“Alright, alright, alright, Dad promises you, I absolutely won’t take out a loan to speculate in stocks. I’ll only use the money in my account—if I lose it, I’ll accept it.” Charles Foster hurriedly reassured his daughter.

“You promise?” Mary Foster was still a bit distrustful.

“Dad promises. If I ever take out a loan to play the stock market, then let the little princess never talk to Dad again, okay?”

“That’s more like it.”

Mary Foster nodded, finally satisfied, and turned to leave. Watching his daughter’s departing figure, Charles Foster showed a wry smile. There were some things he still couldn’t tell his daughter. There was a reason he was working so hard to make money.

……

The next day, William Brooks groggily arrived at school. In his previous life as a full-time online writer, he always slept until he woke up naturally. Now, getting up a little after six—even though his body’s biological clock was normal—his mind was still foggy.

He’d originally wanted to catch up on sleep in the classroom, but at this time of year, it was just too cold to nap there. Twice in a row, he was woken up by the cold wind, so William Brooks had no choice but to give up.

“To make this money, I need to achieve two goals. First is the principal—even if it’s multiplied by forty, the starting amount can’t be too little. The second goal is to find a suitable bookie, make sure the bookie will take the bet and will actually pay out.”

Unable to sleep, William Brooks started calculating how to earn his first pot of gold, jotting things down on paper.

Assets: 18.5 yuan + 5 yuan for lunch.

Maybe if he searched through all the drawers at home, he could find a few dozen more yuan.

Bookie: None yet.

After working it out, William Brooks felt a bit hopeless. If it was under a hundred yuan, bookies were actually easy to find—he knew several in town who handled bets. He could claim his mom sent him to place the bet, and betting a few dozen yuan wouldn’t make them refuse to pay.

Turning a few dozen yuan into a thousand or two—honestly, for an ordinary student, that was already a huge sum. But for William Brooks, it wasn’t nearly enough, because this would be his startup capital after rebirth, and opportunities to make quick money like this weren’t common. At least, after thinking it over all night, he hadn’t found any others.

The whole morning’s classes slipped by while William Brooks was tangled up in his thoughts. As for what the teachers said, he didn’t listen at all.

Studying could wait until after he made his first pot of gold.

At noon, when school let out, William Brooks headed to the snack shop. Since he’d decided to save money, he naturally couldn’t eat lunch. William Brooks decided to buy a pack of Little Raccoon crispy noodles at the shop to fill his stomach a bit.

At this time, Little Raccoon crispy noodles were still fifty cents a pack.

After buying the noodles, William Brooks had just walked out of the shop when he saw Mary Foster coming toward him. When Mary Foster saw William Brooks holding two packs of Little Raccoon noodles, a mocking look appeared on her pretty face. She remembered that this boy had more than ten yuan yesterday, but today he wasn’t even eating lunch. She didn’t need to guess—he must have skipped class yesterday afternoon to go online, and spent all his money there.

The boys in her class, and the ones she knew, were mostly like this.

She’d even thought this boy was different from the others, but now it seemed that what he said yesterday was just to get her attention.

William Brooks didn’t miss the mocking look on Mary Foster’s face. Thinking for a moment, he realized Mary Foster must have misunderstood him, but he didn’t intend to explain.

But just as he and Mary Foster were about to pass each other, a shocking idea suddenly popped into his mind.

“Mary Foster, do you want to make some money?”

Mary Foster hadn’t planned to pay any attention to William Brooks, but when she heard this, she stopped and turned her head, mocking, “Do you think I’m someone who’s short of money?”

William Brooks’s mouth twitched. Right, he’d forgotten this young lady was from a wealthy family—how could she possibly need money?

Thinking this, William Brooks said nothing more and walked past Mary Foster.

“Wait, you said make money—how exactly?”

It wasn’t until William Brooks had walked about ten meters away that Mary Foster’s voice came from behind. William Brooks turned back and gave Mary Foster a big, toothy grin.

Many years later, William Brooks once asked Mary Foster a question: why did she call out to him back then?

And Mary Foster just rolled her eyes at him, because she’d never seen anyone so shameless—someone so poor they only ate two packs of Little Raccoon noodles for lunch, yet still boasted about making money with her. It was the first time she’d met someone so brazen.

Chapter 5 William Brooks’s Ambition

The pearl milk tea shop outside the school.

“So, when you say making money, you mean buying lottery tickets?”

Mary Foster looked at the boy in front of her, who was dead serious, and really wanted to throw her cup of milk tea at him.

Buying Mark Six lottery tickets—this was even less reliable than her dad speculating in stocks. How could she have believed his nonsense before?

“Of course. If you don’t believe me, that’s fine too. Just lend me the money, and I’ll pay you back tomorrow. I can even give you interest—ten percent.”

William Brooks nodded. He was hoping Mary Foster wouldn’t believe him—this way, he could buy more tickets himself. If she joined in, he’d have to split the profits.

“How much do you want to borrow?”

“How much do you have?” William Brooks asked tentatively.