Chapter 280

Under the brown skirt, two slender straight thighs wrapped in black stockings overlapped casually.

Looking out the window of the box, the girl sighed faintly.

At this time, there was a knock on the door.

"Please come in."

As the red-haired girl finished speaking, a middle-aged man walked in.

"Miss, your gift was delivered to the Duke of Lucius's mansion yesterday. The Duke liked it very much. Today he plans to let his son thank you."

"Oh? Is it Mr. Orson, or the new Mr. Lit?" The girl asked with one hand on the back of the chair.

"It's Mr. Orson." The middle-aged man said: "It is said that Mr. Lit's performance was not very good when he first came to the family. Now the Duke is not considering letting him meet outsiders."

"Is that so." The girl nodded, and then put down the coffee.

"Lorenzo." She asked. "Tell me, if it were you, when investing, would you choose a product with high returns and high risks, or a product with low returns and low risks?"

"Miss, I think this depends on one's personal standpoint. If I were starting from scratch, I would naturally invest in a product with high returns and high risks." The middle-aged man pondered for a while, and then said.

"But if I have a lot of wealth, I will choose the more stable one."

"For a large chamber of commerce like the Silver Moon Chamber of Commerce, we don't even need to do anything to make a lot of money."

"You are right, you are worthy of being an old friend who has followed my father for so many years." The girl smiled, and then continued: "But the Silver Moon Chamber of Commerce has only grown bigger and stronger since my grandfather's generation."

"Before that, the largest chamber of commerce in the empire was the Red Dragon Chamber of Commerce."

"The Red Dragon Chamber of Commerce has the same idea and also chooses to be conventional, but why was it eventually overtaken by the Silver Moon Chamber of Commerce?"

"Uh..." Lorenzo was stunned. He didn't know what his eldest lady meant by asking this question, "I don't know..."

"This is the first investment my father gave me." The girl continued.

"In our Bonaventura family, every heir can get equal opportunities. Whoever has strong management ability and can lead the regional chamber of commerce to prosperity can become the leader of the general chamber of commerce. This is the rule set by my grandfather."

"But you should be able to see that,

Lorenzo, my two brothers, one was assigned to the Duchy of Prussia, and the other was assigned to the Duchy of Aragon. These two regions are already economically prosperous."

"There, they are like the party with more capital as you said. They only need to be careful and they will not encounter any problems."

"And I, in this economically backward Duchy of Antica, must give it a try."

"Father, it seems that he likes my two brothers more than me."

"Miss Celinina." Lorenzo heard the girl complaining about her father, and his tone became a little serious: "Lord Louis is fair to every child..."

"Of course I know." Listening to the other party's formulaic sentence, Celinina smiled helplessly. "Okay, Uncle Lorenzo, go out. Bring them to me when someone comes."

"Okay." Lorenzo nodded, and then left the room.

Chelinina stared at the coffee cup on the coffee table, and recalled the things that happened in the family before.

As the owner of the Silver Moon Chamber of Commerce, the largest chamber of commerce in the empire, the Bonaventura family has always been a guest of honor for nobles from all over the country since Chelinina's grandfather.

After all, in this era, it is not the farmers who bury their heads in farming in the countryside, but the big businessmen in the city who can provide a lot of money to the nobles.

They do business in various places, adhering to the business principle of buying low and selling high, and conducting business activities.

And part of the money earned from business went into their own pockets, and the other part was handed over to the lords who protected them.

In addition, in order to let the lords help them do things, the chamber of commerce will regularly hand over a batch of "compulsory fees" to the lords.

At the same time, in this society, although the businessmen are rich, one thing is always firmly strangled by the lords.

That is power.

The number of guards that the Chamber of Commerce can hire is limited, and there is no way to challenge the lord. At the same time, the local judicial power is also in the hands of the lord. As long as the lord is offended, the merchant can only suffer in silence.

For this reason, his father, Louis Bonaventura, wanted to use his only daughter as a bargaining chip for marriage with the nobles.

As long as Celinina is married to a noble of the duke level, the Bonaventura family will have a backer, and the safety of doing business in various places will be guaranteed.

After all, no matter how arrogant and domineering the local nobles are, they have to give the duke some face.

