Chapter 9: The Mysterious Boss

  Watching the minority or foreigner coming and going, Li Jiancheng was as if in a trance. "Ah! Let's not think about it anymore, now that we're in this world, with parents and brothers, what's not satisfying? Do I want to go back to that world alone?" He shook his head, not thinking about those things, wondering if these people would speak Chinese, and if they didn't understand him, it would be a disaster.

  After searching for a while, he finally found a store that sold glass products. He walked in and only saw the boss and two employees, but Li Jiancheng was puzzled, wondering why no one had come to find him yet?

  "Boss, aren't you selling anything?" Li Jiancheng asked strangely to the person who seemed to be the boss.

  "Little kid, this isn't a place you should be coming to." The boss said with an impatient face. Li Jiancheng was stunned! It turned out that he was looked down upon because of his young age, and thought he had come to play.

  "I'm here to buy something," Li Jiancheng said indignantly.

  "Excuse me, sir. You're here to make a purchase, aren't you? Which item has caught your eye?" The boss's expression changed instantly, revealing his true nature as a merchant.

  "What I want is something like this..." Li Jiancheng gestured for half a day, but the boss didn't understand. So Li Jiancheng asked the boss to bring over a piece of paper and drew out the equipment for making wine. The boss told Li Jiancheng that they didn't have it, but could customize one. So Li Jiancheng asked the boss to help him make one, left a deposit, and then left. Seeing the boss's stupid face made him uncomfortable for a while longer.

  "Alas! Society has progressed, but unfortunately, people's moral values remain poor. Businessmen are all about profit as the foundation, I don't know if this is a tragedy for the world or humanity." Li Jiancheng thought to himself.

  He continued to wander aimlessly in the city, and now that he had found a suitable winery, all he needed to do was find a store and get the wine out, and everything would be settled. Suddenly, Li Jiancheng's eyes lit up, and he saw a notice posted on the wall, which happened to be the hotel he was looking for. After taking a look at the address on the notice, Li Jiancheng quickly rushed over. He arrived at a place in the west of the city that was neither bustling nor deserted, and saw a four-story wine building with a moderate number of people coming and going, so Li Jiancheng was very curious why the boss wanted to sell this wine building. With doubts, Li Jiancheng walked into the wine building. Probably because he was just a kid, no one came to ask him what he was doing here, so it seemed like he had to ask himself. He walked up to the counter and tapped on it, and the clerk finally looked at him, and he was much better than the boss of the previous store.

  "Little friend, is there something wrong?" The accountant asked very gently. However, it made him very helpless, unfortunately his helplessness still couldn't change the fact that he was a child.

  "Excuse me, where is your boss? I need to find him." Li Jiancheng asked.

  "It's over there." The little fellow might have been a bit puzzled that someone so young was looking for the boss, but after hesitating for a moment, he pointed to a large door on the north side of the first floor. Li Jiancheng thanked him and walked over.

  Walking in, this place is not bad. There are artificial hills and flowing water, fresh flowers blooming everywhere, the living environment is quite good too. Upon closer inspection, it turns out that this residential house is next to a wine building, connected by a large gate, one side is a wine building, the other side is a bedroom, looks like the boss is a clever person, looks like buying a house will be a bit difficult later on.

  "Huh? Little friend, are you alone here? Where are the adults from your family?" At this time, a man in his forties, dressed in luxurious clothes and slightly plump, appeared. Li Jiancheng took one look at him and guessed that he must be the boss.

  "Excuse me, are you the boss?" Li Jiancheng asked.

  "Hehe, little friend speaks with an attitude just like a grown-up. No mistake, I am the boss." The boss smiled and then replied.

  "It's like this, the young master of my house is planning to open a wine shop and saw that you're selling this place, so he asked me to come and discuss with the boss." Li Jiancheng said in order not to reveal himself, making it seem like his family's young master was the one who needed it.

  "I don't know what kind of person your son is." The boss asked cautiously.

  "General Pillar of State, Young Master of the Tang Guo Gong Fu." Li Jiancheng replied.

  "It turned out to be Young Master Li, I've long admired you! If it's something Young Master Li needs, I'll let it go at the most favorable price." The boss flattered him, but whether he had actually heard of him was another matter altogether.

  Having a background is great! With just this one title, people will give you discounts. "So, boss, how much do you plan to sell it for?" Li Jiancheng asked.

  "20,000 yuan, I want cash," said the boss.

  "What? 20,000 yuan, you'd be better off robbing me! This is the best deal? 8,000 yuan, will you sell or not?" Li Jiancheng haggled.

  "This young man, 8,000 yuan is not even enough to cover our costs. 18,000 yuan is already a very good deal," the boss said, wiping the sweat from his face.

  "Boss, I see you're in such a hurry to make a move, there must be some reason behind it. Hehe." Li Jiancheng sneered, "9,000 taels, our young master can't offer much more than that either."

  The boss's heart skipped a beat, if he knew the reason for his haste, it would be even more troublesome. So he gritted his teeth and shouted: "15,000 yuan, any less and I won't be able to sell it." The boss pretended to look pained.

  For Li Jiancheng, who was used to haggling over prices in his past life, this was a trivial matter. "10,000 taels, will you sell or not? If you don't sell, I can only go back and report to the young master." Then he turned around and pretended to leave.

