Chapter 7 No foundation
“One thousand?” Heinz’s voice instantly disappeared and he looked at Lewis in shock. He never expected that this fellow would actually give such a large number in a single breath.
Lewis revealed a faint smile, “What? You can’t do it?”
“Of course……” Heinz wanted to answer, but suddenly remembered that he didn’t have any decision in this matter. He quickly looked over at Xu Yi, signaling to him with his eyes, hoping that he would quickly agree to this.
What a joke! A thousand Magic Fans, based on the price of two gold coins, that was an entire two thousand gold coins!
Based on the 10% commission, he would earn two hundred gold coins just based on this one deal!
However, Heinz had another thought. If this Lewis directly looked for Xu Yi to make the order, he wasn’t involved in this matter at all, so of course he wouldn’t be able to take a commission.
Thinking of this, Heinz couldn’t help struggling between gains and losses.
Seeing Heinz’s reaction, Lewis instantly understood. The one with the power to make this decision was Xu Yi, this normal looking black haired youth, so he looked over at Xu Yi.
Xu Yi was thinking of something else. He slightly knit his brows and considered it for a bit before shaking his head in front of Heinz’s expectant eyes.
“I’m sorry, I’m afraid I can’t take this order.”
Lewis and Heinz were stunned. Lewis asked with a frown, “Why? Are you afraid that I can’t pay? If it’s like this, I can leave a deposit right now.” He took out a special looking light gold paper from his chest after saying this, “This is the Chimera Chamber of Commerce’s gold note, it can be used on the entire continent and it has a face value of one thousand gold coins. You can look it over.”
“Chimera Chamber of Commerce’s gold note!” Heinz couldn’t help calling out in shock.
The Chimera Chamber of Commerce was the Sines Continent’s largest chamber of commerce. It’s said that there are two large empires behind them, one of them being the Candra Empire’s royal family, who were incredibly strong. So, the gold notes they issued were common currency on the Sines Continent.
This middle aged man could actually casually take out a Chimera Chamber of Commerce’s gold note worth a thousand gold coins, it could be seen that he was quite rich. It was something that a trivial general store owner like Heinz was far from being able to compare to.
“That is not the reason.” Xu Yi was still unmoved, “I cannot accept your order mainly because of reasons with my side. This is because I cannot guarantee that I can manufacture one thousand Magic Fans in a short period of time and even if I force myself to finish, I can’t guarantee their quality.”
“Quality?” Lewis looked at Xu Yi with a bit of surprise, like he had found something interesting. His lips curled into a trace of a smile, “Then Mister Xu Yi, if I were to increase the price a bit, say two gold coins and ten silver coins per Magic Fan, what would you think?”
Heinz’s heart skipped a beat.
Adding ten gold coins per Magic Fan, although it didn’t seem like much, it was a full one hundred gold coins for a thousand fans!
Not to mention that according to the normal rules of business, when a large amount was ordered like Lewis was doing, it was normal to give a discount. Lewis right now was actually taking the initiative to increase the price, so his sincerity could be seen.
However, Xu Yi firmly shook his head, “Sorry, this is unrelated to price. The quality of the product is very important. If it can’t be ensured, a disaster could occur and I’m not willing to see that happen.”
“Disaster?” Lewis knit his brows, as if not understanding what Xu Yi meant.
Xu Yi revealed a smile, but he didn’t plan on replying.
It was not uncommon for problems caused by quality issues on earth, so he didn’t want to see this kind of problem appearing on the Sines Continent.
Perhaps it was impossible to avoid all the problems, but he would do his best.
This was a basic principle as a mechanical engineering master.
Seeing how firm Xu Yi was, Lewis let out a sigh. He took back the gold note, but took out another piece of paper of a different colour that also looked quite special to give to Xu Yi.
“Mister Xu Yi, meeting you is a happy occasion. This is my name card, please accept it.”
Xu Yi took the name card and looked over it. He noticed that there was only a name and a simple address on it, there was no other information on it at all.
This address was in the Lampuri Kingdom’s capital city, Anvilmar, but as for exactly where it was, Xu Yi didn’t know.
Although he had lived in the Lampuri Kingdom for three years now, he had never gone to Anvilmar once.
“If you ever change your mind, you can find me at that address at any time. Perhaps you will have something as novel as the Magic Fan in the future, I hope you can think of me first. I believe that we will definitely have a chance to cooperate in the future.”
Although this Lewis had an astute feeling coming from him that Xu Yi didn’t really like, whether it was his actions or his words, they made people unable to hate him. So, Xu Yi nodded, showing that he understood.
After Lewis left, Heinz took the name card from Xu Yi’s hand. After taking a glance, he called out in shock, “It’s actually Sloan Street! My god! He must be an incredible famous person!”
