Chapter 5 : taste of wealth
"I'll top up 100 million," he said casually, as if mentioning the weather or the color of the carpets.
For a heartbeat, the lobby seemed to freeze. The receptionist's pen hovered mid-air, and her practiced smile faltered for the briefest moment. Her fingers twitched slightly as she steadied herself. "H-hundred million, sir?" she asked, voice carefully measured, betraying only the tiniest trace of disbelief.
"Yes." Adrian's tone remained effortless, calm, and unshakable.
The receptionist quickly pressed a discreet button under the counter, picking up the phone and speaking in hushed tones. Within moments, a soft click announced a call had been placed. "Madam… we have an unusual request at the front desk. Yes, it's a top-up… 50 million."
A few minutes later, a woman in her mid-thirties appeared, moving with poise and understated authority. Her hair was dark, tied neatly at the nape of her neck, and her eyes, sharp and intelligent, seemed to measure Adrian without intrusion. She extended a hand gracefully.
"Good evening, sir. I'm Vivienne Hartley, the hotel manager. I've been informed of your request," she said, her voice smooth but carrying a note of genuine intrigue.
Adrian inclined his head. "Please, process it."
Vivienne nodded, the professional mask in place, though her eyes betrayed a flicker of curiosity. She gestured subtly to the receptionist, who began the transaction under her watchful eye.
The lobby did not erupt in whispers, but the shock radiated in subtle ways. The receptionist's hands trembled as she typed in the numbers; Vivienne's smile was impeccable, but her lips pressed slightly tighter than necessary, a faint bead of tension forming at her temple. Attendants moved like clockwork, but the corners of their eyes betrayed quick, discreet glances toward Adrian, then each other, as if silently confirming that this was, indeed, real.
One attendant leaned slightly toward another, whispering just softly enough for a private ear to catch: When did someone like this appear in our city? Even our richest members rarely spend like this…
The transaction completed, the receptionist spoke again, voice carefully professional. "Top-up confirmed, sir." Her hands lingered over the counter for a second longer, reluctant to let go of the pen. Vivienne's smile remained polite, but a subtle arch of her eyebrow hinted at her astonishment.
Vivienne Hartley had been the lobby manager of The Imperial Crown Hotel for over four year.She had seen a lot of rich people and she had also seen a lot of them with a net worth of billions to tens of billions of dollars. After all, the people who could enter this place would at least be worth something.
But even among the rich people that come here few had the audacity to casually top up 100 million dollars at a single stroke. Whoever could do this was no ordinary billionaire—this was someone whose net worth likely stretched into the tens of billions.
Although the people on the World's Billionaires were top-ranked celebrities who were worth tens of hundreds of billions, after Vivienne got into this circle, she learned that there were many invisible rich people in this world. The ones on the World's Billionaires list might not even make up 1% of the actual figure.
Most of the rich people were very low-key, and this one in front of her was obviously one of them. Furthermore, he was definitely one of the richest ones.
He was so young, so he was definitely the superb son of an invisible family.
To be honest, when she first saw Adrian , Vivienne looked down on him. The clothes on his body might not even be worth 200 dollars in total. There were so many people like that on the street.
When the front desk said that Adrian wanted to top up 100 million into his membership card, Vivienne immediately figured Adrian had to be here to pull a prank on them.
However, because of her professionalism, she still cautiously entertained Adrian and even let him pay. She even wanted to see how Adrian would act when the payment failed. Besides, she was ready to call
the security at any moment, but she did not expect the payment to go through. This showed that she really could not judge a book by its cover.
Vivienne had already got into contact with the upper-class and she yearned incessantly for that status. She even dreamed about becoming one of them
Even though a lot of nouveau riches hinted at her, Vivienne not interested in those chubby nouveau riches. Besides, most of them only wanted her body, and from what she knew, those people who hinted at her were not really rich. They were all tactless and impulsive fake nouveau riches.
She hoped to be favored by a real nobleman. These people were mostly very low profile and this young man in front of her was obviously one of the best among them. He did not even bat an eyelid when he topped up 100 million dollars into his meal ticket.
This person fit her requirements. He was young, rich, and low profile.
So, she decided to aligning on him and decided that this would be the best chance for her to turn her life around. She could not miss this chance. Furthermore, she was very confident in her own qualifications
After Vivienne came back to her senses, she said to Adrian , "Sir, please show us your identification card. I'll help you with the membership procedures."
Adrian handed his identification card to Vivienne.
To be honest, he could already see the other party was just being perfunctory.
They did not even ask for his identification, so how would they register a membership for him? It was clear that they did not believe he would top up 100 million dollars since they only asked for his identification after the payment went through.
However, Adrain did not care. He had been looked down on for the past 20 years. Plus, the other party was pretty nice about it. If this was somewhere else, he might have already been kicked out by security.