She continued, “I just don't know if that Pu'er tea tree is still there. If the tree is gone, it might be a bit difficult to find the location.”Charlie said, “It's okay, I'll accompany you to search for it until we find it.”Vera nodded gratefully and said to Charlie, “If that Pu'er tea tree is still alive, it should be over a thousand years old. It's definitely the largest and most lush tea tree here.”She couldn't help but sigh and say, “However, it still falls short compared to the mother Pu'er tea tree with a lifespan of ten thousand years by Heavenly Lake.”Charlie chuckled, “There’s a huge difference between a thousand years and ten thousand years.”As they got closer, the details of Mount Twint became clearer.Vera pointed excitedly at a particularly lush tea tree near the mountaintop and said to Charlie, “If I'm not mistaken, my parents' ashes are buried under that tree!”Charlie looked up and saw a huge tree standing prominently on the side ridge near the mountaintop.
Looking at it this way, it was not easy to enter openly, and sneaking in wouldn’t be easy either. After all, there were security guards everywhere and surveillance cameras with no blind spots. Even if he snuck in, he might get caught. He could not just force his way up, right?The security guard, upon seeing that Charlie didn't seem like a malicious person who had ulterior motives, spoke up, “Young man, let me tell you, this place is just a tea plantation, and we also have basic tea processing here. The real leaders don't work here. If you really want to talk about a collaboration, go to the downtown area of Pu'er. There's a building called Violet Tower there, which is our headquarters. You need to make an appointment there first. If they arrange for you to visit this area, they'll notify us naturally.”Vera, feeling a bit down, gently tugged at Charlie's sleeve and said, “Why don't we go to Pu'er to talk to their group first?”Charlie also knew that it wouldn't be easy to get in
Violet Group was a well-known company in Yorkshire Hill, but because they were mainly involved in the tea industry, they weren't widely known outside the tea industry. Sophie had never even heard of Violet Group's name before. However, her style of doing things has always been efficient and direct, so she grabbed a pen and paper from her desk on the other end of the line and said, “Alright, Mr. Wade. How can I help you on my end?”Charlie said, “I hope you can negotiate with their boss on behalf of the Schulz Group. If they're curious about why a prestigious young lady like you from the Schulz family is interested in a tea company like theirs, just tell them that your grandfather in Madagascar loves their tea, so you plan to buy the company. In short, maintain a wealthy and capricious tone.”Sophie agreed without hesitation and said, “Okay, Mr. Wade. Please give me ten minutes. I'll grasp a rough understanding of the basic situation of this company first, and I'll then communicate
“Without going public, Gideon could only hold onto this business and its annual profit of tens of millions of dollars. What he actually gets in hand is just about tens of millions. His dream of going public and cashing in several hundred million seems hopeless.”Charlie was surprised by how quickly Sophie could summarize so much useful information in just 10 minutes. He greatly appreciated her business acumen, judgment, and skills.He asked Sophie, “Miss Schulz, from your perspective, how much should we offer to successfully acquire this company?”Sophie replied, “Mr. Wade, based on the information I've gathered so far, Gideon, their boss, publicly holds 57.6% of the shares, but when factoring in other equity structures and option holdings, the overall ownership should be around 78.5%, making him the unquestionable major shareholder. To successfully acquire Violet Group, as long as we can get Gideon's approval, it will be considered a success.”“Judging from Gideon's current income
At this moment, in Violet Tower in downtown Pu’er.The sixty-two-year-old Gideon had just finished hosting a distributor conference. As he still had to host a dinner for the distributors at the hotel in the evening, he could only take a brief rest in his office for now even though he was exhausted, then gather the strength to head to the banquet venue when the time came.Gideon felt somewhat depressed today. Over the recent years, distributors had become increasingly dominant in front of the group. In the past, it was the group that exerted pressure on the distributors, assessing their performance, forcing them to increase their inventory continuously and often withholding their year-end rebates for various reasons to make them work harder and be more obedient.But in recent years, with the rise of e-commerce, most traditional brands had lost this absolute advantage in front of distributors, especially in industries such as alcohol and tea, which were opaque fast-moving consumer goo
He believed that the prerequisite to making money was to first do a good job with the tea leaves so that the money earned could be justified. It was precisely because of this passion and reverence that he had never been able to find a real opportunity to get rich overnight.Those swindlers, on the other hand, were different. If they sold a batch of tea leaves for fifty dollars and possibly sold tens of thousands of batches of tea leaves in a day, they would easily make millions in profit overnight.Sometimes when Gideon saw these people making so much money, he would also lose confidence in the tea industry. He felt that most industries would form a situation where bad money drives out good. If he did want to become bad money himself, he would only be pushed out by it. Rather than letting that happen, it would be better for him to cash out as soon as possible.However, cashing out was not as simple as imagined. Take a bakery for example. The boss worked hard for a year, and although
