"???" The department head couldn't react to this new revelation.
"Mhm." The employee explained, "The villas in the capital are priced at around 90 million per villa. That Zhang Dapao was obviously not aware of the market price. As such, after signing the contract, the miscellaneous fees such as taxes and so on pushed the price beyond 100 million. As such, he still owes them around 20 million for the villa."
At this, the head finally despaired for real. "Can… can we ask for a refund of the money?" he asked expectantly.
"Not possible," the employee replied. "That guy went totally crazy after earning some cash. He paid for a bunch of male and female celebrities and started a crazy party at the villa. Next, his actions were reported by a multitude of people. Now, his villa has already been put forth as the guarantee on his unpaid loan and has presently entered the liquidation stage."
This time, the head despaired for real. It was over. It was all over. They no longer had any sighing grass, nor could they even recover the profits from the sale of the sighing grass. The other relevant parties had already gotten started with production. He could already see the future that awaited him if they were unable to supply the materials in time.
Bang!
His brain jolted furiously, and he almost fainted then and there. He turned around and saw the person from the Research Agency, who was enjoying the show. At that, he recovered somewhat from his shock. Perhaps… he still had a chance at salvaging this.
The head braced himself and walked over. "Hey, bro."
The person from the Research Agency rejected him without a trace of politeness. "Scram!"
The head's face seemed to thicken considerably as he shamelessly asked, "I seem to remember that you still have some in your storage, right?"
"We only have several thousand. How is that comparable to your stock of a hundred thousand?" The person from the Research Agency sneered. Where was the arrogance displayed earlier?
"Come on, share some with us."
"Scram!"
"Bro, please."
"Scram!"
"Master, please."
"Scram…"
"Father, please give me some sighing grass."
"…"
"Grandpa, I hereby kneel down to pay my respects to you."
"…"
Ultimately, the Genetic Union unexpectedly succeeded in obtaining around 1,000 sighing grass from the Research Agency. This was still quite a small amount, though. Nobody knew what had happened to result in this. However, based on the brief description of the person from the Research Agency, the head of the Genetic Union's Procurement Department was truly excessively shameless. If he truly had to describe what had happened during the negotiation process, he could only describe it with the phrase: shocking the eye and astonishing the heart.
Naturally, apart from the Zhang Dapao's punishment, the fellow that had previously caused the price of this sighing grass to increase by using that "breaking through to master producer" as an excuse wouldn't be let off either.
"Investigate this. This is an unfair monopoly of the market. This is a financial scam. I am going to kill that person."
The fury of the Genetic Union was now aimed in a different direction. They did not even need any solid evidence. So long as they found out who that fellow was, they would let that fellow know what the strongest organization in the world, the Genetic Union, was made of. With the enormous power of the Genetic Union, they indeed managed to find out the truth soon enough. Alas, the truth was truly too alarming, to the point where, ultimately, they could only keep their mouths shut despite knowing the truth.
Why is it this fellow? they asked as they looked at the details on their screen. They could make a move to bully any person but this guy here. This grandpa here was a person they could not afford to offend no matter what.
Presently, they only lacked sighing grass. If they dared to offend this grandpa, they would probably lose even the rights to produce this gene reagent. That's right, their result indicated that the person who caused this to happen was precisely Chen Feng.
If it was Chen Feng, the sudden increase of the price of sighing grass and the mass clearance of sighing grass from the market were now explainable. At this time, Chen Feng was all smiles as he looked at the huge amount of money in his bank account.
Mhm, the word "skyrocket" could be used to aptly describe the increase in the amount of money in his account.
In a single day, the amount of money he'd made was already off the charts, reaching a number Chen Feng did not even know how to pronounce. So terrifying was the amount that it was nearly unspeakable. Sighing grass… Chen Feng smiled.
But then, Chen Feng was also clear that this would not last long. This had only happened due to this being the first day, since the various major powers were competing against each other to increase their strength the quickest. With the price of sighing grass increasing without stop, they'd been scared into purchasing the overpriced sighing grass in bulk. By now, they should have regained their calm already.
Furthermore, the only reason they'd had a hard time procuring sighing grass was due to the low demand for this herb previously, which resulted in a low supply. Now that the demand had increased greatly, Chen Feng was sure that those sighing grass farms would start researching ways to increase the output of the herb.
