Steel steam and flame

When we arrived at the villa base, the sky was just getting bright.

In the hall, Delya and Waters looked at the information gathered in their hands with sad expressions on their faces, while discussing in a low voice.

Seeing Cassia come back, the two of them stood up to say hello, finally showing a little joy.

"The recent rapid expansion of business on the black market has brought bad troubles and has touched the interests of some fixed forces. There are many threats that have been passed to us in various forms, but fortunately there has been no direct confrontation yet. They themselves also have concerns about the conflict of firepower." Delya waited for Cassia to sit at the table and directly explained the specific problem.

"It's a good thing and a bad thing." Waters on the side also said, "The good thing is that these threats come from the side we don't want to see, confirming that our current development is indeed working, and we have achieved better results than we have. The results are expected to be even better. But the disadvantage is that although we had anticipated that this inevitable situation would occur, it can be predicted that the time period will be more than half a year later. In other words, we have not made any decisions about this situation yet. sufficient preparation."

"There are indeed enough people on hand, but in terms of quality, there is no way to compare with other fixed forces now. With the advantage of weapons, we are not afraid of them. But if there is a fire conflict, what has been built with great difficulty will They will all regress back to the original stage. If they don't respond blindly, what they do in the future will definitely be even more outrageous. Both aspects are not what we want to see." Delya had a headache, and she thought about this for a long time.

"Waters and I have discussed some plans, and the best one is to shrink our strength first. In other words, it means cutting off our current business, giving up some of the benefits, and showing weakness to others. Wait until a few days Months later, when we have enough strength, we can get back all the lost parts at once."

Waters looked worried at this time: "It's just that even if we do this, we are still worried that the forces on the opposite side will not let go. Because the threat has been revealed, will they really take advantage of this benefit?" Give us time to grow, or should we say that after getting those benefits, they will continue to expand their minds and attack us directly. I can't figure out what they think, so now I have been in a dilemma with the deputy leader about the final decision. I thought about informing you of this matter a few days ago, but there was no way to contact you, Captain. We also know that Captain, you have more important matters at school, so we didn’t rush over to find you."

"It was a good decision not to come to me." Cassia did not answer the two people's questions first, and said something that seemed to have nothing to do with it. But only he knows the reason, "I will consider communication issues next, which indeed brings a lot of trouble. I will ask my friends to help us build a more secure communication network. You need to inform me of the important things in the future. It is also best not to come to the Military School. At present, except for me and you, almost no one knows about our relationship. The Military School is now a dangerous group, and you will only get into bigger trouble in the past. troubles. And these troubles cannot be dealt with in time now."

Cassia paused here. Delya and Waters also showed understanding expressions. The trouble Cassia mentioned is probably what he is dealing with now. Both of them knew what kind of people there were in the military school. They can't afford to offend any of the background forces behind them.

"How long can you maintain the current situation?" Cassia asked after reading most of the collected information, "I will find a way, it will take time. I originally brought you some things, but these need more time to cultivate. In a few days After that, we should be able to make the final decision.”

"It won't take more than half a month. We can delay it by reducing the business on the black market." Waters thought for a while and replied, "Now the factory is also undergoing an industrial transformation plan. We will focus most of our energy on it first. On that side, it may be a more moderate approach. Some industries after transformation are new areas for us. In the past, when we opened up our own markets, they would not pose a threat in the early stage. Whether it is now or for a long time in the future , the main part of our business is still in various types of weapons. The only thing is not just quantity and quality. Steam machinery and airships are very lacking in technology. Most of the cores are in the hands of the empire, and the rest can be used. The part of the technology that is used for production is now just a simple competition within the empire for output and cheapness."

"This is the general conclusion we have reached after our recent investigation." Waters did not forget to add his own words, "In the black market, only weapons, energy and surgery-related items have the attribute of huge profits. And we only have the property of making huge profits on weapons. By the way, energy roughly refers to various types of neutron tubes, which are hard to come by. The mining of limestone mines not only requires a large number of top geologists, but also requires a bottomless pit of early investment in mining machinery. And in post-production, Mature mechanics are indispensable. It is a dead end for us. Not to mention surgery, maybe we can cooperate with some doctors in the dark world, but that can only get the technical aspect. It is not the core of huge profits. , are the raw materials for surgery.”

