127: Chapter 126 Exploring the Mining Area

Upon leaving the embassy, Cao Xiao was about to return to his villa when he received a call from Dapu. Dapu informed him that the mineral rights for that region had been purchased and the procedures were finalized. Originally, the mineral rights for such a large tract of land were not for the local government to decide, but because the area was resource-poor and economically underdeveloped, the parliament hadn't paid much attention. After the local government reported it, the parliament let them handle it themselves. Thus, with the full public relations effort of the Angress Family, all procedures were completed and signed in less than three days. Moreover, the price was relatively cheap. In the eyes of the local government, those areas were barren lands; resource exploration had been conducted many years ago, and everything that could be mined had already been mined, leaving no valuable mineral distribution. Now that the Angress Family had taken the initiative to come and be the "sucker," the local government was more than happy to oblige. They didn't open their mouths too wide for fear of scaring them off, quoting a total price of only 1.5 billion us dollars, which was even negotiable. However, Dapu didn't even bargain; he made the decision on the spot, signed the agreement this morning, and paid the full amount.

Once the news of the discovery of a large oil field was revealed, the local government would certainly regret it immensely, but they wouldn't tear up the agreement. After all, having a large oil field under their jurisdiction would be of immense benefit to local economic development, causing the local economy to take off like a rocket. Not only would there be huge annual tax revenues, but they might even obtain a certain amount of shares, making it a win-win situation.

Hearing this good news, Cao Xiao was overjoyed. Dapu had not only handled things quickly but had also only spent 1.5 billion us dollars, causing the financial pressure on him to vanish instantly, and his mood became exceptionally pleasant. Instead of returning to the villa, he impatiently headed straight to the airport and took a regional flight to the nearest airport to Lake St. Lucia. A few hours later, after getting off the plane, Dapu was already waiting at the airport with a helicopter. It didn't take long by helicopter to reach Vryheid. It was already evening, and it was inconvenient to go to the oil field area, so he stayed at the best hotel in Vryheid.

After dinner, Dapu reported to Cao Xiao: "Sir, all the procedures here have been implemented, and exploration can be carried out at any time. Should we notify China National Petroleum Corporation now? How should the price for the oil field area be calculated?"

Cao Xiao said lazily: "Don't notify them for the time being. Wait until I take a look around tomorrow before making a decision. The matter of the oil field cannot be announced too early; we need to consider the feelings of the local government, as we still need their help with many things. What you need to do now is first acquire the land in the oil field area and relocate the local residents. If some people are unwilling to relocate, buy their land rights and let them live there for free for eighty or a hundred years if necessary, but you must sign a good agreement with them. I don't want a bunch of mysterious oil wells to pop up when the oil field starts producing, leaving us helpless. Remember, don't leak any word about the oil field, and don't make too much noise. Ask the local government for help; it's okay to spend more on compensation. If necessary, you can build another small town to settle them. In the future, jobs in the oil field can also be prioritized for them. Don't use those dirty tricks. Now that we have obtained the relevant rights and hold the initiative, time is not that tight. As long as nothing goes wrong, we can take it slow. I'll decide on the other places after I finish looking. You organize the exploration team first."

"Alright, I will make the arrangements as soon as possible." After Dapu finished speaking, he was about to get up and leave. His relationship with Cao Xiao was like that of a superior and subordinate; they basically didn't engage in small talk except for business.

"Wait! You did very well this time. I've already spoken to Shura, and he is very satisfied. He asked me to tell you that as long as you handle the oil field matters well, he can reward you with some unexpected things that money can't buy," Cao Xiao called out to Dapu.

The way to manage subordinates is nothing more than the carrot and the stick. Seeing how diligently Dapu was working, he didn't mind giving him some sweetness to taste. This would also prevent him from having second thoughts. Otherwise, with constant pressure, Dapu would inevitably feel dissatisfied. He wasn't afraid of the Angress Family rebelling collectively, but he was worried that these people would be outwardly compliant while inwardly defiant, dragging him down.

Dapu's body jolted upon hearing the name Shura, and his expression became solemn and respectful. After hearing Cao Xiao's words, at first, he didn't understand what kind of things would be unexpected and couldn't be bought with money. But when the figure of Shura flashed through his mind, he immediately thought of many things. The reward given by that god-like existence must be legendary and magical things—superpowers? Longevity? Treasures? All of these were possible. No matter what it was, it was something he yearned to possess, and now that he actually had a chance to get it, how could he not be extremely excited? Dapu placed his right fist against his left chest and said with a resolute and powerful expression: "Sir, please help me send my regards to the esteemed Lord Shura! Tell him that the Angress Family will never let him down. His will is our family's highest honor and mission! His..."

