The bell above the pawnshop door chimed with a flat metallic note as Alexander pushed it open.
Inside, the air was heavy with mildew and old smoke. Bamboo shelves groaned under the weight of clocks, patched radios, chipped porcelain bowls, strings of jade beads, and watches that once glimmered on proud wrists but now lay stacked like fallen soldiers. The old pawnbroker squinted from behind his tarnished counter, his glasses hanging crooked on the bridge of his nose.
Alexander's heart thudded. He had been here before—on errands with his older brother. But this time was different. This wasn't childish curiosity. This was reconnaissance.
Because in Hong Kong of 1978, pawnshops were more than dusty stores. They were banks for the desperate, stock exchanges for the poor, and vaults where fortunes changed hands in whispers.
And for Alexander, they were a doorway into the next level of his plan.
He had brought with him a single silver necklace. His mother would not miss it—she kept several, cheap ones bought in markets years ago. This one was plated, not true silver, but enough to test a theory.
He placed it carefully on the counter. "How much?"
The pawnbroker picked it up, squinting. "Cheap stuff. Twenty dollars, pawn value."
Alexander nodded, face blank. He knew the worth—likely bought for sixty, could resell for eighty. But the number didn't matter. What mattered was the process: how interest worked, how pawn notes could be traded like currency themselves, and how desperate sellers sometimes returned too late, losing goods worth ten times what they'd borrowed.
"I'll think about it," Alexander replied softly, taking the necklace back.
The pawnbroker chuckled dryly. "Little boys don't think about money."
Alexander's lips curled in a secret smile. If only you knew how much I think.
He wandered slowly along the crowded shelves, eyes scanning. Radios stacked in rows. Cameras that once captured family happiness. Jade rings. Old coins.
To a casual visitor, it was junk. To Alexander, it was an uncut ledger of lives—collateral from people's desperation, waiting to be flipped by shrewd hands.
His gaze froze on a small pouch labeled 999 Gold – 1 Tael. The red tag scrawled: $1,800 HKD.
His chest tightened. One tael of gold—just over 37 grams.
In 2025, he remembered, gold prices soared far beyond imagination, peaking during financial crises. This single pouch was a seed of something timeless—an asset untouchable by inflation, political collapse, or stock crashes.
And here it lay in a dingy shop, treated like any other pawned trinket.
Alexander pressed the thought down, reminding himself he only had fifty dollars saved from schoolyard trading. A fraction of what was needed. But now he had seen it. Now he knew the path.
On his way out, his eye caught something else: a stack of watches, some broken, some scratched. The pawnbroker leaned over. "These, ten dollars each. Maybe still work. Sellable if polished."
Alexander's mind raced. Watches had always fascinated schoolboys. Owning one—even a cheap, battered model—signaled prestige. He pictured selling them through his "network," presented not as junk but as rare foreign timepieces.
"I'll take one," he said quietly, sliding a coin across the counter.
The old man raised an eyebrow, surprised, but shrugged. "Suit yourself."
As Alexander stepped into the evening street, the watch clutched in his hand, he fought a smile. His first real purchase outside school. His first taste of turning scrap into asset.
The next day at school, while most boys chattered about football, Alexander casually laid the watch on his desk. The cracked face still glittered faintly when it caught the sunlight.
Instantly, whispers spread.
"Eh, Ah Lek got a watch!"
"Where did you get that? Foreign brand?"
"Can I try it on?"
Alexander shrugged, feigning indifference. "Not for children. But if you really want… I could sell. Fifteen dollars."
The boy who had bought gum last week fumbled for coins. "I'll pay!"
The watch changed wrists. Alexander pocketed a five-dollar profit overnight. More importantly, curiosity in his classmates' eyes deepened. Gum was snack. Candy was forgettable. But a watch—that was a symbol, something that whispered status in the corridors.
For them it was novelty. For Alexander, it was proof: pawned goods could be sourced cheap, then turned into high-margin sales even among children. Arbitrage. Another word scribbled in his coded diary that night.
But not all eyes were blind.
That evening, as Alexander fumbled with coins hidden in his sock, his father entered unexpectedly. His sharp eyes narrowed at the little pile of nickels and dollar bills on the desk.
"Where you get so much money?" the man demanded.
Alexander froze. His mind raced. Telling the full truth—that he was running a micro-syndicate—was impossible. His father would beat him for shaming the family.
"I… I saved lunch money," Alexander mumbled. "Didn't buy snacks."
His father scowled, skeptical. "No child saves this much from rice and noodles."
Alexander swallowed. Then inspiration struck. "Papa… sometimes I help classmates with homework. They give me some coins."
The suspicion eased slightly. His father sighed, shaking his head. "Better you study hard, not think of money all day. Tailors live by honest work, not tricks."
Alexander lowered his gaze obediently. "Yes, Papa."
Inside, though, he burned. Honest work alone was a trap; he had seen too many like his father ride needles and thread to their graves. But if it keeps suspicion off me, I'll play the obedient student a little longer.
Later in bed, the incident haunted him. Already, he was attracting attention at home. And that was dangerous.
If a father could suspect coins, then how would teachers react to whispers of candy trades? How would police treat a boy entangled with pawnshops?
He scribbled fiercely in his notebook:
Law: My empire must be invisible. Public = weakness. Shadow = strength.
Rule: Never let family see true profits. Must disguise as chores, tutoring, silly side jobs.
Principle: Wealth must flow quietly, silently, like water under stone.
He paused, staring at the words until the pencil smudged his fingers black.
This was perhaps the most important law yet.
The week passed in a blur of minor victories. Pawned watches flipped for modest profits. Gum supplies stabilized as Fai's cousin returned with a new shipment, and loyalties among his little sellers grew stronger.
But Alexander's mind was drifting further ahead. He spent nights staring at the ceiling, hearing echoes of the harbor outside, and dreaming not of sweets or watches, but of land.
In two years, he knew with crushing certainty, the barren border town of Shenzhen would be transformed into a Special Economic Zone. Land worth dirt today would, in the 1990s, be paved into gold.
Fifty dollars was nothing. Even five hundred meant little. But with time, patience, and silence, the piles would grow. By then, he could funnel them north, convert children's coins into titles and deeds.
The thought made his chest ache with excitement. 1978 is only the preface. The real war begins in 1980.
Lying under his thin blanket, he turned one coin over and over in his palm, letting the edge cut faintly into his skin. Not enough to bleed—just enough to remind him what it was.
One coin, one scratch. One coin today could become ten tomorrow, a hundred next year.
But only if he stayed invisible. Only if he played the long game.
He whispered, so quietly not even the night could hear:
"Pawnshops, watches, candy—they're just the first stones. The real wall is still to build. And I… I shall be the mason."
His eyes closed at last, drifting into restless dreams not of playgrounds or comics, but of rising towers, construction cranes, and a city yet unborn across the border.