CHAPTER 67: BUSINESS, MAN.

"Hmm! I like your confidence. Maybe that’s the kind of confidence that attracts girls? You gotta teach me man. You should have seen the way the pretty girl beside our booth was screaming to talk to—OUCH! What was that for, Joanna?!" João screamed as Joanna stepped on his foot under the table.

"What are you talking about?" she asked, smiling and tilting her head to the left as if confused.

"Why did you step on me?!"

"I have no idea what you’re talking about; you must be imagining things."

Lukas did not say a word as he focused on his meal, unwilling to get dragged into the fight. He knew João had brought trouble on himself. "Who told you to say something you weren’t supposed to?"

* * *

Later that day, Lukas was sitting on the sofa in the living room of his Darmstadt home when Javi walked in and joined him.

"You said you had something to discuss with me?" Javi asked as he sat down beside Lukas.

"Yes, Dad. And I want you to trust me."

"Sure. What is it?"

"I want to create a company to invest my football earnings."

"Hmm... Sure. It’s your money, anyway. We can open up a trust for you or invest it in a safe, broad index fund."

"Yeah. But I want to occasionally be able to pick something to invest in," Lukas added.

Javi did not respond as he stared at his son for a few seconds.

"Are you being serious?" he finally asked.

"Yes, Dad. I need you to trust me. All normal investments will be handled by a professional management team safely, I just want to be able to occasionally pick investments."

"What do you know about finance, Luke?"

"Quite a bit, actually."

"Since when? Anyway, I’ll think about it. What do you wanna invest in?"

"Hmm... Let me think of something. You see the Tesla stock? It’s going to lose half of its current value by April."

"You don’t know what you’re talking about."

"Dad, let’s just create the management firm first. We’ll need it anyway. You can judge whether I know what I’m talking about when the time comes. The company shares will be held in trust by you until I turn 18."

After thinking for a while, Javi agreed. He knew they would need an investment firm to manage Lukas’s earnings. He had educated himself on things like sponsorship deals and image rights and knew that it would be more beneficial for an incorporated firm to handle all of that.

"Okay. How do you plan to go about it, though?"

"I spoke to Marco already. He recommended a friend of his based in London. He will be coming to Frankfurt on Monday and we can discuss it.

"Wait, you spoke to Marco before me?"

"C’mon, dad. I knew you’d accept. That’s how much I trusted you."

"Yeah right. Anyway, we’ll see what he says on Monday. If Marco introduced him, then he must be trust worthy."

"Thanks, Dad."

"I still never agreed on you picking stocks."

"Yes sir. I will convince you soon enough," Lukas responded as he stood up from the sofa and headed to his room.

[*Do you remember the financial stuff 2025? You’re from 20 years in the future, aren’t you?*] TT’s voice rang in Lukas’s head as he walked into his room and sat on his bed.

"I remember the big stuff. But that’s just me. Don’t you remember everything I’ve ever known? I watched a few finance YouTube channel videos recaps over the years. Surely there are a lot of things that was said in those videos that you remember?"

[*My goodness. How shameless can you get?*]

"If you can’t do it, just say you can’t."

[*I can. I just won’t.*]

"Sounds like excuses to me. You aren’t that different from ChatGPT after all. At least your memories are similar the way you both forget stuff."

[*2025: Liberation day tariffs crash and rebound, Trade Desk Inc crash. There are a lot I could name.*]

"I knew I could always count on you."

[*Hmph... Don’t ever underestimate me*]

"Yeah, yeah, sure," Lukas responded as he lay down on the bed to get some rest. "Still got a lot of school work to cover. TT why can’t I take a book into the LTC? I could do my school work in there!"

[*Unfortunately you can’t bring anything in the real world with you. *]

"Hmm... At least I can do a bulk of the thinking in there. Since there’s a stereo system, I’m gonna assume there’s a laptop in there. And since you made me pay for Spotify, I will also assume there is internet connection in there."

