Chapter 1485: A Little Trick
Translator: Nyoi-Bo Studio Editor: Nyoi-Bo Studio
Li Du did not forgive Turis. If it were not for the fact that Logan’s plans had failed or that Li Du had the help of the little bug, he would have suffered.
What he had said previously was only half-true. He had indeed started to suspect that there was a traitor in their team after losing out in the second auction. However, he did not have any evidence to prove the ident.i.ty of the traitor.
At the third auction, Li Du started to observe his men. At the same time, he got Brother Wolf to arrange for bodyguards to tail his men to gather evidence.
However, they did not make any discovery. At the warehouse auction, Li Du launched his scheme. He picked a few warehouses that looked like they were valuable from outward appearance but contained trash. Then, he gave the treasure hunters the valuation.
This time around, he had been keeping a close eye on all his men.
When the first day of the auction ended, he said that he was going home for the night. However, he did not return home. Instead, he had stayed in the area near the warehouses and got the little bug to spy on the treasure hunters.
n.o.body interacted with Logan and his men. Li Du only spotted Turis making a phone call using an old-model Nokia phone.
The little bug did not have the ability to hear. However, Li Du found something strange. As he called, Turis did not say anything. Instead, he kept dialing and then hanging up.
Initially, he did not find a problem with that. It was only by accident, when he saw the call duration log on the phone screen, that he realized the call duration was the same as the sums he put down to value the warehouses.
Based on that, he guessed that Turis was the traitor.
However, he did not have evidence if Turis denied it. Li Du could expel him from the team, but that would not help. The team would be distracted because no one would be sure whether he was a traitor. They would then decide Li Du was an arbitrary dictator.
After all, the impression that Li Du had given everyone was that there was nothing he could not do, nothing he didn’t know and nothing that he would miss. He was practically a G.o.d of treasure hunting.
Finally, Li Du got Brother Wolf to help him steal Turis’s phone. Today, he had brought it out at just the right timing.
Fortunately, he had succeeded. After seeing the phone, Turis and Logan had immediately broken down and spill the beans.
They had no thought that Li Du would look for evidence. They a.s.sumed that Li Du would stop at just knowing the ident.i.ty of the traitor.
The house pickers by Logan’s side started to get anxious. Each of them had spent hundreds of thousands at that auction. They were expecting to make a tidy profit.
After all, during the property auctions that took place before, they had only managed to take the houses that Li Du’s team was interested in. They had bought those houses at high prices, without room for profit-making. Their funds were trapped there.
A treasure hunter started to slip away to pack up their warehouses. The rest followed suit silently, faces full of fear.
With faked calm, Logan stayed put. Li Du smiled and said, “Go ahead, Mr. Wolf King. The lesson from a senior to a junior is over.”
After some hesitation, he added, “Oh yeah, that’s right. Welcome to the world of warehouse auctions. I have a piece of advice for you. This trade is a test of one’s foresight and character. Your stunts from the property auction trade will not work.”
The surrounding men started to laugh. A few flipped their middle finger at Logan:
“This dude is from the property auction trade? F*ck, a bunch of house flippers!”
“Good on Boss Li. House flippers, does your face hurt?”
“Haha, it’s not easy to succeed in the warehouse auction trade. You guys should run back to buying rundown shacks n.o.body else wants!”
Although both were auction-related trades, those in the property auction trade held sustained prejudice against those in the warehouse auction trade. The treasure hunters have suffered a lot of mockery and insults from house pickers.
The tough part was that the house pickers were indeed richer than they were. In terms of industry, it was true that the property auction trade was more presentable. Hence, the treasure hunters could only grit their teeth and bear those insults.
Today, however, Li Du had put them in a better position. Previously, when Logan’s team was attacking Li Du’s, there were many people watching and n.o.body came forth to help them. Now, however, they were all on the same side as Li Du.
As Li Du’s retaliation had been a success, and he had taught the house pickers a hard lesson, the treasure hunters became ecstatic.
The few house pickers who stayed by Logan’s side could not stand the mockery from the treasure hunters anymore. They walked off with pale, dejected faces.
Logan looked like he was about to say something, but realized that he was speechless.
Unless they were able to find something valuable in the warehouses, their money would be gone down the drain. It would be a huge loss!
Logan, too, prepared to leave with the workers he hired to pack up the warehouses.
Many of the treasure hunters forgot about paying up and followed behind to watch.
The men were experts and could tell the value of the items in the warehouse at a single glance.
Li Du did not partake in the fun and walked calmly to the queue to pay up.
Black Mustang smiled widely and gave him a thumbs-up. “That’s nice, brother!”
Li Du shrugged his shoulders. “Just a little trick.”
Black Mustang said, “I’m not saying that what you did just now is nice. I’m talking about now. Other people have gone to watch the show. As a person directly involved in this, you choose to just shrug your shoulders and go on with your own thing. How do I put it? You’ve got cla.s.s!”
Bell waved him over cheerfully and said, “Let’s go take a look together, Li. You can pay later. However, there will not be many opportunities to watch those proud house pickers lose face.”
Since Bell had invited him, Li Du did not object. He followed behind the men to watch the house pickers pack up the warehouses.
The house pickers knew that showing their rivals they had found something valuable in the warehouses was the last chance for them to make a comeback. Hence, they started to pack up at top speed, hoping to find something worthy.
The treasure hunters peeked into the different warehouses and started to call out:
“A lovely table with some rotten chairs, will fetch fifty dollars!”
“A few pistol cases here. Open them. There’s nothing inside, not worth a cent!”
“A Harley-Davidson motorcycle… hey, okay, it’s just the Harley logo. A model of a motorcycle, you can sell it for a few hundred dollars. Not bad, not bad!”
“What is this? F*ck, that’s too smelly. There’s a bunch of rotten stuff in the box. Eek, I can’t bring myself to stay around. This dude is too unlucky. He will have to spend a lot of money to clean it up now!”
“…”
They spent half a day packing up the warehouses. None of the house pickers found anything worth their money. The treasure hunters were finally done watching the show and started to leave.
Before they left, all of them flipped their middle fingers at Logan and his men.
Logan’s face looked worse than before. The worst part was that the house pickers were all coming over to question him. “Wolf King, what do we do about this? You said that we would definitely make money here.”
“That’s right. Now we’ve bought a bunch of lousy houses that can’t be sold, and the last of our fluid funds have been used to buy this trash. D*mn it!”
“Logan, explain this! I spent four hundred grand to buy a few trashy warehouses. G.o.d! I borrowed this money!”
The house pickers surrounded him. Logan could not bear with it anymore and said, “Scram! You idiots! You d*mned idiots! You should thank me for bringing you guys over to attend the auction, do you understand? If it were not for dealing with this China dude, do you think that I would a.s.sociate with the likes of you?!”
The house pickers got furious. Someone yelled, “Punch him!”
The beating began.