allonlinenovel Chapter 454 Xiao 5 goes home 4
Chapter 454 Xiao 5 goes home 4
"Follow me and don't look around." Without turning her head, Wang Ma's hoarse voice came intermittently amid the noise of the market.
"Some people have sharp eyes. Seeing that you are unfamiliar and have no foundation, they will rip you off if they can."
She glanced back from time to time, her cloudy eyes vigilantly scanning the faces of the stall owners and customers around her, some of whom were numb or had sparkling eyes.
The light deep in the market was dimmer and the air more stuffy, as if the piled-up mountains of garbage had blocked out the little sunlight outside.
The stalls here are more fixed, like "stores" made of discarded ship's cabin boards or thick pipes, and the things sold are obviously more "high-end" or more "complete".
Such as usable electronic devices, disassembled weapon parts, and even expired nutritional pastes that are tightly packaged but have blurred labels.
Finally, Wang Ma stopped in front of a relatively quiet counter at a corner.
The counter looked like it was cut and polished from the armor plate of some spaceship hull. It was cold and heavy, with several strange-looking instruments covered with knobs and missing indicator lights on it.
Some disassembled complex parts were scattered around, and the air was filled with a stronger smell of burning metal and low-quality solder.
"This is it," Wang Ma's voice was so low that it was almost drowned out by the noise of the market.
"Old Li is a fair man. Don't be fooled by his scary face, he won't lower the price too much." She raised her chin towards the back of the counter.
A large man sat behind the counter, his head lowered, concentrating on working on a component the size of a fingernail with a fine laser soldering pen.
He seemed unaware of the customer's arrival. On the man's exposed left cheek, a deep, bone-deep scar ran from his brow to his jaw, distorting the muscles of half his face hideously.
His hair was thin and greasy, hanging greasyly around the edge of the scar.
Xiao Wu's voice was like a needle prick, ringing directly in Sirong's mind with incredible sharpness: "Master! He is behind the counter of that man!
Very close! That 'little box' is glowing, it's recognizing my search signal! It's the spacecraft's intelligent core! "
Sirong glanced over and took half a step forward as if unintentionally, her sight passing over the miscellaneous items piled on the counter and sweeping into the depths.
In the dim light, a recessed metal box can be vaguely seen in a corner of the counter's inner wall.
The box itself is unremarkable, with a gray and slightly deformed outer shell.
But just as her eyes passed by, an indicator dot on the front of the box, which was originally extinguished and only the size of a grain of rice, flashed extremely faintly and briefly.
It was so fast that it seemed almost an illusion, but so bright that it looked like a distant star crying out for help.
The one who received them was Lao Li's daughter-in-law, who was different from Lao Li who was always busy with his work.
Old Li's wife, who is also in good shape, is a talkative person.
It's obvious that he is very familiar with Aunt Wang.
"Hey! Sister Wang!" She called out loudly, her voice rising above the clamor of the market, with a familiar enthusiasm.
She casually placed the cloth used to wipe the parts on the oil-stained counter, a smile on her face, and the fine lines at the corners of her eyes were squeezed together.
"What good things did you find today?" She said enthusiastically, but her eyes were like oiled shuttles, quickly passing behind Wang Ma and landing on Sirong and Muchen.
That warm smile was still on her face. "These two..." She dragged out her tone, the curve of her lips deepening. "Do they look unfamiliar? Are they new here?"
Wang Ma quickly stepped aside, revealing Sirong and Muchen behind her, with a proud smile on her face: "Yes, from Old Li's family, this is Xiao Mu and Xiao Si, they just arrived yesterday.
I felt sorry for them and they had nowhere to go, so I let them stay near my shed. Now, I brought them out to show them the way around."
She nudged Sirong gently with her rough elbow, motioning her to come forward.
Sirong took a half step forward, with just the right amount of distance and politeness on her face, and nodded slightly: "Hello. Sorry to bother you."
Old Li's wife laughed heartily, with a kind of roughness that was inherent in this place: "Oh, from now on, just call me Aunt Li, that's what they all call me!"
She said this, but her eyes looking at them did not lose any enthusiasm. "Sister Wang is kind-hearted. It's not easy to make a living in this place. You guys, just follow Sister Wang.
If you don’t understand anything, you can ask me and Lao Li! "
Wang Ma was obviously very pleased with the flattery, with a simple smile on her face.
He buried his head and laboriously untied the rope of her bulging torn canvas bag, muttering to himself, "Hey, she's just a poor creature drifting around outside, she just had bad luck and ended up here..."
She finally pulled out a few twisted metal racks and placed them on the cold counter with a clang. "Sister Feng, take a look. Can you trade these for anything?"
Sirong also put on a polite and cautious smile at the right time and responded softly: "Thank you for your help."
As she spoke, she naturally followed Aunt Wang's rhythm and began to take out the things that she and Muchen had found today.
A few heat sinks, a small bundle of synthetic cable, and some odds and ends.
Her movements were neither fast nor slow, and her eyes swept across the counter very naturally as she placed the items.
In the gaps between the pile of messy parts, the gray metal box embedded in the inner wall of the counter was not far to the side!
The rice-sized speck of light flashed once again extremely faintly, almost imperceptibly, like the aftermath of a heartbeat, as her eyes passed by it.
"No problem, no problem. We're all neighbors!" Sister Feng responded with a smile and a loud voice.
He bent down and pretended to grope under the counter for something to weigh.
"Mrs. Wang, this shelf of yours is worth the price of scrap metal..." Aunt Li and Aunt Wang have already started the transaction.
A trace of pain flashed across Wang Ma's face, but she quickly put on a smile: "It's just scrap metal, so what? Sister Feng, just give it to me as you see fit. I worked so hard to dig it out..."
Old Li still kept his head down, the soldering pen hovering over the component, the bright white light like solidified ice crystals, motionless.
Sirong maintained her outward calm and cooperated with Aunt Wang. She also neatly placed the heat sink and cables she and Muchen brought on an open space a little further away from the counter and waited patiently.
They didn't take out much, and it was far less conspicuous than Wang Ma's bag.
Finally, after weighing Wang Ma's pile of "scrap iron", she was exchanged for a few deflated nutritional paste packaging bags.
Aunt Wang carefully put it in her arms, grinning with relief and satisfaction. "Great! This morning's work wasn't in vain. Thank you, Xiaofeng!"
"You're welcome." Sister Feng waved her hand, acting like an old acquaintance.
Her gaze returned to Sirong and Muchen, who had been waiting for a long time. "It's your turn. What would you two like to exchange?"
Sister Feng's voice was not loud, and she deliberately suppressed the background noise of the market, so that it could clearly reach Sirong and Muchen's ears.