[Recycling two pounds and nine ounces of standard Pre-Qingming Longjing tea owned by the master, system decomposing, decomposition completed; system screening and optimizing molecules, optimization completed; reconstruction in progress, reconstruction completed; congratulations to the master for obtaining one kilogram of supreme Longjing tea from the eighteen tea trees of the Imperial Tea Garden!]
With the system's prompt, the tea barrel in Lin Yi's hand noticeably lightened, and then became heavy again.
When Lin Yi looked inside the barrel again, he found that the once-full can of tea leaves had now become just over half.
"Uh, three pounds of tea leaves turned into two pounds?? System, aren't all tea leaves just tea leaves? How did they decrease?"
[System decomposition and reconstruction eliminate unnecessary impurities and supplement deficient molecules. One kilogram of supreme Longjing from the Imperial Garden emerged after system supplementation. Relying solely on the tea leaves provided by the master, you would only get five ounces and one mace at most.]
Oh wow, hearing the system say this, it seems like I got the better end of the deal.
Upon thinking about it, it makes sense, just like those first two special cold pills from decomposition and reconstruction, a handful only turned into two because the essence is always concentrated.
He put the tea barrel back on the desk and reached for his phone to open a web browser and start searching.
In his impression, he seemed to have heard that Longjing from the Imperial Garden was quite valuable, but he didn't know exactly to what extent.
As Lin Yi typed "Imperial Qian Longjing" into the search engine, a ton of information appeared. Clicking on one at random, Lin Yi couldn't help but shake his head: "Damn, wasted one chance of decomposition and reconstruction to get something worth a hundred thousand yuan."
Looking at the screen again, it stated 'In 2020, the price of premium Pre-Qingming Longjing was about 50,000 yuan per pound.'
After closing that message in frustration and clicking on the next one, the initial look of frustration on his face suddenly vanished, replaced by shock:
"Woah, it turns out it's not a hundred thousand?"
This message was much more comprehensive than the previous one:
'In 2020, the price of premium Pre-Qingming Longjing was about 50,000 yuan per pound. This refers to Longjing from places other than the eighteen trees. The most expensive is undoubtedly the supreme Longjing produced from those eighteen trees in the Imperial Garden!
These eighteen trees yield an average of 400 buds per tree, totaling 7200 buds, producing about two ounces of tea per year! Therefore, the real Imperial Qian Longjing is priceless and scarce.
Additionally, in 2014, to protect them, Huaxia banned the picking of those eighteen trees, driving the market price of Imperial Qian Longjing to astronomical levels.
According to reliable sources, in 2018, one ounce of Imperial Qian Longjing was auctioned for 2.7 million yuan by the Poly Auction House in the Capital City! Since then, there have been no further auction listings for Imperial Qian Longjing.'
Seeing this, Lin Yi was utterly stunned.
Jeez, not to mention current prices, but just calculating based on that 2018 auction's price, one ounce would be 2.7 million yuan, so one kilogram would be 54 million yuan!!!
With this in mind, Lin Yi looked at the large iron tea barrel in front of him, his eyes sparkling.
Good heavens, 54 million! This time, I really hit the jackpot!
He grabbed a small handful of tea leaves, examined them under the room's light, but after a long while, Lin Yi still couldn't see what was so special about them.
Randomly tossing a few leaves into his mouth, even just these few leaves were worth at least a thousand bucks.
As the tea leaves entered his mouth, a bitter taste immediately hit him.
"Ptooey, this is way too bitter."
After spitting the tea leaves into the trash, Lin Yi threw the rest back into the tea barrel, losing interest in examining them further.
To be honest, Lin Yi felt that this stuff wasn't much different from the 400-yuan-a-barrel tea his dad bought.
Really, if there was any difference, it might be that the lingering aroma in his mouth was somewhat distinct after spitting out the tea leaves.
If a true tea lover saw this scene, they would probably rush over and give Lin Yi a beating, as this was such a waste of heavenly materials!
...
The next morning, while Lin Yi was still sleeping, Father Lin entered carrying a box.
Seeing his son sleeping soundly, he didn't wake him up. Instead, he smiled and shook his head before going to his son's desk to take away the pile of broken porcelain pieces to the workplace.
However, when he got to the desk, Father Lin was stunned, muttering to himself:
"What's going on here? Did the brat break this himself? Huh? He left a note? 2018 Jingdezhen-made broken stem-lotus pattern small bowl shards?? Ha, this brat, always pretending to be mysterious."
After casually putting down the note, Father Lin started packing the porcelain pieces into the box with a smile and a shake of his head.
As for the note's content, Father Lin didn't take it seriously, chalking it up to Lin Yi's nonsense. After all, even the most skilled experts couldn't precisely determine the production year from just a shard.
Perhaps because he went to bed too late last night, Father Lin's movements didn't wake Lin Yi.
After packing the porcelain pieces and seeing that his tea barrel had been left behind, he took it along too.
As he walked out of his son's room, Empress Dowager Ye was coming out of the kitchen with a spatula:
"The brat's still sleeping, huh? Oh right, Lao Lin, didn't you buy a barrel of tea yesterday? Where is it? I wanted to make a pot of tea eggs."
Originally intending to quickly take the box to the basement's electric scooter while his wife was cooking, he unexpectedly bumped right into her.
Immediately, Father Lin was startled, and hearing his wife asking for his tea, without thinking, he quickly took it from the box and handed it over.
Before, he would have hesitated to let his wife use his hundred-yuan tea to make tea eggs, but now things were different.
If his wife saw him and their son studying porcelain shards together, he'd have no peace for days.
"Here it is, here it is. I brought it in while chatting with our son last night, and I'm just taking it out now. Meanwhile, I'm helping the brat take his old books to the basement."
Glancing at the box in her husband's hand, Empress Dowager Ye glared at him:
"That brat, high school entrance exams are tomorrow, and he's already eager to throw out his books? He's hopeless! Alright, give me the tea. After I brew it, take some to the office for a snack."
After saying this, she grabbed the tea barrel from Father Lin and headed to the kitchen.
Once Empress Dowager Ye disappeared into the kitchen, Father Lin breathed a long sigh of relief, not daring to linger, and went straight downstairs with the box.
[To be continued…]
PS: Eighty thousand words already, brothers, and still haven't reached the edge of the rankings, sob sob, brothers, give me some support!