6: Chapter 6: A consecrated crystal ball? Give it to me! I want some handcrafted high-tech stuff!

"Let's go!"

Su Che grabbed Su Hao and rushed towards the only convenience store in the village in a flurry.

Su Hao was dragged along, stumbling and looking completely bewildered.

"Brother, what are you doing? What kind of treasure does Grandpa Wang have? Isn't the most valuable thing in his house that color TV that can pick up a dozen channels?"

"A TV is nothing!" Su Che didn't look back, his eyes gleaming with mischief. "He has something a hundred times more awesome than a TV!"

The Su Family Village convenience store was actually just Grandpa Wang's main living room converted.

A faded wooden sign hanging at the entrance read "Su Family Village Convenience Service Point," and the shelves were sparsely stocked with soy sauce, vinegar, spicy strips, white liquor, and a few packs of Blue Baisha cigarettes.

As the two stepped over the threshold, a smell of low-quality tobacco mixed with dust hit them.

Grandpa Wang was wearing reading glasses, squinting as he played a game of cards with a few old men from the village, puffing away on a dry tobacco pipe.

Su Che's gaze bypassed the smoky card table and locked precisely onto the center of the counter.

There, sitting prominently, was a crystal ball the size of a fist.

The crystal ball was set on a red cloth by Grandpa Wang, polished spotless, and under the dim light, it refracted a colorful halo, looking incredibly fancy.

"Grandpa Wang!" Su Che rubbed his hands together and approached with a flattering smile.

"Oh, it's Little Che!" Grandpa Wang lifted his eyelids and exhaled a puff of thick smoke. "Still so energetic after being expelled from school? Buying cigarettes or liquor?"

"Neither." Su Che chuckled and pointed at the crystal ball on the counter. "Grandpa, are you selling this treasure of yours?"

As soon as he finished speaking, Grandpa Wang and the other old men turned their heads in unison, looking at Su Che as if he were an idiot.

"What did you say?" Grandpa Wang picked his ear, thinking he had misheard. "You want to buy my 'treasure of the shop'?"

"Yes! This one!"

"Get lost!"

Grandpa Wang glared, slamming his hand on the table, making the cards jump.

"What are you up to? This is a treasure I had consecrated when I traveled to Mount Tai back in the day! It brings wealth and ensures safety! What do you know about it?"

Another old man chimed in, "Exactly! Little Che, you can't just mess with this thing; it's spiritual!"

Su Che almost laughed out loud.

Consecrated? Isn't this just a big lump of glass? At most, it's just high-purity silicon dioxide.

"Grandpa, don't get excited." Su Che explained patiently. "I don't want your treasure, I just want to... borrow it to study the principle of light refraction."

"What thing? Refraction?" Grandpa Wang looked confused.

"Just want to see how light bends."

"I think you want to smash it and steal it!"

Grandpa Wang hugged the crystal ball to his chest, glaring at him vigilantly. "I tell you, no way! This thing is dearer to me than my old lady!"

Su Che was completely out of ideas.

Explaining science to the older generation was harder than reaching the heavens.

As he scratched his head, his peripheral vision caught sight of an old, dust-covered electric fan in the corner.

It was an old-fashioned "Watson" brand pedestal fan, missing one blade, looking like an unearthed artifact.

Su Che's eyes rolled, and a plan formed.

"Grandpa Wang, is this fan of yours broken?"

Grandpa Wang glanced at it and replied irritably, "It's been broken for nearly two years. It just buzzes when plugged in but doesn't move. What, you want to buy my scrap metal?"

"I'll help you fix it." Su Che patted his chest. "If I fix it, you just... no, just let me touch this crystal ball to get some good luck, okay?"

He deliberately kept his request low.

Grandpa Wang looked at him suspiciously. "You can fix it? Aren't you into drones?"

"It's all related, it's all related."

"Fine!" Grandpa Wang put the crystal ball back on the counter and waved his hand. "If you can make it turn, you can take whatever spicy strips you want from this shelf today!"

"Alright!"

This was exactly what Su Che wanted.

He walked to the fan in a few steps, unplugged it, and dismantled the back cover in no time.

The motor coil inside was burnt black, smelling of char.

