The moment the auctioneer announced the Eden Heights contract, the room came alive with the specific energy of a hundred wealthy people all calculating the same problem simultaneously. "I know that development. The location is exceptional, mountain backdrop, water frontage, perfect positioning for a luxury villa community. The developer put over a hundred and forty million into it. Starting at fourteen million is practically giving it away" "There's a reason it's priced that way. Do you have the nerve to buy it? Yes, it's cheap. But people have died there. More than once. Under circumstances nobody can explain." "Exactly. Even if you acquire it, you can't sell a unit. Who's going to buy a luxury villa in a development where the construction workers refused to go back? What are you going to do with it, live there yourself?" "And the construction isn't even finished. Workers won't go near the place. You'd be buying an incomplete development you can't complete and can't sell." T

Eighty million dollars.The number landed in the auction hall and the room went quiet in the specific way that auction rooms go quiet when a price has exceeded what most people in the space were prepared to pay. The wanting was still there, visible on faces, present in the way people held their paddles, but the arithmetic had moved beyond the available range for most of them.The large man in the front row, who had been calling bids with the committed enthusiasm of someone who had arrived with a number in his head and had now reached it, looked at his paddle and set it down. His expression was the expression of someone doing the honest calculation between what they want and what they can spend, and arriving at the answer that ends participation.Charlotte's hand was already moving toward her paddle again.Ethan stopped her."Charlotte. Don't bid on this."She looked at him."Why? My father specifically asked me to bring this back. That's why I came today.""This bead is worthless," Et

Donovan looked at Ethan with the specific expression of someone who has been surprised too many times in one afternoon and has decided to stop expecting the universe to behave predictably."You're serious," he said."Completely," Ethan said.Donovan was quiet for a moment."I can't accept twenty percent for nothing," he said. "The development has already been sold, you paid for it. Whatever I do from here is labor, not ownership. I'll work for you. If it comes together the way you're describing, pay me a fair salary. If it doesn't come together, consider it me helping you out.""Ten million a year," Ethan said.Donovan looked at him."The salary is something we can discuss," Donovan said, with the practical directness of a builder who has been negotiating contracts for thirty years. "What matters is the work. I'll go home and start making calls. When you're ready, contact me and I'll bring my crew."He stood, extended his hand, and Ethan shook it.Donovan left the Elysian Club with th

Two staff members came forward and moved Ethan's chosen stone onto the scale.The raw stone exhibition operated on two pricing systems. The featured pieces, the King Bid stone, the stones that had been pre-assessed and given designated prices, were sold at their listed amounts. Everything else was sold by weight, the price per kilogram varying with the stone's apparent quality as judged by appearance alone.The stone Ethan had chosen was at the low end of that scale.The staff members consulted their chart and announced: two hundred dollars.The crowd received this number with the specific amusement of people who have been watching a large-scale competition and have just learned that one side's entry fee is two hundred dollars against the other's twenty million.Luo Wentao straightened slightly."Two hundred dollars," he said, with the satisfied delivery of someone landing a point. "And my stone cost twenty million. Do you understand what you're comparing yourself against?""Stone gam

Charlotte's expression changed immediately."Luo Wentao," she said, with a coldness in her voice that had not been there a moment ago, "what exactly are you doing? That stone was Ethan's chosen wager.""It was," Luo Wentao said, with the composed patience of someone who has found a position and is settling into it. "And it's also my raw stone from my reserved section. Nothing prevents me from using my own stone as my entry. Whatever jade comes out of it belongs to him, that was the agreed term. The stone itself was always mine to use however I chose."Charlotte opened her mouth.Ethan put his hand on her arm briefly."Let it go, Charlotte," he said. "If Young Master Luo wants to use it, then he uses it. As long as whatever comes out belongs to me, the terms are satisfied."He was not concerned.The black stone in the reserved section was what it was and what it was, was something his Divine Sense had read clearly during his earlier approach to the cordoned area. Whatever Luo Wentao's