"Control your anger, or it controls you," I shouted even as I swung my staff, sending Jertann across the room, even slamming him with an oppressive feeling to keep him down.
Beating someone down repeatedly while supernaturally suppressing them didn't feel like it should work, but it was the only thing that was actually working.
"I'm … trying," he shouted as he swung his staff, his strength was far above what he should display at his level. It wasn't enough to threaten me, but considering I was a hero at level eighty, and he was a farmer at level fifty, that would have been even more concerning than what had been going on.
His situation was alarming enough, both physically and mentally. Physically, he was having some kind of transformation. A few scales along his body, his teeth getting a little sharper, claws appearing whenever he got angry. Even stopping his leveling didn't solve it completely, just slowed it down.
It was scary, because it reminded us of the cultist corruption.
Zolast had checked his body several times, and found no signs of destruction mana — or any mana — in his body. While it was good to know he wasn't being corrupted, the fact that we had yet to identify exactly what was going on left us stumped.
"Try harder," I said even as I swung my staff, beating him hard while forcing him to defend. "And, give me a daily report," I said.
He snarled even louder at that, which was my intention. After a lot of practice, we discovered that the best way to calm him down was to push his anger to the limit and let him exhaust himself. Unfortunately, since we didn't want him to get any more Experience points until we could identify the problem, it only left sparring as an option.
Nothing angered him like paperwork, not that I could blame him. I never liked it either.
Ironically, his current problem meant he could neither fight nor handle the negotiations. Even handling the outpost was not an option, as an untimely flash of anger might end up in tragedy.
Which meant, he was the only one from our circle of trusted agents with nothing to do, leaving him with the incredibly tedious task of processing the reports that had been coming from all our operations.
"The food shipment had been delivered to the wall without a problem, boss. A quarry is still working on the stones, and the new batch of ballista bolts are ready, waiting for the deal to be completed," he started, summarizing a huge trade operation in a few words.
That was inevitable. Our operations had expanded significantly during the month. Faster than I would have liked, but the unofficial blockade had been even harder than expected. A few days after the first move, Oniphia had completely stopped the convoys, claiming a sudden increase of monster attacks making it unviable.
It wasn't exactly a profitable decision for the city itself, but it was nowhere as devastating for them as it was for the princess, who lacked the stockpiles to handle the situation. A situation that was exacerbated even further when she sent one of her flying castles to bring in critical items, only for it to get lost mysteriously.
A devastating loss … for her. For us, it was a boon. She had already delivered several rare magic books and restricted historical accounts of the previous Calamity to Zolast — well, the high priest of the church — in exchange for several batches of magic ballista bolts and arrows, which were her greatest need, and the negotiations for other critical deliveries — both for weapons and for lord beast meat — were still in process. However, they were far more expensive.
We wanted not only restricted historical records, but truly forbidden secrets for them. Relating the System, the gods, and the dungeons. A hefty price, but not an unfair one.
Amusingly, we were also supplying her forces with more mundane products, like high-quality farm products, vitality-supported weapons, and construction materials, some through the Dawn Hammers, some through the Iron Trust.
With more and more local nobles pulling their support from her, even refusing to trade, we were the only thing that was keeping her still going. I knew that, eventually, it could be disastrous for us … but in the scale we were playing, there was no free lunch.
"Has anyone had any luck with the Awakenings?" I asked.
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"Not since Limenta with his Agility, boss," he answered. "However, we have trained the new recruits with the simplified version of the training, and the improvement is significant."
"Better than nothing. How about the casinos?" I asked, which, at this point, was bringing us even more mana stones than the dungeons, which was an impressive number. But, with the value of mana stones dropping constantly, people were more than happy to waste their excess in the casino.
"Yesterday's profit was ten percent above expected, boss," he started. "However, we had another three hundred black chips and five thousand red chips unredeemed."
"That's another increase," I said with a sigh, wondering how I had actually been caught flat-footed. Our casino chips had an unintended impact.
We had accidentally created a mana-backed monetary unit for the border region.