Seeing Dapu like this, Cao Xiao got goosebumps. Speaking so mushily, did he think he was in a movie! He impatiently waved his hand to interrupt: "Alright! I'll tell him. Just do your job seriously, and he won't mistreat you. You may leave now!"

After sending Dapu away, Cao Xiao had time to clear out the harvest from last night. When the yacht returned, it didn't follow the original path but took a direct route. Along the way, minerals, seafood, sunken treasures, and various valuable items in the ocean were collected. Needless to say, the seafood was selected from the best of several types he had set; otherwise, the seafood in the waters the yacht passed through, regardless of size, would have been completely collected. Even with selective picking, the high-quality seafood in the over one hundred nautical miles of sea area added up to a large quantity. Everything was processed, packed in plastic boxes, iced, and piled up like a small mountain. When the quantity was large, it didn't seem important, and he didn't pay much attention to it. Whether for his own family to eat or to give away, he couldn't use it all. In the future, he wouldn't collect this kind of seafood anymore. Since the yacht passed through deep-sea areas, there weren't many sunken ships found along the way, only a few valuable ones, and they didn't contain many items. He had become numb to these gold and silver jewels, porcelain, and antiques.

This time, he actually collected quite a lot of manganese nodules, totaling over ten million tons. This was just what was collected while the yacht was moving; if it had stopped specifically for collection, there might have been more. Not many other metal minerals were collected, totaling less than three million tons. In addition, there was an unexpected surprise: an offshore oil and gas field was discovered somewhere, and over eight million tons of oil were collected. He hadn't set the collection for natural gas, as it wasn't very useful to him and was difficult to handle. With oil, many chemical products could be produced, and the raw material reserves for the industrial mother machine were mostly complete at once. Eight million tons was enough for him to use for a while.

Finally, there was the seawater. Overnight, one hundred cubic kilometers of seawater were slowly collected, and by now, twenty cubic kilometers had been separated. Cao Xiao didn't dare to go all out with the separation process. The energy required to run the decomposition furnace now was countless times more than when he had level two authority, and the nuclear fuel stored in the space couldn't withstand the consumption of high-power operation. Needless to say, pure fresh water was obtained, along with 600 million tons of salt, 47 million tons of magnesium, 1.65 million tons of potassium, and a large number of non-metallic elemental substances. In addition, 660,000 tons of deuterium, 3,900 tons of lithium, and 66 tons of uranium were collected. These nuclear fuels would be enough for one hundred energy reactors to run at full power for more than a year, not to mention that 80 cubic kilometers of seawater had yet to be decomposed. Once used up, it could be collected from the sea at any time. More than a billion cubic kilometers of seawater could continuously provide sufficient energy for the industrial mother machine for countless years.

Metal elements were fine, but seeing the fresh water and salt in the space gave him a headache. Actually, they could be released directly back into the sea, but this was obtained in exchange for a large amount of energy, and it would be too wasteful to just put it back like that. In some arid regions, fresh water was a very precious resource, with a ton of water costing several us dollars. Besides being edible, salt was also an important chemical raw material. If he couldn't use that much himself, he could sell it to other companies. Moreover, when the decomposition furnace decomposed it, it was done according to edible salt standards, containing iodine and some beneficial trace elements, and the quality was very high. Using it as industrial salt would also be a bit wasteful.

But China only consumes seven or eight million tons of edible salt a year, and the worldwide annual consumption of edible salt is at most around 50 million tons. This salt was enough for the whole world to use for more than ten years. If he really sold it in large quantities, he didn't know how many people's livelihoods he would take away; edible salt production enterprises worldwide would all go bankrupt. The consequences of doing so were too serious for him to bear. On second thought, forget it. Last time, just tens of thousands of tons of titanium powder almost caused big trouble. Waste is waste; these 600 million tons would be kept in the space as raw material reserves for production. In the future, when separating seawater, it would be mixed with fresh water and released back into the sea. He wasn't short of this bit of money; as long as it didn't cause trouble, he was willing to let go of even more. In the future, he couldn't think about meddling in everything. If he was going to sell, he would sell things that were in short supply, making others beg him to buy, which would also save him the mental energy of peddling things everywhere.

