With Pan Jixian around, Li Xiangdong's previous idea of just making a fortune quietly is likely to change.
Li Xiangdong's heart sank. He instructed the Fu brothers to organize the villagers to patrol the bonsai garden 24 hours a day to prevent Pan Jixian from causing trouble.
After the Fu brothers went out to make arrangements, Li Xiangdong thought for a moment and then whispered a few words to Zhou Hongsong and Chen Zaohua.
————
A luxurious five-story building in the county town.
A man in his fifties was reclining on the sofa with his eyes slightly closed.
Pan Jixian knelt on the ground and gently massaged his legs with both hands.
The whole room was quiet, except for the ticking of the clock hands.
"Didn't you say before that you had harvested all the five-needle pines in Forty-Eight Bays Village?"
The man's voice was gentle, but Pan Jixian shuddered upon hearing it, and his grip tightened.
The man grunted, raised his leg to block Pan Jixian's hand, and opened his eyes to look at him.
"I did buy all the five-needle pine bonsai on the market before. I didn't expect that Sishibawan Village had a backup plan."
The man sat up straight, his piercing gaze feeling like a thorn in Pan Jixian's back.
"I spent 25,000 yuan to buy loose goods in the market before, and 60,000 yuan to lend money to people from other places. I spent 3 million yuan to buy the three most recent batches of goods!"
The man kicked Pan Jixian on the shoulder, sending him sprawling backward.
"You useless piece of trash! Because of your mistakes in the preliminary investigation, I wasted three million!"
"Three million! Even if you were sold ten times over, it wouldn't be enough to cover the loss!"
The man, still angry, picked up the glass in his hand and smashed it hard next to Pan Jixian!
The glass shattered beside Pan Jixian, and sharp shards of glass grazed his face, leaving a bright red mark on his right cheek.
Ignoring the burning pain on his face, he crawled to the man's feet and said urgently, "I have another idea, I have another idea!"
The man bent down, reached out and grabbed Pan Jixian's chin, "Speak!"
Pan Ji swallowed hard and said quickly, "If we destroy all the Japanese white pine bonsai in Li Xiangdong's hands, then we'll have all the Japanese white pine bonsai on the market under our control. Then we can raise the price of the bonsai to 20,000 yuan. At that time, we can not only make back all the money we lost, but also make several million more!"
Their previous investigation revealed that the combined assets of the "Eight Kings" amounted to a staggering 20 million.
If this hype surrounding the five-needle pine bonsai goes smoothly, the assets held by the "Eight Kings" will be successfully transferred to their hands.
The man's anger subsided slightly, and he snorted coldly, "How confident are you that you can destroy the bonsai in Li Xiangdong's hands?"
Pan Ji gritted his teeth, "It's not something I'm entirely sure about, it's something I absolutely have to destroy!"
The man nodded slightly. "They said they won't give us another penny. All the money we got from Shanghai will have to be returned in three months. You'd better keep that in mind."
Pan Ji made up his mind and said, "I understand!"
The man took a breath, reached out and gently stroked his face, asking with concern, "Does it hurt?"
Pan Jixian forced a smile, enduring the discomfort of the venomous snake crawling across his skin, and said, "It's okay, it doesn't hurt anymore."
The man looked at him; his handsome face was marked by a bloody gash, and his watery eyes gave him a unique charm.
His breathing grew heavier, and he reached his hand inside Pan Jixian's clothes.
Pan Jixian suppressed his physical discomfort, biting his lip to prevent any groans from escaping his throat.
The scene before him kept shaking, and the hatred in Pan Jixian's chest swelled with each shake.
He hated this old man.
He hated Wang Meizhen for breaking up with him because his parents objected.
He resented Wang Meizhen's father for refusing to help him get a formal job.
He also hated the bastard who gave himself to that old man!
However, the person he hated the most was Li Xiangdong!
And his annoying old man, Li Jin!
If it weren't for their interference, I could have had a very bright future!
He could have a job that everyone envies in the capital, marry a beautiful wife, and have a lovely child of his own...
But now it's all over!
Everything was ruined by the Li family father and son!
After an unknown amount of time, Pan Jixian endured the discomfort in his buttocks, put on his clothes, and limped out.
Several women downstairs cast disdainful glances at him.
"This person is shameless! She's always trying to seduce her father-in-law!"
"My father-in-law is the same. So many people have introduced him to older women, but he just doesn't like them and insists on getting entangled with this pretty boy!"
"..."
The two seemed to be whispering, but their voices were not quiet at all, and Pan Jixian heard them all.
————
In the middle of the night, the darkness was deep, and dark clouds obscured the moon.
The southeast wind is quite strong tonight, blowing very loudly.
A woman crept furtively toward the backyard of the bonsai garden, carrying a large can of gasoline in her hand and two boxes of matches in her pocket.
She bypassed the patrolling villagers and quietly slipped into the backyard.
Spread the gasoline evenly on the ground upwind, then strike a match and throw it onto the gasoline.
She could almost see the five-needle pine bonsai in the backyard being destroyed by fire.
She felt incredibly happy, even happier than when she received dividends from the bonsai garden.
The match landed on the gasoline, and the flame shot up with a "whoosh," illuminating the surroundings with its orange-red glow.
However, soon enough, a basket of soil was dumped onto the flames that hadn't yet spread.
"Who's so wicked..."
She uttered a curse out of habit, then suddenly stopped.
Someone's there!
She tried to run outside, trembling, but someone grabbed the back of her collar tightly, making it hard for her to breathe.
"Damn it, you think you can run away!"
The brigade headquarters of Sishibawan Village was brightly lit.
All the villagers gathered here, glaring angrily at Yang Shuixiu, who was lying on the ground.
Yang Shuixiu's man knelt on the ground and kowtowed repeatedly, begging for mercy.
Fu Youcai forcibly helped him up, saying, "Second brother, it's not your fault, why are you kowtowing!"
"I, I, I, she, she, she, she must have been half asleep, she definitely didn't do it on purpose... Please forgive her, okay? I'll kowtow to you!"
Yang Shuixiu's man pleaded tremblingly, and began to kowtow repeatedly. Before long, his forehead turned bruised.
Yang Shuixiu was terrified. She sobbed, "I didn't mean to... really... I, I was sleepwalking when I went there!"
As she spoke, she began to feel that she was right.
"Anyway, those bonsai trees inside have nothing to do with our village. They all belong to Li Xiangdong! He'll make all the money; we won't get a single penny! We're all surnamed Fu, we're family, so why are you siding with outsiders!"
The village chief was exasperated. "How could our Fu family have married such a spendthrift woman like you! Half of those bonsai trees belong to our village!"
"ah?!"
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