Jowed put the ring on her finger, then suddenly remembered and asked, "What did you show him just now? Why were you both laughing?"
Mr. Li threw the magnifying glass to her. "Look at it yourself."
Jowed picked up the magnifying glass and aimed it at the piece of glass pretending to be a gem.
Then she clearly saw the pattern inside the glass.
It was a QR code.
Mr. Li walked around the antique market for another hour, but didn't find anything valuable, so he finally left.
Jowed took him to a nearby KFC as planned. It was already after 5 p.m., just the right time for dinner.
Mr. Li showed her again what a smart businessman really looked like.
He actually ate two family buckets all by himself. He didn't waste any food at all. Every chicken bone was cleaned completely, with no bits of meat left.
The two family buckets cost over 300 yuan. Jowed looked at the ring on her finger that only cost her 50 yuan. She realized there was no way she could ever get a deal from Mr. Li.
After sending him home, she returned the car to the company, then took the subway back to her university. When she got back, it was already past 8 p.m.
Now, she was the only one left in her dorm. Since graduation was near, her roommates had already rented apartments and moved out. According to school rules, all senior students had to move out by July 1st. It was already mid-June. Jowed stayed only to save on half a month's rent.
Oddly, even though she had been running around all day, she didn't feel tired anymore. The dorm was very quiet. She lay on her bed and played on her phone for a bit. Then her eyes landed on the ring on her hand.
She suddenly became curious about the QR code inside the glass. What would happen if she scanned it? Would it take her to the shop's website?
Maybe she could find more pretty rings.
Thinking that, she got up, took a magnifying glass out of her drawer, magnified the QR code inside the glass, and scanned it with her phone.
The phone screen flashed, and a download window popped up.
Do you want to download the Time-Space Trading App?
Jowed found it strange. Time-Space Trading App? What was that? It sounded a bit magical.
Her curiosity got stronger. She tapped yes.
The next second, a message popped up on her phone. The app was already installed.
This surprised her even more. Normally, downloading and installing an app takes time. How did it finish so fast?
After installation, the app opened on its own. A registration screen appeared.
Jowed was used to registering for things. She typed in a name to try it out: Jowed.
She thought it might say the name was already taken. But nothing popped up. Instead, it asked her to set a password.
After setting her password, she went back to the login screen and logged in.
What she saw made her freeze.
There was only one message on the screen.
Xerry Year 4089: A big bottle of Fast-Acting Snow Skin Water. It can fix any skin flaw. I want to trade for a complete set of 21st-century money.
Jowed's first thought was that someone made this app as a joke.
Someone from the year 4089?
Fast-Acting Snow Skin Water?
What kind of nonsense was this?
There were only two buttons on the screen: Trade and Refresh.
The refresh button was gray. She tapped it. A message appeared. User level too low. Refresh not allowed. The page will refresh automatically in 30 days.
She tapped the Trade button just to try it. Her phone showed a message. Please place the trade item into the trade area within 10 minutes. If you don't, you will lose reputation points.
Then something even weirder happened.
The ring on her finger suddenly lit up. The purple glass turned bright red. Red light shone out in a circle around her pinky finger.
This ring could be controlled by the app, and it could light up too?
With today's technology, it's not strange to have smart gadgets like wristbands that work with apps.
But this ring... what kind of advanced tech was it?
And what was the trade area?
She looked at her phone again. Below the message, there was a small note.
Note: The trade area is the red light zone. Please place the item on a clean, flat surface so the system can recognize it.
She looked at the red light from the ring. That must be the trade area.
Something clicked in her mind. She thought she understood what the system wanted. She looked again at the message about the trade. Now she really wanted to see what would happen if she followed through.
She just happened to have a full set of bills in her wallet.
She opened her wallet and took out one of each bill: 100, 50, 20, 10, 5, and 1 yuan. She stacked them neatly, put them on the floor, and aimed the red light at them.
Then something happened that completely shocked her.
Inside the red light, the bills suddenly disappeared. Just like magic. Gone right in front of her eyes.
The red light from the ring dimmed. The purple color came back. Nothing else happened.
Her phone showed a new message. Item sent. Please wait for the other person to respond.
Jowed was frozen in place.
What just happened?
She stared at her phone, still confused.
That stack of money really disappeared in front of her eyes.
Right then, another message popped up. The other party has received the item.
Then another one. The other party has confirmed.
Jowed was still in shock.
The other party? That Xerry person from more than two thousand years in the future?
