When they wake up the following day, Karine orders two bots to build the final unit in the contract for the swamp village, a second multigenerational home.
"It didn't cross my mind until now, but how do we know that we're building housing units that comply with the local building code?" Karine asks him. "Getting out of debt, and getting me off-world, yes, but not at the price of the residents' safety!"
"The HCP administration doesn't approve blueprints if they don't comply with the building code" Billerica answers her in a low voice.
"So what made the residents of this world reluctant to build housing up until the HCP was announced? You make it sound like the population is growing faster than housing starts! If so, I really hope that the HCP will be enough to get housing starts more in line with the population growth rate!"
I know what this means, if that's the case: as unoccupied housing rates drop, it makes an upward pressure on prices... and that's without any increase in speculation that happens when prices increase steadily. However, I wonder if the problem comes, on this horror world, from speculative investment or from something that made construction unappealing in some way, Karine reflects on what could have led to their predicament.
While the second multigenerational home was being built, Billerica bid on HCP contracts, and he wouldn't hear about it for a while. Upon completion of that particular unit, the contract was deemed fulfilled and he'd then make a reimbursement claim for the actual expenses incurred in building the six units, in excess of the seed money.
"Woohoo! We got another contract for building a neighborhood! However, I believe you're using your mind too much, and yet don't go around thinking that all projects will go as smoothly as this one!" the Taladuan warns her.
"I might need to relax all right, but what's available to us that will allow us to do so?" Karine asks him.
"We're in the swamp, some distance away from everything, and it's dangerous outside. So I may as well introduce you to our movies"
"Just deactivate the universal translation module please... I won't understand anything but that's okay"
"The movie starts in three, two, one..."
And the movie starts with the Taladuan version of what a colleague of her insolvency office on Earth called hancky-pancky scenes, with what feels like little to no setup to her. Did the producers of this movie just pick up a script based on how little setup is required to get to what they deem to be the "good" parts? Karine is then hit by a desire to scream.
"Eeeek!" she screams as her heartbeat accelerates and her face turns red. "That's too... hancky-pancky" her head then spins as her headaches mount.
However, with the universal translation module turned off, Billerica doesn't understand what makes her want to scream, only that she's screaming at what feels like bad scenes to her. Is she screaming because the movie is scary or because scenes are poorly executed? Or do humans have different tastes in movies vs us? I won't pretend to know how their tastes differ from ours, Billerica, unsettled by his coworker's apparent unease, starts raising questions that he feels he won't get answers to just yet.
That's not working... this movie isn't getting me to relax! Hancky-pancky scenes are doing me in today! Karine, reeling in from the dizzying pace at which the movie gets to that hancky-pancky scene, is left wondering how Taladuans actually live through relationships. Especially since some Taladuan filmmaker deems what she calls a hancky-pancky scene a "good" part worth rushing the plot for. Or what their filmmaking conventions are. On top of that, it reminds me far too much of some of the most graphic sex scenes in some bankrupt indie studio's unfinished game. Sometimes, as a licensed insolvency trustee, I needed to play builds of unfinished games by insolvent companies to determine whether bankruptcy really is the way to go.
"I have too many headaches, I need to go to bed for a bit" Karine warns Billerica, while not expecting him to listen.
So while he finishes the movie on his own, Billerica skims the contract, looking for relevant information for Karine to act upon the following day. Such as the number of units, restorations and so on. And, of course, the schedule of repayment. By now Karine must have realized that taking out more loans, beyond her own salary liability, is not an option for now, and then the sales of properties represent our main source of income. And the HCP's system doesn't allow us to pre-sell units under construction, only pre-lease them. However, it doesn't prevent the sale of empty lots.
The following morning, she feels less dizzy, but her mood is still down from the previous day. After the meal of the day, since days are so short on this world that humans can only eat one meal at a time, she gets back to work.
Let's see: this new contract covers a larger area than just a stretch of a village's main street. The area to rebuild contains a mix of bungalows and multigenerational homes, some of which are run down, Karine starts thinking about this new area. At the same time, this feels far too much like what residential areas around Heathrow would be like after Operation Heathrow ended, in MAA. Are Taladuans living in a region of MAA's world that wasn't introduced in the game? The rest of MAA's world is much less advanced technologically...
"We were given one empty plot, another fifty thousand talas in seed money, but no more materials. You know what to do then..." Billerica programs the goals for Karine to pursue, after reactivating the universal translation module.
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"Try not to get a tenant for the first unit then... especially since it's going to be sold quickly"
Karine orders the construction of a new multigenerational home on the empty plot given by the town. Town that has its share of derelict housing.
Upon completion, said home is immediately put for sale. And the home goes for T75,000, which she feels is the best price she could have gotten in these circumstances.
But only minutes after that unit is put for sale, one of the derelicts' owners realize what's happening.
"I bought a home on the cheap, and it turns out that it requires investment I can't afford to make it livable. I guess maybe someone can take it off our hands... especially since that area's market was dead for a while" a homeowner think to itself before the derelict is put for sale.
