Chapter 14 The Untouchable Sparksville

• Mitchel looked at the two figures in the director's office. His eyes filled with hatred and his fists clenched tightly.
• "Your office is mine, Austin. Your woman too.. One day, I will take them all back."
• Although Mitchel was burning with anger, he had yet to find a chance to strike at Austin.
• Mitchel returned to his office in a glum mood. He received a call soon after from his assistant and his face instantly brightened up. He leaped from his chair excitedly. His assistant informed him that Sparksville would be demolished.
• It was a piece of great news. He immediately went to inform Old Mrs. Brigham. Old Mrs. Brigham wasted no time in calling for a meeting after learning about the news.
• Before long, the Brigham Corporation's meeting room was once again filled with members of the Brigham family and the company executives.
• The demolishing of Sparksville was a huge undertaking and it would affect the future of the corporation, so they could not afford to be careless and negligent.
• "What's up with Sparksville, Shawn? Why did the authorities suddenly decide to call for its demolition?" asked Old Mrs. Brigham. Seated in the middle of the crowd, she looked at Shawn with a serious expression. Shawn was the manager for the demolition department that was in charge of the demolition project. Naturally, he knew what was going on.
• "They want to merge two cities and plan to implement numerous sieges moving forward, so the authority are planning to build a bridge. Sparksville sits on the perfect location for the bridge. It's a shoal with a shallow layer of silt and gentle currents. So in order for the bridge to be built, Sparksville needs to go." shared Shawn.
• Merging two cities would definitely require roads and bridges to be paved and many buildings to be demolished.
• "The folks living in Sparksville are among the wealthiest in Fairville. Will they agree to the demolition?" asked Old Mrs. Brigham.
• It must be said even the Brigham family was considered unqualified to take up residence in Sparksville, so one could see how influential and wealthy the folks who lived there were. However, it was one of Old Mrs. Brigham's dreams to be able to live in Sparksville.
• Paving roads and building bridges were efforts to benefit the future generation.They were viewed positively and were an accepted trend of development. However, the same sentiment might not be shared by the residents of Sparksville. Their houses in Sparksville were symbols of power and prestige, there was no way they were going to allow anyone to take that away from them.
• "The issue is not whether they will agree to it, grandma," said Mitchel as he stood up.
• If things were to go as planned, as long as all the residents agreed to the demolition and signed the demolition contract, the Brigham Corporation could send in their excavators without much fanfare and raze the place to the ground.
• "Are you saying there will be other issues?" asked Old Mrs. Brigham in a perplexed tone.
• "Grandma, we cannot afford to offend the folks in Sparksville. Even though the authorities have planned for this demolition, we are taking the lead on this. Those rich folks may not dare to speak against the authority, but against the Brigham family and Brigham Corporation? That's a different story altogether. If we proceed with the plan, there's no doubt that we will piss off most of the rich folks in Sparksville." said Mitchel.
• As he laid everything out on the table, he kept his eyes on Austin. From the look on his face alone, Austin knew that Mitchel was yet again trying to paint a target on him.
• Daniel understood what Mitchel meant and said in a serious tone, "If these tycoons focus their anger on the family and the Brigham Corporation, then we are done for,"
• "The Brigham Corporation isn't even on the Top Ten list in the real estate industry of Fairville, how are we to stand against these tycoons?" remarked a manager.
• "In other words, if we tear down Sparksville, we'll draw the ire of the wealthy folks living there?"
• Hearing that, Old Mrs. Brigham realized the gravity of the situation they were in. She started panicking when she considered the consequence that entailed. If they drew the ire of the rich folks in Sparksville, the Brigham family and the Brigham Corporation would be doomed.
• She expected the contract that Austin signed with Mr. Sawyer would be the launchpad for the Brigham Corporation's rise to the top, instead they ended up with such a sticky and tough project. It meant that the Brigham family, or rather, the Brigham Corporation, might be put in a very disadvantageous position because of that project.
