"Get out!!"
Lu Chen's furious roar boomed like thunder.
The two staff members shuddered in fright. Throwing out a "Just you wait," they scrambled and crawled their way out.
Lu Chen gave them an indifferent glance, then turned to the middle-aged worshipper holding spirit money, his face filled with panic. With a wave of his hand, he said, "Keep burning it. I'll handle anything that comes up."
The worshipper's eyes reddened, and he bowed repeatedly. "Thank you, little brother! Thank you!"
Without daring to delay further, he crouched down and lit the spirit money in his hands.
"Good!"
The worshippers watching from all around immediately burst into cheers.
Someone called out, "Young man, where do you come from? You even dared to stand up to the Chang family?"
Lu Chen smiled unconcernedly and asked in return, "Uncles and aunties, may I ask something? Are all the temples in Haicheng not allowing worshippers to burn spirit money on their own?"
"Exactly! They used to allow it, but who knows what happened later? Every temple suddenly adopted the same rules. You have to buy enough incense offerings from the temple before they'll let you burn paper."
"Isn't that obvious? They can't make money off that spirit money."
"That's right! Temples are businesses too. If they can't get a bite of this meat, of course they won't be willing to make things convenient for you."
Listening to everyone talk over one another, Lu Chen understood.
Before, he had only thought about selling the spirit money. Now it seemed that the tricks behind it were far more complicated than they appeared.
Running a temple was a business to begin with.
Now that outsiders had taken away a profitable source of income, the temples would naturally rack their brains to block it off.
Lu Chen