Chapter 267: Greedy
Once the freshmen interuniversity tournament between Dragon City University and the alliance of the five universities ended with the alliance of the five universities winning, Meng Chao’s battles in the northern frontlines came to an end for the time being.
The large scale fights had already ended, and the Red Dragon Army had set up intersecting steel barbwires all around Shattered Starlake. Now, not many monsters dared to step into the territory occupied by humans, and Dragon City’s main task changed from fighting to constructing. The superhumans could finally take turns to go back to the city to rest, and the students could now take a comfortable winter holiday.
Meng Chao spent his New Year celebration at home as if his mother was trying to stuff him like a turkey served during Thanksgiving.
Even if his digestive system had become much better after he became a two-star superhuman and he could easily shove food down his throat, he was still stuffed full of grease by all the New Year food Bai Suxin had prepared and could not breathe from all the food he ate. In the end, when he saw sausages, he felt his legs go weak and ran away with his younger sister.
Aside from this, everything was good, especially when he saw the prosperous and happy sights on the streets. It was completely different from the desolate and gloomy atmosphere he remembered from his previous life. It gave him the feeling that “everything was worth it”.
The first thing Meng Chao did after the New Year celebration was visiting his elementary school homeroom teacher. He also went to his princ.i.p.al to say that he wanted to rebuild and upgrade Blessed Heavenly Street Elementary School in Lin Chuan’s name.
They would need a large sum of money to fully upgrade an elementary school, but Lu Siya wanted to fulfill Lin Chuan’s dying wish as well, so she insisted on supplying that large sum of money. Meng Chao himself was also no longer a normal teenager who was tight on money.
The Ripple Force V2 that Yan Organization had announced stirred up a hot wave in the market. It had signed contracts with middle schools, elementary schools, the Red Dragon Army, and industries that faced a certain degree of danger because they worked in the wild. This turned the Ripple Force into the head of the three great force execution methods.
This happened because the Future Ripple Force that Meng Chao provided had given Yan Organization a lot of inspiration. Yan Hengbo, the head of the organization, was not a short-sighted man. He did not hold back even a single penny of the money Meng Chao should have received.
And due to Meng Chao’s spectacular performance at the northern frontlines, especially when he swung Surging Lightning during the freshmen interuniversity tournament to force w.a.n.g Dao, who was Dragon City University’s strongest, to a tie, Surging Lightning gradually entered a lot of people’s sights.
Based on what Luo Hai said, there were already more than five thousand orders for this saber before it was even up in the market. The research labs of the martial arts course in various universities, including private evaluation organizations, gave really good feedback, and they predicted that it would become a hot-selling item on the Year 56.
As for the Ultimate Style, Agricultural University gave a lot of support for it. The research centers were set up one by one, and they were filled with customers every day. Many citizens came forth to experience the cultivation style. Hospitals, old folk’s homes, schools, and military organizations also queued up to buy the cultivation cabins for the Ultimate Style. This was a pie that was still growing, so there was astronomical profit within it.
Aside from this, the high wages from the mine exploration, the huge amount of rewards Meng Chao gained from killing thousands of monsters in the northern offense, the rewards he exchanged from his war achievements, the subsidies given by his university for going to war, the subsidies from the researches, the subsidies from carrying out dangerous missions, and the other stuff turned Meng Chao into quite the rich man when he added all the money he gained together.
This sum of money was enough to help Lin Chuan fulfill his wish.
He could also help his mother complete her final expensive treatment.
After she regained full mobility, he booked a full restaurant for her and his father in the most lavish hotel so that they could go and act like a shameless couple in there.
When Meng Yishan saw how mature and capable his son was, he was gratified, but he did not slack off either. The skills and connections he acc.u.mulated after twenty years displayed their power like a volcano. Soon, he expanded Superstar Resource Recovery Company several times its original size and opened up the upstream and downstream production channels from Thunderbolt to the military food production factories, which allowed him to receive a few major deals.
Now, in the middle-grade and low-grade harvesting circle, Superstar could be considered a golden company with great power.
And when a person faced happy things, they were high-spirited. At that moment, Meng Yishan’s graying hair started turning black and shiny. He seemed to have become ten years younger when compared to his previous self, when he was exhausted and dispirited. Now, all his focus was on going all out to realize his ambition.
However, the company had just been set up and its foundation was not stable. Since he was not a superhuman either, he ran into a bottleneck once he expanded his company to its current scale.
If he wanted to continue expanding and make his company even more powerful, his team could not help him.
At that moment, Meng Chao gave his father a terrifying idea — take over other companies!
He could take over other veteran resource recovery companies and use their connections and resources to swiftly increase Superstar’s scale and strength. Then, through this rare tactical blessing, it would rise by leaps and bounds.
“Dad, based on your achievements over the past half a year and the deals you’ve managed to get, you can get three-five times the resources you need from the business field. If it’s not enough, I have money too. We can also get more investors.
“But as long as Dragon City doesn’t slow down its expansion speed, we will continue to have an endless supply of monster materials to deal with. At such a time, the one who has guts will be able to seize the entire pie,” Meng Chao motivated his father.
