I See through Everything

In the evening, the sun set in the west.

Mom fried a plate of water spinach. "Time to eat," she said.

Jiang Miao went to the kitchen to get bowls and chopsticks.

His dad had finished his shower and was cooling off in front of a fan, having turned on the TV.

He filled a bowl with rice for each of his parents.

"Ah Miao, you’ve been running all over the place these past few days. Were you out delivering food again?" Jiang Dahai asked, picking up a piece of pig’s trotter.

"No, I won the lottery a few days ago. I went to Yangcheng to claim the money."

Huang Qiuyue’s eyes widened. "You won the lottery? How much did you win?"

"Over ten million," Jiang Miao said, shoveling a mouthful of rice into his mouth.

"Buddha be praised!" Huang Qiuyue quickly clasped her hands together in prayer.

Jiang Miao felt a bit helpless, but there was nothing he could do about the older generation’s stubborn ways. He could only change the subject. "I’ve been setting up a company these past few days."

"What kind of company?" Jiang Dahai asked hastily.

"It’s for aquaculture. The company is already registered, and the office is at the Magong resort. I had my brother-in-law rent over eighty mu of fishponds over in Salt Town Village."

"Aquaculture?" An unspoken concern flickered across Jiang Dahai’s face.

Huang Qiuyue saw her husband’s worry, but the thought of her son having over ten million yuan eased her mind. "If Ah Miao wants to start a business, just let him try. Aquaculture doesn’t cost that much, and it’s better than delivering food all day. That’s no long-term solution."

"Dad! Mom! Don’t worry. I’ll need help managing things at the company. Get your affairs here in order as soon as you can, stop farming, and come help me run the place."

Jiang Dahai was also worried his son might get scammed, so he nodded. "I’ll finish harvesting this season’s crops, then I’ll head over to Magong to help you."

"Mom, I’ve hired a local woman from Magong to handle the company’s kitchen and cleaning. I’ll need you to help supervise her, too."

"Okay. Once your dad gets things settled here, we’ll come over together." Huang Qiuyue was, of course, happy to help her son.

In truth, Jiang Miao had two reasons for bringing his parents into the company. One was to change their lifestyle, and the other was to reduce their physical workload.

If they continued to farm, the labor would be too intense, their schedules would remain irregular, and their diet wouldn’t be healthy.

If he just told them to change their habits directly, they usually wouldn’t take it seriously and might even become defiant.

So, Jiang Miao employed a roundabout strategy, using the excuse that he needed help at the company to move his parents away from their old home.

"Oh, right, Dad! Mom! Don’t tell anyone about me winning the lottery. We don’t want to make people jealous."

Regarding this, Jiang Dahai was well aware of the village mentality. "I know."

"Let’s eat," Huang Qiuyue reminded them.

The family ate and chatted together.

「The next morning, bright and early.」

Jiang Miao headed out again on his little electric scooter.

About ten minutes later, he arrived at the fish farm in Salt Town Village.

His brother-in-law was there with three local middle-aged men, repairing the dams of the fishponds.

He greeted them and went into the farm’s sheet-metal shack.

About half an hour passed before a Dongfeng pickup truck appeared at the farm’s entrance.

"Brother Yao, over here."

Jiang Yao got out of the truck with two dark-skinned, middle-aged men.

"Ah Miao, this is Old Huang. His company handles factory equipment and support systems."

Old Huang was big and burly, with small eyes that were barely visible. He took out a business card and handed it over.

Jiang Miao accepted the card. "Hello, Boss Huang."

"Boss Jiang, you’re so young and promising. I’m just a few years your senior," Old Huang said with a smile.

Jiang Miao didn’t bother with small talk and pointed to the large vegetable plot. "Boss Huang, I need to build an indoor eel farm, covering about 10 mu."

"Ah Yao told me about it last night. Based on your requirements, how about this: we’ll let Ah Yao handle the basic construction, and you two can negotiate the specific price. I’ll handle the support systems. You’ll need a water circulation system, water temperature control system, salinity control system, industrial refrigeration system, disinfection system..."

The two of them discussed each item one by one.

After going over all the requirements, Old Huang took out a small notebook and did some calculations.

