Title: My First Trading Partner is An Awaken
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"Tell me again! How the heck did it happen?!" Jamal Ortiz anger reverberates in the hall. He was so angry about what happened to those warehouses in his control.
"It was gone, Sir. We really don't know where everything went. We are still investigating it." One of his aides replied.
"The fuck! Did you find out something about what happened to our kind? Do you have any good news that you can share?" Jamal Ortiz said with seriousness.
He really needs good news now as he needs to perform well handling this sensitive part of their hidden business. With all the illegal wrongdoings that their family had, what was attacked is one of the core.
"We have been tracking down the scent left by the attacker whoever they are but it seems that they had used a shielding to surround both of the warehouses, Sir Jamal."
"This means that there is a high probability that someone who has deeper knowledge of the forbidden knowledge can only do this and this would also suggest that it's a group of Albularyos or Antingeros who did it."
"A very powerful shaman or group of Albularyos can only raise a ward with such magnitude, specifically the compound we have in the Manila Area." The aid said.
"Finally! What is the progress of that report now?" Jamal Ortiz asked with urgency.
"This is why I'm here, Sir. I will need your authority to let our men observe the known Albularyos and Shamans in this region and adjacent region." The aid explains.
When Jamal Ortiz heard this, he frowned as his men were stretched out and he even lost more than 50 men in one single night and didn't know if they were still alive or not.
"We had lost 50 men, Damn it! and you wanted me to give you more people?" Jamal angrily questioned which reverberates beyond the hall.
"Apology sir. Since you don't want to give more people, I can only transfer some funds to hire some people from the Hidalgo Clan. They are good at finding people and investigating them thoroughly." The aid said.
"It's good that you still have some brain to seek help with that family," Jamal Ortiz said. "I guess hiring them is the best option we have since the National Capital Region is their dominant area."
"Yes, Sir. They are the people perfect for this job." The aid said.
"Use the appropriate amount to search these bastards as fast as you can. We have lost too much and we still need to give proper explanations to our customers and prioritize their delayed orders." Jamal instructed.
The aide nodded and left the office of Ortiz. Jamal is the helm of the seven cities, his time is too tight to focus on a single mishap. There are still other things he needed to do and he was just too overwhelmed by what happened to their two warehouses that were thoroughly cleaned up.
Most of their business here in the national region is the legal front they made to cover their illegal activities. They have been doing this with some of the clans that had established their presence decades ago.
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All of this thing is hidden from Henry as he was busy registering four items in his possession, three pieces of gold he use to trade with PAL jewelry, five pieces of silver coins from Tyler's world, and the 100 year old ginseng and the jade that he wanted to be appraised by the auctioneer.
"Sir, with the documents that were provided for these coins, I can guarantee that our appraisers can easily recommend the base price of these coins. We will call you about it and provide you with further details."
"However, for these jade and ginseng, I don't know if sir Henry can wait for another two days as we call for our senior appraiser from Singapore to do the appraisal."
"Usually, these things are auctioned in China, HongKong, Taiwan and down to Singapore and rare to do it here in our country. So, it's better for our senior appraiser to do the checking."
It was explained clearly by the clerk of the upcoming auctions events. Henry didn't mind waiting since the auction will be next week Friday, he still has time to prepare.
He went to the mayor's office but he was received by his secretary and his aid. Then, the mayor's aide accompanied him to the office of the said auction house to submit the coins.
"We will call you immediately when the appraiser comes, so that if it's real, we can post it to our online platform as fast as we can before Friday." The clerk further explains politely.
Henry understood the clerk's position and he didn't make further demands. The aide of the mayor also sighs since he was reminded by the mayor himself to serve him as much as possible.
He also told him not to antagonize the young man and just do what he needed to do as an aide. With this reminder, the aide seems to understand how important Henry was to the Mayor.
"Let's go, Nestor. By the way, thank the mayor for me. He had made great effort for these things which I had appreciated much."
"It will be delivered, Sir." Nestor, the aide of the mayor said. "Where are you going now, Mr. Ramirez?"
"Don't mine me, Nestor. I just need to go home as there's no more business here for me." Henry said. There is still a need to read and learn so he wanted to go home.
"Let me accompany you home, Mr. Ramirez. I was tasked to assist you whenever possible so I obliged," Nestor said.
"Alright, since you insist," Henry yielded. He was aware that it was instructed by the mayor and he didn't make it hard for the fellow.
When he went home, he found his father in the gym doing weight training while mimicking what was shown on the television.
