Sammon finally relented and gave in to Caesar's demand. For premium members like Caesar, he was given an extravagant 1% annual interest. This meant that if Caesar had 600,000 Parou in his bank account, then the bank would pay him P6,000 every year.
This doesn't seem like much, but it's only because of Caesar's low funds. If Caesar had 1 billion coins in his account, then the bank would have to give him 10 million coins every year. This was a tremendous advantage for Caesar.
Of course, Erica and the League of Real Estate Agents were given the same offer since they were all premium members that gave a lot of money to the bank itself. But for normal people, the interest would only be 0.1%. If everyone was given 1% interest, the bank would be bankrupt in a year.
Caesar bid farewell to Erica as he exited the bank. She was more than happy with the outcome that she couldn't help but hug Caesar. She didn't care that his dirty clothes would rub off on her. "You are amazing! First the Joy, and now this?! I am in your debt forever. Ask me anything, and I'll do my best to achieve it."
Caesar smiled and waved off Erica's words. "Thanks. I'll be calling you later for that."
As Erica's professional suit disappeared into the distance, Caesar finally smiled. Everything had gone according to his plan.
Back then, he mentioned to Erica that he would be going to the bank, but he did not give her any chance to offer help. This was intentional. Caesar wanted Erica to only appear when the bank owner, Sammon, had already discriminated against him. This was done to have leverage.
If Caesar had gone with Erica from the start, Sammon would have treated Caesar like royalty. Even the employees would not disrespect him like Prune. Then, he would not have been able to convince the employees to riot and threaten to go to the police.
Then, he wouldn't have an interest. Everything was his plan, and it went smoothly.
With the money safely in the bank, Caesar now put his focus on the production of Joy. He still owed Berk 5 kilograms of Joy which would have to be delivered in 5 days. However, his plan was not to produce this immediately.
First of all, he still had 400 grams worth of Joy right here in his hands. He still had to sell this and earn 400,000 Parou. This was not because he was in need of money, but because he wanted to level up as soon as possible. There were still some variables that may come up in his plans that he could not solve using his cunning brain.
[Caesar's status]
[Title: Crook]
[Lvl. 2]
[Exp to next level: 400,000 C]
With his next plan in place, Caesar walked away from the rich and clean part of the town which was called the Heaven's Path. He can't openly sell his Joy here. There were police wandering around and protecting the peace, at least that was their façade.
There were still some shady things going around this place, but it was only with the established cartels and organizations working in the background.
He was only able to sell his Joy to Erica and the real estate agents because they were not originally consumers of the product. Caesar wasn't technically stealing customers from the gangs and organizations, so they won't make some trouble.
It's not that Caesar was afraid of trouble from these gangs—on the contrary, he was planning on dismantling or absorbing these organizations in the future. But he had other plans right now, and it would be chaos if the gangs all moved against him right now.
But, there was one organization that was small and isolated enough to make a move on. And that was the Capo gang.
The Capo gang was an organization that prided themselves on their hedonism. What's that? It simply meant that all they want to do is partying, drinking, and drugs. Their main base of operation was one small part of town, the Trough street.
This street was completely owned by the Capo gang. They established clubs, discos, and brothels, which are all supplied with Joy that the Capo gang produced themselves. How do they do this so blatantly? It's because they have the police on their payroll. You could even see police officers partying and consuming Joy every night in their clubs, which were given for free to the police.
They were fairly successful, with hundreds upon hundreds of people visiting their clubs every night. They could have expanded their business and become even more successful, but they were satisfied with their current situation and continued to party.
They have no desire nor greed to enter the politics of the underworld, which was either lucky or smart of them to do so. If they had continued to expand their clubbing business, the other organizations would have shut them down.
This is the perfect starting place for Caesar's plan to demolish the current Joy business. They were isolated, with no connections to the other organizations so even if Caesar created some chaos, it wouldn't immediately be spread to the others.
As soon as he walked near Trough street, he could immediately hear the 'Wooo!' and the 'Waa!' of the office workers releasing their pent-up stress in the club. Even though it was still early in the afternoon, he could already smell the emanating beer breath from the customers coming out of the club.
He walked towards the club's entrance, with violet and red lights spilling out from the hinges, but he didn't walk inside. Instead, he looked to the side near the alleyway and saw a disheveled office worker with his tie tied around his forehead. He was bent down and spitting out projectile vomit on the walls of the club.
"Ugh… they told me it would make me feel good. But instead, it only made me puke my lunch!" the man complained.
Caesar approached the man and leaned against the wall. "Let me guess, they offered you some drug and told you it would give you ecstasy."
"Yeah, those damn kids."
"What was it? Joy?"
"Yeah," the man replied, wiping the vomit from his mouth.
"You got scammed. That was probably an inferior product that they just wanted to get rid of. It's your first time, right?"
The man nodded. "I don't frequent this place, just wanted to break free after the divorce." He looked up at Caesar with his eyes blurry and unsteady. He was clearly still intoxicated and still under the effects of the Joy. He saw Caesar as a normal office working man.
"That's too bad. She cheated, right?" Caesar asked.
The man looked up at Caesar and nodded. He first wondered how Caesar knew that, but his unstable mind didn't question it much and just nodded.
It was easy for Caesar to guess. He only had to look at the ring finger of the man and saw a ring-shaped untanned part on it. He clearly got rid of the ring after the divorce. And if he had been the one who cheated, he would still wear his ring after feeling guilty. But with his ring gone, the only possibility was that it was the woman who cheated.
"You gave her everything, and she just spent it all on another man, right?" Caesar asked.
"Yeah…"
"You tried everything, and she wouldn't budge."
"Yeah."
"Now, you feel like it was your fault. But its not. Its her fault. She's the problem."
"Yeah!"
"You'll straighten things out and tell her she's wrong. You'll finally have your closure."
"Yeah!!"
It was at this point that the man stood up, albeit shakingly, and took Caesar's hand in appreciation after this revelation. He was lost, but Caesar's words felt like a shining light that guided him to find out what he wanted to do.
At first, he regretted going to this place, but he had a stroke of luck and found this nice and trustworthy man. He didn't even know this man's name nor did he know what he looked like, but he would follow this man's every word.
Caesar saw this, and smiled. He was finally ready to harvest.
"You'll consume this, and your troubles will go away. You will only feel happiness and forget about that woman," Caesar said as he showed the man a small bag or red powder.
"Okay!" The man immediately responded without thinking about it even a little bit. He was completely intoxicated and he didn't even notice that this substance was the same color as the powder that had made him puke. If he was more sober, he wouldn't have been manipulated this easily.
The man quickly consumed the Joy, and as advertised, felt like all the resentment he had built up over his toxic marriage was finally gone. Wife who? It was only Joy that could help him discover who he was as a man again.
"I'll buy 100 grams!" the man said and patted his pants for his wallet. But as soon as he looked inside, he saw that he had no money left, not even 100 coins for a carriage fee to go back home.
"Fuck!" he shouted. He really wanted to buy the Joy, but he didn't have any money on hand. He can't even use his bank account as he had emptied it before and stored his money and buried it in a secret place so that his wife couldn't steal it.
"That looks like an expensive watch. 50,000 coins, right? I'll be willing to give you 50 grams of Joy in exchange for the watch."
"Deal."
As soon as Caesar received the watch, he saw the letters in his vision changed.
[Caesar's status]
[Title: Crook]
[Lvl. 2]
[Exp to next level: 350,000 C]