Chapter Ninety-Two: A Strange Object

“Stop right there!”

Tang Long stared hard at Gou Yuniang and shouted, and she seemed to be startled by him, freezing in place and not daring to move again.

The two of them locked eyes, staring at each other in silence. A long moment passed.

Tang Long gave two awkward laughs. A man, after all, could hardly help himself in front of a beauty, and he knew very well that this beauty meant him no harm at all.

“What are you coming in here for?”

With a blush, Gou Yuniang answered softly, “This is your towel, and your sleeping clothes for tonight.”

Tang Long, lounging in the huge jade bathtub, nodded. “All right. Just put them there. I’ll get them myself later.”

He let out a quiet breath of relief, though there was inevitably a little disappointment as well. Who would not want someone to throw themselves into his arms of their own accord?

Though, truth be told, ninety-nine percent of such initiative in this world came with ulterior motives, that did not stop men from liking it.

Following Tang Long’s instructions, Gou Yuniang placed the towel and sleepwear on the shelf. Her gaze flicked toward the bathtub. After a brief, embarrassed hesitation, she stood in the corner, lowered her head, and began to undress.

Tang Long had assumed that after setting things down, she would leave, so he paid it no mind. His thoughts were still on how many treasures might be hidden in the Baofeng carving workshop. There had already been a jade bowl, a jade vat, and even a toilet carved from Russian jade no. 7 pit stone.

To have stumbled upon a five-million find was already an unexpected windfall.

Splash.

It was not until he heard the sound of water that Tang Long came back to himself. Seeing Gou Yuniang, with not a stitch on, already stepping one leg into the great bathtub, he was momentarily stunned, his mind going blank.

“Um... do you people have some custom of bathing together?” Tang Long could not help asking cautiously. If this was their tradition, then... well, one could only adapt to the customs of the place.

Gou Yuniang climbed into the tub, sat down with a flushed face, and ignored the question. How could he not understand what she meant?

Shyness, embarrassment, not daring to let herself go — she knew all of that. Before coming in, she had even asked herself whether she should really be so bold. In the end, reason had won out, and she had walked in with determination.

Yes, reason had won. She had come in because she had made up her mind under the guidance of reason, not on a whim.

From now on, she would be this man’s slave. Whether she admitted it or not, whether he admitted it or not, that would be the truth.

Once an oath is sworn, it can never be discarded.

Tang Long rubbed his nose, and his gaze could not help drifting toward her. Fine, he admitted it — he was no paragon of virtue.

The atmosphere was far too awkward. Should he say something?

The trouble was, Tang Long did not know what he should say. He was not a saintly man. In all the years he had spent carrying out missions around the world, he had met more than his share of feminine confidantes, lingered in the neon of nightlife districts, sometimes with flirtation and pretense, sometimes with genuine feeling. When emotions ran deep, he admitted he had his faults in matters of love — though never in vulgarity.

A man’s youth would be wasted without a little roving fancy.

Unintentionally, Tang Long looked at her skin and frowned, unable to stop himself from glancing a few times more.

He swore he was only looking at her skin. But to Gou Yuniang, it felt as though Tang Long were staring straight at her, unblinking.

Her face burning red, she was both shy and flustered. Having mustered all her courage to come in, now that she was sitting in the tub, she no longer knew what to do next. Tang Long felt awkward; she felt even more awkward.

Tang Long’s eyesight was excellent. The skin of a twenty-year-old woman and that of a thirty-year-old woman were different, and the difference between twenty and forty was even more obvious when it came to skin alone. By forty, many women were no longer as firm, and their moisture and suppleness had noticeably faded.

But Gou Yuniang was different. Her skin was like jade — no, as if it had been nourished by something. Wrapped beneath her clothes, that quality might not have been easy to notice, but now it was unmistakable.

It was like a strange plant in the Amazon rainforest, a miraculous species bearing fruit that gave off a foul stench yet was as translucent as crystal. The locals called it the Tender Bud Fruit.