It wouldn't be long before the supply of this herb increased greatly. In the future, this would be one of the bestsellers on the market. As such, the demand for this herb would only increase, not decrease. As for its price, it would naturally drop gradually before slowly readjusting to its new normal level.
Based on Chen Feng's initial estimate, the proper value of this sighing grass should be around 1,000 yuan. He checked his records and noted that indeed, presently, the sale of his sighing grass had indeed dropped greatly compared to when he'd first started selling. Since the various powers were already done purchasing what they required, anyone still purchasing now was likely an ordinary gene producer.
A smile appeared on Chen Feng's face. "Well then, time to change the price."
Virtual community.
An advanced producer was hesitating while staring at the price of sighing grass. This price of 99,999 was the type of price that surpassed the imagination. Granted, an advanced producer wouldn't truly be lacking in money. Unfortunately, the price of sighing grass coupled with other materials had caused the production cost of this beyond X gene reagent to be incredibly expensive.
Should he buy this sighing grass, then? His heart ached. After hesitating for a long time, he sighed and decided to still make the purchase. For the sake of his research, what other option did he have? Just as he was about to make the purchase, the exchange board was refreshed and something new appeared on it.
"Yi? Someone else is selling it as well?"
He was rather shocked. One ought to know that he had waited for an entire day, yet this small store had been the only place selling sighing grass thus far. Nobody else had been selling it, but now…
Shua!
He turned the interface on and was immediately stunned.
Name: Sighing grass.
Price: 3,000 yuan.
Introduction: To repay the contribution of the great producers toward humanity, this shop is selling at a special price. Hopefully, all producers will continue working hard to produce even better gene reagents.
Restriction: Only one purchase per person.
Restriction: Advanced producers only.
Bang!
The moment this announcement was made, the entire virtual community erupted in an uproar. Three thousand yuan? This was an incredibly low price! When they took a better look, they noted that the seller this time was precisely "The Strongest Gene" shop—Chen Feng's shop.
"Chen Feng?"
"The main researcher of that Beyond X project?"
"Haha, it's him indeed."
"Why does he have so much sighing grass?"
"Haha. He must have known in advance that those damnable capitalists would take the opportunity to increase the price shamelessly. As such, he must have prepared his stock in advance to sell it to us normal producers at a fair price."
"So that's the case."
"He is indeed worthy of being a member of the Gene Production Association."
Everyone praised Chen Feng. That already righteous reputation of Chen Feng's improved greatly once again. Naturally, there were some who claimed that Chen Feng was the very person that caused the price to increase in the first place.
"Hehe, I seem to recall that the power you belong to is rather huge?"
"I heard that you guys purchased a lot of them at the price of 99,999 yuan?"
"Tsk tsk, no wonder you guys are trying to discredit Chen Feng. Seems like your benefits have been threatened now, huh?"
"True, true."
The masses despised the complainers. After all, with Chen Feng's contribution and reputation, who would believe these complaints?
If Chen Feng was truly doing this for profit, he could very well sell sighing grass for 88,888 yuan. A lot of people would still purchase it at that price. Was there a need to reduce the price to only 3,000 yuan? Clearly, he was doing this to ensure the spread of this new formula.
Toward this, the various major powers could only swallow their grief. What could they do? They felt extremely helpless as well. How long had it been since they'd exhausted their wealth to purchase the initially overpriced sighing grass? It hadn't even been one full day yet! Wasn't it excessive of Chen Feng to reduce the price in such a manner?
Yet he still dared claim he did not wish for the price to be excessively high? What nonsense? Now, they could see things very clearly. Chen Feng was clearly scamming them, the major powers who had purchased a huge amount of sighing grass earlier, treating them like major idiots.
Moreover, the targets of Chen Feng's scam were only these major powers, while the ordinary producers were all spared. As such, even if they complained, the masses would only ignore them. As this incident progressed, the very first batch of beyond X gene reagents was finally produced by numerous producers. Finally, this new gene reagent entered the hands of the public. Three days later, the first beyond-B-class genetic warrior appeared, rocking the entire world.