Chapter 17: The Master Plan for Making Money

Page (1/3)

Wishing my brothers a happy Labor Day! By the way, please consider bookmarking, voting, and investing.

※※※※※※※※※※※※※※※※※※※※※※※※

To gain financial power in the mission world, Hua Twelve had made plenty of preparations before entering.

First, the movie had clearly established the story’s start time—sixty days before the 2011 college entrance exam.

With this precise timing, he assumed everything in this world was identical to the real world and memorized over three hundred stock codes.

This was the legendary method of picking a daily limit-up stock.

Then, Hua Twelve memorized the international economic trends for the next decade or so. This was fairly simple—just keeping in mind big data and major events.

This was to prevent any discrepancies in background details between the two worlds; he could still easily make a fortune by predicting economic trends.

Finally, he memorized the scores of more than a hundred matches from the world’s five major soccer leagues during April and May, two months before the 2011 exams.

Although it sounded like a lot, all this information didn’t even fill a single A4 page. He memorized it in a day and had it all recorded on paper when he returned yesterday.

What excited Hua Twelve was that upon entering this world, he found it exactly as he had imagined—identical to the real world.

Under such circumstances, simply betting on an underdog in a soccer match and picking the exact score could easily yield dozens or even hundreds of times the payout.

If he was more ruthless and placed a triple parlay bet, the multiplier could reach over ten thousand times, enabling financial freedom in the blink of an eye.

But the misfortune was that Liu Beishan, the kid, wasn’t yet eighteen. By law, lotteries cannot be sold to minors.

Of course, whether Liu Beishan was seventeen or eighteen in reality was hard to tell—people might even believe he was twenty. Buying the lottery shouldn’t be a problem; the issue was redeeming the prize.

Winning several hundred thousand or even millions meant going to the lottery center, where an ID check was mandatory.

Hua Twelve had already researched online: minors buying and redeeming lottery tickets required a guardian’s accompaniment.

Heavens! Where would Liu Beishan find a guardian?

His father had abandoned the family, and his mother, burdened with a child from another relationship, couldn’t remarry. When Liu Beishan was thirteen, his mother beat him after a failed matchmaking attempt, causing him to run away from home that year.

In his memories, Liu Beishan had returned to find his mother, but she had already moved.

Finding Liu Beishan’s mother was not hard, but with such a mother, how could Hua Twelve entrust her to claim a grand prize?

Sighing, after much thought, he found no one trustworthy and had to give up the quick fortune from the lottery, instead focusing on stock trading to develop wealth steadily.

Half an hour later, footsteps sounded outside, followed by a knock on the door. Hua Twelve opened it to find Da Kang and Lai Zi.

Seeing the injuries on Hua Twelve’s face didn’t surprise them—Da Kang had heard about it over the phone, and since the three often collected debts for others, conflicts and injuries were frequent.

Page (2/3)

As soon as Lai Zi entered, he laughed:

“Little Bei, you’re amazing! Quietly you got Wei Xiao Wu and the others locked up. Last time we beat up his brother, and he threatened to get us back, but now you’ve taken care of him!”

Da Kang wasn’t as carefree as Lai Zi. His expression darkened as he took two stacks of cash from his pocket and placed them on the table:

“Little Bei, this twenty thousand is from me and Lai Zi. Take it and lay low for a while. When the heat dies down, come back—or better yet, don’t come back at all!”

Hua Twelve was a bit surprised: “Where did you two get so much money?”

“Don’t ask, just take it and go!” Lai Zi said.

“I got five thousand from my mom, and the rest came from Da Kang’s dad!” Lai Zi added.

Hua Twelve knew Da Kang’s father drove a taxi, so having some money was normal.

He raised an eyebrow at Da Kang: “Aren’t you afraid your old man will beat you to death?”

Da Kang nonchalantly lit a cigarette and laughed: “Not that easy to kill me. He’s got only me, depends on me to support him in old age!”

