I ended up accepting Robb’s invitation. Two days after our discussion, a meeting was arranged at the Spatial Bank and we were not the only two invited. Three more people have been invited to discuss this venture.
We were told to wait in an isolated room for Richard Mackenzie to arrive. Robb and I quickly became the centre of attention as we were the only two people who belonged to the same organisation. None of us spoke a word; no greetings were exchanged and instead, everyone was silently judging each other.
I was particularly interested in this group of people. After all, they were the ones behind the greatest pyramid scheme in history. Even though Richard Mackenzie was the public figure at the front, these people were the helpers behind the scene. There were two men and a woman. One of the men particularly stood out.
His skin was ghastly white. He had blank-looking blue eyes and white woolly hair that showed his African origins. If I had to guess, this person suffered from albinism and was probably someone important in his tribe on Earth. He had a nose piercing and earrings made of animal bones and was holding a witchy bone staff. To top it off, he was wearing the robe of Undying Light, the organisation that despite its name consisted mainly of Death element users. Like the Healing Temple, Undying Light aimed at instigating the conflicts since more deaths would mean more business for them.
The other man wore the uniform of Natures Guard. His face looked familiar and I eventually recalled that he was one of the patients I treated in the past when Natures Guard started recruiting humans. As for the woman, she seemed to not belong to any organisation but rather, a mercenary group. She was not wearing any uniform but instead, had a flint and steel tattooed on her left arm. The flint and steel were the emblem of the mercenary group that went by the same name. I found it quite odd that a mercenary group recruited a human but now was not the time to ask about that.
A few minutes after we arrived, Richard finally entered the meeting room and closed the door behind him. The tension between his invitees lightened significantly.
“Thank you all for coming. I invited you all to discuss the business I am planning to start. I do not think that you know each other. So, let me first briefly introduce you all.” Richard say politely.
“My name is Richard Mackenzie, but you can all call me Richard. I am Scottish and I now work here at the Spatial Bank. I was able to get into contact with you all after finding the information you wrote to open your bank accounts. I mainly chose you all because you are currently the richest humans in Tussock. I tried to contact a few more but they sadly refused to join us.”
“This gentleman is Robb. He is a member of the Healing Temple and more specifically the Lovers Hall. He is the one who tipped me on the new laws that are going to be passed.”
“Next to him is Alex. He is also a member of the Healing Temple, but you should know him more from the rumors surrounding him. He is the person who won about two thousand points at the House of Fortune and also helped save many other humans.”
“This lady’s name is Tesha. Thailandese if I am not wrong and the current lover of the leader of the mercenary group, Flint and Steel.”
“Next we have Joey, someone from Natures Guard with some connections with the Druidic Order.”
“Finally, this man’s name is Choumka. Former priest of one of the tribes of Tanzania. He now works for Undying Light.”
I nodded politely in response and everyone acknowledged each other. ‘Names I never heard before. Still… Richard is quite resourceful to be able to contact them all. He also seems to not mind how I reacted the first time I saw him.’
I silently judged the situation and was pondering on how exactly Richard was going to explain his business plan to us. A meeting between humans was definitely going to attract undesired attention. I was certain that some people would listen on our meeting secretly. Although it was an isolated room, nothing was truly isolated in this world and backdoors always existed. If they really wanted to, the Spatial Bank could easily alter the protection runes of the room without our knowledge. It was the same for the isolated rooms of the Spiritual Hall. We were all regular people who never interacted with each other before and so, there were no established secret codes or anything that could be passed.
“Let us move on to the reason I invited you here. First, let me explain the situation. As far as I know, trade rules are soon going to be implemented to protect us, humans when trading with the races of the Union. We will be considered as equal in a trade and will no longer have to fear being scammed.” Richard started.
“That is great, but how do you know that it will happen? You contacted me three days ago with good news, but three days have passed, and I have yet to see any new laws. Instead, I heard that over ten thousand new guards have been dispatched to the city’s barracks from the higher floors and these new guards are not just Bangaas.” Tesha, the only woman in the room said. She glanced at Robb, looking for an explanation since Richard introduced him as the informant of the group.
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Robb shrugged his shoulders, looking clueless. “I don’t know. That is what I heard and obviously laws cannot be passed overnight. I don’t know how the system works here but they probably have to vote and work with the Union which takes some time. I have not been able to contact the person who told me this information yet.”
“…”
“It does not matter anyway. I will only move forward with my business plan if the laws are passed. But we can take the time to properly discuss it and give everyone some time to think about it. What do you think?” Richard said to help the uncomfortable Robb.