Gideon, feeling frustrated, cursed, “In you young people's words, this year's Pu'er tea market is damn chaotic!”Gideon paused for a moment before he continued, “Damn it! Not only are the major traditional tea companies desperately lowering prices to undercut the market, but those emerging brands are also using marketing and pricing tactics to continuously attack the market space of our traditional tea companies. You say your tea is good, they say that the price of the same tea next door is half our price. You ask them to taste both teas, they say there's no difference in the taste. How can we deal with them?!”Wind was also extremely frustrated as he said, “More and more people are drinking tea now, but there aren't many who truly understand tea. They're all just following trends. They won’t be able to tell the difference between tea that costs a hundred dollars per kilogram or ten thousand dollars per kilogram.”Gideon nodded in agreement and sighed as he said, “What's worse is th
The secretary's words left both Gideon and his son, Wind, dumbfounded.They had naturally heard of Schulz Group's reputation. After all, the Schulz family was one of the strongest families in Oskia, and they were an absolute top-tier presence in the country.In contrast, although it was called a group, Violet Group hadn't even made it to the Growth Enterprise Market. Not to mention being listed in Yorkshire Hill, they could only barely be considered a well-known enterprise in Pu'er City.Even in their wildest dreams, they wouldn't dare to imagine being acquired by a top-notch family like the Schulz Group. After all, the difference in their status was too vast. The assets of Schulz Group were a thousand times greater than those of Violet Group.Therefore, Gideon had an incredulous expression as he asked his secretary, “Are you kidding me? Schulz Group wants to discuss an acquisition with us?”The secretary looked aggrieved as he said, “Chairman, how could I joke with you? She did s
When Jacob came to his senses, he was already in tears. The student presumed he was unwell and asked, "Mr. Wilson, do you want me to call your wife to pick you up?" Elaine's sarcastic face immediately popped up in his mind, and he trembled with fear. He quickly wiped away his tears and stammered, "D-don't bother... I... I just got something in my eyes..." The student obviously didn't believe him and asked worriedly, "Why don't you call your wife? Or I'll call a cab for you." "No, no." Jacob waved his hand and said, "I'll call my son-in-law to pick me up. He has just returned to Aurous Hill, so it shouldn't be a problem." After that, he quickly took out his phone and called Charlie. Just a few minutes ago, Charlie had left the cafe and was about to walk Yolden to his car. When he saw Yolden walking straight toward a domestic new energy vehicle, he asked curiously, "I don't think you were driving this model before, were you?" "I just bought it," Yolden replied with a smil
If Matilda still had feelings for Jacob, his nostalgic strategy would definitely have a strong impact. However, Matilda had already decided to move on, so Jacob's suggestion did not stir any emotions in her at all. With an apologetic smile, she said, "Sorry, Jacob, Yolden is downstairs waiting for me. We have something to discuss. How about another day? We can have dinner together, and I'll treat you." Jacob didn't expect the nostalgia strategy to fall flat. His original plan was to use nostalgia to get Matilda to go with him to eat near the school, then take the opportunity to revisit old places and subtly reignite their past memories. After all, revisiting old places was the best way to rekindle old feelings, no exceptions. It was like drinking the pasta water after cooking the pasta. However, he never imagined that Matilda's expression wouldn't change in the slightest. There was no shyness, no hesitation, no nervousness, and certainly no fluttering heart. She simply and
Matilda had been listening attentively before, but now, she was lowering her head, fiddling with her phone, and her expression even carried a hint of shyness and happiness, like that of a young girl. Jacob felt a pang of jealousy. While doing the presentation, he couldn't help but resentfully think to himself, "What has Matilda been chatting about with that Yolden guy? She's so happy..." At that moment, Matilda had just received a message from Yolden. In the message, Yolden informed her of the outcome of his conversation with Charlie and expressed his desire to have the wedding as soon as possible. Seeing how eager her beloved was to marry her, Matilda naturally felt very touched. At that moment, she had completely fallen into Yolden's love. For this man, who had a similar background, education, values, and even lifestyle to her own, she could find no fault with him. She felt that he was perfectly tailor-made for her by heaven itself, almost as if everything about him perfectly m
Charlie's worries were not unfounded. He had long known that Jacob had not completely given up on Matilda despite her relationship with Yolden. After returning from the cultural exchange in Korea, Jacob had been more dejected than ever before—something he hadn't even displayed when his family had gone bankrupt. If there was still a chance to salvage the relationship when one's beloved was merely dating someone else, their marriage was tantamount to a death sentence. Furthermore, considering the high intellectual backgrounds of Matilda and Yolden as well as their age and life experience, their decision to marry at this stage of life undoubtedly signaled their intention to build a long-term future together. This left Jacob with absolutely no chance at all. At this moment, Jacob was blissfully unaware of the devastating news and was busy conducting a calligraphy and painting workshop at Senior University. The so-called workshop was essentially a few slides showcasing classic
After that, Charlie asked with a bit of curiosity, "When did you and Matilda decide to get married?" Yolden smiled sheepishly and explained, "Remember when the city organized our cultural exchange trip to South Korea? I confessed to Matilda during that trip, and she accepted. After spending some time together, we both felt we were a great match. Considering our age, we didn't want to delay such an important decision any longer, so we decided to take the next step and build a family together." He continued, "Last month, we went to Lambonear for a few days. I bought a ring and proposed to her by the seaside, and she said yes. We also sought the opinion of our respective children—Autumn and Paul—and they were both very supportive. Both kids are exceptional and independent, so they urged us to have the wedding as soon as possible. I wanted to wait until you returned so I could check your schedule. For our wedding, we'd like to ask you to be our officiant." "What? Me as the officiant?
