yet. If it was before, I wouldn’t want to take the commission or get involved in this wicked murder case.
However, this time we had endured hardship, and we had almost lost our lives on this ship. I could say that we had fought with our very lives for this commission. If I didn’t get it, I would be resentful for the rest of my life.
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Several days later, the ship owner was released. His wife was warded in the hospital. She had been rescued in time, and they had even retrieved her nose to reattach it back…
The ship owner’s wife had attempted to kill us. With the recorded video as evidence, she couldn’t deny her crime. The ship owner even brought it to court, claiming that his wife had deceived him to take his ship. In the end, he won the case. Furthermore, she deliberately cut her nose off. Since it was of her own volition, it had nothing to do with us.
Having a ship like that on Qinhuai River was the same as having a cash cow. The ship owner didn’t forget his debt to us. He paid us the entire sum. He also didn’t dare to keep the Ban Liang coin, sending it to us as a part of the commission. He was afraid that the Ban Liang would act up and send his remaining property away together with his words.
After receiving the commission and the Ban Liang coin, we didn’t dare to stay any longer in Nanjing. We drove back that same day.
Back home, I got to know the story of the coin.
It turned out the very first owner of the Ban Liang coin was Ji Bu, a famous general in the Qin and Han Dynasty.
There was a proverb that states, ‘One thousand in gold is nothing compared to a promise from Ji Bu.’ It clearly showed how much Ji Bu valued his promise.
According to legends, when Ji Bu was still a kid, he didn’t keep his promises. Instead, he was a liar who cheated everyone.
After an incident, Ji Bu had started to value his words.
When Ji Bu was working as a jailer, he’d encountered a prisoner who gave Ji Bu a Ban Liang coin and pleaded for him to help clear his name. Ji Bu agreed to help him.
However, Ji Bu didn’t help the prisoner in the end. Eventually, the prisoner was chopped in two at the waist as his death sentence. Before he died, he cursed and yelled at Ji Bu for not keeping his word.
The young Ji Bu was shocked by this incident. After that, he had crossed his heart with a pledge that he would try his best to keep his word. And he always kept the Ban Liang coin with him as a reminder.
In the end, he successfully did what he set his mind to. He became a famous general with a great reputation in history.
Later on, I sold the Ban Liang coin to a businessman from the Philippines.
He was a leading businessman in the communication industry. He told us that his key to success was to always keep his promise.
However, as his business had grown quickly and he had to mingle in this dark and corrupted society, he had become more fickle, agreeing to sign many blank checks.
That was why he bought the Ban Liang coin to give himself the final line in his business.
Nowadays, people’s living standard is getting higher and better, but the beautiful virtues that had been imparted to us through five thousand years of history have slowly eroded.
People deceive each other everywhere. Sometimes, when someone kept their promise, it would even become big news.
It was even more ridiculous that someone now wanted to use an otherworldly item to keep himself from not forgetting his original heart and keep his word.
This was the tragedy of society, and also the tragedy of man!
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