Chapter 167 Mysterious cargo
Ankhto revealed a bright smile, “What? Why can’t it be me?”
Cantona looked at the motorcade behind him and was confused, “It’s just sending a few goods, but you actually came, isn’t this strange? Then again, these are agricultural magic machines, how is it related to the manager of the household magic machine department?”
“Because this time it isn’t just agricultural magic machines, there are some other things.” Ankhto replied with a smile.
“No wonder.....I felt it was strange. Although three hundred agricultural magic machines are a lot, there’s no need for this many transport Magic Cars. So there are other things.” Cantona looked at Ankhto and asked, “What? Did chairman Xu send you here to sell household magic machines in the Stantine Duchy?”
Ankhto gave Cantona a thumbs up, “Smart. Sir chairman had me come this time to bring household magic machines over and open up the Stantine Duchy market. How about it? You’ve been in the Stantine Duchy for a while, you should be familiar with this place, right? Do you have any suggestions?”
Cantona shook his head with a bitter smile, “I feel that chairman Xu and you will be disappointed. The people of the Stantine Duchy are very poor and there aren’t many people who can afford household magic machines.”
Ankhto didn’t look disappointed as he said with a faint smile, “This isn’t anything, the people of Banta City also couldn’t afford household magic machines a few years ago. But now every household in Banta City is filled with household magic machines. The people of the Stantine Duchy can’t afford it now, but that doesn’t mean they can’t afford it in the future.”
Cantona couldn’t help smiling, “Was this what chairman Xu said?”
“Right, sir chairman told me this before I left.”
“Chairman Xu is also confident, I admire him very much.” Cantona said with a nod.
“But sir chairman’s confidence has never been blind, right?” Ankhto said.
Cantona thought about it before laughing. He didn’t discuss this any longer as he looked over the motorcade before moving to the side.
“No matter what, let’s let the motorcade go in to rest. You came all the way here from Banta City, it must have been very hard. I’ve already had people prepare a meal, so first fill your stomachs.”
“Alright.” Ankhto replied with a smile. He waved at the motorcade behind him and the powerful Magic Cars moved past the two of them, heading into the farm.
When the final Magic Car passed by Cantona, Cantona looked inside and was surprised to find that sitting in the passenger seat was the leader of the human Frestech Chamber of Commerce guards.
“Why is he also here?” Cantona was even more confused.
Although the Frestech Chamber of Commerce had several hundred guards, these guards weren’t weak. Hart was the leader of three hundred human guards and could be considered in a high place in the Frestech Chamber of Commerce, so he wouldn’t easily leave it.
When he came out as a guard before, it was because Xu Yi had tagged along or they were transporting important cargo.
Xu Yi wasn’t here this time, but he still came.
This meant.....there was something important among the cargo?
But this motorcade only had some normal agricultural magic machines and some household magic machines, what was important about it?
When Cantona was about to ask Ankhto, Ankhto softly patted his shoulder and he had a ghost of a smile.
“Chairman Cantona, there are some things that you shouldn’t ask, so don’t ask them.”
Cantona’s heart filled with a chill. He quickly nodded with a few dry laughs before leading Ankhto into the Frestech Farm.
After a while, the motorcade entered the living area at the center of the farm. However, only the first half of the motorcade stopped and over ten Magic Cars didn’t slow down at all as they headed to the sea.
Cantona was doubtful, but remembering Ankhto’s warning, he could only keep this down. He began seriously entertaining Ankhto and the motorcade that was left.
The motorcade that Ankhto brought didn’t just have a large amount of agricultural magic machines for reclaiming land and household magic machines to sell in the Stantine Duchy, there were also a large amount of everyday goods.
According to Ankhto, Xu Yi told him to bring these, which could be considered a New Years present for all the workers at the Frestech Farm.
Seeing the rich goods in the truck, Cantona couldn’t help giving a sigh.
Chairman Xu really considered everything. Although he was far away in Banta City, he didn’t forget these details.
There were a lot of goods, but it didn’t cost that much. However, there was no doubt that it would increase favorability of the Frestech Chamber of Commerce workers that were here.
Although Cantona had already considered giving Cantona Chamber of Commerce workers gifts, the Cantona Chamber of Commerce couldn’t transport goods as well as the Frestech Chamber of Commerce. He could only buy some local Stantine Duchy goods which couldn’t compare to the things from Banta City.
But compared to this, the thing that Cantona cared the most about were the ten Magic Cars that had gone away.