• Putting aside the issue of whether they could take over Sparksville, the signing of that contract meant that they were about to offend the influential families in Sparksville. It was too late for them to void the contract now as they were not able to afford the liquidated damages that would be incurred from doing that. On top of that, they would also draw the ire of the authority.
• No matter how they try to navigate around the issue, the project turned out to be such a hot potato for the corporation.
• It would be a pity to abandon the project at that point, but it was also an extremely sticky situation to deal with head on.
• "You have brought a disaster to the family and the Brigham Corporation, Austin! You good-for-nothing fool!" said Leah coldly while glaring at Austin.
• Hearing Leah's words, the rest of the Brigham family members immediately turned their heads towards Austin and stared at him. The initial celebratory mood in the room instantly vanished. Let alone dreaming about making a huge fortune, now they were not even sure if they could keep the rice bowls they currently had in their hands.
• With all that happened, Mitchel was not done yet, he came prepared. He threw a stack of documents on the conference table and stared at Austin with a triumphant look.
• He asked coldly, "Do you know who are the big wigs that live in the thirty villas in Sparksville, Austin?"
• Austin had been paying attention to Sparksville for a long time, there was nothing that he did know of the place. But seeing how smug Mitchel was, Austin decided to not fan the flame and allowed him to continue.
• Mitchel was not aware that he was but a clown on the stage. He assumed that Austin was ignorant and was stumped by his question, so he got even more excited and became full of himself.
• "In Villa No. 23 lives the Swanson family, the industry giant of Fairville." announced Mitchel.
• "What? The Swanson family? Hey, their capabilities are out of this world and their playing field is way beyond our reach." exclaimed an executive of the Brigham family. The faces of the others in the room grew sullen.
• "That's not all, there's Villa No. 17. There lives the Crowe family, founder of the Ashcrown Consortium." sneered Mitchel. The real estate industry was a lucrative one, but the Brigham family was only regarded as a mid-tier nouveau riche at best. The Crowe family of the Ashcrown Consortium, on the other hand, had a long and storied history. They had a hand in almost all of the major department stores and supermarkets in Fairville.
• "My goodness, how can we demolish that place? Who would dare to do that?" said another executive as his face turned glum.
• "Villa No. 12, the Cromwell family."
• "Villa No.9 belongs to Mr. Johnson."
• One by one, members of the Brigham family fell silent as Mitchel read out the names of the residents in Sparksville. Many of them could be seen falling into despair.
• Of course, it was not surprising at all that they would lose heart. If Brigham dared to make a move on Sparksville, any of these big wigs could pull strings behind-the-scenes and ensure that the Brigham family was cut off and left helpless. If that happened, the Brigham family would be the one being razed to the ground instead of Sparksville.
• "This contract is not fair at all! Does Mr. Sawyer have a grudge against us? It's clear that he wanted to dupe us with this!"
• "No, we absolutely cannot do this. If we offend so many of these big wigs, we'll definitely be buried alive before we know it. These hidden powers are not to be trifled with!"
• "What about Austin? He's the walking disaster that wrought this disaster upon our family!"
• "He shouldn't have signed that contract in the first place. Now that the contract is signed, we can't afford to offend both parties. Those influential families would definitely hold a grudge against us once they find out we signed such a contract."
• Members of the Brigham family in the room started to grumble, and even the company executives frowned at the new development. They had completely forgotten who were the ones that were in a hurry to sign the contract. Of course, even if some of them remembered, they would rather feign ignorance than to admit it.
• Someone needed to take the fall for this, and it was definitely not them.
• They did not dare to point their fingers at Old Mrs. Brigham or Mitchel, so Austin was naturally the only target left for them.
• In comparison, some of the senior department managers present were very calm. They stayed silent but their faces were strained and their minds were busy at work. They did not care about the fate of the Brigham Corporation, what they cared about was whether their interests were affected by that whole episode.