“Oh?” Xu Yi looked at Heinz with a curious gaze.
“You don’t know?” Heinz seemed to be very surprised with Xu Yi that he didn’t know about Sloan Street, “Sloan Street is where the large noble families of Anvilmar live. That Lewis wants you to go there to contact him, that means that he is definitely an important person who lives there!”
Xu Yi revealed a smile, not caring at all. It didn’t matter if this Lewis was an important character, he didn’t have a relationship with him right now.
What he needed to care about right now was not this. Although he had earned a profit of over four hundred gold coins from this first batch of Magic Fans and could be considered rich, that was only the first step. If he wanted to continue earning more profit, there were still many things he needed to do.
He didn’t accept Lewis’ order just now was because of the reason he mentioned. He couldn’t guarantee the production line of the Magic Fans.
The entire Magic Fan production line was him connecting the blacksmith and his coworkers together, it was in fact a non-standard production line. Because of this, any problem that occurred could affect production.
The biggest problem was the ten coworkers who were in charge of the Magic Array at the core of the Magic Fan.
The ten coworkers who had received the benefits of working with Xu Yi for a week, as long as Xu Yi continued to give them the same rewards, they would happily draw more Magic Arrays for him. However, this kind of cooperation was not stable, it could be cut off at any time by any sudden reasons that occur.
But when Xu Yi took out a contract in hopes of employing them, all of the coworkers rejected him without any exception.
Although they didn’t say anything, Xu Yi was very clear on the reason why they rejected him. It was completely because of their modesty and pride as magicians.
They didn’t have any problem helping Xu Yi draw a few Magic Arrays, it could be considered some extra income in their spare time.
But if it was signing a contract, to them, that meant becoming Xu Yi’s employee. To these magicians that were normally filled with pride, this was a very hard thing for them to accept.
Although Magic Fans had the word magic in their name and was related to magic, the Sines Continent didn’t focus on the application of magic. This work was no different from being a normal artisan, so naturally magicians would look down on it.
Other than that, the blacksmith shop’s side didn’t let Xu Yi feel assured.
Even if Xu Yi drew extensive blueprints when ordering the Magic Fan outer covers and labeled each part with careful details, there were still many parts of the outer cover that did not meet Xu Yi’s requirements.
If it wasn’t for the fact the technological requirement of the Magic Fan was not too serious, Xu Yi would have returned all these defective products and had them remake them.
Of course Xu Yi was very clear that this was him making excessive demands.
As a high level mechanical engineer from earth, Xu Yi was used to high tech machines from earth that didn’t differ from the requirements by even a single millimeter. But this was the Sines Continent, a mechanical world that had no foundations in technology at all. If he wanted to reach the same level of technology as on earth, that was of course a fool’s dream.
“Ai, such serious responsibilities.” Thinking of the problems that he faced, Xu Yi couldn’t help letting out a long sigh.
The next day, Xu YI went to the Magic Tower for work like normal.
Xu Yi’s status in the research laboratory was different compared to before. Although his magical power wasn’t any stronger, at least the ten coworkers that had worked with him and gained quite a bit of benefit from him were much more friendly to him compared to before.
When he walked into the lab, there were more people that greeted him.
Xu Yi responded to them with a smile. When he sat down in his spot, Wella suddenly came up from beside him and slapped the Magic Array blueprint in front of Xu Yi.
“Xu Yi, I have already thoroughly studied your Magic Array!”
Xu Yi looked up in a surprised manner, seeing that there was a very proud look on Wella’s face. He looked back down at the Magic Array blueprint on the table and noticed that it was the core Magic Array of the Magic Fans, the Revolving Wind Array.
But Wella had made put several notes on the blueprint, commenting on almost every node.
It was like Wella had said, based on the blueprint, she had thoroughly studied this Magic Array. Each annotation was very detailed and very easy to understand.
Even if it was someone who had just come in contact with magic, if they looked at this blueprint, they would completely understand all the changes Xu Yi had made to this Revolving Wind Array.
Xu Yi looked over it and felt his eyes cross. He suddenly looked up at Wella, “Hei, Wella, you really are good!”
Wella gave a soft snort and revealed a look of pride.
“But this is just a low level array, it’s not that hard to study it.”
Xu Yi laughed, obviously he wouldn’t fall for the obvious hole in Wella’s words. He raised the blueprint and asked, “Can you sell this blueprint to me?”
Wella was stunned, “What are you buying it for? Didn’t you make this array?”
Xu Yi gave a shrug, “I was just honoured that someone would make such detailed annotations to this array, so I wanted to take back this blueprint. How about it? Will you sell it to me? Give me a price.”
