After four months, I finally have a Tier Master. I must add an extra chapter.
With four burly Polar Bears watching her and not a single weapon on her, Charlene glanced back at the vigilant guards before looking at the gentlemanly 007 in his well-tailored suit. Naturally, she chose to get into Craig's car. However, just as she sat down and reached for her seatbelt, a sudden jolt of electricity hit her from behind, knocking her out cold.
Craig chuckled as he looked at the key fob in his hand and then turned to Antonov, who had been watching closely. "I heard your boss bought Aston Martin. Could you pass on a message for me?"
"I'm not your errand boy, you English wimp," Antonov replied in heavily accented English, deliberately mocking him.
"Heh, isn't your boss also English?" Craig shrugged. "Maybe I should let William know his new recruit is a nationalist."
"Whatever," Antonov said indifferently. "No need for you to tell him. If my boss wants to know what I said, he'll know. You English wimp."
Antonov's repeated jabs of calling him a "wimp" were enough to get anyone heated, but seeing the nearly 2-meter-tall giant standing beside Antonov, whose massive muscles strained against his suit like a bear in human clothing, Craig just smirked and said, "Tell your boss to meet me at Churchill's underground bunker." With that, he revved the engine and sped off.
"Pfft!" Ivan, the bear-like man, spat on the ground. "English wimp."
Meanwhile, in the luxurious Mercedes minibus, the five experts from Tianchao sat in the back two rows, whispering among themselves.
"Who would've thought William Devonshire, who looks so refined, can be so ruthless? As soon as we left, that delicate girl was immediately surrounded by those Polar Bears."
"Haha, Old Yang, did you really think someone who built such an empire before even turning 20 would be kind-hearted? William Devonshire isn't just a tech genius. You've seen the reports—he single-handedly took out over 60 targets in Montenegro, half of them with headshots. To be honest, we shouldn't even be the ones passing this message. If someone wants to approach him, they should do it directly. Having us old men deliver the message? I don't think that's a good idea."
"Agreed. We should watch how things unfold for now and get to know him better. This isn't the right time yet."
"But all we're doing is delivering a message. I think the sooner we say something, the better. If we wait too long and grow closer to him, he might think we approached him with ulterior motives. Based on what he said at the New York press conference, it's clear William Devonshire is very suspicious by nature. If we suddenly tell him about this long-lost relative, I guarantee he won't be happy. He might even distance himself from us on purpose."
"Yeah, if no one reached out when he was struggling, but now that he's rich, suddenly someone shows up, who wouldn't be suspicious? Too bad his father, Chen Jing, passed away 20 years ago, and the rest of the family died in accidents last year, leaving only a single child—a 12-year-old. Otherwise, we wouldn't have to go through all this trouble. William does seem to have a good impression of us, but if we handle this poorly, it'll be our fault."
"What good is a favorable impression? He's a full-blooded capitalist. Good impressions only matter when there's no profit conflict. Someone who grew up in London, facing discrimination, won't go out of his way to help us for nothing."
"Exactly. Have you seen the English papers lately? Based on the valuation of $15 billion, he earns about 500 million yuan a day. What could you possibly offer him?"
"Wait, 500 million yuan a day?"
"No wonder he can buy $1 billion worth of antiques like it's nothing. Damn, just think of those tens of thousands of valuable artifacts he's collecting."
"And where will he store them all? He's planning to build a massive museum. Didn't Abigail say they're preparing to build a facility that can display 20,000 pieces and house 100,000 artifacts? Even the tens of thousands he's got now wouldn't fill it."
The group fell into an envious silence. Though they were considered top figures in the field of antique collecting, compared to William, they felt like mere amateurs. Even together, their collections couldn't rival what William had amassed in just a few days, a fact that made them seethe with jealousy.
"Hey, what if we start collecting a few good pieces for ourselves? The English aristocrats aren't doing too well financially right now. We might be able to pick up some bargains."
"Heh heh." The others simply chuckled without saying anything further.
The one who had spoken grew irritated. "What's with the 'heh heh'? Don't tell me none of you have thought about this."
"Of course we've thought about it, but what good does that do? William Devonshire is an aristocrat, a filthy rich one at that. Do you have his connections? And do you think English nobles would just let us into their homes to look at the loot their ancestors stole? They're probably too guilty to let us see anything, let alone give us a deal."
"True enough, but it's still a shame. Standing in front of treasure but unable to reach it."
Meanwhile, William, who had been listening, waited for several minutes before realizing they had gone off-topic. He sighed in frustration. These old men weren't suitable messengers at all. They started discussing whether or not to tell him about his relative, but somehow ended up talking about trying to score cheap antiques.
However, they were right about one thing. William didn't care much about any distant relatives in Tianchao. But if there was only one left, perhaps he could lend some support.
"Sunday, check their communication records from the past few days. Let's see if we can find out anything."
"Understood, sir."
"I didn't expect your father to be from Tianchao," Abigail said, holding William's arm. "No wonder you're so fond of Tianchao antiques. Boss, when are we going to start building our museum? You know that with the current downturn in the market, the sooner we build, the lower the cost."
"You know economics now?" William teased with a smile.
"Oh, please. Can you stop being so weird?" Abigail scolded him lightly. "So what if you have a long-lost relative? Meet him, see how it goes. If you like him, keep in touch. If not, just give him some money to get by until he's an adult. It's not like you'd miss a few thousand pounds."
Then, with a smirk, she added, "Also, I can't believe how shameless you are, eavesdropping on those Tianchao experts."
William raised an eyebrow. "Do you know who these guys really are?"
"Of course, they're the top authentication experts from Tianchao. What's so special about that?" Abigail asked, puzzled.
"Heh, exactly because they're top experts is why I'm suspicious. You may have learned the language, but you don't understand the inner workings of Tianchao. These people don't lack money. In fact, at their age, you couldn't hire all five of them for a combined monthly salary of £100,000. Getting one or two would be impressive, let alone five, and two of them have even had disputes in the same field. If there's nothing fishy going on, then I'd be shocked."
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