Calculating Cultivation

I didn’t think I pulled one over on elder Xu Xiaoli, offering profits, not revenues. But she didn’t call me out on this, which I was grateful for. Perhaps she didn’t understand the difference, which would be a bit dangerous if the confusion persisted. My hope was she had decided to treat the entire investment as a minor issue. Regardless I planned to give her detailed statements about the company on a yearly basis and make sure she was paid off.

Taking any risk about her backing was unacceptable. And 25% of the profit would be a sizable chunk. But she might have to pay up to one of the immortals in charge of the Imperial Sect or the Sect itself. I had no way of knowing this or the internal politics of her actions.

The elder left and then Zheng Ting and I left. As I made my way back to Zheng Ting’s apartment and paying the elevator fee. We settled as I thought about what had just occurred. “You really like causing trouble Young Master.” She used an old expression for me, to show how amused she was by my antics. She handed me a cup of tea which I sipped.

“Thank you. If you aren’t making some trouble, then you aren’t living. We need to work out the plan. This time I will need to get directly involved,” I explained. Zheng Ting sat down with her own cup of tea.

“What’s the plan Yuan Zhou?” she asked with a smile. I was glad she wasn’t complaining and was invested in this. I needed her help since it was going to be a massive headache.

“It’s about a five-year caravan loop from Half Moon City to here. And a year of hard traveling for a cultivator. There are three main issues as I see it. The first being setting up mines and digging up the ore in various cities and refining it into spirit iron. The second shipping the finished bars here. And third, making spirt steel from the shipped bars.” Zheng Ting nodded at this and then spoke up.

“For the first issue, we set up an individual in each city, to manage mines, and prospect for new ones. New ones would be easier and less headache involved, but more money would be needed. A new sight, with a cultivator helping get things set up so it doesn’t take years, you are looking at one rank 3 spirit coin. How big is our war chest?” she asked me.

“I have 94 rank 3 spirit cores left. I have that much in coin,” I replied. I had several lesser spirit stones for personal expenses, but this was going to be my war chest and start up funds.

“The chance of hitting spirit ore is fairly low. So, if we set up 50 mines across 10 cities, about 5 might get spirit ore. We can arrange our own caravan, or have you transport things directly with a spatial ring. But I don’t have any idea how we can afford a formation to make rank 6 metal.”

“Ah, that is where I have some ideas. We make mines in the wilderness, deep in the wilderness. Then construct formations that draw in energy of the heavens and the earth. We make our own spirit ore,” I replied.

“Is that possible? I mean why hasn’t it been done?” I smiled at that question, since it was one, I often asked myself while looking at various businesses.

“The risk of attracting a high-level beast. But it would be a matter of trapping the entrance. And having people live underground to manage the mine. Each mine only needs 20 or so people. We might lose a few. But they would all be trapped at the entrance. Something like I saw at the Cloudy Moon Sect’s outpost.” I was getting excited as my knowledge all came togeather for this idea.

“We dig into mountains, with hard rock. Scatter these mines about. Even if one is taken out, there would be a lot more. The formation drawing in the energy and the mining efforts, don’t have to be that much. Also refining can happen on sight,” I explained.

“What about food and other supplies?” Zheng Ting asked.

“Shipped in twice a year, to limit the risk. I can start this up in the territory the Cloudy Moon Sect controls for the most part,” I added. I would be infringing on some other territories slightly with how the arrays were pulling, but it should be fine.

The issue with condensing arrays was that they tried to pack the energy into a specific item or core. I would have poorly designed arrays set up to pull in the energy, but then disperse it locally. Mine out the iron, and store it around the condenser. Heck, the ore could be left alone once mined and then picked up after a long period of time.

That was a better idea and I explained that to Zheng Ting. “So hidden mining locales, that are made. Ore is mined, the condensing array placed, but it diffuses in the area with mined out iron ore. Then you seal up the mines, and come back five years later,” she explained back to me.