The night passed without incident. Early the next morning, Cao Xiao and Dapu took a helicopter to the area designated for the purchased mineral rights. This time, the helicopter was piloted by Duan Hong, and there were only four people on board. Cao Xiao held a map and planned a flight route according to the scale. This route zigzagged back and forth across the more than 10,000 square kilometers of the mining area, just covering the entire area. Duan Hong followed the route and piloted the aircraft without question, but Dapu couldn't understand why Cao Xiao wanted to see the entire mining area from the sky. Doing so was meaningless, so he couldn't help but ask. Cao Xiao could only give a perfunctory answer, saying that he had some achievements in exploration and was judging where minerals might exist based on terrain and vegetation. It was impossible to tell him that by looking once from the sky, he could discover the distribution of all minerals buried within a depth of several thousand meters underground, which was countless times more efficient than professional exploration teams. Dapu was skeptical upon hearing this unreliable reason, but in the end, he didn't ask further.

According to the flight path planned by Cao Xiao, the area of more than 10,000 square kilometers was roughly equal to a square with a side length of 100 kilometers. The detection diameter was 20 kilometers, requiring about three round-trip flights, with a total distance of about 800 kilometers. The helicopter's flight speed was about 200 kilometers per hour. Since there were only four people on the plane, plenty of fuel was carried. The entire mining area could be fully detected in one morning. The Lake St. Lucia oil field area was left for the final detection. After the detection, they could return directly to Cape Town. Tomorrow, he would handle the affairs of Tiandu Company, and the day after, he would fly straight to Somalia.

They didn't even eat lunch at noon. Except for refueling, the plane had been flying at full speed all morning without landing. Cao Xiao had been pretending to observe the terrain with binoculars. The flight altitude was only 1,000 meters, and the scenery on the ground could still be seen clearly through high-powered binoculars. This was how Cao Xiao passed the time. Dapu lasted for an hour before becoming drowsy and no longer had the energy to curiously follow Cao Xiao's actions.

At 10 PM, Cao Xiao returned to his seaside villa in Cape Town. Today's detection results were not very ideal. Although not as mineral-rich as he had guessed, it wasn't a waste of those over one billion us dollars.

A total of more than ten mineral deposits of various sizes were discovered this time. Among them, there was an oil field in a range of hills more than 50 kilometers away from the Lake St. Lucia area, with reserves reaching a staggering 230 million tons, which could be considered a large oil field, worth over 60 billion us dollars. Moreover, the oil layer was less than 300 meters deep, so the extraction difficulty was not high. That hilly area had sparse vegetation and no water source; it was just a barren, uninhabited land. Cao Xiao immediately told Dapu to buy that more than 20 square kilometers of land as soon as possible. After it was finalized, the relevant mineral rights should be separated out to form valid legal documents and mailed to him along with the land ownership. He intended to use this oil field as a betrothal gift for marrying He Yueyou. An oil field worth tens of billions of us dollars was perfectly suited to He Yueyou's status as a betrothal gift, and its value was not lower than a ten percent stake in Hongdu Group. No one would blindly say he was living off a woman anymore, and it would also give He Yueyou's family more face.

Additionally, the most noteworthy discovery was a large copper mine with reserves of 150 million tons. More than half of the other ten or so mineral deposits were buried very deep, and the extraction cost was too high, so he didn't plan to develop them. The remaining five mineral deposits were all small mines with low reserves but high value. Among them were two gold mines, one diamond mine, and two coal mines. The combined ore reserves of the two gold mines were only 1.6 million tons, and the ore grade was far lower than that of the Rand region. Fortunately, they weren't buried deep, the ore layers were relatively concentrated, and the extraction cost was low.

That diamond mine only had over 300,000 carats, and Cao Xiao didn't plan to mine it; he collected it all directly into his space. What surprised him was that the diamonds in this small diamond mine were generally large. Those over ten points accounted for 60 percent, and those over one carat reached 10 percent. Moreover, the largest rough diamond was half again as large as the one he got from the Angress Family, though it was oval-shaped and had obvious flaws in two places inside. It would be dismembered into multiple pieces during cutting, and the clarity was only "slightly included." Its final value wouldn't be too great. But this was also quite rare. Along with dozens of other rough diamonds over 100 carats, the total value of this diamond mine would not be lower than some medium-sized diamond mines. This made his idea of establishing a jewelry company even stronger.