[*I can not confirm nor deny your statements. You can check by yourself the next time you are in the LTC.*]

* * *

Monday evening around 6pm.

Lukas had just finished freshening up from the ’light’ training session of the evening. He had spent the whole of the weekend catching up on his school assignments which he turned in that morning. He was able to study and do research in the LTC, but he still had to come to the real world to write down anything on a piece of paper.

The training session after school was, contrary to what coach Toppmöller had initially promised them, anything but ’light.’

By the 30th minute of the session, majority of the players were sprawled on the floor dying to catch one deeper breath of fresh air to regulate their heartbeat.

Toppmöller made them sprint 10 sets around the pitch immediately after warm-ups. He called it "kick starting the heart." Larrson, however, had a simpler name for it — torture.

The training was now over, though, and the players were gradually leaving the facility. Lukas stepped outside the ProfiCamp gate and walked towards where the cars were parked.

"Hey, Lukas. Are you done with today’s training? How was it?" Marco asked as he saw his client walk up to the car he was leaned up against.

"Marco. It was hell. I think Toppmöller was trying to see who’d die first on the team."

"Hahaha... I’m sure it won’t be you, anyway."

"Definitely not," Lukas replied with a smile. He then looked around the parking lot. "Where’s my dad."

"He’s waiting at the café with Henry. They are waiting for us."

Javi had been introduced to Henry Thompson, the financier, by Marco when he arrived. Lukas was already in training at the time, though, so he hadn’t met him yet.

"Let’s go then," Lukas said as he stepped into Marco’s vehicle.

The bells chimed as they opened the door to the café. At the table located at the far corner of the almost empty café, was Javi in conversation with a blonde-haired who looked to be in his late 30s to early 40s.

Lukas and Marco walked over to the table and joined them.

"You’re here?" Javi asked as they sat down.

"Yeah, sorry for running late. The session took longer than I thought it’d take."

"It’s alright. It gave me a chance to get to know Mr. Henry even better."

"Lukas," Marco said, "this is Henry Thompson, he is a very trusted and capable friend of mine. He currently runs an investment advisory firm London." He then turned to Henry, "Henry this is the Lukas Brandt I told you about. He’s going to be the best player in history."

Lukas stood and raised his hands towards Henry. "It’s nice to meet you Mr. Thompson, I have heard a lot of things about you from Marco."

"Likewise. Please just call me Henry, Mr. Thompson sounds too formal," Henry replied as he took Lukas’s hand in a firm handshake.

"Alright, Henry."

"I’ve known Marco for almost ten years. He is the biggest Messi fan I have ever seen. To hear him say you’ll be the greatest footballer in history, I had to come see for myself."

"And what is your opinion so far?"

"From what I’ve researched, you’ve definitely had a great start to your career all the way from the 4th tier to, currently, the Bundesliga. I am intrigued."

"Thanks for the compliment. I see you’ve met my father."

"Yes. Javi and I were just discussing my qualifications and how I could be of value to your budding career."

Lukas turned to look at Javi who seemed to be in deep thought about the content of his conversation with Henry.

"I graduated from Warwick university 15 years ago with a degree in Economics. I then worked for Barclays Wealth for 10 years before I decided to retire and start my own investment advisory firm.

I have a CISI Diploma in Wealth Management and I believe I will be a very good fit to help you as your finances grow."

"With someone with your background and experience, for sure you’ll be able to get far better clients. I’m just starting my career and I’m not sure the amount of money under management would be worth your time," Lukas said, a bit confused.

"I’m placing a bet," Henry said as he stared directly at Lukas.

A/N: Our boy can’t just be the best footballer in history, he’s gotta be the richest too!

Missed some Chapters. Had a horrible headache yesterday and couldn’t write at all. Hope you’re all having a wonderful weekend. Thanks to all the privilege subscribers. You guys are the best.

-Writ.