A Hutrall Gold Coin Was the Price of the Genuine Article

"Teacher."

"I remember you said our shopping time was limited, didn't you?"

"Quit nagging."

Feeling the magical fluctuations belonging to her disciple behind her, Serie, who was crouched before a stall, turned around and spoke.

That said, Serie also knew that her time for appraising treasures was nearly up.

To make up her mind, she simply beckoned to the disciple behind her, signaling for Guter to come closer.

"Aren't you quite knowledgeable about antiques? Look at these with me."

"Fine."

Guter drawled his reply as he crouched beside Serie. There was a hint of helplessness in his voice, along with a touch of "indulgence"?

Whatever. Since his own Shang Zhou Old Timer enjoyed digging for gold in the shitpile of antiques from last week, then as her disciple, he would support her. At most, their journey would be delayed by a day.

Taking several antique ornaments from his teacher's hands—items even she could not determine were genuine or fake—Guter held them and silently examined them.

As expected, he could not understand a thing.

After all, his knowledge of antiques was entirely limited to the category of vessels, and even that came from memories of copying books at the Monastery.

And in the business of antique appraisal, there was no such thing as drawing inferences from one example.

Antiques from different categories and eras all had their own characteristics and particularities. They were not completely unrelated, but they were not much better than entirely different trades either.

For these ornaments that even Serie found difficult to judge, if Guter truly had to offer an opinion, he could perhaps only rely on the Talent Trait known as the Innate Tomb Raider Saint Body.

That was, none of these ornaments looked like they had been excavated recently.

Guter glanced at the stall owner again. The man's gaze was sly and his appearance slovenly; even if he came from a fallen household, he should not have looked like this.

By now, Guter had already reached a conclusion about whether these antiques were real.

He gently returned all the ornaments to their original places, dusted off his hands, and prepared to persuade his teacher to leave.

The odds of finding a genuine item at a stall like this were practically nonexistent.

The "antiques" at this owner's stall had probably been bought by the pound from his supplier.

However, when Guter saw the trace of expectation in Teacher Serie's gaze, his attempt to dissuade her came to a halt.

The image of Serie's disappointed face after learning that she had misjudged something last time surfaced in his mind.

Hmm.

Fine. Genuine or not, he would buy these "antiques." He could just treat them as toys for the old child at home.

Guter patted Serie's shoulder twice, then looked at the stall owner with a rather helpless expression.

Pointing at the few ornaments Serie had picked out with obvious disdain, he said,

"Wrap all of these up. Name your price."

Hearing the customer's words, the vendor's face lit up with delight.

After hurriedly glancing over those worthless ornaments, he was about to quote an astronomical price.

But the customer in front of him seemed rather knowledgeable. Judging from his movements and expression, he appeared to have noticed something.

Though the owner did not understand why the young man still wanted to buy these fakes, he hesitated when naming the price, reducing it from a jaw-dropping astronomical sum to a somewhat more down-to-earth astronomical sum.

"Ten—oh, no, one gold coin?"

Guter's eye twitched. "You've really got some nerve!"

Seeing this, the owner felt slightly uneasy. But wasn't this the normal process? Especially in the antique street-stall business, weren't buyers and sellers supposed to haggle over the price?

Could this be some naive fool from who knew where?

Having gone a long time without making a sale, the stall owner feared missing this customer as well. Gritting his teeth, he took the initiative and said,

"Customer, I can see you really want to buy them, so I won't play games with you. Give me five silver coins."

"Deal!!!"

Before the stall owner could finish speaking, Guter handed him a Hutrall Gold Coin. The action left the owner completely dumbfounded, even making him lose confidence in himself.

Could there really be a genuine item among these antiques?

That could not be right. Everything at his stall had been bought by the pound from upstream merchants. They had not even been willing to include a box. How could there possibly be anything genuine?

But if there was nothing genuine, then why would this young man...

With these thoughts constantly running through his mind, the street vendor numbly packed up the "antiques" and handed them to Guter.

Watching the two customers walk away with a complicated expression, the stall owner collapsed onto the ground.

He had clearly made a killing on this transaction, so why did he not feel happy at all?

"These antiques all had problems, didn't they?"

On the road, Serie looked at the wrapped "antiques" in the bag and asked Guter beside her.

"Why would you think that, Teacher?"

"When we left, that owner's face did not show even the slightest happiness one should have after making money," Guter replied with a smile.

"Heh."

"He had that expression because your stupid behavior shocked him."

Serie mercilessly exposed the truth. "And he lowered the price far too readily. That clearly showed he lacked confidence in the price he was asking, or rather, that he had a clear understanding of the actual value of what he was selling."

"In that case, they could not be genuine."

"So why?"

Serie stopped in front of Guter, blocking his path, and asked seriously.

"Why buy something you knew was fake, and even refuse the owner's price reduction, buying it at such an inflated price when it was not worth it at all?"

"Answer me."

"Because..."

Guter lowered his head slightly. "A Hutrall Gold Coin was the price of the genuine article."

"If the deal had been made for five silver coins, then it would have been a fake."

"I wanted Teacher to have bought genuine items, because I did not want to see that dejected look on your face again whenever you made a wrong judgment."

His words left Serie silent. She stood there blankly for a while before her expression finally returned to normal.

"So that was your reason."

"How boring."

Serie replied in an even tone, "I thought you would be a smarter disciple."

"Forget it. Come buy supplies with me. There is not much left on the list, so we should be able to finish before nightfall."

"Fine."

Guter answered with some regret and silently followed behind his teacher.

Were elves really that emotionally dull, or was what I did just too damn stupid?

Guter, walking behind her, wore a bitter expression. Just as he thought he had ruined everything, he accidentally caught sight of his teacher's small gesture.

Serie had originally been casually carrying the bag containing the "antiques" in one hand, but after hearing her disciple explain himself, she silently cradled it carefully against her chest with both hands.

Even her steps became noticeably lighter.

"Honestly, Teacher."

The bitterness instantly vanished from Guter's face, and a smile appeared once more.

If you were touched, just tell your disciple. Was that really so hard?