Thirty thousand talas might not be much, but it's about the price I paid for the derelict, the derelict owner muses while waiting for offers.
Speaking of offers, Karine is the first one who fields an offer, because she feels like, based on the speed at which the previous units were sold, she must act quickly to secure even a derelict. Looks like this derelict needs a lot of work for getting it to livable condition, so perhaps that's why I see it listed for only T30,000. And... deal! Karine then presses on the green button with a grey "thumbs-up" emote.
However, having used up most of the materials reserve for building the first unit, she looks at the estimated amount of materials required to repair the derelict. One hundred tons, and there are only 25 tons left. Thus far, it seems like we're operating in a monopolistic competitive environment, and that we're merely price takers. My job here seems to center around managing cash flow and materials. The question is: how much to order?
"I have been negotiating with the town's mayor, the mayor wants to lease a multigenerational home in the town's name. But here are the specifications for it: that home has to be upgraded to three stars, its outer walls must be painted teal" Billerica makes a change order to her. "They will pay the going rate in rent, however"
"What does the mayor use this home for? If they want the house to be publicly funded, it better be for a homeless refuge, or for some other town-funded social program!" Karine is teetering on the edge of fury, depending on the answer to the question.
"It might appear bizarre to you, but here, on this world, towns of a certain size or bigger have a customary function residence for its mayor, typically multigenerational-sized"
"And then I hope the mayor rents his regular home out upon completion; we have seen how this plays out. Otherwise I might feel like we have no choice but to terminate the contract!"
"I'll relay your concerns to the mayor. However, I trust you understand what happens if the contract is terminated?" Billerica also starts getting angrier. "You will be stuck on this world! And we go bankrupt as well!"
I guess, I have to buy 500 tons of materials and then repair the structural issues plaguing the houses in this neighborhood, after selling them one by one, Karine sighs, upon hearing from her angry boss. However, this change order is making me befuddled at best, and outraged at worst. I mean, that mayor's town had lots of derelicts on which action is taken only now, and the action is clearly aimed at growing the town's population.
And the cycle of buying derelicts to then sell the restored houses continue for a few more units, lasting through the day. Until they are one restoration short of the contract requirements.
"Why didn't you just build the mayor's function residence?" Billerica scolds her.
"I wanted to have adequate cash reserves to do it, and also I feel like we can't get out of debt without having the ability to build more expensive buildings than multigenerational houses!" Karine retorts, while she's about to buy the duplex's blueprint.
"This is the kind of actions that caused us to get in debt in the first place! The previous project manager kept building villas, mansions and other high-end houses that couldn't be sold!" Billerica argues with her.
Now I have a better idea of why the company went into debt. They served another market segment that proved saturated, whereas the HCP catered to a different need. However, I might be wondering if there was some kind of "gold rush" towards high-end houses and then a bust, Karine feels like there's a new question popping in her mind.
"We're not servicing the same market! For now, we might want to build duplexes!" Karine keeps arguing.
"Sometimes, I feel like you want to become caliph instead of the caliph" Billerica starts speaking in riddles.
"Caliph? Is that the native name of the title for the head of state, or government? Also, what does that mean to you?"
What does "becoming caliph instead of the caliph" even mean to them? To me, it meant being exceedingly scheming in the pursuit of ambition; however, it might not mean the same to the locals, Karine returns to work, while she never felt like she really wanted to become "caliph instead of the caliph" in the meaning she knew, on this world anyhow. But is the town ready for duplexes? My heart says yes, yet my mind might say otherwise.
In the meantime, Billerica didn't answer her, so she quietly buys the duplex's blueprint for T60,000. And another batch of 500 tons of construction materials, in hopes of being able to build one such duplex. I might not have much money, but here's a derelict someone just put for sale. We barely have enough left to even buy a derelict to demolish!
But Karine would realize that one of the remaining multigenerational derelict owners, worried that their derelict would fall apart and hence lose their investment, is willing to sell that derelict at a rock-bottom price. Which makes Karine accept the asking price, which is a fraction of the price she paid for the first derelict in town.
Once that derelict becomes Wonderlic's property, she feels like it's better to demolish it in a controlled manner than to try to restore it, which somehow allows the construction bots to recover part of the materials, albeit only a fraction of the derelict's mass.
And she gets all 3 construction bots to build her first duplex. The duplex, as usual with the HCP-provided plans, would feel a little blocky to the locals, but for some reason, makes a question pop in her mind. Has some Taladuan, a senator even, kidnapped a human architect, or another architect working in similar housing styles to what I'm accustomed to at home?
Yet, upon completion, by nightfall, the duplex fetches twice the price of a multigenerational, since the duplex's total size is almost the same as gluing two multigenerational homes together.
"I can kind of feel that, on the trajectory we're taking, we'll land bigger contracts and deliver more units, but land will be at a premium" Karine sighs. "There might come a time where not even duplexes will be enough to fulfill contracts, but..."
"Yet more signs that you want to become caliph instead of the caliph!" an angry Billerica interrupts her.