One of the biggest problems came from the sudden lack of silver, which, unlike Earth, was not just an ornamental metal, but valued for its ability to hold vitality. Due to the trade blockade, the silver that was in circulation had been stockpiled rather than being used directly.
And, with the number of dungeons operating at the border, the mana stone availability replaced it, but there was a problem. Unlike silver, mana stone was a volatile commodity, easily weaponized by a mage unless it was protected. Also, they lost potency unless they were stored properly, and even triggered beast attacks.
So, our casino chips, given for mana stones, had suddenly exploded in popularity. Many people, particularly the smaller merchants that operated in our territory, took the chips away and used them as money. First, for the smaller purchases, but slowly, the scale increased.
Our red chips were worth ten thousand mana points, and the black chips were worth a hundred thousand.
I could have stopped it, but I just added a hefty ten percent fee to the conversion process, and started using those mana stones for our other projects. Then, I added a withdrawal queue for the mana stones — to prevent a bank run in case everyone decided to withdraw their mana stones on the same day.
It could have made people panic, but a combination of two factors prevented it. The value of mana stones was dropping daily, making the withdrawal less of a priority than the convenience of trade. We were practically controlling the dungeon, ensuring that we would be able to just collect more to meet the demand if necessary.
A few other guilds, even the local noble houses, tried to copy us, but they failed spectacularly, unable to match our advantages. Once we realized those chips were being used as money, I sat with Zolast and Launara, doing our best to create chips that were nearly impossible to copy, thanks to a combination of my lifetime experience with counterfeit money, Zolast's incredible enchanting abilities, and Launara's rapidly growing forging prowess.
The other local houses didn't have any advantage, making it inevitable that they would fail sooner and later.
And, since I was such a nice man, I hastened the process by forging some fake money. After a few disguised visits to the exchange points … those noble houses realized why it was a bad idea to enter a business they barely understood.
Leaving me quite a bit richer.
"How about the forges?" I asked, even as I attacked him again. Rather than dodging, he parried and got closer, trying to counterattack, but I kicked him away.
"We have thirty forges now. They are operating at full speed, and none of the locations have been discovered," he explained, which wasn't too much of a surprise. Ultimately, we had established those secret forges at several desolate spots right at the border between Town Maell and Town Yoentia, even using the web of tunnels that the cultists had left for transformation.
Though, cleansing, securing, warding, and reinforcing those tunnels had cost us a lot of mana stones, making the benefits of our accidental success of mana-backed money very useful.
With the area under our control, they were safe enough. Naturally, none of the recruits knew about the true scale of the operation. They were under the impression that there were one or two other locations. Only when someone neared level sixty, we revealed to them that the operation was larger.
Even then, we brought them to another secret forge directly under our church, at Town Maell. At least, in that case, when it was inevitably revealed it would turn into a religious battle. It would be easier to manage that way.
"And the mines?" I asked.
"The six mines we have in our territory are operating at high capacity, though we had three more sabotage attempts in the last six hours, all thwarted successfully with no cost of life, though two of the mines had to stop their surface operations," he said.
"They are getting more brazen," I said. I didn't need to ask about the identity of the saboteurs. "How's the distribution?"
"Two at Town Maell, one at Town Yoentia, boss," he said with a frown.
One that I matched. "It looks like they are getting less scared of our church. Maybe the mysterious assassin needs to make a showing during the next ambush?"
"Why not the Holy Crusader, boss," he asked, his smirk suddenly wide. "You look dashing in gold."
"I should have picked a less blinding color."
"Probably," he said as he chuckled, but it faded soon. "But you better hold on. We have some news from the forces of a few baronies that surround Town Maell from the East. It looks like they are going to act."
"Let me guess. They haven't suddenly sent their forces to the Wall?"
"No, they have already rejected the summon of the princess, citing a lack of supplies."
I sighed. "So, the brief rest period we had is over. All that remains is to see whether they will start slowly, or aggressively."
"Very much so, boss," he said, equally frustrated, though he regretted he wouldn't be able to take part in the fighting.
"Don't worry, Jertann," I said. "Soon, we'll have enough fighting that you won't be able to avoid it."
I hoped that, when that day arrived, he wouldn't end up broken.