Charlie said without hesitation, "Sure. When is it convenient for you? Send me the address, and I'll go meet you." Charlie had always respected Yolden not only because he was a nice and talented man but also because he and his mother went way back and went to the same school. Yolden said hastily, "I've just come from Senior University. It's the weekend, and I don't have classes today. Why don't you send me the address and I'll meet you?" Charlie gave it some thought. It was a little past 3 p.m., so Yolden had likely already had lunch, and there were still a few hours until dinner. Inviting him to The Heaven Springs didn't seem ideal for a discussion. Considering that he had lived in the United States for many years and probably had a habit of having coffee in the afternoon, Charlie said, "How about this? There's a Starbucks not far south of the university. Let's meet there for a cup of coffee." "Perfect!" Yolden said with a smile. "I was just thinking you could give me an addre
On the way back to The Heaven Springs, Julien was in a much better mood than when he had arrived. Initially, he was filled with anxiety, unsure of what Charlie had planned. But now, everything had become clear. The troublesome matter of Salem and Edmund was no longer his concern. All he had to do was wait for the video from the ship to be released and then head back home. Charlie noticed his improved mood and smiled as he asked, "Julien, you've resolved the most critical matter right after landing in Aurous Hill. You must be feeling pretty happy, right?" Julien chuckled and said, "To be honest, before coming here, I was worried that I'd end up going back empty-handed and being secretly mocked by others. But now, it's different. Once your video is released, no one can blame me for not doing my job. If anything, they can only blame their family for missing their chance. After all, so much time has passed, and it's their fault Salem and Edmund were moved to the Middle East." As he
"Good." With a light nod, Charlie turned to Jiro and spoke up, "Jiro, I'll give you a chance to prove yourself." "Okay, Mr. Wade!" Jiro beamed excitedly. "Please tell me what to do! I promise I will do my best to serve you." Charlie smiled and said, "Once the ship is ready, you'll board it together with them. Your only task is to keep a close watch on them the entire time. Don't let them pull any tricks. If you succeed, you'll be a free man here. You'll get a basic monthly salary and can ask for anything you like within reason—so long as it's not contraband, it will be yours." Hearing this, Jiro was so thrilled that he trembled all over. His current treatment was already decent, but he was still only a semi-free man. He didn't dare casually set foot on the ground outside. If he could become a truly free man, he would be able to enjoy the sunlight outdoors freely. More importantly, from then on, he would have a salary. Although he couldn't personally go out shopping, having a sa
Julien had uncovered Charlie's true identity quite some time ago and investigated Charlie's background. He was well aware that Charlie had become the head of the Wade family and that the Acker family fully supported him. Although the outside world believed that Ten Thousand Armies had subdued the Wade family, Julien had witnessed Charlie's methods firsthand. Even the top two figures of the Rothschild family had been toyed with by Charlie, so how could Ten Thousand Armies possibly make him surrender? Thus, Julien deduced that Ten Thousand Armies was undoubtedly Charlie's covert tool. Considering the combined strength of the Wade family, the Acker family, and Charlie's personally cultivated forces, it was evident that Charlie even had the power to contend with the entire Rothschild family. Moreover, with the life-extending pill in his possession and the life of the Rothschild family head in his hands, Charlie's chances of prevailing in a confrontation against the Rothschilds were e