Meng Yishan was very impressed with his son’s judgment and skills. If his son had not insisted on it in the beginning, he would not have left Prosperity so willingly, but just half a year since then, he had managed to create a huge business. He still felt like he was dreaming.
He heard everything his son said, and he had long since been thinking of getting loans from the bank to expand the company.
But it would not be easy for him to find targets to take over.
Since Dragon City gained victory in the northern offense, most of the resource recovery companies in Dragon City lived pretty good lives. Aside from the ambitious ones who wanted to expand, there was simply no need for them to accept investments from other companies, much less accept a take over.
Besides, Superstar did not have a solid foundation. If the companies they took over were too small, there would be no meaning to it. But if they were too big, they would be greedy and face the risk of not being able to take them over completely.
But since Meng Chao gave the idea, he was naturally confident in himself. He smiled and gave a name that shocked Meng Yishan.
“Prosperity Resource Recovery Company!” Meng Chao said firmly. “As long as we buy Prosperity, Superstar will be able to upgrade itself to a whole new level. One of these days, it will become the largest resource recovery company in Dragon City!”
When he saw how shocked and puzzled his father was, Meng Chao explained things in detail.
First of all, ever since Prosperity lost a large batch of its skilled harvesters half a year ago, it received a huge blow to its foundation, and since the management was not good, they lost a few major deals one after another. Since there was a lack of skilled harvesters in the market as well, Prosperity never had the chance to “heal”, and its reputation was no longer as great as before.
Second, one of Prosperity’s main deals was helping Frenzied Saber harvest monsters. But since Frenzied Saber was completely wiped out in the northern offense, this job was gone, and the operations of the company were getting worse.
Third, Prosperity’s boss, Qin Hu, was heavily injured during the northern offense and lost his ability to fight for the time being. Right now, he was working together with Project 1024 of Agricultural University’s martial arts course with the hopes of using the Ultimate Style to clear his clogged up spirit meridians. He did not have the energy to manage his resource recovery company, and he had long been thinking about giving it away completely, but he had just not found a suitable buyer.
“We’ll gain a lot of benefits if we buy Prosperity,” Meng Chao said with a smile. “First, even if a veteran company is at its weakest, it’s still stronger than a new company. Prosperity is a veteran resource recovery company that has been around for years. Even though a large group of skilled harvesters left last year, there are still a few skilled harvesters which stand as the pillars.
“If we can draw their entire team over, we will instantly upgrade Superstar’s skills. I can also look for some of the lecturers and students from Agricultural University’s resource course to form a school-enterprise alliance, so we’ll even be able to take deals to harvest Nightmarish Beasts
“Second, and this is the most important of all. Prosperity has a lot of connections and resources in the circle. They were left in the back when Frenzied Saber was at its strongest, but no matter what, this circle isn’t indifferent to its members. Once everyone learns that the entire Frenzied Saber has fallen, many of the hunters will lament over this and will think about paying some respect to Qin Hu and Prosperity.
“If we buy Prosperity and take in those connections and resources, it will help a lot with Superstar’s growth.
“Third, we were originally one team. Even though we were enemies at one point and slightly displeased with each other, in the face of profit, this is nothing. I believe that once we’re bound together again, we’ll cut down on a lot of the unnecessary costs that are inflicted by our conflict. Then, we’ll make the brand new Superstar occupy the biggest portion of the market at the fastest speed possible.”
Meng Yishan knew that his son was right.
But he still thought that this was all wishful thinking.
“But Qin Hu...” he said hesitantly.
“Trust me, Dad, among all your problems, Qin Hu is the least of them.” Meng Chao smiled brilliantly.
The trade proceeded smoother than Meng Yishan thought it would.
In truth, while Superstar wanted to expand, Qin Hu wanted to cast aside Prosperity, because it was a huge burden that just gave him endless problems.
He might appear crude and arrogant, but that was a false impression he put on in the business field and the hunter circle. He was actually a very cautious person and knew better than anyone that after Meng Chao absorbed the spirit energy from the Red Radiance Jades and Blue Origin Crystals and got so many forces of power favoring him, he now possessed a lot of potential.
It was one of his wishes to get a chance to bind his interests with Meng Chao’s.
The only tiny problem in this was... Shen Rongfa.
“The others can stay, but that Shen Rongfa must leave!”
This was something Meng Chao mentioned in his father’s place, and he gave no room for discussion.
Qin Hu agreed to it straight away.
Just as he promised, he kicked Shen Rongfa to the side, and, apparently, he could no longer stay in the harvester circle.
Meng Chao was very curious. He asked Qin Hu in private as to how he was planning to talk to his wife about this.
Qin Hu replied proudly that he told his wife that he had lost his abilities and was now just a normal person. His former enemy came to his doorstep to settle a grudge, and he could not even protect himself, so how could he protect his brother-in-law? The takeover of the company was Meng Chao being petty and taking revenge. He came to settle accounts! If Qin Hu’s brother-in-law did not leave for his safety, he would not even know how he died!
Meng Chao found himself speechless when he heard the answer.
But no matter what, Superstar had successfully taken over Prosperity and completed its grand move of eating a major target. It also threw a powerful deep water bomb into the harvesting circle. Now, Superstar had broken down the wall that stood in its way toward higher circles and could sail through the waves to fulfill its ambitions.