But perhaps because the person involved was too close to the matter to see clearly, the old man had not thought of this at all. He shook his head repeatedly and said,
"That won't do. How could this thing be worth that much money? If I spent that much, people would laugh at me. At most, 300!"
"Then put it down. I can't sell it at a loss. Since you say it isn't worth it, I'll just leave it here. Maybe some fool will come along and buy it someday..."
Since the old man had taken a fancy to this double-linked vase, he was certainly unwilling to give it up. The two sides haggled for a long while, and in the end, the old man still paid the villager 2,800 yuan. The villager even acted extremely reluctant.
Then the old man asked again, "Little brother, do you have anything else good? Look at the two things you sold me—neither is any good. At the very least, you have to throw in one more item. If I hadn't been doing this for Old Zhou's sake, and if I hadn't hated coming here for nothing, I absolutely wouldn't have bought them!"
The villager thought for a moment before slowly saying, "There is still one item, but your prices are all too low. I'd lose money on this vase. If I hadn't held onto it for so long without managing to sell it, I wouldn't sell it to you no matter what. And now you want me to throw something in as well? That's definitely impossible."
The old man's expression immediately changed when he heard that. He put on a smile and said, "It's fine, it's fine. Let me take a look at it. We can talk about the price."
The villager glanced