Chapter 43: Robert’s Problem

Translator: _Min_  Editor: Lis_, Rundi

The phone rang for a long time without an answer.

Just as Jiang Chen was about to hang up, someone picked up.

“Hello?” an unfamiliar voice curtly said in English.

The voice was deep and slightly scratchy—not at all like Robert.

“Jiang Chen, Robert’s Han friend. And you are?” Jiang Chen used his broken English to slowly answer.

“Nick. My boss is currently in trouble… can I trust you?” Nick asked after some hesitation.

“Of course. Robert is a good guy. Even though I’m in Han, I still miss him dearly. Also, we have unfinished business.” Jiang Chen dug deeply into his vocabulary to finally articulate what he needed to say.

The other side remained silent for a while before Nick finally explained the situation.

Because of Jiang Chen’s terrible English, Nick purposely slowed down for him, and after a while, Jiang Chen finally understood what happened.

To put it simply, Robert went on a business trip to Iraq two days ago and was kidnapped.

With Nick’s combat ability, this normally would not have happened, but the insider they worked with multiple times turned out to be a traitor; the group that came out to meet them weren’t local militants but instead masked terrorists.

This was going to be problematic.

[Fu*k, you have your gold business, but you ended up going to this ghetto place and dropped the ball at such a critical moment.]

Regardless of Jiang Chen’s internal curses, however, Robert had his own reasons.

During this period of time, he planned on staying safe, but because Jiang Chen failed to follow up with him, he started to question the deal.

Did the Eastern man really have business for him? There were no other messages, so Robert decided to stop waiting and accepted the insider deal that had a “low” risk.

Curses aside, Jiang Chen still had to find a way to solve the problem.

For now, he didn’t have any other routes to sell the gold for cash since it would be insane to sell 500 million USD worth of gold without proof of ownership. He did not wish to get tangled up with the authorities.

So how about a visit to Iraq?

Jiang Chen was hesitant at first, but upon further thought, a smile appeared on his face. Perhaps it wasn’t such a bad idea. With his special equipment and superman-like body conditions, he was not afraid about the possible danger, especially since he could just run away if there was trouble. Turn the corner and travel to the apocalypse for a few days, and no one would catch him.

At the same time, Jiang Chen also had other considerations as well.

If he helped Robert, not only would the gold problem be resolved, but he would also gain another backup option. Even if he had to leave the country in the future, there would always be a place for him to go. He trusted that Robert would help him out if he was in need.

Although they only met once, he could tell that Robert had a spirit that respected contracts.

This was especially critical.

If he was someone who only chased after profit without any regard to promises, then he was a waste of emotional investment. Even if Jiang Chen decided to save him, it was easier to find another partner.

Once Jiang Chen made up his mind, he didn’t waste a second as he immediately booked the tickets online to Dubai. He planned to layover in Dubai before heading to Baghdad. Since he already has his passport, all he needed was a travel visa before departing.

Once ticketing was resolved, he immediately packed and left. No longer staying at his rented apartment, he found a hotel to stay at instead. Only after taking care of the gold problem would he consider buying a house.

Although selling several tons of gold at once would be difficult, trading in a few kilograms wasn’t entirely impossible. Jiang Chen, who was running out of money, retrieved a business card and called Mr. Liu at the gold store to book an appointment.

－

Jiang Chen ended up exchanging seven kilograms of gold, but since he didn’t care about the decimals, he sold it for 1.5 million.

What Jiang Chen didn’t notice as he left the gold store, however, was the look of greed that flashed across Liu Anshan’s poker face.

The more he thought about it, Liu Anshan was certain that this guy had a special means of acquiring large amounts of gold. Perhaps by digging in graves? Or through illegal mines? Liu Anshan didn’t know. All he knew was that this guy had much more gold!

He had Jiang Chen secretly investigated. After acquiring the funds last time, he immediately spent everything. Now in less than a month later, he came again to sell more gold.

What did this mean?

It meant that he had an unimaginable amount of gold! If he came to possess it accidentally, there was no way for him to have spent it all so quickly.