Around the Tender Bud Fruit, vast numbers of venomous snakes gathered and coiled, numbering in the tens of thousands. Within a radius of one kilometer, if you stepped in, you might well have several snakes underfoot with every step.

This Tender Bud Fruit was exceedingly rare and not easy to harvest. If eaten, it would instantly burn through the body, dissolving into a pool of blood — unimaginably toxic.

But if its juice were applied to the entire body, the user’s skin would become wonderfully soft and tender, delicate as jade, aging at a very slow pace. The effect could last for roughly sixty years.

On the market for strange treasures, a single Tender Bud Fruit could fetch as much as seventy-five million U.S. dollars, with juice content amounting to only about ten grams.

Because supply had long been unable to meet demand, many wealthy people — especially wealthy women — used tiny, diluted amounts of the juice to maintain their skin and preserve firmness.

Tang Long had once seen the wife of a super-rich family. Her skin, having been treated with Tender Bud Fruit juice, gave off the same feeling as Gou Yuniang’s.

“Have you used some kind of strange treasure?” Tang Long could not help asking.

Gou Yuniang paused slightly, then looked up at him in surprise. “What are you talking about? What is a strange treasure?”

Tang Long touched his nose. Her expression did not seem fake; she truly did not know what such a thing was.

From his contact with her, she seemed to be the kind of woman who rarely left Peach County, perhaps even one who had hardly been outside at all. She probably had very few chances to encounter strange treasures, or even hear of them.

“A strange treasure means, as the name suggests, an item with miraculous effects,” Tang Long explained briefly. Then he went on, “That’s not important. Do you know your skin is exceptionally good? Its suppleness, smoothness, luster, even its texture — all of it is several times better than that of women your age.”

Gou Yuniang blushed and nodded at first, then shook her head. “I know my skin is a little better, but I don’t know how much better than other people’s.”

Tang Long said earnestly, “By my estimate, with skin as tender as yours, if it were measured by an instrument, your actual age would probably not be more than twenty.”

There was no need for more to be said. It was simply too delicate. Especially once wet, it became as smooth and lustrous as jade soaked in clear water.

Gou Yuniang looked up at him shyly, then lowered her head again. “Is it really as miraculous as you say? I think it’s just average.”

Hearing someone praise her, she could not help feeling genuinely happy.

“Average? This is far beyond average.” Tang Long smiled wryly. How many top tycoons in the world, especially women, would give anything to possess such perfect, dewy skin, and spend vast amounts of money and effort searching for it, only to fail in the end and regret it for life?

Still puzzled, Tang Long asked with a touch of curiosity, “How do you usually care for it? No, that’s not right. Skin like yours probably could not be achieved through care alone. Have you eaten something special?”

Gou Yuniang hesitated, then smiled bashfully and said softly, “Not really. I’ve eaten ordinary grain and rice since I was little, so I definitely haven’t enjoyed any heavenly treasures like the ones you mentioned.”

After a brief pause, she added, “Maybe it has a lot to do with my long contact with jade. As the old saying goes, people nurture jade, and jade nurtures people.”

Long-term contact with jade?

Tang Long nodded thoughtfully, then shook his head. “Maybe that makes some sense. But many people wear jade and fiddle with it all day long, and there are old master carvers who handle jade every single day. Yet none of them have skin as soft and tender as yours.”

So Gou Yuniang’s explanation was not entirely right.

“People nurture jade for three years; jade nurtures people for a lifetime.” Many knew that saying, but Tang Long felt it was more like a merchant’s slogan, meant to deceive potential buyers.

Jade did indeed have benefits for the body, but its effects were absolutely not as miraculous as people imagined.

Handling it, playing with it, yes. But to rely on jade alone to make one’s skin truly exceptional, one would need a peerless treasure.