While she was still trying to make sense of it, another message popped up on her screen.
The other party has sent their item. Please confirm receipt.
The screen showed a Confirm button beside a Cancel button.
Jowed's hand was shaking a little. She reached out and pressed the Confirm button.
At that moment, the ring on her finger lit up again. The color was different this time. It was glowing with a green light.
Her phone showed a message: "The traded item will arrive in the trade zone in two minutes. Please check it when it arrives."
Since she already had some experience, Jowed knew more or less what to do. She aimed the green light from the ring onto the floor.
Soon, something even more amazing happened.
Under the green light, a glass bottle appeared out of thin air right in front of her.
Her hand was still shaking as she picked up the bottle. On it was a line of writing: Instant Snow-Skin Water.
The letters looked a bit different from regular Chinese writing. They were simpler, but she could still understand them.
This was the exact item mentioned in the trade.
But even more shocking than the product was the time-space trading device itself.
She still felt like she was dreaming. How could something like this exist in the real world?
Another message showed up on her phone: "Please confirm receipt within three days. If you don't, the system will confirm it automatically. If the item does not match the description, you can report a complaint. If the problem is confirmed, the other trader will lose reputation points."
Two new buttons appeared: Confirm Receipt and File Complaint.
Jowed was still lost in shock. She didn't click anything right away. Her mind was a mess. She needed time to understand what just happened.
She sat there in a daze for a while before she started to accept it all.
Her feeling slowly changed from being shocked to being excited.
If the person who traded with her really came from the future, didn't that mean she could get amazing things that don't even exist in her world?
Just like this bottle of water.
She turned her attention back to the item she had just received.
It looked like a regular beauty product. On the bottle, there was product information, the name of the company that made it, and instructions on how to use it. Right in the center were the big words: Instant Snow-Skin Water.
She saw the production date: January 9, 4089.
This thing came from more than two thousand years in the future.
Her heart was full of excitement. If this item was really from the future, maybe it would really work.
Right now, modern science can remove facial scars, but the results are not always good. Maybe in the future, when technology is much better, removing scars could be easy.
The instructions said that using this water for one week could remove all scars on the body, whether old or new. It also had a whitening and smoothing effect. It could make the skin clear, soft, and perfect.
Perfect skin was something many people wanted, not just women. Even men wanted that. Jowed knew that many top celebrities spent millions every year to care for their faces, but even they couldn't achieve perfect skin.
If this water really worked, it would be priceless.
But because of a bad experience during a mole-removal surgery, Jowed was too afraid to put it on her face. She decided to try it on her foot first.
If she had not received it in such a strange way, she would never believe that something like this could work. But now, she had hope that it might.
On her right foot, there was a scar from her childhood. She had knocked over a bottle of hot water and got badly burned. She had to stay in the hospital for a few days. The scar was permanent. Since it was on her foot, she didn't care too much about it.
The usage was simple. Just apply the water to the damaged skin. Jowed used a cotton swab to dip the water and put it on the scar.
Right after applying it, her foot started to itch a little. It didn't feel good, but it was bearable. After a short while, the itching stopped.
This made her nervous. Was it working?
That night, she couldn't sleep well. Her head was full of thoughts about the strange trade and the special water. She didn't fall asleep until early morning.
She woke up around noon. The first thing she did was check her foot.
The scar was still there, but it was clearly lighter than before. She could see the difference with her own eyes.
She was very excited. It seemed like the Instant Snow-Skin Water was really working.
But to be safe, she still didn't want to put it on her face yet. She wanted to wait until the scar on her foot fully healed first. Her facial scar had been there for over three years. A few more days wouldn't hurt.
She opened the time-space trading app on her phone. By now, she completely believed in the device.
The screen still showed the last message from yesterday. She pressed the Confirm Receipt button.
Even though she hadn't finished testing the product, she already had a good idea about its effect. Besides, she only spent less than two hundred yuan. Even with the current result, it was already worth it.
More importantly, she wanted to see if she could get more amazing things from this device.
After she confirmed receipt, the system showed a message: Trade complete.
The trade message turned grey. In the corner was a label that said: Traded.
But there were no new trades showing up.
The only thing on the screen was a refresh button. She tapped it. A message popped up: User level too low. No access. The page will refresh in 30 days.
It seemed like she had to wait a month to see the next item.
The app had no other buttons she could press. The system gave no details about what this user level meant. The only thing Jowed could look at now was her personal user information.