As for how dangerous Jiang Chen was? Liu Anshan already had him investigated with the help of a friend.

He was just an employee at a clothing store in Shimao who ended up fired. There was no way he had any special background.

It was time to contact his brother.

When he thought about his brother, however, he was slightly hesitant. He didn’t want to have anything to do with his brother, but in this case, he had no choice.

Despite his misgivings, Liu Anshan made up his mind and called the number.

“Hello? Brother? It’s me, Liu Anshan. Let’s cut the small talk. I want to propose a business deal if you’re interested. Let’s split it fifty-fifty, but the lowest I’m willing to go is forty-sixty! No less.”

His brother was Liu Changlong, the head of Hongyi Gang and a prominent figure among Wanghai City’s crime scene.

Jiang Chen even had a small conflict with the Hongyi Gang before.

－

After leaving the gold store, Jiang Chen took a taxi to a rural area. He needed to rent a storage space to hold the supplies he needed in the apocalypse. Although online shopping was convenient, it was not a good long-term strategy. With thirty people now living in the base, it would be much easier to purchase in bulk from food distributors and also save on cost.

After paying for one year of rent, Jiang Chen rented a small storage space. The area around and inside had excellent privacy protection which pleased him. The rent was not expensive either for a rural area at three thousand a month.

After renting the storage space, Jiang Chen didn’t rest but instead found the number of a Wanghai City food distributor online and dialed. He cut straight to the point and ordered ten tons of rice, five tons of flour, 300 boxes of canned meat, and 200 boxes of canned vegetables, as well as salt and oil. With such a large order coming in, the boss of the distributing company eagerly took the order. After getting the address, he guaranteed that the goods would arrive within two hours, but only after paying a down payment up front.

Jiang Chen instead paid for the full amount.

Once the full amount of 160,000 RMB arrived in his bank account, the boss became frantic. He didn’t know how he got lucky to have met someone this rich. The full amount had been paid without hesitation.

Immediately, he began to prepare and even personally rode the truck as they arrived at the storage.

Jiang Chen obviously realized the boss’ flattering words and emphasized that if the quality of this batch was good, he would come to him the next time as well. The boss of course promised that every bag of rice was newly produced and all of the canned food were from certified producers.

Jiang Chen didn’t comment and instead hinted that the next batch would preferably be without labels. The boss paused momentarily before he smiled mischievously at Jiang Chen and agreed.

It wasn’t difficult for him to acquire products that way as he would just contact the people he knew at the factory. For him, it was one less step in their production.

After some small talk, the boss shrewdly left, sensing the Jiang Chen still had things to do. After the truck drove away, Jiang Chen returned to the storage and shut the door tight. It was time to do the real business.

He inhaled deeply and looked around at the supplies that nearly filled the entire storage.

He then lit up a cigarette, which was something that he did every time he travelled between the two dimensions. In front of Miss Sun Jiao’s shocked and joyful gaze, Jiang Chen moved all of the supplies into the swimming pool that had previously contained the gold.

The swimming pool was now full of food.

“I’ll help you get a couple more vaults of gold,” Sun Jiao blurted out after gathering her thoughts from her temporary shock. This was the only thing that came out of her mouth.

“Pshh, I haven’t sold all of the gold yet. And even if you got more, I wouldn’t be able to exchange it for money. Also, these supplies cost nothing there,” Jiang Chen explained.

“Then why don’t you bring back more?” Sun Jiao was slightly embarrassed. She tried to cover her expression with a furious look and a flash of her teeth at Jiang Chen—except in Jiang Chen’s eyes, it was all harmless coquetry.

“Don’t be greedy. Would you even be able to finish it?” Jiang Chen laughed as he patted Sun Jiao’s butt.

“I can. Even if I can’t, I’d just leave it here.” Sun Jiao blushed as she stared at Jiang Chen again.

“Don’t become a little pig. Then I’d have to eat Yao Yao,” Jiang Chen said jokingly.