Gou Yuniang glanced at Tang Long, then lowered her head, her face still red. “Since I was very young, I have carried two special pieces of jade with me. One is warm as the blazing sun and is called warm jade. The other never grows warm no matter how long you hold it, and it can refresh the mind. It is called ice jade.”

Treasure?

Tang Long’s eyes lit up. Curious, he asked, “Where are they? Hurry up and let me see them!”

For some reason, Gou Yuniang looked a little self-conscious, even more so than she had been when standing naked in front of Tang Long just now.

“Are family heirlooms not to be shown to outsiders?” Tang Long said with a smile. He blinked and chuckled. “Don’t worry, I’m not asking to take them. I just want to look and broaden my horizons.”

Tang Long was certain that the reason Gou Yuniang had such flawless skin was probably connected to the two jade pieces she mentioned.

Warm jade was like the blazing sun, and it released a captivating fragrance. Ice jade was cold to the soul, with the power to refresh the mind and calm the spirit. Both were famed treasures. Tang Long had heard of them, but never seen them.

Since the opportunity was here today, he naturally wanted to learn something new.

A little shyly, Gou Yuniang stood up. It was not that she was stingy or worried Tang Long would take the two pieces for himself and claim them as his own; she was simply embarrassed. Besides, these two treasured jades had always been carried privately from childhood and never shown to anyone.

Before coming in, she had deliberately removed the two pieces, fearing it would be awkward if Tang Long saw them. She had not expected to be asked to fetch them now.

Tang Long lay in the bathtub and waited for a long time before Gou Yuniang finally returned, somewhat unwillingly. Though she had not hesitated to show herself naked, she still held the two pieces of jade behind her back, not bringing them out directly.

She herself was like jade, perfect.

Tang Long could not help but laugh and say, “It’s not that serious. I’m only looking. It’s not as if I’m going to take them. Why so stingy?”

Gou Yuniang lowered her head, blushing. “I’m not stingy.”

After a moment’s hesitation, she finally brought the two pieces of treasure out from behind her back.

Tang Long looked at the two objects and froze. He had assumed the treasured jades would be jewelry or pendants of some kind. He had not expected them to be shaped like polished staffs.

“There,” Gou Yuniang said. She first stepped into the jade bathtub, rinsed the two pieces in the water, then held them out to Tang Long, so embarrassed she could barely meet his eyes.

Tang Long took them. The moment they touched his hand, one felt warm and the other cool, sharply distinct from one another. The warm sensation seemed to sink straight into his bones, while the coolness ran along his wrist and surged into his brain, leaving his mind crisp and refreshed.

What is a treasure?

A treasure is something that, the moment you hold it, makes you feel how different it is.

One could not quite say it was unique in all the world, but it was certainly rare.

The two staffs were about the same size, each roughly twelve centimeters long and about as thick as three fingers, weighing around half a jin apiece.

If one looked closely, one would see fine carved patterns upon both, along with a curve of unusual and distinctive design.

The first thought that came to Tang Long’s mind was how inconvenient it would be to carry something this heavy around and handle it day after day.

It was said that warm jade carried a faint fragrance, unlike the scent of plants. Its aroma could enter the body and enhance the human immune system.

Tang Long held the warm jade and brought it close to his nose, wanting to see whether, as the rumors claimed, warm jade carried a soul fragrance.

“Don’t!”

Seeing what he was about to do, Gou Yuniang blushed and hurried to stop him, but it was already too late. Tang Long had already brought the warm jade up to his nose.

He looked up in surprise. “What’s wrong?”

Gou Yuniang’s face was red all the way to the roots of her ears. She lowered her head and did not dare look at him. “N-nothing.”

Tang Long rolled his eyes, muttering inwardly about what on earth was wrong with her.

The fragrance of the warm jade was unlike perfume. It was not something one could discern so easily. One had to close one’s eyes and savor it carefully before one could truly feel its aromatic grace.

Gou Yuniang secretly glanced at Tang Long from the corner of her eye, and at his expression she was a little speechless.