The Kicked Out S-Rank Appraiser Creates The Strongest Guild - Chapter 09: The Flower Girl
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- The Kicked Out S-Rank Appraiser Creates The Strongest Guild
- Chapter 09: The Flower Girl
To guarantee the personnel that Ranju had requested, Laurent went to the Quest Reception.
“Ah, welcome, Laurent-sama.”
There was none of the disdain that the receptionist had attended to him with before. Instead, she appeared completely regretful, practically falling over herself to serve him with the utmost courtesy.
Though she’d been seated, she made it a point now to stand and bow to him.
Since Laurent had become the representative of Arsenal of the Spirits, it had been like this.
Lilianne had used liberal force to ensure that Laurent would be treated with respect.
The receptionist and her superior had paid a visit to Laurent, clamouring to apologise to him.
Though Guardians of the Magical Tree was not as strong as Golden Hawk, it was still a big customer, one that the Quest Reception could not afford to offend.
The receptionist had apologised profusely for getting carried away, though it had been under Golden Hawk’s orders that she had done so. Since then, she shrank into herself whenever Laurent was in vicinity.
She had apologised so desperately that Laurent felt sorry for her.
“How can I help you today?”
“Er, I’m looking for five people with B-rank or higher [Ore Mining] skill, and five more with C-rank or higher [Item Storage] skill.”
“I see, please wait for a moment.”
She rifled through her files at an astonishing speed, searching for alchemists and item gatherers that could fulfil Laurent’s conditions.
“Here they are. There are five people with a C-rank [Item Storage] skill.”
“Could you arrange interviews with them for me?”
“Yes, of course.” She filled out the paperwork easily.
“And what about the [Ore Mining] personnel?”
“I am very sorry, but currently, we have yet to recruit anyone with a B-rank or higher [Ore Mining] skill,” she apologised, sweeping into a bow so low that her nose was almost grazing the floor.
“Um, it’s, um, fine if you don’t have anyone available. Please, lift your head. You don’t need to lower yourself like that,” Laurent told her, astonished.
Even after he’d said that, she was polite to a fault. From beginning to end, she excessively abased herself as she served him.*
(T/N: In Japanese culture, it is expected that employees humble (or ‘abase’) themselves through behaviour and language when speaking to a superior or customers. It’s the standard level of politeness expected from them, so the receptionist’s behaviour here is extreme but not entirely bizarre.)
Still, it’s troublesome. Without recruiting five people with B-rank [Ore Mining], I won’t be able to give Ranju the resources he needs. The reality is that there aren’t many people with B-rank [Ore Mining] that do freelance, I guess.
Laurent exited the Quest Reception. He paced, gnawing at his recruitment problem, and soon night fell over the city like a curtain.
The shops lit up. People returning from work filled the tavern.
Maybe I’ll head into a bar, too. It’s been a while since I’ve had a drink.
Laurent recalled his adventurer days. He had often exchanged information over drinks in the bar, and he’d gotten a lot of tips on adventuring there.
For the first time in a long while, Laurent pushed open the tavern’s saloon doors.
Unexpectedly, he ran into someone from an alchemist guild that he’d worked with during his Golden Hawk days.
“Aren’t you Laurent-san?”
“Zens-san, it’s been a long time!”
Since it had been a while, they decided to get a table together so that they could catch up with each other.
“So, you’re not a member of Golden Hawk anymore, then, Laurent-san?”
“Yeah, it’s a bit embarrassing, but I got expelled.”
“Is that so? Well, if that’s the case, it should be fine if I rant about Lucius to you.” Helped along by the alcohol, Zens dove into a tirade about his grievances with Lucius. “Can you believe him? Nobody should have to put up with that, right? It’s not enough that we have to deliver A-grade Iron ore to him at two hundred gold coins apiece, or that we have to put our alchemist capable of refining [Earth Stones] on house arrest for some reason. Noooo, on top of all that, he wants us to make a wedding gift of the highest-quality silverwork!”
