American Medicine God: Starting by Inheriting a Pharmaceutical Company and Selling Medicine

Early January 1981. Water Pharmaceutical Factory, basement.

This place has been transformed into a makeshift vault. Several high-wattage incandescent bulbs hang overhead, illuminating the entire space in a stark white light, leaving no shadows to hide in.

A long wooden table was piled high with banknotes.

Instead of neatly bundled banknotes, there were mountains of loose change piled up like garbage. One dollar, five dollars, ten dollars... crumpled, stained, some even stained with blood and drug powder.

Three men in black suits were counting money around a table. One of them, a short man wearing thick-rimmed glasses, was frantically pressing buttons on a calculator while constantly wiping the sweat rolling down his forehead with a handkerchief.

He is Fat Tony's personal accountant, nicknamed "Calculator".

Fat Tony sat at the other end of the table, a thick cigar between his fingers. He wasn't smoking it; he was just staring intently at Victor, who was sitting opposite him.

Victor Corleone seemed out of place.

In this environment filled with the stench of money and violence, he still wore a three-piece suit and held a steaming cup of black tea in his hand.

"Have you figured it out yet?" Fat Tony's voice rang out.

"Almost there, boss." The accountant's fingers flew across the calculator, making a clicking sound like a burst of gunfire.

A few minutes later, the accountant stopped what he was doing. He swallowed hard and nervously pushed a slip of paper covered in numbers in front of Fat Tony.

"Boss, based on the market circulation of 'Blue Sky' purple water and the shipment data we have, the total revenue last month should be around two million US dollars."

The accountant's voice trembled.

"But we only have 500,000 in cash here."

The air in the basement seemed to freeze instantly.

The bodyguards in black suits who were counting money stopped what they were doing at the same time, their hands involuntarily reaching for their waists.

Fat Tony slowly shifted his gaze from the note to Victor's face.

"Two million. Five hundred thousand."

Fat Tony repeated the two numbers, then suddenly sprang to his feet.

"Snapped!"

A silver Colt M1911 pistol was slammed heavily on the table, causing the piles of banknotes to tremble slightly.

"Victor, my friend," Fat Tony forced a sinister grin, "Do you think I, Tony di Nozzo, am some kind of spaghetti-eating idiot? Or do you think the Corleone family's remaining reputation can withstand a bullet?"

Although the dark muzzle of the gun wasn't directly pointed at Victor, the sense of impending death had already gripped his throat.

Victor put down his teacup.

The sound of the porcelain cup hitting the table was crisp and pleasant.

"Your accounting math is pretty good, Tony," Victor said calmly. "Last month's turnover was indeed two million."

"What about my money?" Fat Tony roared. "Where did the other 1.5 million go? Did your silver-tongued lawyer swallow it? Or did you use it to fill the hole your old man left behind?"

"If I really wanted to steal your money, I wouldn't have let you through this door."

Victor took a thick black folder from the briefcase at his feet and threw it in front of Fat Tony.

That's a "reinvestment plan".

Fat Tony paused for a moment, but didn't look at it. He was a rough man; looking at reports gave him more of a headache than killing someone.

"Explain," Fat Tony uttered coldly.

"One and a half million, not a single penny went into my pocket." Victor held up one finger. "Five hundred thousand was used to prepay for raw materials for the next three months. Tony, have you noticed the recent price increases in chemical raw materials? Because of the oil crisis. I locked in the prices, and that alone will earn me an extra three hundred thousand next quarter."

Victor extended his second finger.

"Five hundred thousand dollars will be used to order two new fully automated filling lines. The current manual filling is too slow and simply cannot keep up with the demand in Philadelphia. The new machines will arrive next week, and production capacity will triple."

"What about the other 500,000?" Fat Tony's expression softened slightly, but it remained gloomy.

"Take care of the union, and establish our own logistics network." Victor looked directly into Fat Tony's eyes. "Frank is dead, but the mess he left behind remains. The new union president needs to 'show his support.' And we can't always rely on your Cadillac trunk for deliveries. We need refrigerated trucks, legal transport permits, and a 'blood vessel' that the police can't find fault with even if we get pulled over."

Victor pointed to the money on the table.

"Tony, do you want to be a street thug collecting protection money, or a CEO sitting behind the scenes counting his cash?"

"This 1.5 million is neither mine nor yours. It is our 'moat'."

Victor's voice wasn't loud, but it resonated deeply in the deathly silent basement.

"If we don't expand production, control costs, and sort out logistics, we'll just have to watch helplessly as other imitators emerge next month and steal our market share."

Fat Tony fell silent.

He picked up the folder and flipped through a few pages at random. Although he couldn't understand the complicated charts, he could see the thick stacks of invoices and contract copies.

Every penny has a destination.

He turned to look at the accountant.

The accountant had stopped sweating. He leaned over and quickly glanced at the accounts, his fear turning into surprise.

The accountant, who was in charge of the business, adjusted his glasses, his voice tinged with a hint of awe. "This...this is true. The purchase price of raw materials is indeed 20% lower than the market price. And if that production capacity forecast is correct, the profit margin next month will double."

"Double?" Fat Tony's eyebrows twitched.

"At least double," the accountant nodded confidently. "This is simply brilliant management."

Fat Tony looked at Victor.

Victor remained seated quietly, toying with the family ring in his hand, his eyes clear and resolute.

That look in his eyes wasn't the look of a petty swindler. It was the look of a leader.

a long time.

Fat Tony suddenly burst into laughter.

"Ha ha ha ha!"

Laughter echoed in the basement, making the light bulbs overhead shake.

He grabbed the gun from the table, tucked it back into his belt, then picked up the bottle of Louis XIII and poured some into Victor's teacup.

"Moat... I like that word." Fat Tony patted Victor on the shoulder, so hard he almost broke him. "You remind me of a young Meyer Lansky (the pioneer of gangster accountants). You've got brains, Victor, you fucking have brains."

Fat Tony pulled out his checkbook from his pocket, a tool he always carried to launder some "large sums of money".

He quickly wrote down a string of numbers, tore it off, and slapped it down in front of Victor with a "thud".

"I won't take that 500,000 in dividends. Here's another 500,000."

Fat Tony looked at Victor, his eyes no longer filled with murderous intent, but instead with fanatical greed and trust.

"Consider this additional investment. Buy those machines, fix those damn trucks. I want to see purple water sold in New York, sold in Washington!"

Victor looked at the check, a slight smile playing on his lips.

"make a deal."

Victor raised his teacup and lightly clinked it against the bottle in Fat Tony's hand.

"It's a pleasure working with you, Tony."