Empire of Shadows

Mr. Jobav had once ridiculed those gamblers.

He ridiculed them for not knowing how to restrain their desires, for continuing to throw their chips onto the gambling table even when they knew they would lose in the end.

It wasn’t until they found they could no longer pull out a single chip that they realized in a daze that they had lost everything they once possessed.

In fact, he was the same now. He had also become a gambler, but unlike those low-level gamblers who revolved around money games…

He was a bit more high-class. He sat at another, more high-class gambling table, playing a more advanced game concerning wealth, status, and power.

But regardless of whether the gambling table was high-class or low-class, its core was always the same. It required investment, and there would be losses.

As he invested more and more funds, it became increasingly difficult for him to turn back.

It wasn’t until this moment, when he suddenly woke up, that he remembered this game required stakes.

The assistant was silent for a moment. “Assuming they all want to cash out, we still have a shortfall of two million.”

He didn’t directly tell Mr. Jobav how much money he had left. This showed that his own money was actually all gone, and he had also misappropriated some of the depositors’ money.Hearing this number, Mr. Jobav’s hands trembled. A great fear enveloped him. He tried to open a cigarette case but failed after two attempts.

His hands were shaking too much.

The assistant helped him open the cigarette case. He took one of the cigarettes and, after several attempts, managed to hold the cigarette holder with his mouth.

The assistant took the initiative to light the cigarette for him with a lighter. His hands could do nothing now.

Nicotine did indeed have a calming effect. Although his hands were still shaking, they were not shaking as violently.

“How could the loss be so much?” he asked in a low, incredulous voice.

Perhaps he was asking about the origin of this number, or perhaps he was asking himself.

The assistant handed over a document. “Since you got to know the Mayor, he has taken more than one point three million from you in several projects. Polly and the others also extorted a sum from us. Then there was…”

He glanced at it. “We lost Arthur Williams’s liquor. After the Mayor’s mediation, you compensated Arthur with five hundred thousand.”

“Besides these larger expenses, you also used about four hundred thousand in your social engagements with the Mayor.”

“This includes multiple parties organized by you, as well as gifts sent to the capital.”

“Next, we have been supplementing our cash by trading bonds, and this batch of bonds has also caused us to lose a large sum of money.”

“Finally, there’s your campaign team, with an expenditure of about twenty to thirty thousand per month. Together with all the campaign activities, about four hundred and fifty thousand has been spent.”

“There is a list here. I haven’t mentioned some of the smaller, miscellaneous records. The total is around three million.”

His own wealth was only over a million. But before he had met the Mayor, before he had started to dream of becoming an upper-class figure…

His financial situation was very healthy. Although he had to face some extortion sometimes, the expenditure on extortion over three to five months was at most tens of thousands of dollars.

But since meeting the Mayor, he was like someone who had been brainwashed, frantically rushing towards that unrealistic goal and dream.

No, it wasn’t brainwashing. It was that when the goal he had longed for for so long appeared before him, he had impatiently pounced on it. No one had brainwashed him.

It was like a person who had been in pain for a long time. When he saw a painkiller, he would pay anything for it.

His hands were still trembling slightly. He opened his mouth and exhaled a thick puff of smoke. “So… after I cash out everything in the bank now…”

The assistant continued, “Yes, I’ve already made it very clear. You are going bankrupt, if you can’t stop them from continuing the run on the bank.”

A smile with an indescribable flavor appeared on the assistant’s face, flashing by in an instant. “Actually, even if they don’t make a run on the bank, it will be very difficult for us to continue, sir.”

“It’s very difficult for us to make up for the losses in a short time with the money we have left.”

He stopped as he spoke, giving Mr. Jobav time to accept, to process.

After about two minutes, he took an envelope out of his pocket and handed it over.

Mr. Jobav’s eyeballs moved slightly, staring at the envelope on the desk. “What bad news is this now?”

The assistant sighed lightly. “My resignation letter.”

Mr. Jobav’s eyes blinked. He didn’t react at first. After a while, he looked at him in disbelief. “Now… even you are leaving me?”

The assistant’s expression was calm. At this time, calmness was actually a kind of indifference.

“The child has grown up. I plan to take him to live elsewhere. Otherwise, he will always think of his father.”

“Maybe this can help him get out of the pain of losing his father. A new environment, a new life.”