"The total comes to 3.68 million. Let’s just round it down and call it 3.6 million. What do you think, Boss Jiang? If you have any doubts about this quote, you can have other companies take a look. My price is on the low side for the industry; I’m only making about five or six hundred thousand on this."

"That’s fine. Boss Huang, please prepare the contract."

"You’re straightforward. Boss Jiang, how about lunch together?"

"Sure. Let’s go to Sea View Villa near Jinting Bay."

Next, Jiang Miao negotiated the price with his cousin, Jiang Yao. They agreed on a price of 500,000 per mu, for a total of 5 million, to contract the construction work to him.

The price was quite reasonable.

After all, it was for a 10-mu, single-story, steel-frame factory building, including leveling the ground, installing utilities, and adding an insulation layer. It averaged out to about 750 yuan per square meter.

’My cousin definitely needs to make a profit,’ Jiang Miao thought, not too concerned about it. ’If there’s no money to be made in a business deal, it won’t last, no matter how close the relationship is.’

"Brother Yao, the Magong area is prone to typhoons, so quality is a must. It’s best if the structure on the side facing the sea is designed to minimize wind resistance."

Jiang Yao slapped his chest. "Don’t worry. Your big bro will give it his all and build you an indestructible factory."

"When can you start construction?"

"We can start tomorrow, but we need to do the landfill first. There’s only a little over four mu of open land here, so we have to fill in six mu of fishponds. That’ll take about half a month."

Old Huang chimed in, "Once the infrastructure is done, which should take about four months, have Ah Yao contact me a month in advance. I’ll need to order the equipment and materials ahead of time."

"No problem."

With the farm’s construction settled, Jiang Miao had Ke Yong drive over to pick him up, and the group went to lunch.

In the afternoon, he and Ke Yong returned to the resort restaurant.

In the second-floor office, Jiang Miao created a spreadsheet of his recent expenses.

Resort restaurant rent: 200,000 (includes a 50,000 deposit, with annual rent of 150,000).

Resort restaurant renovation costs: 500,000.

Eel farm rent: 109,200 (1,300 yuan per mu per year).

Eel farm basic construction: 5,000,000 (10 mu).

Eel farm support systems: 3,600,000 (10 mu).

Patent application agency fees: 80,000 (for 8 invention patents).

Company registration agency fee: 6,000.

Vehicle purchase: 260,000.

Trip to Hong Kong and Macau: 80,000.

Shopping: 40,000.

Total: 9,875,200 yuan.

And his previous income:

Savings from food delivery job: 73,000.

Scratch-off ticket winnings: 400,000.

Macau gambling winnings: 24,840,000.

Total income: 25,313,000. Current balance: 15,437,800.

Of the remaining money, five million needed to be set aside as working capital, leaving about ten million available to use.

He estimated his upcoming expenses.

To get things running quickly, the few hundred eels from his family’s and brother-in-law’s ponds wouldn’t be enough. He had to purchase mature eels from other farms.

The current market price from eel farms was about 50 yuan per kilogram. A mature white eel weighed around 1.5 to 2 kilograms.

The remaining 74 mu of open-air fishponds at the farm could each support 800 to 1,000 mature white eels.

Using 1,000 eels per mu as the standard, 74 mu would require 74,000 mature white eels. At a price of 80 yuan per eel, the procurement cost would be 5,920,000 yuan.

And the subsequent costs for feed, medicine, and so on would also be a significant expense.

But this investment would be worth it.

Because the average import price for glass eel fry this year was 31,000 yuan per kilogram.

On average, one kilogram of glass eel fry contains about 10,000 to 15,000 individual glass eels, though sometimes only a few thousand, as a single glass eel weighs around 0.1 grams on average.

A single female eel can produce an average of 1,600 eggs, with a survival rate of around 90% in an artificial breeding environment.

This meant that ten female eels could produce about one kilogram of eel fry.

However, female eels die soon after spawning. To increase economic efficiency, Jiang Miao planned to acquire a small factory and purchase a canning production line to process the post-spawn eels directly into canned eel.

A small canning line, including the facility, would cost around five to six hundred thousand yuan.

But fortunately, Magong Town used to be a prosperous fishing port and still had some small seafood processing plants. Acquiring one shouldn’t be too much trouble.