Hax watched the ten men making a pistol with clumsy hands. One of them accidentally touched the hot metal and burn his finger.

“Put your finger in that bucket of water, and get back to work. This is your moment of truth, if you all succeed in making a pistol today, each of you will get 10 gold coins.”

The ten burly men got excited when they hear that. Their hands started moving a lot slower but a lot more carefully and refined than before. Truly, money was the biggest motivation of all. Hax didn't mind giving them 10 gold coins if he could get 1000 access points. It was a huge bargain to him.

As he continued to supervise his students, Bodin entered the forge.

"How are they doing, Hax?"

"Well, they learn quick. I'm confident they can finish the pistol today."

Bodin laughed. "I told you. If all 60 of them learn how to make a pistol, we would be able to sell it to every rich man in the kingdom."

Hax shook his head. "We shouldn't sell it only to the rich."

"Why?"

"I'm willing to teach more people how to make a pistol. That means there will be more pistols produced in a day. I'm sure, we can reduce the cost, especially when the price of materials doesn't even reach one silver."

"But the profit margin will be on the low end. I give you more men so we can satisfy the demand in other cities, not to reduce the price of the pistol. Think about how much money we can get and what we can do with it. Buying a lot of spiritual crystals is not a fantasy anymore."

Hax looked at him in the eye. "It's not just about getting wealthier, and living longer, Bodin. When you tell me that a lot of people wanted to buy my pistol, I've come to a decision."

Bodin frowned. "I believe that decision is not good for the profit."

Hax smiled. "I decide to make my pistols available to every norm, whether they are rich or poor. I want them to have this weapon not to hurt others, but to protect themselves. You told me that a lot of people are being suppressed by these magicians. Sure not all of them are bad, like your friend Gaelin. But imagine if every norm in the kingdom, and even in the entire world can walk around on the street knowing that they can be safe, that they can defend themselves if needed."

Bodin widened his eyes. "That's very ambitious."

"We have the ability to be ambitious. With this weapon, every norm would be able to live their lives in peace."

Bodin held the man's shoulder. He couldn't believe that the man in front of him was so kind to the norm. The man didn't even differentiate between poor norms or rich norms. To be honest, Bodin felt quite embarrassed. Why did he chase for profits if he could change the lives of every norm? Money, wealth, longevity, would all come to an end eventually, but the dignity of a human being must be kept eternal.

"I agree with you, Hax. I will support you will all I have. In fact, I will use a bulk of our profit to expand our reach so we can give every norm in every corner of the world the safety they needed." Bodin snatched the pouches on Hax's waist. "In fact, I will take these gold coins to speed up our project."

Hax blinked when Bodin snatched his pouches. He said that he would help the norms so he could use a fine argument to lower the price, who would've thought that Bodin was so excited about it and proceed to snatch his golds.

"Ahem. I will need that gold. Pistols are not enough to deter a stronger magician. I will use that gold to develop stronger weapons for the future of the norm."

Bodin slapped his shoulder and smiled. "You are right. Why didn't I think of that? With stronger weapons, no norms in the world would be suppressed. This is amazing! But I will keep two thousand gold coins with me. Expanding our reach to other kingdoms takes a lot of work."

Hax snatched back two of the three pouches from Bodin's hand. "Haha, you are correct. But I think we should focus our development in the Avatar Kingdom before expanding in other kingdoms. And don't forget that developing stronger weapons is much more important than expanding our reach, at least for now."

Bodin snatched back the pouch. "Developing stronger weapon is important, yes. But I need more capital to expand our reach in the Avatar Kingdom. Distance between cities is vast, and we need more magic bulls to pull our carriages. Besides, it's useless to have stronger weapons if the norm couldn't get it."

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Hax stepped forward. "We can sell our stronger weapons to a well-off norm at first to get the capital for the expansion. But to do that, I need more money to develop it."

Bodin dodged Hax's hand. "We cannot do that. We must make sure that every norm can get their hands on our weapons. Selling our stronger weapons at high prices beat the purpose of our endeavor."

"We can just sell the pistol on low prices, while the rest of the weapon we charged a bit higher. This is in fact necessary because the process of making a firearm stronger than a pistol is hard and complicated. I don't think the men you send to me could make them even after months of training."

Hax and Bodin argued while they snatched each other's pouches back and forth. The forge room was incredibly lively because of their argument. Even the burly men started to get distracted from their work.