A year ago, at the family banquet, Louis wanted to introduce Donny Florence, the son of the Duke Giovanni Florence, the largest lord of the Dukedom of Napoli in his hometown, to Celinina.

Seeing a man who suddenly appeared beside her with a ferocious and ugly appearance, but pretended to be gentle and refined, Celinina knew without thinking that it must be arranged by her father.

Celinina is not stupid, she knows what her father means, so after the banquet, she talked to her father overnight.

"I know your ambition, Cherylina." At night, her father Louis sat in the study and looked at her.

"Since you know, why do you still go against my wishes..." Cherylina looked at Louis in confusion.

"Duke Giovanni is a good man. Although his son Donnie has a bad personality and looks a bit ordinary, and there are many topics about his romantic affairs, he is the future heir of the Duke after all."

"If you marry him, the contribution you can bring to the family is far greater than if you go into business."

"Your two brothers are not bad at business. They can manage the branch in an orderly manner. What we need now is political help."

"Promise your father to make the last contribution to the family."

"Contribution?" Celinina looked at Louis with red eyes. "In your opinion, your daughter's happiness is not as good as the business you have at hand, right? Do you regard me as a commodity?"

"Celinina!" Louis' tone was a little stern. "I raised you so big and let you receive the best education, not for you to talk back to me here!"

"Father..." Celinina lowered her head and pondered for a long time. Finally, she finally made up her mind, raised her head, and said resolutely.

"Grandpa once said that every child in the family wants to have equal inheritance rights, and whoever is most capable of leading the Chamber of Commerce well will inherit."

"Is this sentence set in the family rules?"

"You?" Louis looked at Cherylina in disbelief. "You want to disobey me?"

"I am not disobeying you, father, you forced me to this point."

"Okay, okay, okay." Louis said this, and laughed in anger. "Okay, I will give you two years. If you can't bring the branch of the Duke of Antica to the top position in income in two years, you

will give up the idea of ​​inheritance and come back to marry Mr. Donny!"

So, half a year ago, Cherylina took Louis's letter of appointment and took office in Antica City, becoming the head of the Antica branch of the Silver Moon Chamber of Commerce.

Chapter 14: Gifts and Returns

Sitting in the carriage, Orson looked at Litt beside him and gently patted the armrest to attract his attention.

"Lite, the person we are going to meet next is quite important. You should behave better in front of her, which will be very helpful for your future."

"Eh?" Litt was a little confused. "To me?"

"Well, she is the eldest daughter of the Bonaventura family, Chelinina Bonaventura."

Then, Orson told Litt about the status of the Bonaventura family and the Silver Moon Chamber of Commerce in the empire.

In the original book, Chelinina is also one of the heroines. In the early days when Litt was not favored by everyone, she resolutely spent a lot of money on Litt and cultivated Litt.

When Litt was financially tight and dared not ask for money from his family, Chelinina was able to provide financial assistance to Litt.

When Litt was injured, Chelinina took the initiative to send Litt the best potion.

In the subsequent open and secret struggles with Orson, Chelinina also chose to intervene in the family from the bottom of the secrets and support Litt.

The reason why she did this was simple. People who add icing on the cake and people who help in times of trouble are treated differently.

Just like what she mentioned to Lorenzo before.

If you want to make an investment that can make her rich overnight, you must not choose a product that looks very stable.

This is why she asked Lit as soon as Lorenzo came.

As a businessman, why did she intervene in the affairs of the noble family? Orson didn't know.

Maybe it was because of ambition.

This time, Orson brought Lit to the Silver Moon Chamber of Commerce. He wanted Chelinina to meet Lit in advance so that the relationship between the two could be promoted faster.

After all, she was one of Lit's harem.

Half an hour later, the carriage stopped outside the Silver Moon Chamber of Commerce.

Orson and Lit got off the car, and Lit glanced around.

She had never been to a big city. The only time she went to a city was when she was ten years old and went to the city with her parents to celebrate her birthday. She went to a nearby small town with a population of several thousand.

Although Antica City is not one of the largest cities in the empire, it is at least the capital of the Duke, and it is naturally more prosperous than ordinary cities.

