Road to becoming the wealthiest: Starting From Treasure Hunting in the Cabinets
Chapter 417 - 303: Is This Considered Good People Receiving Good Rewards?_2

Chapter 417: Chapter 303: Is This Considered Good People Receiving Good Rewards?_2

Douglas Cooper had already dived to catch some seafood, and at the moment, Lincoln Harrington was cooking, while Sean Knight and Elijah Hastings were resting.

"Boss, what do you think this is?" Douglas Cooper excitedly holds up a small item for Sean Knight to see.

"This is...red coral?" Sean Knight looks at the bright red, deer antler-shaped object, and blurts out, "Where did you get this?"

Natural red coral is an organic gemstone, with a delightful color and a lustrous texture, growing in the deep ocean 100 to 2000 meters away from humans.

It is ranked alongside pearls and amber as one of the three major organic gemstones, and is listed as one of the seven treasures in Eastern Buddhist scriptures, cherished as a symbol of wealth and auspiciousness since ancient times.

However, due to excessive mining, it has become very scarce worldwide.

As for the price, natural red coral is 80-100 times that of gold!

One gram of pink coral costs 1000-5000 yuan; one gram of deep red coral costs 10000-20000 yuan, and top-quality pieces are over ten times that price!

So, just this piece in Douglas Cooper’s hand is worth several tens of thousands of US dollars – just a few dozen grams!

"Where did you get it?" Sean Knight’s breath is a little short.

"There’s a piece of reef under this island, and there’s quite a bit of it growing around the reef. It looked so beautiful that I picked it up. Boss, is this as valuable as a gemstone?"

"This isn’t like a gemstone; this is a gemstone." Sean Knight takes a look, then returns it to Douglas Cooper: "This one piece could probably buy you a house in your county town."

"What?" Douglas Cooper is startled!

Even though he now has tens of millions of assets, this price was beyond his expectations!

"I’m going to dive and get more right now! There’s a lot down there!" Gold sparks seem to shoot from Douglas Cooper’s eyes.

This is like picking up money!

Picking up money isn’t even this fast!

But then Lincoln Harrington casually interjects:

"It seems that everything under the sea near this island belongs to the boss, right?"

Douglas Cooper is suddenly embarrassed.

He is holding the red coral, unsure whether to hand it over or not.

Sean Knight laughs and says:

"Don’t be so nervous, the few of us will take turns diving now, and whoever catches it can keep it."

"Really?" Douglas Cooper’s face immediately lights up with happiness.

"Of course it’s true," Sean Knight answers.

Elijah Hastings and Lincoln Harrington both look at Douglas Cooper with disdain.

Douglas Cooper quickly defends himself:

"Actually, it’s not about how much it’s worth, it’s mainly that feeling when you’re salvaging, you know? That feeling is absolutely amazing!"

There are three diving suits on the yacht, and Douglas Cooper drags Elijah Hastings into the water.

Half an hour later, Douglas Cooper and Elijah Hastings come up one after another.

Douglas Cooper is holding a large handful of red coral - several kilograms worth.

In Elijah Hastings’ hand is just a single, complete branch that looks like a flower and could be planted in a pot as an ornament.

"That’s enough, one branch is enough." Elijah Hastings says voluntarily, "I think this branch is quite beautiful."

"Lincoln, let’s go down and take a look." Sean Knight has seen many corals in the sea before, but never red corals, let alone picking them.

He and Lincoln Harrington change into the diving suits and sink down.

The seawater here is not very deep, about twenty meters, and the water is not very clear, but Sean Knight’s good eyes quickly locate the large reef mentioned by Douglas Cooper.

Lincoln Harrington dives down to the edge of the reef, then points down.

Indeed, Sean Knight sees some branching red coral beneath.

He doesn’t pick any, and signals for Lincoln Harrington to act on his own, while Sean Knight himself swims to the side.

There doesn’t seem to be much red coral in this area, and Sean Knight estimates that there are only a few dozen kilograms in total.

Sean Knight wants to see if there is any more nearby.

Perhaps the fish here have never seen humans before, so they not only don’t hide when they see Sean Knight, but some even swim towards him, curiously watching this big creature.