“Silverwork?”
“How do I put this? Some big shot idiot from nobility organized a silverwork’s fair to commemorate his daughter’s wedding. We’re supposed to craft something for the exhibition. Essentially, he’s looking to garner favour from the nobility, and he’s using us for his schemes. How the hell are we supposed to craft silverworks of the highest quality and alienate the best alchemists?” Zens chugged down more ale, as though overcome by frustration.
Lucius is giving out some really unreasonable orders. Looks like Zens-san is having a rough time of it, too, even though his alchemist guild is the largest in the city.
Laurent could not help but sympathise with Zens.
“Everything is such a mess. You know this as well, don’t you, Laurent-dono? How much money it takes to increase the rank of a skill.”
“Yes, of course.”
Once the knowledge of a skill was acquired, it was exceedingly rare for it to deteriorate. But to raise your skill in the first place costs a lot of money.
Zens had also invested considerably in his workers’ skills, but that expense was shouldered entirely by Zens’s guild. Lucius did not bear a single cent of the cost.
“Right now, our furnaces are being watched by Lucius’s men. They won’t let anyone capable of refining [Earth Stones] above B-grade near the boilers. We have alchemists who are just about to break through to A-grade [Earth Stones], but they’re not allowed to practice at all. When they return to practice, they are going to need to start with a clean slate.”
Lucius is being Lucius, as always. All because Guardians of the Magical Tree snatched out one dungeon from under his nose, he’s placing this ridiculous amount of pressure on the alchemist guilds in his control.
Laurent’s pity for Zens’s situation grew.
Then an idea occurred to him.
“Ah, Zens-san. If it works with you, would you buy some iron from my guild? I’ll sell at a hundred gold coins per A-grade Iron ore. At that price, surely you’ll be able to make a profit if you resell it for even two hundred gold coins?”
“One hundred gold coins for an A-grade Iron ore? I mean, that would be very beneficial for us, but is that really alright? It’s quite cheap.”
“Yes. Look, the truth is, the product is good. But Lucius controls the alchemy market, right? No one will buy from me because of that, and it’s just collecting dust in our storage.”
“I see. But it still doesn’t feel right. I mean, we’re affiliated with Lucius, too.”
“Alternatively, maybe you could loan us five staff members that have over B-rank in [Ore Mining]? And of course, we’ll be sure to pay them their wages.”
“That’s perfectly fine with me!” It worked out well. While Lucius was relentlessly exploiting Zens’s alchemists, he also had a surplus of miners, and he was just wondering what to do with them.
“Well, then, that’s sorted. Ah, yes, if possible, why don’t you send along a responsible alchemist to our guild, as well? If you do that, we could provide A-grade Iron ores and materials for silverworks, and your alchemist can get to work there.”
“No, that would, of course, be more than I could have hoped for. But is it really alright? It seems too good to be true.”
“Yes, though, if you could just keep this from Lucius? Right now, Lucius isn’t paying a lot of attention to me. But if it was discovered that you were outsourcing work to me, I think it could become a real problem for my guild.”
Zens huffed. “Is that so?” He’s hiding something, he thought.
It was not unsurprising. He had noticed that there was something more to Laurent’s words.
But even Zens could not have imagined that within Arsenal of the Spirits, there was a single person capable of refining one hundred [Earth Stones] within a month.
It did not matter, though. It was not as though he was in the position to pick and choose right now.
At the rate Zens was currently going at, his workshop was racking up a massive amount of debt, and he would have to fire some of his employees. If he was unlucky, he might even become bankrupt.
“Very well. I agree to all of your terms.”
They decided to meet somewhere inconspicuous tomorrow, where there were no eyes watching, and hammer out the details then.
——
As Laurent left the tavern behind, he felt as though a burden had been lifted from his shoulders.
Somehow, I managed to scrape together the people I needed. The stock will be organised soon, too, which means Ranju’s management skills will be raised.