As the largest chamber of commerce in the empire, the branch of the Silver Moon Chamber of Commerce is naturally one of the most prestigious and beautiful buildings here.

Seeing that Litt was very curious, Orson deliberately stood with him at the door for a minute before leading him into the chamber of commerce.

"Seeing the family emblem on the chests of the two people, the waiter of the Silver Moon Chamber of Commerce wisely made way for the two people."

Entering the chamber of commerce, a middle-aged man came to greet them.

"Mr. Orson, long time no see, welcome to your presence." Lorenzo said so, and walked up to shake hands with Orson.

"Deputy Agent Lorenzo, long time no see." Orson smiled and nodded, stretched out his hand to shake hands with Lorenzo.

"Uh..." Lorenzo then looked in the direction of Litt, and seeing the family emblem on his chest, he understood the other party's identity.

"This must be Mr. Litt, I have heard of your name for a long time." As he said so, he also stretched out his hand to Litt.

"Thank you, thank you..." Although Litt had finished learning the theoretical knowledge, he immediately showed his timidity when it came to practice.

He even forgot to take off his gloves when shaking hands with others, and just shook hands with Lorenzo.

Lorenzo was stunned, and Orson was also stunned.

"Mr. Lit is really different." Lorenzo said this, taking the initiative to ease the embarrassment.

Orson also smiled when he heard it.

"The eldest lady is waiting upstairs, let's go upstairs to talk." Lorenzo said this, pointed to the stairs, and then led the way for the two.

"Didn't Duke Lucius say in his reply that he would send you, Master Orson?" Lorenzo asked on the way, seemingly intentionally or unintentionally.

"Haha, I am Lit's teacher now. He will be able to handle such occasions in the future, so I brought him here to let him experience it in advance."

"It seems that Master Orson is really a good role model." Lorenzo said with a smile.

Then, they came to the exquisite and gorgeous box on the second floor. After Lorenzo opened the door, he stood outside the door respectfully.

It was inconvenient for him to go in on such occasions, even if he received the order from the master to keep an eye on Cheryl

Nina.

In the exquisitely decorated box, a girl with red hair and golden eyes was sitting on the sofa at this moment, watching Orson and Lit enter the room, her eyes stagnated.

Then she stood up again with a smile on her face.

"Miss Cheryl, long time no see." Orson said this and introduced Lit beside him.

"This is Lit, Lit, this is Miss Chelinina whom I mentioned to you before."

Seeing that the other party was a woman of similar age, Lit relaxed a little, and then took the initiative to greet:

"Hello, Miss Chelinina."

"Yes." Chelinina nodded, "Please sit down, both of you."

After inviting the two brothers to take their seats, Chelinina took the initiative to go to the side and pour a cup of black tea for each of them.

"I didn't expect that the Duke valued me so much that he actually sent both of his sons. I am really flattered." Chelinina kept a businesslike smile, but her eyes were secretly looking at Lit.

"Miss Chelinina, you are too modest." Orson said this and took a sip of tea. "Father likes the gift you gave him very much. As the backbone of the economy of the Dukedom of Antica, the Chamber of Commerce is a model in the industry for taking the initiative to help the Lord when he is worried."

The "gift" that Chelinina gave to Lucius was 3,000 sets of weapons and armor.

Recently, the orcs on the eastern border have started to move frequently again, so Lucius had to organize an army to resist.

But the army is a gold-eating beast. Not to mention the long-term investment of military pay and food, the equipment needed to arm the soldiers alone costs a lot of money. The economy of the Dukedom of Antica is not good, and many active soldiers' weapons and equipment are old-fashioned and urgently need to be replaced. How can they afford to purchase new equipment? Even if they can raise money, it will take some time to build the equipment.

And this gift from Chelinina can be said to have solved Lucius's urgent need.

Although Lucius is not good at politics, he is not a fool. Naturally, he knows that the Silver Moon Chamber of Commerce will not do business at a loss, so he asked Orson to come and talk to Chelinina.

This can be considered as training for Orson.

"We, the Dukedom of Antica, have always respected and admired Chamber of Commerce leaders like you." Orson said a set of official words and took out a box from his storage ring.