Cassia thought of the spider-shaped mining machinery assembly she saw under the Gerun Oasis, and shook her head first.

He and Delya also laughed helplessly at this time. The main raw materials for the surgery come from dragons, as well as many hormones required for preparation, etc. Most of these things come from extreme areas. Even Cassia has only heard a little about these two until now. You can count as having met half of the dragons. But trying to get them at the source is nothing more than a joke.

It is definitely impossible to raise dragons, and the result will be the same for a long time in the future. That could be one of the cores of an empire. Most of the things about dragons currently floating on the black market come from the Quartet forces and the Imperial Military. As for the raw materials for extracting hormone components, extreme areas do not seem to be places that can be easily entered and exited at will.

Even if you get these, each of the precision machines that are extracted and produced is priced at an unimaginable price.

Cassia smacked her mouth, but there was no taste in it.

"Have you ever thought about doing positive business?" Cassia suddenly asked, the dark world is only a part of the empire. Compared to the huge population base of the empire, the number of people involved was not that large. What feeds most ordinary people is the regular business in the empire.

An unknown smile appeared on Delya's face, and Waters didn't know how to answer for a moment. They knew in their hearts that this was just an idea that Cassia came up with at once, like inspiration, but they still couldn't search for a suitable sentence in their heads to answer.

"Probably not. Most of the methods in the empire that can make huge profits in a short period of time are in the dozens of thick legal documents in the empire. The reason why the dark world continues to attract people in is precisely because it is not subject to these laws and rules Supervision. Leader, you know this very well." Delya thought for a while and said tentatively, "We have the funds to do frontal business, but there are too many hard conditions that are lacking. Even if we want to use frontal weapons For business transactions, we cannot pass the first point. We need to submit information to the imperial management agency to apply for the corresponding qualifications, just like the Knights. There are just more terms and restrictions. To smoothen the processes and relationships, we have to go around in the end To dirty means."

"The Webley Arms Company is an exception. The empire's highest authority, the Imperial Parliament, already has their people. When the most basic laws of the empire were formulated, they were personally involved. No one can compare this. And, We are better able to adapt to the environment of the dark world and survive in it.”

Cassia knew that what she just said was just words and would not achieve any results. Finally, it comes back to how to deal with the troubles of black market business. Cassia also considered asking Ye Jielin and others for help after going back to school this time. It's just that the threat from Dellin needs to be carefully paid attention to. It is not a wise choice to leave the military school at this time. Ye Jielin's team had only left Manoma not long ago, and Atuohuan generally only provided intelligence help. Finally, there's Selmer, who has nothing to think about except himself.

If you want to spend money to hire powerful mercenaries, you will see results in a short period of time. Nearly half a year later, Delya also had enough funds.

"All converted, it's about six billion holy coins."

"So many!" Cassia herself was surprised.

"It's all the things, most of the source of funds, or the factory itself that Webley Company took over." Delya said in a rather discouraging way, "The actual money available now is only billions, and there will be more. Few. Many customers have not paid for the goods and have been owed. There is a lot of money, but it is basically not included in our actual income. Because once they die, they are destined to not be able to recover it. This has happened several times There is no way to solve the problem now, and we are also involved in an endless loop."

"Because if they get more weapons and survive in the near future, we can not only receive the money owed, but the rewards will also be huge enough. This has to force us to often make a decision between the two. The choice is whether to continue transporting the weapons, or not to try to recover the debt and stop in time." Waters' face had a light of enjoyment flickering, "It's the nature of gambling. In addition to new customers, some of the weapons business is long-term. The group of people who come and go, the transactions with them all follow this pattern. One-time sales and purchases are things that many people hope to encounter."

Cassia couldn't understand what Delya and Waters said more and more. Apart from a simple exchange of equal value, he had never understood the detailed rules in the black market business.