Ankhto was acting this mysteriously and adding in the fact that chief Hart was the one in charge of escorting them, just what kind of goods were in those Magic Cars......
Cantona suddenly had a guess and his heart was shocked. He couldn’t help looking at the sea with eyes filled with shock.
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The ten Magic Cars went at a moderate speed until they came to the sea and stopped by the wharf.
This steel wharf wasn’t complete right now, but the finished part could allow some ships to enter from the sea.
Hart jumped down from the Magic Car and looked up, finding several dark spots on the sea quickly approaching.
“It seems like they’re on time.” Hart nodded and moved towards a middle aged man who came out of a building on the wharf.
“Hello chief Hart.” The middle aged man revealed a very friendly smile and gave a strong shake of Hart’s hand, “I’ve already waited here for two days.”
He looked at the motorcade behind Hart after saying this and kept praising, “These are the Magic Cars developed by the Frestech Chamber of Commerce? They really are more powerful than horse carriages. I thought that it would take you several days to come from Banta City, but I never thought it would only take two days. This really surpassed my expectations.”
Hart looked at him and said with an emotionless look, “If mister Anklo was here, he wouldn’t be surprised.”
The middle aged man revealed an awkward smile, “I am naturally not as experienced as mister Anklo. This is my first time seeing a Magic Car, I’m a bit surprised.”
“You’ll get used to it in the future.” Hart went to the sea and pointed at the dark spots, “Those should be your boats, right?”
The middle aged man quickly nodded, “Right, right, we saw your motorcade arrive, so I already gave the signal. I ask chief Hart to wait a few minutes, they will be here soon.”
Hart nodded and came to the wharf with the middle aged man, watching those dark spots approach.
The middle aged man kept talking to Hart and Hart gave him a short and concise answer each time. The man felt helpless and stopped talking, as the two waiting in silence.
After around twenty minutes, those dark spots approached and they were thirty boats that were commonly seen in the Stantine Duchy.
Although they were boats, they weren’t as big as the boats that sailed on the Sandy River. Rather they were smaller, with each boat being less than ten meters long and three meters wide, they were all small boats.
Seeing these small boats, Hart couldn’t help shaking his head.
The middle aged man on the side noticed this and asked, “What is it? Chief Hart, is there a problem?”
Hart asked with a frown, “These boats are too small, how will you transport the goods back?”
The middle aged man laughed, “You don’t need to worry about this. Although these boats are small, it’s quite easy for us to transport the goods in these ten Magic Cars.”
Hart nodded and didn’t ask anything. He went to the boats by the wharf and bumped into Anklo who had just gotten out.
“Chief Hart, hello.” Anklo wasn’t as excited at that middle aged man, but how he kept looking at the Magic Cars showed the trace of anxiety in his heart.
Hart and Anklo shook hands before he pointed at the Magic Cars, “The things have been transported. Mister Anklo, please inspect the goods.”
Anklo didn’t hold back at all as he came to the Magic Cars with Hart. He went into the back of one of the Magic Cars and lifted up the cloth.
With just a look, Anklo couldn’t help taking a deep breath.
Under the cloth were weapons that let out a bright and cold glow.
Just based on the glow of these weapons, he knew that they were of splendid quality. They far surpassed the normal goods that could be bought from a blacksmith in the cities.
As for the standard weapons of the Stantine Duchy, they couldn’t compare to these weapons at all.
Anklo just took a look and immediately pulled down the cloth. He turned to Hart and found that Hart was very calm, not moved at all.
“I was excited about these weapons, but in chief Hart’s eyes, these are just normal things.” Anklo secretly gave a sigh before looking over the other Magic Cars with Hart.
The first seven Magic Cars were filled with weapons and armours and in the eighth and ninth Magic Cars, they were filled with large amounts of Magic Repeating Crossbows and arrow boxes.
Seeing these Magic Repeating Crossbows, Anklo became more excited.
He knew the might of these Magic Repeating Crossbows. If they had these Magic Repeating Crossbows, as long as they had enough arrows, their enemies couldn’t approach them.
When he came to the final Magic Car that Hart personally escorted, when Anklo pulled back the cloth, his breath couldn’t help stopping.
Chapter 168 No alternative
Looking at the scattered steel pieces that formed an unknown machine under the cloth, Anklo’s complicated expression returned to normal in the end. He turned back to Hart and gave a nod, “Chief Hart, please express my gratitude to chairman Xu. He is helping us this much, I will forever remember this in my heart.”