"The capacitor is broken; the starting torque isn't enough." Su Che concluded after one look.

He turned to Su Hao and gave an order.

"Go, find me an old radio, or a black-and-white TV will do."

Although Su Hao didn't understand, his execution was top-notch, and he immediately dug out a broken radio from the pile of junk in the corner.

Su Che removed a capacitor the size of a fingernail from it, and pulled a small roll of solder and a portable soldering iron from his pocket.

These were his tools of the trade, which he carried wherever he went.

Amidst the astonished gazes of the crowd, Su Che quickly soldered the new capacitor on and reassembled the casing.

The whole process took less than five minutes.

"Done." Su Che clapped the dust off his hands and plugged it in.

Grandpa Wang pressed the switch, half-doubting.

"Hum—"

After a faint electrical sound, the old fan, which had been paralyzed for two years, suddenly spun its blades with a "whoosh"!

Although it was missing a blade, causing it to shake a bit while spinning, the wind it blew was roaring, instantly dissipating much of the smoky smell in the room!

"Holy crap! It really turned!"

"Amazing! Little Che, with your skills, it's a waste not to open an appliance repair shop!"

Grandpa Wang was full of disbelief. Not caring about the cold of winter, he stepped forward to feel the wind, his old face flushed with excitement.

"Good lad! You're really something. I'll have it to use next summer!"

He waved his hand. "Tell me, what spicy strips do you want? Take whatever!"

Su Che chuckled, rubbed his hands, and approached the counter, but his eyes remained fixed on the crystal ball.

"Grandpa, forget the spicy strips. Look... can I borrow your treasure for one night? I promise to return it in one piece tomorrow!"

Grandpa Wang looked at the whirring fan, then at Su Che's eager eyes, and hesitated.

"Just... just one night?"

"One night!"

"Can't bump or drop it!"

"Don't worry!"

"Fine!" Grandpa Wang gritted his teeth and handed over the crystal ball, feeling a pang of pain. "You must return it tomorrow morning! I'm still counting on it to bring me wealth!"

"Got it!"

Su Che hugged the crystal ball like a precious treasure and dragged Su Hao away.

Back at the studio, Su Che placed the crystal ball on the table, turned around, and rushed back into the scrap yard.

This time, his goal was clearer.

Two scrapped DVD burners, a projector with a broken screen, and a flyback transformer from an old TV.

Su Hao watched him carry these pieces of junk back to the studio one by one, and he was completely confused.

"Brother, what are you doing? First a crystal ball, now a DVD player, are you performing a ritual?"

"Something like that."

Su Che grinned and casually turned on the live stream.

The number of viewers in the live stream room skyrocketed, and the chat was going crazy.

[The streamer is back! I already took my pants off, and this is what you show me?]

[Holy crap, isn't that Grandpa Wang's crystal ball? Streamer, did you steal it?]

[DVD? Projector? I get it! The streamer is building a home theater!]

Su Che couldn't be bothered to pay attention to the chat, pointed the camera at the parts on the table, and began his "performance."

He first carefully removed two rice-grain-sized red laser diodes from the DVD burner.

"Family, today I'm going to perform a magic trick for you called 'Turning Stones into Gold.'"

As he spoke, he connected the two diodes in parallel and then connected them to the step-up circuit removed from the TV's flyback transformer.

He also removed a set of focusing lenses from the projector and fixed them onto a crude stand using wire and hot glue.

Finally, he used pliers to carefully and gently tap off a small, fingernail-sized fragment from the edge of the crystal ball.

If Grandpa Wang saw this, he would probably faint on the spot.

Su Che placed the crystal fragment precisely at the focal point of the lens.

A "high-power laser bombardment device," crude to an outrageous degree, was thus born.

The chat in the live stream had turned from mockery to confusion.

[This... what the hell is this? Alchemy?]

[Are those two red lights laser heads? Aren't you afraid of burning it out doing this?]

[I feel like my nine years of compulsory education in physics have been insulted...]

Su Che ignored all the noise.

He dug out a pair of welding goggles from the corner and put them on, covering half his face.

Then he faced the camera and revealed a crazy and confident smile.

"Watch closely."

"Next is the moment to witness a miracle."

After saying that, he slammed the power switch on!