Laurent was not only polishing Arri’s skills, but he also made sure to continue cultivating Ranju’s skills.
Supplying Ranju with the staff he needed was imperative for raising his management skills.
Having to think about trying to employ more people is honestly such a hassle.
And now that he was freed from the pressure of procuring workers, Laurent began to consider the moves he could next take to disrupt Lucius’s plans again.
Though it was nighttime, Laurent dropped by an open armory.
As it was, nearly all the alchemist guilds were under Lucius’s control, so the weapons displayed in the city’s shops were all made by the alchemists under Lucius’s employ.
It’s pretty cheap, he thought as he examined the goods.
Each and every one of them was dirt-cheap. Arsenal of the Spirits wouldn’t be able to craft anything cheaper, no matter how hard they tried.
Lucius is probably buying these at an unthinkably cheap price. But that doesn’t change the fact that, in the end, there’s a huge difference between the capital and scale he is capable of and ours.
If one made a large purchase of goods in one go, they would be able to get that much of a discount.
The alchemist guilds would be able to use the large sum of cash that they received from sales to develop their personnels and equipment, and in turn, they would be able to produce goods at cheaper and cheaper rates.*
(T/N: The past two paragraphs are… weird. I’m not entirely sure what the author is trying to say, and while I’ve done my best, I’ve probably mistranslated something because I’m pretty sure that’s not how businesses work.)
The ten alchemist guilds controlled by Lucius had a combined total of over five hundred highly qualified alchemists.
Every day, more than five hundred alchemists would compete ruthlessly with each other to think of ways to mass produce weapons cheaply, which would then be supplied to the market.
Conversely, Laurent’s workshop only had two workers.
Even if he included the staff members he’d recently acquired, their numbers wouldn’t exceed twenty people.
It wouldn’t even be a contest.
And in truth, even Lilianne only purchased [Earth Stones] from Laurent. For general arms, she had little choice but to buy from the alchemist guilds affiliated with Lucius.
Laurent thought hard about how he could stand against Lucius.
Guardians of the Magical Tree won’t be ordering [Earth Stones] from us forever. Moving into the weapons industry is inevitable. But because there’s such a large difference in our funds and scale, our chances of winning in a price war are close to zero. In that case, the only thing we can do is to produce weapons that fill in the niches in the market that Lucius’s guilds cannot. We have to produce something that stands out. And we cannot accomplish that with our current staff. No matter how high the quality of the weapons we produce, it’s useless if we can only craft one. We need to find a worker with a more unique skill…
Laurent walked along his route home, deep in thought. Just then, he happened to catch sight of a girl selling flowers.
She was calling out to the passers-by in a shaky, thread-like voice.
It was plain for all to see that with her awkwardness, she was not cut out to be a peddler.
“Um, excuse me… um,” she tried to call out to a passing man, grasping a flower in her hand. The man did not even notice her, and promptly left.
The girl hung her head in disappointment.
Poor thing. There’s nothing sadder in life than being made to do a job you’re not suited to.
Laurent made up his mind. He appraised the girl’s skills.
Her skills were as below:
[Silverwork] B -> S
[Product Development] D -> A
[Product Design] E -> A
[Spirit Sealing] A -> S
Laurent inhaled sharply.
W-What? Her latent potential in [Silverwork], [Product Development] and [Product Design] are all above A-rank?! And aside from that, what the hell is [Spirit Sealing]? I’ve never seen nor heard of this skill before. Surely, it can’t be a unique skill?!
Laurent used his [Appraisal] skill to bring up a detailed description of [Spirit Sealing].
[Spirit Sealing]
This skill allows the user to seal spirits within gold and silver ores.
Typically, silver ores are used to seal spirits.
Gold and silver ores into which spirits have been sealed will develop a special effect.
“W-Wait, Miss,” Laurent spoke to the flower girl without thinking.
“Yes?” The girl looked over her shoulder. She had flowing silver hair and deep green eyes. And pointed ears. It was a young elvish girl.