Road to becoming the wealthiest: Starting From Treasure Hunting in the Cabinets
Chapter 1006 - 547!

Chapter 1006: 547!

Even though the people in the tribe are not wealthy, they indeed have some local products.

The trading post had transported many small commodities, including food that goes without saying, various iron tools, household utensils, cloth pieces favored by women, tools favored by men, and even toys for the kids—they pretty much had everything.

In the past few days, Charles Young had basically not stopped, continuously transporting items from the Cave Storehouse out, and he did not return empty-handed either; he gathered up small commodities from Urumqi of Xinjiang, including some from nearby cities, and transported them over.

After all, running empty just meant running empty; transporting more each trip meant earning a bit more.

The Base was now filled with goods brought by the tribal residents, and some security personnel were even temporarily assigned to act as quality inspectors.

After all, not all goods were useful—take the grape cake, for instance, there was no way Sean Knight and his crew would accept that. Grapes from Xinjiang were already on the market in vast quantities, and even if it wasn’t the right season, they had plenty of cold storage facilities, and fresh grapes were available at any time. They truly weren’t in short supply.

When Sean Knight arrived at the Base, he saw a long line of people and convoys waiting to exchange their items.

Even though the Base had opened four spots for exchanging supplies, they were still too busy to handle the demand.

Elder Hassan was also there, but he wasn’t there to exchange goods; instead, he was using big trucks to transport things belonging to the Tribe to the Tribe.

A significant portion of the items in the Cave Storehouse originally belonged to the Tribe. Elder Hassan’s initial plan was to go to the marketplace, to further marketplaces, to exchange them for daily necessities.

However, with the arrival of Charles Young’s airplane, Hassan found another way.

He frequently visited China and knew that many items there were of good quality and reasonably priced, better than what he could exchange in the marketplace.

So he simply handed over the items from the Cave Storehouse to Sean Knight, except for a portion he kept for personal use and reserve.

On Sean Knight’s side, he kept the weapons and some usable supplies, while the rest were taken away by Charles Young, one airplane load at a time.

So, Oscar Knight’s Firm was not short of items for a short time.

"... This is the Raw Lapis Lazuli I found in the mountains; please check its quality. I want to exchange it for pots, bowls, and paper."

"The quality is good; you can exchange for two pots, many bowls, and there’s also paper. Do you need anything else? If you’re only exchanging for these, I’m afraid you won’t be able to use them all up."

"Then... can you exchange it for a toy for my child? Just one is fine."

"You could exchange for fifty..." The person sitting at the table doing the Appraisal earnestly said, "You might want to think it over, do you need anything else?"

In his hands was a large piece of Raw Lapis Lazuli of very good quality, which in China could easily sell for tens of thousands, even more if made into jewelry.

Sean Knight had previously said to try not to lower the price too much; it might not be very fair, but it should at least make the locals feel it’s worthwhile.

This standard was slowly figured out after exchanging a few items.

The previous owner of the Lapis Lazuli happily left with a cart full of items, while the onlookers showed envious expressions.

Afghanistan had 1300 tonnes of Lapis Lazuli reserves; although not very valuable in the past, now it’s priced by the gram.

But locally, many people could find rough stones, just that they are hard to sell, so the price wasn’t high.

Now that there was a trading channel, and since the other side offered a much higher price than the traders that came before, these people were naturally willing to exchange.

"This carpet, please take a look, my wife spent three months weaving it..."

"Hmm, no damage, looks pretty good. What do you want to exchange for?"

"Rice, flour, salt, shovels, a bicycle..."

"Alexander Khan, you’re too greedy. How could you possibly exchange for so many things?"

"It is possible; I’ll give you a bicycle, a bag of rice, a bag of flour, two packages of salt, plus five shovels, how about that?"

"Great, great, that’s wonderful!" Alexander Khan was over the moon, having originally thought he might only exchange for some of the items, he didn’t expect to get them all!

The prices set by the Base were mostly beyond everyone’s expectations, so the enthusiasm for exchanging goods was very high.

Sean Knight arrived at an exchange spot, just in time to see an old woman exchanging a bronze Buddha statue for items.

"Boss, how do we exchange this?" Little Hu at the exchange spot was scratching his head in difficulty, and when he saw Sean Knight, he hurried over to consult, "What’s the price for this? We have no idea!"

The old woman said:

"Exchange for food, just one bag of food would be good..."

Locals believe in Islam, and Buddhism is considered a foreign religion, so such items must be remnants from the past, found by the old woman somehow.

Listening to the translator’s words, Sean Knight confirmed again:

"Grandmother, are you really sure you want to exchange?"

"Exchange, exchange! We have almost nothing to eat at home..."

Hassan happened to walk by and asked Sean Knight:

"Mr. Knight, is there a problem?"

"No, this old lady is trying to exchange an antique..." Sean Knight replied.

"Can she exchange it? If she can, then let her. I know her; all the men in her family died in the War, and she lives in poverty..."

"But these are cultural relics, isn’t it a pity to exchange them? I can just give her some food..."

"Let her exchange it," Hassan shook his head and said. "If you give it to her, she won’t be at ease. If she exchanges it, she will eat in peace. Besides, what good is keeping such things? Better to exchange them for something tangible."

This made Sean Knight think back to China in the 1960s and 1970s. Back then, the country was poor, the common people were poor, and the country even set up Antique Shops to sell less important cultural relics to foreigners in exchange for foreign currency to develop the economy.

Isn’t Afghanistan the same now?

Cultural relics and such aren’t really that important; what’s crucial is the lives of common people, right?

He was now basically certain that he should not tell Elder Hassan and the United States about the Persian King’s Tomb just yet; saying it now wouldn’t be of any use and might even lead to its destruction.

It was better to wait for the right moment.

After exchanging ten bags of food, salt, and some other household items for the old woman, Sean Knight also arranged for Elder Hassan to have the items delivered to her home by car.

This act of kindness immediately started a trend of exchanging cultural relics for goods among the tribal residents nearby!

This was something Sean Knight had not expected!