Shen Le almost held his breath on instinct. The fragrance... it was too fragrant, so intense it nearly made him faint!
Legend had it that highly concentrated indole gave off a powerful stench, but when diluted a thousandfold, it became the scent of jasmine...
So what I'm smelling is an overpowering floral fragrance—because the perfume is too concentrated, has it condensed into a gas that smells foul...?
No... no, wait. This wasn't perfume. Smoke billowed all around. They were burning spices. They were...
Shen Le instinctively took a step forward, wanting to see what fuel was inside the incense burner. With that single step, the tip of his shoe sank deeply down.
Looking down, he saw a thick, dense carpet beneath his feet. Gem-like, dazzling patterns clustered at its center, from which intricate, gorgeous flowers spread outward.
The flowers extended all the way to the edges, where stylized palms, roses, tulips, and all manner of plants formed broad borders. Shen Le swallowed involuntarily.
"Persian Isfahan carpet..."
This type of carpet used genuine silk for warp and the finest lamb's wool for weft, woven with extreme density.
The threads in the carpet before his eyes were so fine that its warp and weft were nearly impossible to distinguish with the naked eye. Shen Le crouched and ran a hand over it. It felt delicate and soft beneath his fingertips. Even if it could not compare with cashmere, it probably would not feel scratchy if worn against the skin.
This density was at least 130 knots per ten centimeters—perhaps even higher!
He had once heard his advisor say that such carpets could still be bought in Turkey. A high-density carpet measuring 1.2 by 2 meters would casually cost tens of thousands. And the carpet here...
The carpet here...
Brilliant gleams flashed now