“I guess there’s no harm in simply making plans in case these laws are truly instated. I am actually very curious about what you are planning to sell that can compete with what the Union already has.” Joey said as he rubbed his goatee.
“I was coming to this. There is no point in selling any products since we cannot do any better than the Union, but we can offer services! I initially thought of doing something like a bank but there is no way the Spatial Bank would allow something like this to happen since they have the monopoly. However, there are services that banks usually offer that are not offered by the Spatial Bank and I was planning on taking advantage of that. For example, what do you think of an insurance company?” Richard explained confidently. His eyes shone as he revealed his plan. “The best example I can give you is Life Insurance. We all know that the tower is a very dangerous place, and everyone has loved ones. I am certain that Life Insurance will be in high demand. Nobody wants to die but if something happens to them, they would at least want to know that their loved ones would be able to live safely. Then, there are teams that would take a serious blow if one of their members perished. They would be delighted to have a financial cushion to rest on while they fill in the gaps in their formation. Life Insurance can be our base service. We can later expand to cover other areas and possibly also do business with the races of the Union. I am sure that the existing businesses would be very interested in the concept of insurance.”
‘Insurance?’ I fell into deep thoughts as I heard Richard’s explanation. He continued to speak but I was no longer listening.
I did not remember all the details of the pyramid scheme, but an insurance company matched the image I had in mind. It was not hard for insurance companies to transition into pyramid schemes. ‘The concept of insurance does not exist in the tower yet and while he mentioned that word, he never exactly described what an insurance was. He is probably being careful in case this conversation is being spied on.’
‘His business proposal does sound very legitimate so far, but it is probably just a facade that will divert the Union’s attention.’
“This is not going to work, isn’t it? Insurance work because the incidents are very unlikely to happen while in this case, death is a very likely outcome considering what I experienced so far. Furthermore, although everyone has loved ones, right now, the chances of them being together is extremely low.” Tesha argued after some thoughts.
“Yes. But once the laws are passed, the situation will change, and people will be more likely to find their acquaintances. The odds of dying will also be drastically lowered.” Robb said cautiously.
Richard observed his invitees arguing about his proposal in delight. At the very least, he had successfully sparked the interest of one or two people. He eventually cut them short. “As I said, this is just a rough plan and the business plan will obviously need to be polished, but you get the gist of it. The point is that insurance will be in high demand and can be priced adequately. As long as we are the first to offer this service, we can greatly benefit from it. The early bird gets the worm.”
“Right.”
“It was an interesting proposal but at the end of the day, the trade rules need to be established before I make a decision.”
“What about you, Mr. Alex? You haven’t said a word since the start of the meeting.”
To my surprise, Richard called me out to ask for my opinion. I was indeed the only one who hasn’t contributed as I had already made up my mind. Since he was inviting me to act as an investor, I had no reason to refuse; accepting the offer would place me at the very top of the pyramid. It was an even better position than I hoped for. I did my best to not influence others since I did not want to alter the course of history. I did not know the contribution made by these people to the success of the pyramid scheme and certainly did not want to push away a major contributor.
I cleared my throat and spoke for the first time. “As many of you have already said, my final decision will also depend on the laws that are going to be passed. But for now, I am in favour of this proposal. I don’t know much about insurance and business in general, but I am willing to take some risks. The salary of the Healing Temple is simply too low. Our current situation is rather good, but if we remain idle, it will not take long for us to become irrelevant as the hunters continue to climb the tower, becoming richer and wealthier. We cannot leave Tussock but taking away some wealth from these hunters does not sound like a bad plan to me.”
“You are rather optimistic for someone who remained so expressionless over the course of the meeting.” Tesha pointed out as she played with her hair. “Do you think it is so easy to start a business? Chances are that this venture is going to fail, and you would just waste your investment.”
“This lady is not wrong. You look quite young and probably have not experienced society much.” Joey added.
“Maybe. But the past week has proved how lucky I can be.” I replied with a faint smile. “Richard looks quite confident in himself anyway. We can just put a clause in the contract we sign in the future to confirm that he has credentials to back him up and is not simply trying to scam us. If he is experienced in this sort of thing, I don’t see why I can’t give him a chance.”
“Hmmp. I guess that is not a bad idea. He did say he was a banker or something along those lines when he approached me.”
“What about you, Choumka?” Joey asked his neighbour.
“I will first have to contact the spirits and ask for their advice.”
“The spirits?”
“Yes. The spirits of my ancestors. It is an important ritual that I do before taking any important decisions. The spirits have always guided me properly and it is thanks to them that I managed to survive.” Choumka said with a serious expression.