Back in his rental room, Luke sat with a calculator, staring at the small mountain of gold dragons piled on the table until his eyes went dizzy.
Each gold dragon weighed about eight grams. Taking an average gold content of 60% and a gold price of 950 yuan per gram…
One coin could be exchanged for roughly 4,500 yuan.
And he had three hundred and seventeen of them.
That ant… over 1.4 million yuan!
The number made his breath catch.
He had truly… stumbled into a treasure vault.
But cold water was quickly poured on his excitent.
Gold wasn't paper money. He couldn't just deposit it in a bank or pay with a QR code. The whole world had strict supervision on large gold transactions, especially those with unclear origins. A jobless young man suddenly pulling out hundreds of oddly shaped, variably composed "gold lumps" would be invited for "tea" by the authorities in minutes.
Legitimate gold shops had strict buyback limits, while underground channels were risky and offered brutal discounts.
"Legal cashing out… is really its own art."
Luke scratched his head, feeling a bit stuck. Converting hundreds of gold dragons into clean bank balance numbers in the short term was almost impossible. He needed channels, thods, and possibly a proper "laundering" process.
However, this headache was soon washed away by an even hotter thought.
It was fine if cashing out was slow. He wasn't in a hurry to spend big on Blue Star anyway. The real gold mine was still in Westeros — and he had only just taken the first shovel!
Moreover… his previous pricing had probably been too conservative.
Over the next two days, Luke operated like a wound-up machine.
He changed into the more presentable black noble casual outfit — no house sigil, but the fabric and tailoring were enough to command respect — and returned to Silk Street.
This ti, he didn't set up a stall. Instead, he selectively approached the richest, most curious, and most likely to throw money for "showing off" targets: noble youths in lavish carriages surrounded by servants, wealthy rchants wearing huge gemstone rings and involved in Narrow Sea trade, and shrewd stewards procuring luxuries for high-end brothels or great noble houses.
His remaining stock was limited: fifteen jars of salt, fifteen jars of sugar, seven bottles of floral water, ten bottles of wind oil essence, and seven specially selected perfu bottles with the most exquisite shapes, so even featuring modern press-spray heads.
The trading process completely exceeded Luke's expectations and control.
When he showed the snow-like white sugar to a Dornish spice rchant, the man's狂喜 after tasting it drew the attention of a Stormlands noble nearby. The mont Luke quoted "thirty gold dragons," the spice rchant hesitated — but the noble imdiately spoke up: "Forty. I'll take them all." The spice rchant panicked: "Forty-five! I'll pay forty-five!"
In the end, that single jar of white sugar sold for fifty-five gold dragons.
And that was only the beginning.
Salt was pushed up to ten gold dragons per jar. Wind oil essence, under the reputation of an "Eastern miracle dicine" and its instant refreshing effect, was bought out by an old count suffering from migraines at ten gold dragons per bottle — three bottles total.
Floral water, with its unique insect-repelling fresh scent and exquisite bottles, triggered fierce competition among noblewon and high-class courtesans, with prices skyrocketing from one hundred gold dragons.
The real madness was the perfu.
When Luke demonstrated the clever "spray head" — a light press releasing a fine fragrant mist — the long-lasting, captivating scent conquered everyone present. It was no longer just a fragrance; it felt like so kind of magical enjoynt and a symbol of status.
Several nobles from the Reach, famous for their wealth and hedonism, along with a representative of a Braavosi banker, engaged in near-frenzied bidding.
"One hundred and fifty gold dragons!"
"Two hundred!"
"Two hundred and twenty! Sir, please let have it. House Tyrell needs it as a gift!"
"Two hundred and fifty! The Iron Bank of Braavos appreciates unique treasures!"
The final bottle — the most ornate in shape and most complex in scent — was bought on the spot by a Lysene rchant for a breathtaking five hundred gold dragons. The man even offered to pay partly with Braavosi bearer notes, but Luke cautiously accepted only gold.
The last bottle of floral water also sold for five hundred gold dragons after fierce competition among several rich rchants.
When Luke left the last buyer's sight with an empty backpack (his storage space was also cleared out), pretending to stay calm until he turned into a deserted alley, his legs went weak.
It wasn't from exhaustion — it was from shock and excitent.
He had thought ten-gold floral water and two-hundred-gold perfu were already sky-high prices, but the market's madness and the purchasing power of the upper class far exceeded his imagination. What they were buying wasn't just goods — it was uniqueness, superiority over others, and social capital.
"I lost out… I lost out so badly!"
Luke pounded his chest in regret, yet couldn't stop grinning. The stuff he sold earlier had practically been given away at cabbage prices! Still, he understood that without the early testing and groundwork, without those "relatively low" prices circulating to build reputation and curiosity, he couldn't have created this later frenzy.
Now, the number of gold dragons in his personal storage space had reached a dizzying figure: three thousand and seventeen coins!
By his previous rough calculation, that was equivalent to over thirteen million yuan on Blue Star!
And that didn't even include the value of the silver moons, silver stags, and so bearer notes.
A proper overnight fortune.
From an unemployed youth who could barely afford rent to a cross-world rchant sitting on "ten million" in assets — all in just a few days.
That night, he didn't imdiately return to Blue Star.
Carrying such a huge sum, he needed to hear exactly how big a wave he had created.
He walked into a mid-tier tavern on Silk Street again, ordered the cheapest ale, and sat in the most inconspicuous corner. With his earphone in and the translator working quietly under the table, he listened.
Soon, fragnts of conversation were captured and translated into his ear:
"…Have you heard? In the last two days, so incredible new goods appeared on Silk Street…"
"Heard? My sister-in-law's friend's steward spent a hundred gold dragons yesterday on a small jar of 'frost sugar' and presented it to his master. The master was so pleased he rewarded him with a gold dragon!"
"That's nothing! I heard a lord near Baelor's Great Sept spent five hundred gold dragons on a bottle that sprays fragrant mist! Said it was for his mistress!"
"His Grace the King seems to have received a bottle of that insect-repelling scented liquid and liked it very much… The Queen has even sent Lannister n everywhere to inquire about the source of that long-lasting perfu…"
"The Hand of the King appears quite interested in those little refreshing dicine bottles…"
"Quite a few clever fellows have already made a fortune flipping them! They bought from that strangely accented fellow for dozens or hundreds of gold dragons, then resold to nobles with money to burn at several tis the price!"
"Right now everyone is looking for that seller! They say he's a young man in black or gray clothes with a weird way of speaking — possibly from across the Narrow Sea, or even farther…"
"If we find him, we'll strike it rich! Either partner with him, or…"
The voices dropped lower, mixed with a few aningful low laughs and the clink of cups.
Luke silently sipped the almost untouched ale, but cold sweat had broken out on his back.
The news had spread faster and wider than he expected.
It had already reached the level of the King, the Queen, and the Hand.
Countless rchants and factions were now moving, eager to find him to get a share — or simply rob him of everything.
He was like a massive stone accidentally dropped into a pond. The ripples were spreading rapidly and would soon attract circling sharks.
He could no longer trade openly like this.
The huge sum in his hands also needed to be properly hidden.
He needed a real "base" and "bodyguards."
At the sa ti, he needed to lie low for a while, let this wave of frenzy die down, and make those searching for him lose their target.
He quietly left the tavern and lted into the thick night of King's Landing.
The gold dragons in his storage space weighed heavily — both honey and poison.
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