Chapter Ninety-Eight: Massive Funds

The only one in the room who did not stand there stunned like a statue was Liu Shaoyu.

Monkey was a little better off than Du Yue, because although he knew the stuff was valuable, he had no real sense of just how valuable it was.

Liu Shaoyu did not need to be mentioned at all; by the time he should have been shocked, he already had been. He had already seen that cavern filled to the brim with ice.

For a fleeting moment, Du Yue’s mind truly did freeze, because what stood before him was so astonishing that it was simply beyond reason.

Who had ever seen this much ice? Who? Wait—no, that was not right. This much? That was far too abnormal. Could it be fake?

At that thought, the man who had already turned to stone slowly recovered his chubby, fleshy shape.

“I don’t know why Brother Liu is showing me so many round blue stones. Surely you’re not saying these are gems?”

Du Yue’s words sent a wave of contempt through Liu Shaoyu’s heart. Round blue stones? I think you’re the one who’s round.

“What, Brother Du, you don’t recognize them?” Liu Shaoyu’s tone was thick with disdain. Who was it that had just been pretending to be a statue?

“Heh heh, you know how it is. These things, if they are really…” Du Yue had not even finished before Liu Shaoyu cut him off.

“What, even Brother Du doesn’t have the courage to take them on?” Liu Shaoyu’s contempt only deepened.

In truth, Du Yue had already weighed the matter countless times. This pile of goods would make his name resound far and wide, perhaps even lift him back to the very top of the Qinghong underworld brokers. But it could also send him into the abyss with no return.

So he hesitated. This was an opportunity, but the risk was far too great.

Still, given his present situation, combined with Liu Shaoyu’s provocation—more importantly, with the merchant’s instinct, and especially the instinct of a black-market merchant—he finally made up his mind.

“If I don’t dare take it, then there isn’t a second person in the entire universe who would.”

His tone was calm, as though such an arrogant statement were simply fact.

That was exactly what Liu Shaoyu wanted to hear. With those words, half the deal was already settled. What remained was the money. But for Liu Shaoyu, anything that could be solved with money was no problem at all.

Du Yue seemed to be reassuring himself as well. After composing himself, he spoke again.

“Still, with so much of it… no one can swallow the whole thing.”

He was already calculating how to move this shipment.

“I’ve heard certain people have not been very peaceful lately.”

Liu Shaoyu knew exactly where the ice ore in his hands had come from, and he knew even better how it had come to be there.

As for the people in that desolate starfield, Liu Shaoyu had no intention of letting them off.

What one person says carelessly, another hears with intent. And in this case, the speaker had spoken with intent to begin with. To Du Yue, the words naturally brought to mind an old acquaintance in black-market trade. He had heard that they recently lost a shipment of ice that should already have been mined.

Could it be connected to him?

At that thought, the look in Du Yue’s eyes as he regarded Liu Shaoyu changed once more.

Still, that had nothing to do with Du Yue’s real concern. In his view, the Huang family’s smuggling business was, at best, a small-time operation.

But even the smallest mosquito is still meat. Though the scale was small, that was only relative. They were certainly not short of the money for a few ice crystals.

It would sound as though the force Du Yue represented could not even compare with the despised Huang family.

In truth, what Du Yue was thinking was that he was worth more than the entire Huang family.

He had also vaguely caught wind of something, and this was the perfect chance to act on it.

“Fine. I’ll take all of it. But if you expect cash for everything, I’m afraid I can’t agree to that.”

Liu Shaoyu had already anticipated this. He knew that not only Du Yue, but anyone at all, would find it unrealistic to produce so much cash at once.

“There are exactly five hundred ice ore crystals here. You can inspect them.”

Liu Shaoyu had already made his calculations. By saying this, he was in effect accepting Du Yue’s proposal.

Though he had been prepared, when Liu Shaoyu spoke the exact number, Du Yue’s heart still gave a violent jolt.

Five hundred. Good heavens. And all of them were goose-egg sized. The same kind of ice ore, yes, but while one the size of an egg was only about twice the volume, its price was three times higher.

In truth, there had always been a misunderstanding about the price of ice ore: the inflation of the black market.

Just think of it. In a single battle alone, Liu Shaoyu’s personal warship had used two doomsday weapons. That meant two pieces of ice ore.

If the market price were truly as exorbitant as the black market claimed, then the cost of war would be far too high.

That inflated price had been deliberately manipulated. The Federal military would never permit any force other than itself to hold large reserves of ice ore.

And the military’s reserves were actually far greater than most people imagined.

Every year, so many people searched the desolate star region without pause. On a large scale, they could never compare to what Liu Shaoyu had found, but in total quantity they far surpassed a single discovery like his. Yet the amount circulating in the market was far less than what was mined.

This stemmed from strict military control. United Mining and Galactic Universal Technology were both companies with military shares, and every year they supplied the army with vast quantities of ice ore. Exactly how much, no one knew.

Liu Shaoyu himself had not known any of this before he spoke with Xin Qingyi.

He had not expected that after so many years, the structure of society would still be so eerily similar to what it had once been.

What you see is only what they want you to see.

Some people live their whole lives inside lies, believing that is the real world.

Liu Shaoyu shook his head and cast those thoughts aside. For now, the business at hand was the priority.

Before coming here, he had already estimated the value of this black-market transaction. Once he knew the truth behind things, the worth of the three thousand cubic meters of ice ore in his possession had to be sharply reduced. In truth, even saying three thousand cubic meters was a little generous; subtracting the gaps between the pieces and the structure of the mining vessel itself, there were really only about two thousand cubic meters of ice ore.

But even that was more than enough.

“Five hundred pieces. The black market price is one hundred billion universal credits per piece. But I think there are some things you already understand.”

At last, the discussion reached the matter of price.

Liu Shaoyu naturally understood what Du Yue meant. Fortunately, he had done his homework beforehand, or today he truly would have embarrassed himself.

Du Yue also believed that anyone with this much ice ore could not possibly be ignorant of the inflated pricing. As for why Liu Shaoyu had so much of it—

Du Yue was not interested, nor was he afraid. The greatest taboo in black-market trade was asking where the goods came from.

“The first five pieces, I can help you sell at black-market price. The remaining four hundred and ninety-five will have to be sold at the military procurement price. If you agree, I’ll make sure all of it is moved within half a month. But I’ll take a fifteen percent commission on the deal.”

He rattled it off in one breath.

Liu Shaoyu gave a slight nod after hearing that. Harsh, yes, but steady and reliable. Fifteen percent: if the first five were sold at a total of five hundred billion, and the remaining four hundred and ninety-five at roughly one billion each, that would be four hundred and ninety-five billion more, for a total of five trillion four hundred and fifty billion. Fifteen percent of that came to seven hundred and forty-two point five billion.

In the end, Liu Shaoyu would still have more than four trillion seven hundred billion left.

“Or,” Du Yue said, “I can give you twenty trillion in cash right away, and you can choose three trillion’s worth of goods from me.”

He offered two options. The second seemed more convenient at first glance, but it was not.

For a black-market merchant like Du Yue, the greatest source of wealth was not acting as a middleman, but stockpiling goods.

With huge capital at hand, he bought low and sold high. Often, after transport, a single item’s profit could multiply more than tenfold.

So in Du Yue’s eyes, if Liu Shaoyu was willing to sell such a valuable thing all at once, he must be in urgent need of something.

For goods worth trillions, Du Yue truly could not think of anything on the legitimate market that Liu Shaoyu would be able to buy.

“How will you choose?” Du Yue asked again.

A note to readers: sorry, I’m late again today.