“Exactly. Keep the condensing arrays a low rank and the beasts might get annoyed, but they won’t be able to get at the ore itself. I could get a team. One senior cultivator to dig these places out and place the arrays for condensation and defense, a group of mortals to spend a month mining out ore. They get sealed up and then go back around and collect all the ore, smelt it on site, and then ship back bars. A portable array to condense rank 2 spirit iron isn’t that expensive,” I explained.

“Let’s say that is possible. You will have to do all the moving yourself?” she asked me.

“The optimal time would be every five to ten years to go around. But it could be longer and the spirit ore would just get better. Low rank arrays for combining spirit ore have been around for a long time and have been fairly optimized. No one has done this, since the set-up cost is so high, the headache is immense, and getting a payout is a nightmare,” I explained.

“You need an elder, or someone who can use techniques who you can trust,” Zheng Ting said. “I don’t think you will find an elder who wants to work like this. You are trading one problem for a more complex problem. While your idea has merit, depending on other cultivators and not mortals is a big flaw.” I frowned at this.

“What do you suggest?” I asked.

“Set up mines near cities. A lot of them will be missing but we can set up more. Play a numbers game. If you can use a condenser array for the ore, can you use it for the bars?” she asked.

“No. Since they aren’t natural, they resist the energy of the heavens and the earth. But most people do it like that, since it easier,” I explained. It was similar to how high-ranking spirit wood was created. But the process was not in favor, since pulling out the energy from the surroundings caused issues with the beasts and other forms of life.

“Cultivators will make mines easily. We move into a city, set up 20 mines, a fair distance out. Get a road built. And some cultivator support to make the initial mineshaft. From there we use your mining strategy. Eventually we will hit spirit ore,” she suggested.

We had two different business strategies. “Ah, my idea is more guaranteed, but the room around the condenser is not enough,” I muttered as I thought over both of them. I sipped my tea. It had been an interesting idea and I could see a family doing something like that to create treasures for their descendants, but it wasn’t practical. Mortal mining near cities was the only option.

I took a deep breath to recenter myself. While I had a vague idea how all this would work, the devil was in the details. I thought I had hit on a shortcut, but it wasn’t useful for this start up portion of the business.

“How big was the vein of spirit ore that we found?” I asked Zheng Ting.

“It goes for a while, but it only aligns with the iron ore. Once that runs out, then no more spirit ore,” she explained. It wasn’t like mining out a layer. We had to find deposits. Most mines were located by finding samples of ore on the surface and then digging down from there.

“But the mine I own was still going?” I asked.

“Mines tend to last quite a while. A decade to a century, then they run dry. The only option to make this economically feasible is to mine out on a vast scale using mortal methods. If we go only with mortal means and not cultivators, we are looking at least 5 years per mine and 50,000 tael,” she explained. This was why I didn’t even consider starting up new mines back when I was in Half Moon City.

“That will depress the price of iron. We could ship the excess out of one city without issue, but having excess iron in several cities will be an issue,” I replied and considered the issue. “We could ship it back and make steel here, is there a market?” I asked. Zheng Ting got up and got a book before coming back. She flipped through it.

“There is a market, but not a huge market,” she replied. That meant it was high enough to get a huge profit by shipping iron bars all the way out here.

“I am an idiot,” I said as another idea came to me. “We ship the iron here. Make it into steel, and turn that steel into finished goods, which we then ship out.”

“Several other people do that,” Zheng Ting said, but I waved her off from telling me about people doing this.

“We create a new device. The rickshaws have a coating around their wheels?” I asked.

“Yes rubber,” she replied, and I nodded at this. One thing that was missing was bicycles. I hadn’t seen any around. But she corrected me on that issue. Bicycles did exist, but there were issues.

“They are priced too much. Rickshaws are used by wealthy people. But cultivators get around with either rickshaws or on their own power. It is also on the list of restricted goods to ship out of Imperial City,” she replied. That was some nonsense right there, and I collapsed back into my chair. “Anything made of steel needs a special export permit, like the pumps we used for the mines.”