Sean wondered if he could just reach out and grab a big one?

However, he ultimately didn’t reach out, but instead felt a bit smug - being surrounded by a school of fish was quite impressive, right?

Without straying far, he circled around and soon made an exciting discovery - not far away, a large area of red coral was hidden beneath the living pink coral, easily ten times the size of the previous patch he saw.

Sean didn’t continue searching; most of the red coral in this area was alive, and he believed there should be more nearby.

He casually took two dead coral branches and floated up, with Lincoln Harrington following nearby.

After resurfacing, they found a marine patrol boat nearby. The coast guard officers had already boarded their yacht and were confronting Elijah Hastings and Douglas Cooper.

"You guys arrived just in time - we have both the suspects and the goods!" The Coast Guard Captain, who was a local, looked coldly at Sean and Lincoln, "Come with us!"

Sean boarded the yacht, put down the red coral, and one of the marine officers immediately came forward to take it. Sean reached out and said:

"Don’t touch it, that’s mine!"

"You guys are involved in illegal salvage!" the marine police insisted.

"The thing is, we have the authorization of the island master. We’re allowed to deal with the things here as we wish."

Sean’s words made the marine police hesitate.

They had been watching this yacht for quite some time.

Or rather, they had already set their sights on this boat while it was still in port.

Someone reported that the boat was suspected of illegal salvage. Although their colleagues hadn’t found anything previously, they couldn’t rule out the suspicion.

And the same group of people rented the boat for a second time, going so far out to sea, which naturally raised suspicions among the marine police.

Of course, the most important reason was that there were several Chinese on the boat!

Sean took out the authorization letter from Oliver Brooks and a photocopy of the island’s ownership documents and handed them to the team leader of the marine police.

After carefully reading it twice, the team leader reluctantly returned the documents to Sean, greedily glanced at the red coral held by his subordinate, and said:

"Leave the things here, and we’ll go."

The marine police officer reluctantly put down the items and left in the small boat.

"Thankfully the boss was prepared." Douglas Cooper spit in the direction of the small boat, remarking.

"Alright, once we can’t see them anymore, quickly dive and salvage all those red corals!" Sean said solemnly. He wondered what to do about the living red corals.

He couldn’t protect them here all the time, could he?

"Boss, are you afraid that those people will come back and take the red coral?" Elijah Hastings asked, reacting the quickest.

"Seeing the look in their eyes, it’s a certainty."

"So we should indeed take the initiative."

"There are also some living red corals that I’m afraid they’ll harm."

Sean voiced his concerns.

Everyone felt a bit troubled. None of them wanted to destroy the living red corals, but it was difficult to say how the others would behave.

"Can we gather some poisonous sea creatures to place around the red corals, like venomous sea urchins, jellyfish, octopuses, etc.?" Lincoln suddenly suggested.

"This is a great idea!" Sean’s eyes lit up, "Alright, one of you three stays on the boat, the other two go for the red coral, and I’ll go find things to protect the red coral."

Sean put on his diving suit, took his net pocket, and dived quickly into the water.

Though the island’s fishing resources were not abundant, there was a great variety of marine creatures.

Sean carried a pair of pliers and his net pocket, stuffing any poisonous creatures he encountered into the net pocket - geography cone, highly poisonous sea stars, flower urchins, sea snakes, etc. As long as it was venomous, Sean put it into the net pocket - luckily, the net pocket had a dense netting which prevented the creatures from escaping.

After a dozen trips back and forth, Sean threw around a hundred poisonous creatures into the coral cluster... These creatures, accustomed to living among coral reefs, quickly adapted to the new environment and found their own caves and hiding spots to survive.

Sean used this time to swim in the nearby area, and when he saw the complex underwater environment, he felt slightly relieved.

With Sky Eye, he could spot any dangerous creatures in an instant, making his collection of poisonous creatures very efficient. He made several more rounds, gathering all the venomous creatures near the patch of red coral before stopping.

When Sean surfaced, he saw that Elijah, Douglas, and Lincoln had already returned.

There was a pile of red coral on the deck - by Sean’s estimation, at least one-third of it was top-quality deep red coral, each gram worth tens of thousands of dollars.

They were going to be rich!