Hart said without any expression, “Chairman Xu told me before leaving that this is just a very normal transaction, everyone is getting what they want.”
Anklo was surprised. After pausing for a bit, he knit his brows as he pointed at the scattered pieces and asked, “But I have a question. Chief Hart, why do the parts of the Magic Trebuchet look this small? If they are assembled, wouldn’t it be much smaller?”
“This is our company’s second generation Magic Trebuchet. Although it is much smaller than the first generation, it isn’t weaker and is rather stronger, so it is a bit stronger compared to the first generation Magic Trebuchet. Moreover, because it is smaller, it is easier to carry. Look, we only needed one Magic Car to transport it over.” Hart explained.
“It’s like this.” Anklo looked at the parts of the Magic Trebuchet and still had some questions, “But how do we assemble this thing together? We don’t have anyone for that.”
Hart took out a small book from his chest for Anklo.
“There’s the assembly instructions for the Magic Trebuchet on this and it also includes the main maintenance parts for the Magic Repeating Crossbows, as well as the armours and weapons. After you finish transporting these things, you have to study them. Otherwise, if it breaks because you didn’t maintain it, our company won’t provide any repair services.”
Anklo took the small book and didn’t read it as he kept asking, “Chief Hart, why didn’t you just provide a technical personnel to guide us on these things? Wouldn’t that be more convenient?”
Hart shook his head, “Sir chairman said that this is simply a transaction between our two sides. If we send people, it will be interfering in the internal affairs of your Stantine Duchy. He felt that mister Anklo wouldn’t be willing to see that.”
Anklo was silent for a bit before giving a slight nod.
“Chairman Xu had considered everything, but......” Anklo looked at the ten Magic Cars and said with a bitter smile of self ridicule, “Actually, this is equivalent to you participating......”
Hart was silent.
Anklo was quite for a bit before taking a deep breath and regained his energy.
“Alright, chief Hart, I have confirmed these goods and now we’ll do the trade.”
Hart nodded and took out a list of the cargo for Anklo. After Anklo had confirmed it, he gave Hart a signed contract.
This contract was to give an iron mine and a Magic Crystal mine in Anklo’s territory to the Frestech Chamber of Commerce.
According to the contract, the Frestech Chamber of Commerce would have the rights to exploit these mines forever.
In other words, this iron and Magic Crystal mine was completely handed to the Frestech Chamber of Commerce. It was no longer related to Anklo or the Stantine Duchy anymore.
These two mines were used by Anklo to pay for these weapons from the Frestech Chamber of Commerce.
Although it was just the cargo of ten Magic Cars, their total value was two hundred thousand gold coins.
The new Magic Trebuchet was already worth ten thousand gold coins.
As for the three hundred Magic Repeating Crossbows with the arrow chests, each set sold for a high price of four hundred gold coins and three hundred equaled one hundred and twenty thousand gold coins.
As for the remaining weapons and armours, they had a total of seventy thousand gold coins.
Actually, these two mines had a value of over two hundred thousand gold coins, it was no less than three hundred thousand.
But Anklo couldn’t take out that much money, so naturally he could only trade resources for things he needed from the Frestech Chamber of Commerce.
If he had the choice, Anklo wouldn’t want to give up the resources under his name because he knew the importance these resources had in developing the Stantine Duchy.
But he had no alternative.
Because if he wanted to achieve his goal, he had to spend money and he had to spend a large amount of money.
With Hart’s directions, his subordinates loaded the goods from the ten Magic Cars into their boats. Anklo had a complicated expression, as his eyes revealed anxiety as his lips had a bitter smile.
“I hope that these sacrifices will bring a good result, otherwise I’ll become the most condemned person in the history of the Stantine Duchy.”
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Anklo was worried about the future because of his decision and the people of Banta City were happy about their bright future, as they welcomed the new year with great enthusiasm.
With another year passed and since her highness Seveni took over Banta City in the later half of the year, Banta City was once again filled with life. It was completely different from when it was dead and spiritless when Count Stagg was City Lord.
In just half a month, not only did Banta City recovered the prosperity from before, it became even more lively.
As the magic machine industry led by the Frestech Chamber of Commerce entered the hearts of the people, there were more and more people in Banta City dragged into this industry. In Banta City now, everyone could find a satisfying job and wouldn’t need to worry about food or clothing. They could even enjoy a luxurious life that they wouldn’t dare dream of a few years ago.