“With the backing of an elder can we get around that restriction?” I asked and she shook her head.

“No. Pumps are one of the items that is released in limited quantities, but we couldn’t get parts in Half Moon City. They had to be ordered, besides the leather for the valve. Anything with rubber is completely banned from export,” Zheng Ting explained.

I was silent and upset. She spoke up again. “It is just a matter of scale and then consolidating the spirit ore we do find,” she explained.

“I know that, but I was hoping for a shortcut, rather than trying to go city by city. And all the regular ore we dig up, what do we use it for? If we push the metal market, then a lot of vested interests will be upset,” I replied.

“Your idea of using condensing arrays, you can’t use it with bars?” she asked, and I shook my head.

“No. The energy of the heavens and earth won’t be easily absorbed. It can happen but it is a hundred times harder and normally not worth the effort. Using spirit stones defeats the purpose as well. That is why I liked my idea of guaranteed spirit ore, even if there are a lot of hassles,” I replied.

This would be a lot easier if we could do a large strip mine, but that wasn’t even worth talking about. The beasts would become enraged at something like that, and it would draw too much attention from cultivators.

“We need 10,000 rank 2 bars to make one rank 6. We can worry about the spirit stones later. That is the real bottle neck. We start up 100,000 mines. If a tenth of those hit spirit iron, then that means 100,000 carts of spirit ore per day. Or 10,000 rank 2 bars per day. We need to think bigger not smaller,” Zheng Ting told me.

“There are 1,000 or so cities under the Imperial Sect, so a 100 mines per?” I asked and she nodded.

“Yes. Operations can be made for by shipping iron to Imperial City. While it isn’t much, it will offset operational costs. The biggest issues then are the initial funding and organization. But that is the only way to make this entire thing work,” she replied.

“That would be immense. Most cities have 30 to 50 mines. You want to double that and do so for every city,” I felt my heart speed up at this.

“Yes. You taught me that the key was working smarter, not harder. We can get permits easily enough in each city with the backing of the elder from the Imperial Sect and a promise not to sell iron bars in the city. The city owners will just be happy there is more business,” Zheng Ting explained. That was true. As long as there wasn’t a disruption, there would be more work, and business flowing through the city.

No one would consider the issue of me taking all the iron out from this half of the continent, leaving it a barren wasteland. “Let’s say this is true. How low can we get the costs?” I asked.

“With multiple mines per city, we can use local cultivators to make the roads. Only 50,000 tael, per mine. Or half a rank 3 spirit stone. We would need 50,000 rank 3 spirit stones,” she said.

“And there is the problem. If I had that much, I would just cultivate, not open up mines,” which was what everyone else most likely said. “We need a loan,” I muttered. No one would loan this much. There was still the issue of setting this all up and processing the rank 2 iron bars into rank 6 steel, which would be another expense.

To make money, I needed money. There was a long stretch of silence at this. “Alright, we will go with that plan” I finally said.

“What?” Zheng Ting asked me in surprise. I was going to take another gamble. Even if it failed it should impact things too much. There was also prep work that needed to be done. Trying to fight my way up through the third rank, to get the resources I needed, sounded like a nightmare.

I was going to take another gamble. I had time in Imperial City to sort things out over the next couple of months and get arrangements into place. My mind sped along as I realized this was the only path forward.

“I will get the funds. Somehow. I need a green ocean lily for my cultivation. I need to grab a second one. That will be another 30,000 rank 3 spirit stones right there, based on your investigation into the price?” I asked to confirm.

“Yes,” she replied. If I got one, getting a second shouldn’t be that hard. Either I would die, or the problem would be worked out. There just wasn’t any other way for me to get that kind of money. No one would give me a loan like that. Cultivators didn’t like loans. They might give discounts and show face, and maybe a small helping hand between friends. But cultivation was viewed as a solitary journey, so asking for loans wasn’t done.