Hua Twelve pondered briefly, then took out a shoulder bag, put the twenty thousand inside, and said:

“Consider this a loan. I’ll pay you back ten times!”

For the first time after entering, Da Kang smiled and gave Hua Twelve the middle finger:

“Alright, I’ll wait for Little Bei to make it big and pay me ten times back. Now hurry up and leave. Don’t let Ma Qi’s men find you in Anqiao!”

Hua Twelve slung the bag over his shoulder and smiled:

“Who said I’m running? I have business to attend to. Let’s go!”

He dragged the confused pair out and hailed a taxi to a real estate agency near the property registry, spending five hundred yuan to get an income certificate.

Having helped friends apply for home loans before, Hua Twelve knew these agencies had plenty of such documents.

After leaving the agency, Da Kang and Lai Zi anxiously said:

“Little Bei, are you crazy? You just spent five hundred on a piece of paper?”

Hua Twelve smiled without explanation:

“Don’t underestimate this paper—it’s very useful!”

Then he hailed another taxi, went to a bank to open a card and deposit the twenty thousand, and then to a securities company to open a trading account.

Minors couldn’t buy lottery tickets or open securities accounts. The former was non-negotiable, but the latter wasn’t absolute.

Anyone sixteen or older with proof of income could open a securities account to trade stocks.

With the income certificate, Hua Twelve opened an account smoothly and used all twenty thousand to buy a stock that had plunged in the morning but rebounded to hit the daily limit in the afternoon—yielding about a 15% gain after one rise and one fall.

Page (3/3)

This meant that selling the stock the next morning would net Hua Twelve over three thousand yuan in profit.

Exiting the stock hall, Da Kang scratched his head:

“Little Bei, I thought you were going to run with the money, but you’re gambling!”

Lai Zi also scratched his head, clearly thinking the same.

“What gambling? This is financial investment. Let me make it clear—if I lose, it’s all on me, and I’ll pay you back tenfold. If I win, consider you shareholders; I want half, and the rest you two split according to your investment.”

Da Kang obviously didn’t believe he could make money but resignedly said:

“Whatever you say, Little Bei!”

Hua Twelve smiled, handed out cigarettes, one each:

“Let’s go eat. My treat!”

Da Kang and Lai Zi had no choice but to follow with sighs.

After lunch, the three wandered the streets with nothing to do. Passing behind a bus stop, Hua Twelve suddenly froze.

On the back of the bus stop was plastered with various small advertisements, including one for “document forging.”

Hua Twelve stood stunned for a moment, then slapped his forehead:

“I thought of buying a stock with an income certificate, but why didn’t I think of this!”

Pointing at the ad with excitement, he asked the two:

“Do you know a reliable place for this?”

Da Kang glanced at the ad, then without hesitation said:

“Four-Eyes’ brother does that!”

Four-Eyes was also a friend of theirs, a used phone vendor. The trio usually sold phones through him. Four-Eyes appeared in the movie too—he was the owner of the phone repair shop where Liu Beishan got his phone fixed for Chen Nianxiu.

“Then what are we waiting for? Let’s go find Four-Eyes!”

After saying this, Hua Twelve beckoned the two to follow.

Lai Zi looked at Da Kang and sighed:

“I’m starting to have no idea what Little Bei is thinking!”

The three headed easily toward Four-Eyes’ shop, crossing two streets and entering an alley. Once through, it wouldn’t be far.

But in the middle of the alley, they were confronted by four youths holding machetes and baseball bats.

Da Kang and Lai Zi immediately grabbed Hua Twelve and tried to run back, but before they reached the alley entrance, more men armed with machetes and iron rods came from behind.

“Done... done for. It’s Ma... Ma Qi’s men!”

Lai Zi trembled so badly he could barely speak. Da Kang pulled out a hairpin from his pocket, ready to fight desperately.

Hua Twelve pressed down on Da Kang’s hand:

“It’s nothing serious. Put that away.”