Henry didn't disturbed his father as he went to his room and continued doing self studies. With his brain capacity now, he can understand most of the things in the book after just a bit of reading.
His memory had been sharpened due to the continuous training of Ezio's Breathing technique and drinking the F-rank potion every other day.
For the past few days, he's been learning how to run a business of his own and how to do investing. He also augments his lacking in topics about math and sciences.
Aside from that, he continues learning different languages starting from English, Mandarin, and Spanish. Yet he mostly uses his native language when dealing with his family and even to most people.
He can now speak fluently with English and Spanish and he still needs a bit of time learning Mandarin. He plans to learn another language too and he is more particular with the Latin language.
With his interaction with Mang Dondon and his group, he is even more eager to learn the dead language that no one speaks nowadays.
As for his other targets, he taps his sights on learning computers and programming and he plans to enroll himself in that course.
"It seems this is not the world that I had known of. I didn't know that the myths of Aswang are not a myth and even the existence of engkantos bothers me."
"My drastic interaction in this field gives me urgency to secure my father and my siblings more. The only thing that I can do is to have more people on my side to do my bidding or to really be powerful enough for them not to touch my family in the near future."
Henry knew that his involvement in the Aswang activity would not be hidden forever. He knew that truth and accepted it with open arms.
He just needs to make sure that even if these clans of Aswang knew his involvement, he is powerful enough to defend himself from them.
The learning of the Latin word prepares himself for the offer of Mang Dondon of joining the Shamanic Order, Although he knew that has power, learning a forbidden language had a charm of its own.
Having the additional power of different systems is tempting enough even for Henry. He was intrigued about the summoning of Spirit Familiars Like that of Banoy.
Yet he knew that he needed to equip himself with the language since it's the backbone of the said system of power.
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"Greetings, Mr. Ramirez. These are Mr. Robert Li and Mr. Daniel He. They are here voluntarily as the appraiser of this foundation."
This is the same clerk who received him two days ago. Henry also introduced himself as one of the people who will join the auction.
The two old men come from China and Singapore, respectively. As they heard that there is a need to appraise certain jade and ginseng.
They thought that it was a joke but when they learned that the man who tried to auction it personally knew Mayor Sales, who was then a good friend of theirs, they tried not to debunk it without seeing the items.
As for Henry, he too urges Tyler to send him more of the wine, The jade and the ginseng.
On Tyler's side, he immediately sends bulks of it as those items are too cheap as compared to the oil talisman he will be auctioning in Wadas City.
Thus, he had stocks of those wines, rough jades and different ages of ginseng stored in his trading platform.
"Thank you for doing this, Mr. Li, Mr. He. Miss Margie informed me about your arrival and told me to immediately see you for the appraisal of my auction items." Henry politely said.
"Yes. Although we are skeptical about it since we had encountered a lot of people who wanted to earn money through those items rarely appreciated in this country." Daniel He spoke with seriousness.
He was doubtful about it really but since one of the members of the foundation held the auction in this city, they were obliged to do what they could offer.
"Ah yes, Mr. He. I hope you can appraise my items. It would be gladly appreciated." Henry wasn't sure if this old man was arrogant or not, yet the fact that the middle aged man didn't raise his voice or intentionally dismiss him was still respectful.
"Don't get your hopes up young man. To claim about a 100 year old ginseng is too much already. We had traveled to different places in China and the rest of the west and southern portion of Asia but we only encountered ginseng that is 95 years of age."
This time it was Mr. Robert Li who augment what Mr. Daniel He said.
"That's true, Young man. It would be very difficult nowadays to discover such ginseng if there is. However, if you really possess it, we would be glad to check it out since we are already here." Mr. Daniel He commented.
Although he was still not used to such talks and play of words, Henry didn't mind. He knew for a fact that these people only speak out what's in their mind right now.
The two old men are straight forward and he likes most of such people.
"That would be great. I have them here in the styrofoam container. However, as for the jade, it's here in this eco-bag." Henry casually pointed out.
"Mr. Ramirez, are there more than one jadeite that you wanted for our appraisers to check?" Margie said as she finds that the eco-bag seems to have more than one stone in the bag.
"Yes, I do have five jades to appraise and 10 pieces of ginseng. Would that be alright with you, Mr. Li and Mr. He?" Henry asked.
"It was fine, Margie. We are idle anyways. We might as well check what Mr. Ramirez had to offer." The two old men said.
They were actually surprised how calm Henry was. They knew how to provoke their words most of the time especially when it comes to jobs related to their expertise.