For example, for things that you didn’t buy because you were stingy or for other reasons, when New Years came, naturally you would make up for it.
So when New Years came, the Frestech Chamber of Commerce’s household magic machine department had large sales.
Just in a single week, their sales numbers were as good as the past two months added together.
According to the data, in just a short week, the Frestech Chamber of Commerce earned a shocking five hundred thousand gold coins just from household magic machines.
Because the Frestech Chamber of Commerce had high profits, in just a single week, the Frestech Chamber of Commerce earned a net profit of three hundred thousand gold coins just from household magic machines.
If this was three years ago, Xu Yi would have been wild with joy when he saw these stats.
But when he saw these stats now, Xu Yi found that he didn’t feel anything. Rather he was trying to see if there were any errors from the data, seeing if there were any places that he could improve on.
There was no other way. According to this year’s stats, the Frestech Chamber of Commerce had broken through to the ten million gold coin mark, so how could Xu Yi feel joy from a trivial three hundred thousand?
Of course, the more they earned, the more they also spent.
The Frestech Chamber of Commerce’s net profits were shocking, but they also made shocking investments.
Not mentioning the wages that reached a shocking three million, the Frestech Chamber of Commerce started investing in production bases in the second half of the year because of their expansion plan, as well as investing in the Black Rice Wasteland, the Stantine Duchy, and Sowell City in the last two months, they had already spent over five million gold coins.
Counting this, by the end of the year, the Frestech Chamber of Commerce only had an excess of a million gold coins.
Compared to the current scale of the company, this bit of money wasn’t considered anything. When finance manager Sebas was going over the year end reports, he kept complaining to Xu Yi and kept reminding Xu Yi to balance out the revenue disbursement next year, or the company might really have a deficit.
However, Xu Yi just smiled at his warning and didn’t care.
The Frestech Chamber of Commerce had invested this much this year because of the development plan he had made.
When the production bases are finished next year and start producing, these investments would turn into large amounts of profit.
At that time, the Frestech Chamber of Commerce’s profit would increase. It wouldn’t be strange for it to increase by several times.
The more important thing was that the Frestech Chamber of Commerce had laid down their foundation. They wouldn’t be influenced by the changes of a single city anymore. They could adapt to any situation and wouldn’t have to become passive because a single noble was aiming at them.
“Of course the normal nobles no longer dare plot against you or the Frestech Chamber of Commerce. Royal father had already displayed his attitude last time at the Royal Parliament, so there is no noble that would dare anger royal father on this matter.”
Seveni looked at Xu Yi who was sitting in front of her looking relaxed and shook her head.
“Xu Yi, to be honest, I don’t understand, why do you always have a confident expression when you are always in danger? Tell me, why are you recruiting so many guards? It can’t be that you want to increase the guarding power of your company, right?”
Xu Yi revealed a faint smile, “Much? It isn’t much, it’s only five hundred people. Compared to the Falcao Chamber of Commerce that has over two thousand guards, our Frestech Chamber of Commerce with our less than a thousand guards can’t be considered much.”
Seveni glared at him, “Stop acting! Your company has elf guards, dwarf guards, and even those beastmen guards you just recruited on the Black Rice Wasteland. Right, there’s also the guards that you recruited from the Stantine Duchy that don’t count to your total. If you add them all together, it’s already past two thousand, right?”
Xu Yi laughed into the sky, but he didn’t give an answer.
Seeing his reaction, Seveni was a bit angry. She slapped the table and knit her brows. It was rare to see her raise her voice and shout in an angry voice, “Xu Yi, the battle strength of those elves, dwarves, and beastmen are all higher than normal humans. If you compare battle strength, your Frestech Chamber of Commerce’s guards can compare to an army of five thousand. Just what do you want to do?”
Seeing Seveni’s serious expression, Xu Yi gave a sigh and spread his hands, “Your highness, I don’t want to do anything, I just want to protect myself. You just said that no nobles dare aim at me or the Frestech Chamber of Commerce, but does that include his highness Eric?”
Seveni’s eyes trembled as she gave a sigh before not saying a thing.
Seeing Seveni’s reaction, Xu Yi revealed a faint smile and continued, “Alright, your highness, let’s not discuss what everyone is aware of, what is the meaning of that? Let’s discuss business, what standard of equipment do you want for your five thousand private guards?”