Chapter 515: Jiang Silu is Scammed! Lu Fan is Furious

In Yangcheng, the late March weather was already getting a bit hot.

The bougainvillea by the flower shop’s entrance was in bloom, its magenta petals spilling over the top of the wall. Jiang Yixia was squatting by the door, trimming the branches. SNIP, SNIP went the shears, and a small pile of clippings grew beside her.

Her phone buzzed.

She picked it up and saw a message from Jiang Silu.

Jiang Silu: [Mom, I landed a huge job, five thousand yuan! It’s for a landscaping company that needs a full landscape design plan.]

Jiang Yixia couldn’t help but smile as she read the message.

She wiped her hands and typed out a reply: [Do a good job, and don’t betray their trust.]

Jiang Silu replied instantly: [Mhm, I know!]

Jiang Yixia put her phone back in her pocket and went back to trimming the flowers.

Sister Li came over from next door, a cup of tea in hand, and leaned against the doorframe to watch her.

“Sister Xia, did your daughter send more good news? Look at you, smiling from ear to ear.”

Without looking up, Jiang Yixia replied with a smile, “Silu landed a design job. Five thousand yuan.”

“Five thousand yuan?” Sister Li’s eyes widened. “Your daughter is really something.”

“It’s too early to say. It only counts when it’s done,” Jiang Yixia said, but the unconcealable joy in her voice gave her away.

Sister Li took a sip of tea and sighed wistfully. “Both of your kids have done so well for themselves.”

Jiang Yixia didn’t reply, her shears never stopping.

…

「Jinling University, women’s dormitory.」

Jiang Silu hung up the phone and spun around once in her chair, overjoyed.

Song Miaomiao poked her head down from the top bunk, asking curiously, “Silu, what’s got you so happy?”

“I landed a huge job, five thousand yuan!” Jiang Silu turned to face her, buzzing with excitement. “It’s for a landscaping company that needs a full landscape design plan.”

Song Miaomiao jumped down from her bed and leaned in to look at her computer screen. “What company? Are they legit?”

“It’s called ‘Green Garden.’ They found me on Taobao and said they saw my previous work and felt the style was a perfect match.” Jiang Silu pulled up the chat history to show her. “See? We’ve been talking for a few days, and they gave me really detailed requirements.”

Lu Yao came out of the bathroom, drying her hair with a towel, and asked, “A huge five-thousand-yuan job, you think you can handle it?”

“I’ve got to try,” Jiang Silu said with a smile. “If I pull it off, that’s five thousand yuan. Enough for two months of living expenses.”

Liu Shiting, who was sitting on her own bed, thought for a moment before chiming in, “Be careful, Silu. Don’t get scammed.”

“I won’t,” Jiang Silu laughed. “I checked their official website. They seem pretty legitimate, and they’ve been registered for several years.”

For the next week, Jiang Silu poured all her free time into this job.

She did research, drew sketches, created models, and rendered images, working late into the night every day.

Sometimes, Song Miaomiao would wake up in the middle of the night and still see her sitting in front of the computer, the screen’s glow illuminating her face, her eyes fixed on the design draft.

“Silu, you’re still not sleeping?” Song Miaomiao asked groggily.

“Almost done, almost done. You go ahead and sleep,” Jiang Silu replied without turning her head.

On the evening of the seventh day, she finally completed the entire plan.

Renderings, construction drawings, a plant selection list—not a single thing was missing. She packaged it all into a compressed file and sent it through the Taobao chat window.

She leaned back in her chair, let out a long breath, and sent a message to the client’s customer service: [Hello, the design plan is complete. Please have a look.]

A few minutes later, they replied: [Received. We’ll take a look.]

Jiang Silu stared at the screen for a while, but nothing else came through.

Figuring they probably needed to review it first, she shut down her computer, climbed into bed, and went to sleep.

The next morning, she opened her phone and saw a refund request in her Taobao seller dashboard.

The client had requested a full refund, stating the reason as, “Design plan does not meet expectations, significant style differences.”

Jiang Silu shot upright, her fingers flying across the screen as she typed: [Hello, could you please tell me specifically what doesn’t meet your expectations? I can make revisions.]

The customer service representative was slow to respond, taking over ten minutes to send a reply: [No need for revisions. The entire direction is wrong. We’ve hired someone else.]

Jiang Silu grew anxious and pressed on: [But I’ve already spent a week on this, and I met every single one of your previous requirements. Can you please give me another chance?]

This time, they didn’t reply at all.

Jiang Silu sent several more messages, but they vanished without a trace.

She stared at the refund request, her finger hovering over the “Decline Refund” button for a long time.

If she didn’t decline, her entire week’s work would be for nothing, and she wouldn’t get a single cent.

If she did decline, the client would probably request Taobao’s intervention, which could drag on for a long time without a guaranteed outcome.

She took a deep breath and tapped “Accept Refund.”

Song Miaomiao came back and saw her sitting dazed on the edge of her bed. She came closer and asked, “What’s wrong? You look awful.”

“The job fell through,” Jiang Silu said, tossing her phone onto the bed. Her voice was muffled. “The client wasn’t satisfied and requested a refund.”

Song Miaomiao was stunned for a moment, then quickly tried to comfort her. “It’s okay, it’s okay. You’ll find another one.”

Jiang Silu nodded but didn’t say anything.

Two days later, while scrolling through her phone, Jiang Silu suddenly saw a notification.

“Green Garden’s official website has updated its design portfolio.”

She casually tapped on it and scrolled to the “Design Works” section. Then, she froze.

The very first image was the plan she had made.

The renderings, the construction drawings, the plant selection list—they were identical. Even her watermark had been cropped out and replaced with their company’s LOGO.

Her fingers began to tremble.

She took a screenshot, went back to her Taobao chat history, and sent it to them: [What is the meaning of this? You got a refund and you’re still using my design?]

After a long time, the customer service representative replied with a single sentence: [This isn’t your design. We designed this ourselves.]