“If you don’t sell it, I’ll complain to the person in charge here about how you tried to deceive this beautiful lady. Let’s see if anyone will buy gambling stones from you then,” Leo grinned, pointing at Nicola, threateningly.
Now both Coral and Nicola couldn’t help but laugh. This guy, he’s a fast learner.
The stall owner felt bitter inside and looked at Leo with a wry smile. “Bro, please don’t do this. Doing business is already tough enough. How can you bear to ruin my livelihood? Fine, seven thousand, I won’t make a cent from you, just let me break even.”
“Alright.” Leo took out his bank card and handed it over.
After swiping the card, the dark and unimpressive large stone belonged to Leo.
Seeing Leo hugging the stone as if it were a treasure, Nicola teased, “Leo, be careful with that heavy ‘treasure.’ Don’t drop it on your foot.”
Saying that, Nicola called over a service staff member, who then placed the gambling stone she bought on a small flat trolley.
Leo’s eyes widened in surprise, and Coral couldn’t help but smile. This guy looked stupidly adorable while hugging that big stone like that.
“Aren’t you going to put your ‘treasure’ on the cart?” Nicola couldn’t bear to see Leo continue holding it.
After Leo placed the stone on the cart, Nicola said, “Let’s go, let’s cut the stones. And don’t try to dodge if you lose!”
The three of them walked to the middle of the square, where the stone cutting machine was already being used by several people.
Among them were Madame K and Keith, who were at the auction venue earlier.
Currently, Keith was placing a gambling stone onto the cutting machine, and beside Madame K, there was a piece of stone with a window already cut open. The jadeite in the window had a waxy texture.
“Miss Pater, I don’t know how to cut gambling stones. I’d like to watch how others do it first,” Leo spoke frankly.
Nicola nodded, “Sure, let’s watch.”
People who enjoyed gambling stones loved to watch others cut them. In a short while, a small crowd had gathered around the machine.
Watching others cut gambling stones was like watching others play chess. Even though they couldn’t do it themselves, they could still experience the gamut of emotions felt by the owners of the stones.
Using popular terms nowadays, it was called “emotional sharing.”
Another advantage of watching others cut stones was that if someone cut out something valuable, they could directly offer to buy it from the owner, provided that the owner agreed to sell.
Keith had already fixed the gambling stone and put on safety goggles and gloves. He then turned on the power of the cutting machine.
The blades of the machine rapidly rotated, and water continuously poured down, serving to cool, clean, and lubricate.
Cutting gambling stones couldn’t be done casually. If you cut the jadeite in half with a single stroke, it would damage the integrity of the jadeite, making it unsuitable for creating larger pieces, thus reducing its value.
Professional stone cutting involved estimating the location of the jadeite inside the stone beforehand and trying to cut from the edges of the jadeite, ensuring that the internal type and quality of the jadeite could be seen once it was cut open.
For stones with thin coat and expensive in price, many people chose not to cut them but instead use a polishing machine to slowly remove the outer layer.
For gamblers, cutting the stone was a moment to witness either failure or miracles. Whatever the result, they would have to bear it themselves.
With the potential to lose all their invested money or gain hundreds or thousands of times in return, gambling on stones was that thrilling.
Keith had started the cutting, and the machine emitted a slightly grating noise.
He chose to cut from the middle-right part of the gambling stone. The cutting blades of the machine were extremely sharp, and in just a few minutes, the stone was split in half.
The onlookers craned their necks to see and found that there was only limestone inside the cut gambling stone, no trace of jadeite.
“No green at all!”
“The skin of this gambling stone looked promising, but there’s not a hint of green.”
“This gambling stone was probably bought at a high price; that’s a big loss.”
The crowd started discussing.
Keith’s expression also turned grim. He thought this stone would have some jadeite, but it turned out to be just a regular stone.
On the other side, Madame K suggested, “Keith, try one more cut.”
Keith didn’t want to accept the reality because he cut from the middle, so there should be at least a little jadeite, not nothing at all.
Hearing Madame K’s suggestion, Keith nodded and decided to give it one more try.
He fixed the slightly larger half of the gambling stone on the cutting machine again and started cutting from the middle once more.
Soon, the cutting blade of the machine disappeared into the stone once more.
“Crack!” The large half of the gambling stone was split in two again, and water was poured over it. This time, both sides still showed limestone, with no sign of jadeite.
Keith sighed, as his four hundred thousand went down the drain.
The onlookers also sighed sympathetically, understanding how Keith felt at this moment.
Keith moved the waste material from the cutting machine to the side without looking at it any longer.
“Keith, don’t be sad. You still have this half of the gambling material. It’s sure to yield top-quality jadeite!” Madame K pointed to the gambling stone with the window cut open beside her.
After all, Keith had been in the gambling stone business for more than twenty years and had seen all kinds of situations. He quickly calmed himself and focused on the half gambling material at Madame K’s feet.
If this half material, which he had paid one million eight hundred thousand for, turned out to have good jadeite, it could make up for the loss from the previous whole gambling stone.
This half gambling material had excellent performance in both the windowed area and the skin. To perfectly bring out the internal jadeite, Keith decided to just polish it.
Moreover, if Keith could reveal more jadeite from the windowed area, he could sell this half gambling material at a higher price, thus transferring the risk.
Keith picked up the half gambling material from the ground and placed it on the cutting machine. He then took the handheld polishing machine from the side and started carefully polishing along the edge of the window.
As the grinding wheel rapidly turned, the stone’s outer layer quickly disappeared.
“Quick, look! There’s green!”
Someone with keen eyes called out, seeming even more excited than Keith himself.
Madame K quickly took a ladle of water and poured it over the area Keith had just polished.
The part he had polished revealed jadeite clearly.