514: That money should be mine!

"Encountered trouble?" Zhang Fengmao's tone paused. "What happened?"

"It's like this. Didn't I mention that my family opened a garment factory here? Perhaps because business has been good lately, it's attracted some jealous eyes. A group of people just showed up at the door..."

Ye Su gave Zhang Fengmao a general overview of everything, from the staff coming to inspect the factory for consumer issues, to the five local thugs coming to 'borrow' money, and finally how he had beaten them back.

"Seeing how familiar they were with the process—from the anonymous report to the doorstep extortion—it was a smooth, practiced routine. I'm worried this group might have some background here, so I wanted to trouble you, Godfather, to help me look into where these people are from."

On the other end of the line, Zhang Fengmao didn't agree to help immediately. Instead, he asked in a surprised tone:

"Are you saying that you just took down five people single-handedly with your bare hands? Are you bragging to your Godfather?"

"I'm not bragging. I just played around and learned a few moves from movies back in the day; I didn't expect them to actually come in handy."

"And what about you? Are you injured anywhere?"

"No, I'm perfectly fine."

"That's good then." On the other end of the phone, his tone clearly relaxed a bit. "If anything happened to you, your Godmother would likely be worried again."

Wu Lianfang had just had a brush with death two days ago, so Zhang Fengmao naturally didn't want her to suffer any more shocks.

"I didn't realize that the Xingchao Garment Factory, which has been the subject of so many rumors lately, was actually opened by your family."

A swimsuit factory had suddenly popped up in Yang County, and the swimsuits it sold were a massive hit across the internet, prompting garment factories in other places to follow the trend.

As the richest man in Yang County, Zhang Fengmao had heard a bit about this.

It was said that by relying on this swimsuit craze, Xingchao Garment Factory had earned at least several million, leaping to become a star factory in Yang County.

While eating at home last night, Ye Jianguo had mentioned in passing that the family operated a small garment factory in Yang County.

Zhang Fengmao naturally had no interest in a small garment factory, and after hearing Ye Jianguo's words, he hadn't followed up with more questions.

If not for this phone call, Zhang Fengmao really wouldn't have known that the 'small garment factory' in Ye Jianguo's mouth was actually the recently explosive Xingchao Garment Factory.

"Haha," Ye Su laughed. "This factory was originally opened just for fun. I didn't expect to have such good luck and actually make a name for ourselves."

Zhang Fengmao teased, "If you can make this much money just playing around, what would happen if you actually got serious?"

"Haha, it's just good luck. Maybe if I worked seriously, the results wouldn't even be as good as just playing around like I am now."

Ye Su chatted and joked with Zhang Fengmao about trivial matters, no longer mentioning the request for Zhang Fengmao to help resolve the factory's trouble.

And Zhang Fengmao didn't make Ye Su wait long. After laughing heartily on the other end of the line, he steered the conversation back to business:

"Alright, I know about the garment factory matter. Go do whatever you need to do; don't worry about it anymore."

"Okay, thank you, Godfather."

With those words from Zhang Fengmao, Ye Su knew the matter was settled. He had nothing more to worry about.

"Anything else?"

"Nothing else."

"Alright, then let's leave it at that." Zhang Fengmao didn't forget to urge him:

"You said you're returning to Yangcheng in a while. If you have time lately, bring the whole family over for dinner often to add some life to the house."

"Sure, I understand."

After a few more words, Zhang Fengmao was the first to hang up.

After Ye Su put his phone back in his pocket, he went back into the factory to find Ye Jianguo and told him that Zhang Fengmao had agreed to help.

Hearing that Zhang Fengmao would help, Ye Jianguo's heart finally settled... On the other side, the five men who had been beaten away by Ye Su drove an old Honda for two or three kilometers before the lead man, enduring the sharp pain from his back, took out his phone and made a call.

As soon as the call was made, it was picked up by the other side:

"Hello?"

"Brother-in-law."

"Well? Did things go smoothly?"

"Don't even mention it. We were beaten out by Ye Jianguo's son..."

The man gave the person on the phone a general account of what had just happened.

"Fuck!"

Bang—

"Hiss!"

On the other end of the line, hearing that five people had gone and were actually taken down by Ye Jianguo's son alone, the middle-aged man forgot he was holding a cigarette and slammed his palm on the table in anger. As a result, the falling ash burned the back of his hand, making him gasp in pain.

If Ye Jianguo were present, he would certainly recognize that this exasperated man was Du Liqiang, the owner of one of the garment factories he had commissioned last month to produce the great sage swimsuits.

From the conversation between Du Liqiang and the other man, it wasn't hard to tell that the five men who had just gone to cause trouble at Xingchao Garment Factory were acting under his instructions.

"Brother-in-law, what do we do now? Looking at Ye Jianguo, I'm afraid he's not willing to spit out even a bit of the money he's earned lately."

"Dammit!"

Suppressing the urge to curse his brother-in-law and the other four as useless trash who couldn't even beat a young man in his twenties, Du Liqiang barked out another exasperated curse before continuing:

"If he's not willing to spit it out, he'll have to spit it out anyway. He tricked me into helping him make clothes, and after screwing me out of such a huge sum of money, he wants to keep all the benefits for himself? There's no such thing as a free lunch!"

At the beginning of last month, after receiving the order from Ye Jianguo, Du Liqiang's mood was so good he wanted to hum a little tune while walking.

Tens of thousands of swimsuits, with the fabric provided by Ye Jianguo—after deducting wages and other expenses, Du Liqiang roughly calculated that he would make at least 100,000 to 200,000 in net profit.

In all his years of running the factory, it was rare for his monthly net profit to reach 200,000.

During that time, Du Liqiang's attitude toward Ye Jianguo was practically better than toward his own father, calling him 'Brother Jianguo' in every phone call.

But ever since the great sage swimsuits hit the trending searches and the sales volume and prices climbed steadily, and he calculated that Ye Jianguo could earn at least several million, Du Liqiang hadn't had a single night of peaceful sleep.

Every time he thought about it, his heart ached so much he couldn't even enjoy his food; he had to go to Jindu Foot Massage to find Xiao Fang for some 'unwinding'.

The day before yesterday, Du Liqiang had also learned from somewhere that Ye Jianguo's family had acquired a Lamborghini, which made him toss and turn even more, unable to sleep all night.

The more Du Liqiang thought about it, the more he felt he had been screwed over by Ye Jianguo.

If he hadn't been tricked by Ye Jianguo into doing OEM processing for him, and his own factory had made this swimsuit model, he definitely could have made a fortune too, rather than just earning that one or two hundred thousand in processing fees.

Now that he had processed tens of thousands of swimsuits for Ye Jianguo and earned him millions, Ye Jianguo had to share some of that money with him.

After much thought, Du Liqiang came up with this plan: let his brother-in-law and his gang of idle friends first anonymously report Xingchao Garment Factory, and then go to the door to demand money.

He didn't expect that his brother-in-law's group, who usually bragged to high heaven about how they could carve a path from one end of the street to the other with a watermelon knife in their youth without blinking...

...would now go to the door as five people only to be beaten out like dogs by a young man, causing his plan to get money to fail!

Du Liqiang couldn't understand how he had been so possessed back then to marry that yellow-faced woman at home and get stuck with that good-for-nothing brother-in-law!