“Him too, and me too. We all are.”

Mr. Jobav’s fists were clenched tightly. “Can I… keep you?”

He spoke very carefully. He had almost never spoken to anyone like this before. He desperately needed his assistant by his side now. He still wanted to struggle, to try.

The assistant shook his head. “The boat tickets have already been bought. I’m sorry that this happened at this time, but some things cannot be changed.”

He stood up as he spoke. “I will miss the days we worked together. You will always be in my memory.”

He bowed slightly, and then strode away.

Mr. Jobav watched his back, having completely lost the ability to think. The departure of his most important assistant, the huge deficit, the Mayor’s failure, the hopeless election—all of this made it hard for him to breathe.

He slumped in his office, not thinking about anything, not wanting to ask anything.

He didn’t know how long had passed. The phone in front of him suddenly rang violently. He picked it up a little numbly, without speaking.

“Is this the bank president?”

“We don’t have much cash left now. If… you can’t provide funds as soon as possible, we may not be able to honor the depositors’ withdrawal requests.”

Mr. Jobav hung up the phone and patted his cheeks. “I’ll go and handle it.”

He then went to the vault, selected a few valuable antiques, and went to find a place to cash them in.

Although gold was also easy, gold had other uses. If necessary, taking out the gold could still hold on for a while longer.

Actually, the reason people were demanding to withdraw cash now was also related to the Mayor being abandoned.

Everyone knew that Mr. Jobav had been very close to the Mayor for the past six months and had invested in many projects.

In some rumors, he had almost become the Mayor’s moneybag, constantly paying out money.

If the Mayor had remained strong, then no one would have thought there was a problem.

A municipal councilman wanting to make money was not a difficult thing.

But the problem was that the Mayor was finished. Inevitably, some people would talk about Mr. Jobav’s situation with schadenfreude.

But as they talked, these people’s expressions changed. If Mr. Jobav was unlucky, then would the depositors be any better off?

There was no doubt about this. So the first group of people who realized this problem went to withdraw their money. When they took their money out, they inevitably told their close ones.

So “don’t tell others” became “don’t not tell people.” A new wave of bank runs was born.

For the past six months, they had been dealing with the problem of bank runs. From time to time, people would systematically withdraw money. He even suspected sometimes that these were all Lance’s tricks.

But now he had no time to consider so much. He took the antiques directly to the bank, hoping to get a loan with these antiques.

First, deal with the current terrible situation, and then consider the subsequent problems.

As for the assistant’s resignation and the like?

He could no longer care about it.

If the bank really went bankrupt, then he would have no way out but death.

Right now, the only ones who could provide him with a large loan besides the bank were the gangs. He knew that if he looked for Lance at this time, he might be able to borrow money, but for some reason, he didn’t want to look for Lance.

Even though he knew the bank wouldn’t give him that much of a loan and would severely suppress the price, he was still reluctant to look for Lance.

The more successful Lance was, the more his own failure was highlighted.

As a somewhat famous immigrant banker in Golden Port, Mr. Jobav still easily got a loan from the bank. Of course, the amount he got was only forty percent of the value of the antiques he had mortgaged.

If it weren’t for the fact that he still had some connections and relationships, the bank would have even intended to push the price down to thirty percent.

In fact, everyone knew that he might not be able to hold on. Only he himself was still unclear.

Soon, Lance also heard this news. It was Jonathan (the bank’s vice president) who told him, saying that he had heard that Mr. Jobav had borrowed a large sum of money from a peer, and that there might be a problem with Jinda Bank’s cash flow.

He reminded Lance that if he had any related business with Jinda Bank, he should clear it up as soon as possible.

Lance was a little surprised to receive this news, but he also felt it was reasonable.

He was not at all surprised that such a speculation would have such a result. The risk was great, and the output was also great.

If the Mayor had won, the assets he had invested now would have come back to him multiplied.

But he had lost, that was all.

After hanging up the phone, Lance called Morris over. He asked, “Do you think there’s anything on Jobav’s side that is of value to us?”

Morris sat in his wheelchair, his legs covered with a blanket. “Mr. Jobav? What happened to him?”

Lance pursed his lips. “He’s going bankrupt. Before he goes bankrupt, maybe we can get something of value to us from him.”

Morris was an “old Empire District person.” He thought for a long while and said, “He has a big house…”

(End of chapter)

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