The Hunter

Liu Jian rented a one-bedroom apartment in an old suburban neighborhood. The apartment was always messy. He didn't go out much during the day; his activities were mainly concentrated in the evenings.

Two laptops sat on the old coffee table in the living room, an ashtray overflowing with cigarette butts lay beside them, and several empty instant noodle containers sat nearby. He was wearing a slightly worn T-shirt, sitting cross-legged on the somewhat sagging sofa, his eyes fixed on the screen.

This is his job—finding products online that look problematic, buying them, and then seeking compensation from the sellers. He calls this "fighting counterfeits," but he knows in his heart that he's actually making money from it.

I've been in this business for a few years now and I've figured out the ropes. You can't go to big shops; those have legal teams and are not to be trifled with. You look for small shops that look like they're run by an individual, preferably with slow customer service and product descriptions that might be a little suggestive.

Money is one thing, but sometimes, when he encounters a particularly stubborn seller, he gets even more motivated. He records the struggle, edits it, posts it on short video platforms with a sensational title, and can gain a lot of followers and earn some money from traffic. Combining both, it's faster and more flexible than a regular job.

He yawned, rubbed his sore eyes, and randomly entered a few keywords into the search box of the e-commerce platform. As he scrolled, a store selling alcohol caught his attention.

The store name was ordinary, and the product photos were extremely perfunctory, showing just a wine bottle on the table with a somewhat dark background. Looking at the price, Liu Jian was stunned – 1288 yuan? He remembered this brand of wine; it would sell for a little over twenty yuan in supermarkets at most.

Clicking through to the product details page left him speechless. It only had a few lines stating the wine was from a certain winery, the approximate wholesale price, and followed by. "The taste is average, don't expect too much; shipping is slow, don't buy if you're in a hurry."

The review section was filled with negative comments, all complaining about the outrageous price and saying the shop owner was greedy. A few others said they bought it out of curiosity but regretted it terribly. I scrolled through several pages and couldn't find a single positive review.

Liu Jian stared at the screen, his mind racing. This store was too strange. The prices were so high, and the product details page was so straightforward—it was practically saying, "I'm just going to sell at a high price, take it or leave it." The reviews were so bad, and the owner didn't care. Either they didn't care about the business at all, or they were mentally unstable.

But regardless of the type, it could be an opportunity for him.

He carefully examined the product title and details page. The title was simply "XX Brand Baijiu," and the details page, besides clearly stating the basic information of the liquor and the actual wholesale price, did not contain any promotional terms such as "collector's edition," "aged," or "special effects," and even seemed to discourage customers. From an advertising law perspective, it was difficult to directly label it as "false advertising."

However, Liu Jian, having been in this business for a long time, knows that sometimes it's not necessary to pinpoint concrete legal violations. Price itself can be a game-changer. Selling something that costs a dozen yuan for over a thousand is a huge price difference.

Even if the store clearly displays the prices and states the cost price, such a huge price difference easily leads people to suspect "price gouging" or "unfair pricing." The average consumer's first reaction will undoubtedly be, "This store is ripping people off."

When the time comes, he'll file complaints, report them on the platform, and then post it online to stir up trouble. With so much public pressure, many small shops won't be able to withstand it and will mostly choose to pay compensation to settle the matter. Even if he doesn't necessarily have a complete legal standing in the end, the process itself will be enough to give the shop owners a hard time, and many people will just accept it because they find it too troublesome.

More importantly, this shop seems to have a "what's the worst that can happen?" attitude, still selling despite such terrible reviews. This kind of shop owner either has some other connections and doesn't care about their online store's reputation, or they're incredibly stubborn and prone to arguments. Arguments are good; conflict creates drama, and that's how they get viewers for their videos.

He mentally calculated his profits. One bottle cost 1288 yuan; if he bought dozens of bottles... He tapped his fingers on the calculator. Buying 50 bottles would cost over 60,000 yuan. According to the "three-times compensation for fakes" policy, that would be close to 200,000 yuan. Even if he couldn't get the full amount after negotiation, even a 50% discount would still be 100,000 yuan. That was much more profitable than the small shops selling health products for a hundred or two hundred yuan that he had previously targeted.

Thinking of this, Liu Jian felt his heart race, and his drowsiness vanished. He leaned forward and carefully examined the shop's credit rating and opening date, both of which were low. This further confirmed his suspicion: this wasn't a legitimately run shop.

To do it or not?

He lit a cigarette and took a puff. There were definitely risks involved. What if the shop owner was a hothead or had connections and insisted on fighting to the end? That would be troublesome. But then again, he'd encountered plenty of tough guys before, and most of them ended up being dropped, with very few actually going to court. Most people were afraid of the hassle and the potential repercussions.

Moreover, if this deal goes through, the profits will be substantial, enough to keep him off work for quite some time.

He'd smoked half his cigarette when he made up his mind. He moved the mouse, clicked on the purchase page, hesitated for a moment at the quantity field, and then typed "50". He figured that buying more would give him more leverage in negotiations, and the other party might be more willing to resolve the issue quickly.

After confirming the order and making payment, Liu Jian leaned back on the sofa and exhaled a long puff of smoke as he looked at the payment success page.

Next, he secured the evidence. He took screenshots of the product pages, especially the details page showing the wholesale price and the phrase "taste is so-so," and saved them all. He also took screenshots of the order details.

Then, he opened the document and began to think about how to negotiate with the seller in the first letter. His tone couldn't be too soft, but he also couldn't be too aggressive at the beginning. He would start by stating that "the consumer is questioning the unreasonable price" and see how the other party would react.

He could almost see the next steps: contact the seller, put pressure on them, negotiate compensation if they backed down, and start recording footage and preparing to upload it online if they remained defiant. He even started thinking about how to come up with a more appealing video title.

The sky outside the window was just beginning to lighten, but Liu Jian was wide awake, his eyes gleaming. He had a feeling that he might have caught a pretty big fish this time.