Wella looked at Xu Yi in surprise before casually waving her hand, “At least you know quality. Forget it, I’m not as blinded by money as you, a broken fan actually costs two gold coins. This blueprint isn’t worth anything, I’ll give it to you.”
Xu Yi laughed, “Then I’ll have to thank you.”
After saying this, he didn’t hesitate to put away the blueprint.
He really wanted to thank Wella. With this blueprint, it helped him solve a large problem.
If he wanted to teach people how to make this Magic Array in the future, he didn’t need to guide them that closely. He just needed to let them see this blueprint and they would understand most of it. It really saved him quite a bit of effort.
When he was about to focus on his work, the doors to the lab suddenly opened. Still quickly walked in and looked around the lab before her gaze locked onto Xu Yu.
“Xu Yi, come with me. Grandfather wants to see you.”
Chapter 8 Summoned by the Great Magician
After being in the Camilla Magic Tower for close to two months, this was actually Xu Yi’s first time entering the top of the Magic Tower.
When he stepped into Great Magician Camilla’s exclusive use area, a cool feeling immediately hit him. It made Xu Yi give an uncontrollable shiver and he almost gave a sneeze.
“It’s really good having a large scale Frost Array.” Xu Yi rubbed his nose before talking to Still in front of him with a smile.
“What? Are you envious?” Still looked back at Xu Yi with eyes filled with curiosity.
The Magic Fan Xu Yi had invented not long ago had made her surprised, but she never thought that her grandfather would suddenly summon him. Adding in the impression Xu Yi made on her on the first day, Still was quite interested in Xu Yi.
“Of course.” Xu Yi replied very naturally, “The seniors in the lab had secretly said many times that if there was a large scale Frost Array installed in the lab, everyone’s efficiency would increase by several times.”
Still laughed before saying while waving her hand, “That won’t happen. Grandfather is known for being poor, he doesn’t have the money to install a large scale Magic Array in each lab. Even this array here is only used on the hottest day, normally it’s only for decoration.”
Xu Yi somewhat understood this, but was still very curious.
“Young Miss Still, this isn’t normal, right? His excellency Camilla is still a Three Star Great Magician. Not mentioning anything else, just the set salary the kingdom gives him each year isn’t small, how could he be poor?”
“That’s because he spends more money than he receives.” Still gave a shrug and looked very helpless, “You only know that grandfather is a Great Magician and earns a large salary from the kingdom each year, but you don’t know how much magic research, especially high level magic research like grandfather does costs. He uses most of his income to buy magic materials and the rest is used for upkeeping the Magic Tower. His budget is actually quite tight.”
“It’s like this…..But I’ve heard that other Great Magicians are all very rich……”
“Are you trying to say that grandfather has no abilities in earning money?” Still rolled her eyes at Xu Yi, “Let me tell you, you can’t mention this in front of grandfather, otherwise he will be very angry.”
“No, no, no, of course I’m not thinking this. I’ve heard that his excellency Camilla has always been opposed to magicians focused on earning money……”
“There’s no choice, grandfather is just that stubborn.” Still let out a sigh, “I have urged him several times, but he always says that magicians should be focused on magic. Thinking about making money all day, they are simply shaming the name of magicians.”
Xu Yi nodded and said nothing else.
Great Magician Camilla reminded him of those scholars who focused on research, they also disdained doing business. They felt that the scent of money would corrupt their academic research.
Xu Yi did not like this kind of attitude. Sure the scent of commercialism would greatly affect academic research, but with the infusion of commercialism, it would raise their research funds, drastically improving their research environment. It would actually greatly increased the efficiency and progress of academic research.
There were many examples on earth of perfectly combined research and business. The two worked with each other and its effect was much greater than pure research.
Moreover, the mechanical engineering profession Xu Yi had was a science that focused on applications. If they couldn’t create commercial value in their practical application, it would be considered a failure.
“We’re here.” Still directly opened the door and signaled to Xu Yi to enter, “You can go in, grandfather is waiting.”
Xu Yi fixed his clothes and walked in with his head held high.
Great Magician Camilla’s private research lab took up the entire top floor of the Magic Tower, naturally it took up a very large area. It was at least four-five times larger than the lab Xu Yi worked in.
The arc ceiling of the lab was very high, with its highest point surpassing five meters. Looking around, this place seemed to be around the same size as a basketball field.
At the center of the space was a desk and sitting behind the desk was an old man with a deep blue robe and deep blue hair currently performing magical research.
This should be Great Magician Camilla.
Hearing that someone came in, Great Magician looked up. After seeing Xu Yi, he looked him over and nodded before lowering his head back down to continue his research.
Xu Yi was not surprised by this, he had already heard that Great Magician Camilla was obsessed with magical research. He must be immersed with some problem right now and wasn’t willing to stop.
