“How about the condition you promised in the notice?” The girl asked after some thinking.
“It is of course valid. When I start my shop, I will forge an item for each contractor. Be it armor or weapons, you can choose anything you want.” Miles added. There were at least ten craftsmen in the academy. Although Miles had the edge in rare formulas, those craftsmen were working for such a long time. Even if Miles had a few better alloy formulas, the market wouldn’t choose him without making sure his products were better.
“Alright, I will sign it.” The girl said.
“Perfect,” Miles said and reached out Coin. He already had the contract ready. Inside the articles, he explained the terms in detail. If either side failed any condition of the contract, both sides had the right to cancel the contract. In such a case, the one violated would pay 1000 merits to the other party.
The girl read the contract, and after checking it again, she signed it. It was a contract signed through the academy’s app, so it was impossible to cheat or avoid the payment.
“As stated in the contract, I will build my forge after the new year, until then your employment hasn’t started. But I will do my best to finish your item before that date. Please send me a detailed message for the item you require.” Miles said and sent the girl away.
After earning umpteen number of merits with Alex, he decided to recreate his forge. He already had a plan in mind, but he had to make a name for himself in the market. Before that, he would make contracts with new students and forge items for them to use. There was a clause in the contract, forcing every person who had received his items to use in the coming tournament.
When his items shined in the tournament, his forge would get famous overnight. Although he would have to invest all of his merits, the gain would be at least tenfold.
Not long after the girl left, another new student came. He too wanted to work for Miles and signed the contract after some time.
One after another, almost all new students came to visit Miles. He rented a billboard in the square so all new students knew by now that Number 2 was a craftsman and was hiring new students. Of course, not all of them signed the contract. After all, students such as Number 3, had rare elements, and even before he leveled up to mid-tier, he would be poached by bigger Forges in the city. So, Miles had no chance to hire him.
He either had to give him a better contract with lots of benefits and at least triple merits or something rare but he wouldn’t do that. Firstly, the market didn’t require that element as much as other common elements, secondly, he didn’t want to increase the prices through competition. Inflation in the market usually started with overpricing the talents, and Miles had no intention to be part of this. He was only going to live in the academy for two years, and in those two years, he would craft items for students to earn merits. He wasn’t aiming to get rich in the city to leave two years later.
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Miles looked at the contracts in front of him. People came one after another and he talked with almost all the new students. In the end, he only contracted with 40 of them. Half with two elements. As of now, he had more than 50 elements covered, and he hasn't contracted with anyone who could use lightning. After all, he and Alex were close friends, and he saved it for Alex. He wouldn’t make a contract with him but would pay him accordingly. Alex wouldn’t work with others anyway.
Although forging forty items for 40 contractors seemed a lot, it was an investment. Humans wouldn’t use one item only anyway. If they wanted him to forge armor for free, they would come back to him to forge weapons, shields, ammunitions, and other devices they required. Although he would be giving away at least 5000 merits, he would earn them through the following crafts.
“Now that is done. I have to find a place to use.” Miles said. “Coin, see if there is a rental forge in the city. For now, I cannot open mine.”
“Looking.” Coin said and answered not long later. “There are indeed several of them, and some of them owned by the academy. Students are allowed to use them as long as they pay for every consumable.”
“That is the easy part. I never intended to buy them in the academy anyway.” Miles said and smiled.
“What do you mean? Where else can you buy them?” Coin asked.
“Have you forgotten the stronghold I can go through with the Dimensional Device?” Miles grinned and prepared to leave with Makwa. “Makwa, we are leaving. Come here.” He shouted upstairs. Not long after, the cute polar bear started to run down the stairs. In the middle, he tripped over and tumbled down all the way down and clashed with the wall.
Miles laughed at the clumsy pet and placed him on his shoulder. “I will take you to Portal World again. This time to another place though. Since you are small, it shouldn’t be a problem for you to pass through the dimensional device.”
After he walked to the city, he passed through the device and appeared in the stronghold. He looked around and failed to see any familiar faces. The stronghold they arrived at was pretty far from the rest in the F-Circle. They chose this one because it was newly built, and as its first dwellers, they had some privileges.
In those six months he was training with his father, he sold another two dual elemental orbs in the shop he had in Unizon. As he promised, he sold one to the Shin family, and the second one was the pinnacle-tier of Grunt-Rank, so they were worth a lot of money.
When he decided to move this stronghold with Zall and Xavic, he paid a big sum to rent a quarter of it for ten years. An average person would level up from Form-Rank to Extol-Rank in 6 to 10 years, so it was more than enough for Miles.
He didn’t have many projects for the land, but keeping it was better. At least, he could rent out the land piece by piece to earn back his money. After all, although it was vacant now, in a few years, it would be filled with people like any other.