"Alright," Bodin said. "You can use these 2000 gold coins to develop a stronger firearm but not too complicated so we can produce them faster."

Hax nodded. "With 2000 gold coins, I believe I can make improvement on the pistol. The damage will not increase by that much, but we can produce them faster."

"Good." Bodin returned the pouch that he stole from him. "I'm going to start buying more carriages and magic bulls. I'm also going to employ more people so we can expand our reach faster. With our ambition, it's impossible for the two of us to do it alone."

"Our project will also benefit a lot of norms aside from safety and security perspective," Hax said.

Bodin raised an eyebrow. "What else?"

"There is more job for them."

Bodin was intrigued. The day before, he saw a lot of norms slept on the street and hadn't eaten for days. If he could give them a job, then they could buy food and shelter.

"You are a genius, Hax. I will make sure to employ a lot of norms as long as our earnings allow it."

Hax almost slapped himself. He shouldn't have said that, because now a bulk of the profit would be spent on employing more people that they might not need. His fine argument literally backfired on him.

“I have made more than a dozen pistols. It’s in that box.”

“You are getting faster and faster.”

Bodin left the forge room to spend 1000 gold coins for something that Hax hardly cared about. Anyway, the loss wasn't that bad considering he would get much more demands in the future. More demands equal more money. Yes, he had said that all he cared about was his past, but having more wealth didn't hurt.

He returned to supervise his ten students. They made a lot of errors in making the small parts, but Hax didn't scream or shout at them for their failures. He didn't need to waste energy on such useless action. The gold coins he dangled in front of their face already motivated them to the fullest.

A few hours later, one of the burly men dashed towards him. "Sir, I did it! I did it! I made the pistol!"

Hax came out of his daydream and grabbed the pistol from the man's hand. The frame looked crude, and the handle was quite uncomfortable. It felt like grabbing sandpaper. The pistol would make the palm itch if used intensively.

He pressed the trigger a few times so to know how it feel. It was roughly the same as his work, but the clicking sound made him realize that this pistol was susceptible to jam. Hax cocked the gun, but it stuck. He frowned before he used more strength.

Hax eyed the burly man who was smiling.

"Give me a bullet."

The man rushed to the table to grab a bullet.

"Don't be in such a hurry."

The burly man lowered his head with a smile. "Sorry, sir."

Hax loaded one bullet and tried to find something to shoot. He could just shoot the wall or the ground, but he didn't want to risk it.

Bodin fired his gun in public space with a crowd gathering on him, but he didn't tell Hax that part. If he did know, Hax would lecture the merchant about firearm safety.

After a while, Hax decided to shoot the tree trunk again. This time he put less distance between him and the target.

Bang!

When the bullet punched through the wood, Hax was fairly satisfied, but not too much. "The accuracy is terrible. I told you to carve the barrel with care. And don't put too much gunpowder inside the bullet. Look how that deviates the trajectory."

"Sorry, sir. I thought the bullet will be stronger that way."

"Yes, it will be stronger. But if you cannot hit your target, then what is the point?"

"I will do better, sir."

"Good. Have the rest of you finished yet?"

"Yes, sir." They replied.

Why did it feel like he was a teacher asking the students if they had finished their exams? Hax shook his head and inspected the quality of their work. When He was finished he would lecture them on what parts should they improve or fix. Generally, they all have their own ideas on how to improve the pistol. This was a mistake because he didn't ask them to improve it. All he expected of them was to create the pistol according to the schematics, but the prize must have motivated them to do something more.

"Sir, I believe a longer barrel will make our weapons stronger," one of them said.

"Yes, you are not wrong that a longer barrel will improve the pistol. But you made the barrel incorrectly which reduce the accuracy. The advantage of a long barrel is lost because of this. Not to mention that your pistol is too heavy for ordinary people. I don't make this pistol only for big dudes like you. I want every people, even if their body is as thin as paper, could wield these weapons. Understand?"

"Yes, sir."

Hax let out a breath. "Don't worry about it. I plan to make a heavier weapon in the future. Your experience in making a longer barrel will be an advantage at that time. The rest of you can go home now."

Hax gave them 10 gold coins each, and kick them away along with the fifty burly men.

"Now that they are gone, I can do my business."

[Congratulations. You have completed your mission 'Knowledge Sharing']

[You have been rewarded with 1 blueprint '1000 access points']

"Nice!"