During this time, Xu Yi looked around the lab.
The lab was much neater than he had expected. There were all kinds of strange magical technology placed according to groups by the walls. The only messy place was the desk Great Magician Camilla was currently sitting at.
There were strange marks on the wall and ground, which should have been left by Great Magician Camilla during his experiments.
Many of those marks were quite deep, it could be seen that the situation was very dangerous back then.
Xu Yi suddenly stopped at a corner where a pile of mangled iron was placed. However, Xu Yi could easily tell from looking at this pile of mangled iron that it was the first Magic Fan he made that Still bought from him.
Based on how tattered the Magic Fan was, it should have been destroyed by someone.
As for who broke it…...
Xu Yi looked back at Great Magician Camilla with a bit of surprise in his heart.
“Could it be that Great Magician Camilla is very interested in this Magic Fan? But the magic inside this thing is at a very low level, how could he care about something like that?”
Not long after, Great Magician Camilla seemed to have finished his research. After stretching his body, he directly stood up.
After looking at Xu Yi, Great Magician Camilla was a bit surprised like he had completely forgotten about Xu Yi.
After pausing for a bit, he finally nodded at Xu Yi, “You are Xu Yi?”
Xu Yi quickly gave a respectful bow, “Yes, that’s me. Respectful greetings to your excellency Great Magician.”
Great Magician Camilla waved his hand, “No need to be nervous. I had Still bring you over because I wanted to ask you a few questions.”
“Please ask your excellency. As long as I know it, I will definitely answer it.”
“Good.” Great Magician Camilla looked around and arrived at the mangled pile of iron Xu Yi had just seen, “I’ve heard Still say that you made this thing?”
“This……” Xu Yi looked at the Magic Fan that one couldn’t see the true form of anymore and awkwardly replied, “When I gave it to Young Miss Still, it didn’t look like this.”
“Don’t blame Still, I wanted to investigate it a bit, so it became like this.” Great Magician Camilla threw the Magic Fan to the side. He dug around in his desk and took out a blueprint, “Here, I was looking for you mainly because I was interested in the Magic Array you inscribed on the Magic Fan. There are some parts that I can’t understand, I hope you can explain them to me.”
Xu Yi was instantly filled with profound respect for Great Magician Camilla. As a Three Star Great Magician, he actually admitted that he didn’t understand some things to a fellow that hadn’t even passed the Magicians Guild’s certification exam. It could be seen that he was very serious about magic.
“Your excellency Camilly is too polite. I think there isn’t anything the Great Magician can’t understand about this Magic Array and the things you don’t understand should be unrelated to magic, right?”
Great Magician Camilla thought for a bit before shaking his head, “You can say it is unrelated, but you can’t say it is completely unrelated. Come, take a look, this place…..” Great Magician Camilla pointed at a part of the Magic Array, “I can understand that you changed this part to make the Magic Array’s revolving wind effect weaker, but I don’t understand why you did it. Could it be you don’t want the Magic Array to become stronger?”
Xu Yi took a look and immediately replied with a smile, “You’re completely right about this, this change does weaken the Magic Array. However, your excellency, this Magic Array is mainly used to provide power to the Magic Fan, so it doesn’t need to be that strong.”
Great Magician Camilla shook his head, “That’s not right, I’ve tested your Magic Fan. Although the wind blown out isn’t small, haven’t you thought that sometimes you might need a larger breeze? For example, my room is this big, if there was only a single Magic Fan, it can only blow wind in a very small part. It can’t satisfy my needs at all.”
Xu Yi spread his hand with a bitter smile, “Your excellency Camilla, I did consider this problem when designing the Magic Fan, but I was limited by the materials used for the Magic Fan. The fan blades can’t withstand such high speeds at this time. If the Magic Array’s power was increased, the fan blades would revolve faster, but the Magic Fan itself won’t be able to take it. You won’t be able to use it long before it breaks.”
“It’s like this……” Great Magician Camilla remembered the first time he injected magic into the Magic Fan. When the fan blades were quickly rotating, it couldn’t take it after using it for not long. It directly turned the Magic Fan into a pile of scrap iron, a matter that Still had complained about for a long time.
“Alright, leaving this question aside, what is with this place?”
“Oh, this. This is guarantee the Magic Array’s power was kept in a small area of fluctuation, guaranteeing that the wind blown out of the Magic Fan wouldn’t be too unstable.”
“Then what about this?”
“This is to combine it with the overall design of the Magic Fan. Look, this Magic Array is attached to the middle axle of the Magic Fan. If it wasn’t designed like this, the power released by the Magic Array will be greatly affected and it would waste the Magic Crystal.”
“Very good. There’s also this part……”