Chapter 60: Wind Blessed
When Hiro arrived at one of the abandoned industrial parks in the suburbs, he found plenty of black cars lined in formation outside the perimeter.
He asked Sebastian to stop there and not wait for him, as he would be busy on an excursion with a group of friends for a long time.
Of course, as the driver and butler, Sebastian had nothing else to say other than to wish Hiro good luck and safety.
A young woman with an indifferent expression received Hiro, bringing him to meet with Rosaline and her group of immediate family and subordinates.
This group of youths were the descendants from her line of the family, and their strength should be at around the same level as Rosaline if not weaker.
However, Hiro had no idea as to what's their actual level of power, he only knew that not a single one of them was a threat to him.
Hiro approached Rosaline and greeted her with a faint smile. Then, he started looking around.
"If you're looking for Bella, she's not coming with us. Her family wouldn't allow her to get involved in something like this."
Hiro didn't mind. If he wasn't mistaken, although Bella was involved with the Paranormal Society, it was just a matter of circumstance.
Perhaps if she didn't have sufficient treasures on her body, even the weakest Tier-9 could handle her with ease.
Hiro wondered if he could get his hands on some awakening potions and distribute them to other people, would they work just the same?
"Cousin, is this the retainer you brought over?" A person from the side asked curiously.
The voice carried no malicious intent, just pure curiosity since Rosaline refused to bring a family-designated retainer, claiming that she would invite an outsider.
"A retainer?" Hiro raised an eyebrow and moved his eyes from Rosaline to her siblings and cousins, finding that each of them had someone standing behind them in a servile manner.
Are they treating me like some kind of a servant? Hiro was a little amused.
Rosaline's grandfather had plenty of children, thus his family line was rather populated.
On the one hand, it could increase the chances of a genius being born in his line of descendants; on the other hand, the internal competition would also increase together with the shrinking of resources.
"He's not my retainer," Rosaline said, emphasizing the word. "I requested his help this one time, that's all."
The true retainers looked over curiously, some even harbored a sense of hostility for one reason or another.
Hearing her words, Rosaline's other siblings and cousins were also curious, but this wasn't the time to chat.
From a distance, they heard the loud noise of the approaching helicopter, and everyone got ready.
Hiro looked up curiously. A helicopter?
"All gates controlled by the church and the state are located on islands throughout the five seas," Rosaline noticed Hiro's expression and explained.
She didn't question why the mysterious organization behind him didn't tell him something so trivial, as this piece of information was rather relative.
Unless Hiro's strength reached a certain level, she doubted that the sphere of his missions would expand beyond the provincial capital of the country.
Then again, this is only from the paranormal aspect, as Rosaline had recently connected the newly established Sciatis Holdings Limited with Hiro.
Word in the circle is that this is a shell company brought up by Nebula Electronics.
This means that Hiro was also a figurehead for the company. After some careful investigation, Rosaline found out that everything in the company from top to bottom was under the control of a female CEO.
That CEO, Arabella, was very talented and never suffered a loss ever since she took a position in the company.
Rosaline had reasons to believe that Arabella was the true hidden chess piece planted by that mysterious organization to infiltrate the provincial capital's sphere of influence.
Of course, Sciatis Holdings Limited wasn't even qualified to become a small boat in the restless deep sea that is the capital, but it was slowly anchoring itself in these deep waters.
Even still, Rosaline didn't dare investigate too much into this company's matters.
"I see," Hiro nodded thoughtfully after hearing Rosaline's explanation. He wasn't really interested in the location of these gates, as he had no plans to infiltrate their pocket dimensions anytime soon.
If Hiro guessed correctly, the only reason as to why they kept these gates open despite the ludicrous exhaustion of resources was the steady flow of faith energy.
As long as the bottom line of faith energy wasn't compromised, then it didn't matter how many resources they burned in order to keep the gates open.
Furthermore, when the backlash from the world arrived; the sea was a vast and open space.