  "Wait!" The boss was indeed anxious, "11,000 yuan, if you agree then I'll sell it to you, otherwise I'd rather not sell."

  "Alright, deal." Li Jiancheng nodded his head in agreement after a moment of consideration, feeling delighted in his heart that this wine shop was definitely worth more than 11,000 taels. But why was the boss so eager to sell? He couldn't figure it out and didn't think about it anymore, anyway, he would first take over the shop and then worry about it later.

  "Alright then, please hurry up and have your young master bring the money to sign the deed. This wine shop and this room will be yours." The boss seemed to let out a sigh of relief.

  "What?" Li Jiancheng exclaimed in surprise.

  "Is there something wrong?" The boss asked in puzzlement.

  "Nothing, nothing." Whoa, I made a big profit this time. I originally thought it was just one wine house, but unexpectedly even this room is included. It seems that there must be some problem, otherwise the boss wouldn't have sold it so cheaply. However, now that the wine house is in my hands, we can talk about the reasons later.

  Li Jiancheng hastily ran back, took out all the jewels buried under the floor, and saw that there were a few pieces. One was a jade necklace, one was a jade ring, and another was a jade Buddha statue. I don't know if these three pieces would be enough to sell. Seeing that Li Shimin was not around, he rushed out again, just reaching the door when he heard a voice coming from behind, so he ran away quickly.

  "Hum! Big brother came back and ran out again, without bringing me along. I'll settle the score with him when he gets back." Li Shimin panted and said at the door, under the gaze of the guards at the door, he could only helplessly return to his room.

  "Boss, I want to pawn this thing, don't know how much it's worth." Li Jiancheng took out the jade necklace and asked the boss.

  The boss initially thought I was just a kid and didn't pay much attention, but when he saw the ring on my hand, his eyes lit up, though they quickly dimmed again. Heh heh! There's hope.

  "Little friend, I think the color of this ring isn't very good. Hmm! I'll give you 5,000 taels for it. How about that?" The boss pretended to think for a moment before quoting a price. But Li Jiancheng knew it was definitely not just this price, because the boss's eyes had suddenly lit up earlier, letting Li Jiancheng see it.

  "It's like this, too little, I'll go take a look at another house." Li Jiancheng also pretended to hesitate for a moment, then said.

  Suddenly, a fellow slammed the big gate shut, and the boss sneered at me: "Heh heh, young friend! At your age, where did you get such an expensive item from? It can't be stolen, I think. If I report to the authorities, you'll... Of course, if you sell it cheaply..."

  It turned out that the boss had this idea, and Li Jiancheng thought he wanted to rob and kill him. This made it easier to talk. Li Jiancheng also smiled at the boss and took out a jade pendant from his pocket and gave it to the boss. The boss took it and looked at it, his face suddenly turned white, and his whole body trembled uncontrollably. Then he grabbed Li Jiancheng's hand and shouted: "Master, I have eyes but don't recognize Mount Tai, I didn't know you were from the Tang Guo Gong Fu, Master please forgive me." It turned out that the jade pendant had the words "Tang Guo Gong Fu" written on it, and as a young master, he of course had an identity token, and his guards also had command tokens, they just weren't the same. The boss thought Li Jiancheng was a servant of the Tang Guo Gong Fu, so he begged for mercy, if he knew Li Jiancheng was the eldest son of the Tang Guo Gong Fu, he would probably be scared to death; the gatekeeper was also frightened and knelt down with weak legs.

  "Cough, ignorance is no excuse." Seeing that the boss just wanted to buy it at a low price and didn't think about killing people and robbing goods, Li Jiancheng didn't make things difficult for him. "As for this ring, our young master brought it to me as collateral, so you set the price yourself..." Li Jiancheng smiled slyly, thinking that fortune was indeed cyclical!

  "I think this ring is of superior quality and can be sold for a good price, 20,000 taels. I wonder if it's acceptable?" the boss asked timidly.

  "What? 20,000 taels, it's a huge difference from my estimated price! It seems that the reputation of Duke Tang is worth a lot of money!" Li Jiancheng thought to himself. He pretended to think for a while and nodded his head. The boss and the apprentice secretly wiped their foreheads. "However, our young master doesn't want anyone to know that he pawned something, so you know what to do."

  "The little one knows what to do." The boss hastily nodded, if people knew that he had robbed the Tang Guo Gong Fu, he would have died without knowing how to die. In fact, Li Jiancheng didn't know the price of this ring either. It was actually worth this price, but since the boss bought it at this price, I guess he didn't make much profit.

  The boss, under Li Jiancheng's orders, took two boxes, each containing 100 gold bars, each worth 100 taels of silver, exactly 20,000 taels. The boss called two apprentices to carry the boxes and follow Li Jiancheng. When they arrived at the hotel, they came to the room where the boss lived. The two apprentices put down the boxes and quickly left. Li Jiancheng handed one box of gold bars to the boss, then took 10 more gold bars from the other box for the boss. After seeing the gold bars, the boss took out a document, stamped his handprint on it, and asked Li Jiancheng to do the same, each keeping a copy. The wine tower now belonged to him! As soon as he saw Li Jiancheng stamp his handprint, the boss let out a sigh of relief, as if he had been freed from something. Just as Li Jiancheng was about to ask a question, they heard a noise coming from the door.

  "Boss, what do you think about the thing I told you?"