“Do you want to die? You pervert.” Embarrassed, Sun Jiao lifted her hand and hit Jiang Chen on the shoulder, but from Jiang Chen’s smiling face, she could tell it hadn’t hurt at all.

Of course Jiang Chen didn’t mean it; he was not perverted enough to eat Yao Yao. Also, Sun Jiao’s flexible waist didn’t seem like it would grow fatter anytime soon.

“Oh, and find a few detailed-oriented people to scratch off the production date and the other symbols. You have to be extremely careful with this, or maybe you and Yao Yao should take care of it personally. In the future, I’ll try to obtain supplies without any labels.”

After repeatedly urging Sun Jiao in a few more things, Jiang Chen traveled back to the modern world.

He looked at the empty storage unit again and headed back out. He locked the door and cautiously checked to see if it was visible from the outside before he walked to the road and called a taxi to go back to the city.

In the car, he called Xia Shiyu.

－

“What? You have to leave the country? For how long?” Surprisingly enough, Xia Shiyu didn’t seem too shocked by the news of Jiang Chen disappearing again. Perhaps she was used to it.

At least this time, Jiang Chen told her his plan and didn’t just disappear on her without any warning. The last time, Xia Shiyu had been so afraid that she almost called the police thinking he got into an accident.

“Hmm, not too long, business-related. I’ll be back in a week.”

“Then what about the company?” Xia Shiyu sighed resignedly.

“Of course it’s up to you, hehe.”

“…” When she heard Jiang Chen’s laughter, Xia Shiyu tiredly rubbed her temple.

“I stored all of the game data onto the USB drive, so I’ll send it to you in a bit. You’re much more familiar with the advertisement process than I am. Hehe, so you’ll have to work a bit harder this time. I’ll treat you to dinner after I come back.” Jiang Chen felt he was becoming more shameless by the minute.

“Treat me for a week!” Xia Shiyu said angrily.

“No problem, one month works as well!” The hearty voice from the other side made her unable to vent her frustration.

She hung up and flung the phone aside, leaning back against sofa with a huff.

This guy…

If she were his boss like before…

She thought about what happened and suddenly became silent. For some reason, she was suddenly reminded of how she had fired Jiang Chen and the miserable time when she herself had lost her job. Suddenly, she felt terrible about herself.

Guilt? Unease? Self-blame?

She couldn’t explain the emotion.

The back of head pressed against the sofa. She didn’t know what she was thinking about and just stared blankly at the ceiling.

She liked this modernized apartment as the two-floor design really combined spaciousness with comfort. Despite her uptight workstyle, in her free time, she was someone who had a taste for a luxurious lifestyle.

With a salary of ten thousand RMB, she spent half as rent, but she didn’t feel bad about it. She believed that the purpose of earning money was to improve life quality and excessive saving only demonstrated lack of confidence in the future.

Jiang Chen also didn’t expect her to pay back the loan, so she didn’t have to save money for that either.

What she didn’t realize until now was that while she usually carefully planned her spending, she hadn’t even considered paying back her loan in her monthly budget.

She blankly stared at the intricate crystal chandelier as she remembered her time in the cheap apartment that cost 800 a month. Back then, she had to carefully plan every meal.

For some reason, a man’s face surfaced in her mind, that always grinning face.

To be honest, the normally serious Xia Shiyu really disliked that improper grin.

However, she could not come to dislike the face.

With dilated pupils, Xia Shiyu touched her lips but didn’t know why.

There was a throb in her heart that she had never felt before.

[What is this? Whatever, I’ll stop thinking.]

She shook her head and stood up after turning off the TV.

Since Jiang Chen was sending the USB drive in a bit, it was not good to see him like this. With the thought of taking a shower, Xia Shiyu entered the bedroom and prepared clothes to change into. She then walked into the bathroom and shut the glass door.

She stared at the water coming out of the showerhead and let the clear water trickle down her flawless skin. Xia Shiyu entered a daze once more.

[Hmmm? After the jog, I already showered…]