Not many lives would be at risk.
As Hiro was thinking, his phone's ringtone went off, disrupting the solemn atmosphere.
A young man with cold features looked over, displeased. "This is such an important and secretive operation, and you kept your phone turned on? Are you stupid?"
Hiro gave the guy the side eye and turned his head away, answering the call without much thought.
"Master, I'll send you a list of recommended stocks to acquire right now, I hope I'm not disturbing you."
Hearing Arabella's voice, Hiro was delighted.
Thankfully, her research was over before he left for the New World, as things could have gotten a little inconvenient otherwise.
"Good work," Hiro praised earnestly. "Wait for my return, I have a good reward waiting for you."
"Why thank you, Master!" Arabella was delighted. Finally, she earned praise from her master—it had been such a long time.
"Mhm, take care."
After hanging up, Hiro checked his email and found a list of ten companies that were heavily stationed in the country, but their influence overseas wasn't that bad.
Most of them were trading companies that worked in the logistics and transportation business.
This wasn't a surprise to Hiro since these companies could be considered neutral third parties in most business deals.
After going through the companies, Hiro put his eyes on a multibillion-dollar company where the largest shareholder only had 4.2% of the shares.
After making up his mind, Hiro instructed the system to use the %5 shares voucher to exchange for Wind Blessed's shares.
Wind Blessed was an e-commerce trading company, but it only handled the transportation of bulk goods.
From wood, construction materials, exportation of goods, and importation of goods.
They have stocks in various industries from aerial transport to overseas shipping, and they even have their internal trading network inside the country.
These channels were very helpful to Sciatis Holdings Limited's future expansion, even if they couldn't use them immediately.
Hiro knew that Arabella would find these channels useful one way or another.
Hiro then instructed Ei, his artificial intelligence program, to switch the dividend policy so that Hiro wouldn't receive the money transfer, but it would be kept in the Wind Blessed company's account.
This way, not even the COC would know that he silently acquired the largest shares in this trading behemoth.
It wouldn't hurt to be careful.
After he sent the acquisition target to Arabella and told her to coordinate with Ei for anything she needed in the future, he stopped fiddling with his phone and made it back to the group.
The helicopter was already above them, and it was slowly descending towards the landing platform.
Rosaline had yet to say anything when that young man stormed over with a cold expression.
"Typical fodder side-character…" Hiro murmured in a low voice, and as expected, the young man stood so close to Hiro that their noses almost touched.
His deep, terrifyingly cold eyes drilled into Hiro's crimson pools. "This is no picnic, little guy. This is your first and last warning, understand?!"
Bang!
Everyone gasped in shock when Hiro smashed his forehead into the young man's nose bridge.
The young man stumbled back two steps, and a moment later, his eyes rolled to the back of his head before he fell back; unconscious.
Hiro shook his head vigorously before combing back his messy red hair, muttering something.
"I remember now," a retainer suddenly recalled something and whispered to their master. "This should be Crimson Ace, he's really popular on social media right now."
These heirs and proud daughters invested their time in their training, not the happenings in the world of internet celebrities.
Thus, their retainers quickly explained Hiro's background. What they meant to convey was that Hiro's physical strength was abnormal.
To dominate an entire sorcerer match for over 90 minutes without exhibiting any signs of fatigue wasn't something so simple, not even for Paranormals.
Especially since it happened in public and it was guaranteed that Hiro hadn't used any unusual energy throughout the game.
They thought that Hiro's abnormality was related to some sort of physique enhancing Paranormal inheritance.
Such inheritances weren't rare in the outside world, and it could explain his explosive physical attributes.
Nonetheless, wasn't it too much of him to dare attack a member of the Rosch family in their midst?
"My bad," Hiro seemed to realize that he needed to make an excuse for his actions.
"My nose is quite sensitive, I just sneezed uncontrollably."
Then, realizing that something was amiss with his excuse, Hiro cupped his nose and bent over violently while coughing.
ACHOO!