There was no stock market or any kind of interest returning investment. Giving a percentage to elders and the Imperial Sect was the cost of doing business, but the elder wouldn’t be selling shares of the business. They would horde them like a dragon would. Since it all came down to the energy of the heavens and the earth, there wasn’t much of a market to exploit. Everything could be priced out based on this energy.

What they didn’t realize was that the spirit ore was an untapped resource. I was going to go after this and hopefully and get a second green ocean lily. There was no way I would be getting one through purchasing one. If I had to try and get one, getting two was like getting one in my mind. The difficulty only went up slightly, but not that much after the initial massive jump of getting one in the first place.

While I could have used a second and hunting to fund my cultivation in the third rank, that was not something I wanted to do. Hunting beasts was for muscle bound idiots who couldn’t think or talk stuff out with their main helper. Cultivators just rushing off and killing things and hoping not to be killed. That was feudal age thinking, even here in Imperial City, that mindset was carried through by the elders and the culture.

I was aiming for something different. And while other cultivators might have done something similar with the guilds, this wasn’t going to be a trade organization. It was going to be a massive mobilization of mortal power to get spirit ore, to make rank 6 steel bars. Something like this would get me laughed out of any sect or city.

The sheer scale of what I was doing would be massive. I had been thinking silly thoughts about setting up collection arrays. Zheng Ting was right. It was go big or go home, and I was going big.

“Then that is the only way. I want you to begin setting up operations here in Imperial City. I am guessing moving on all 1,000 cities isn’t going to be quick or easy?” I asked.

“No. I can run a test case with a nearby city to work out the issues, then when you come back with the funds, I can aim to go to every city,” she replied, and I nodded at that.

“I can fund 60 rank 3 spirit stones to get set up and test run on a nearby city,” I told her and she nodded.

“That would work. We would still be in the shadow of the Imperial Sect, and the travel time isn’t that bad,” Zheng Ting said.

We spent the rest of the evening and the next two days going over the details. She would get property at one of the towns near the outer wall. A headquarters would be set up. It didn’t matter if the property was out of the way since we weren’t selling to the public.

From there it was a matter of hiring people and managing expenses. Zheng Ting would operate through the Coinage Guild, since while they reported to the local sects, their overall masters were the high-ranking sects, or the Imperial Sect in our case.

It was easy enough for me to deposit 60 rank 3 spirit stones with them and let Zheng Ting make withdrawals based on that. There was a conversation with the manager of the main branch here in Imperial City, to get favored status from elder Xu Xiaoli’s backing. I had no doubt they would check with her, or her assistant and it would be passed on in whatever internal method they used.

Once that was confirmed, with a letter from the Coinage Guild, it was much easier for Zheng Ting to begin making moves in Imperial City to set up the future headquarters of Zhou Holding Company Limited. I was keeping the same name. The directors in charge of each branch, would be instructed to start up businesses that didn’t conflict with others once money began flowing.

The model would be simple. A team of three people would be appointed as directors. An operational, financial, and hiring director. No one person would have total control of the branch. They would go out to a city, and withdraw money they were allocated from the Coinage Guild.

They would be paid based on shipments of bars that were received in Imperial City. Once they got operational and making money, they could look at other businesses, with the primary rule of not starting any kind of drama.

They would get a bonus depending on performance and standards. I wanted the same level of operations I had with my mines back at Half Moon City. While the people were debt slaves, I wasn’t trying to spread human misery. There needed to be strict guidelines and procedures, with the hope to keep these people around long term and promote them to other areas of the company as it grew.

The first test city would provide a pool of candidates, then there would be waves of expansion, drawing on people that had moved up the ranks in other cities, promoting internally. Safety would fall under operations. Each city would stockpile up the bars and a caravan would eventually be used to get them back, by tagging along with another caravan. In time we might do our own.

In Imperial City, we were easily able to get some land, and bars would be stored there. In time a building for a rank 6 array would be constructed to make the rank 6 steel bars. It would be insanely expensive, but that was something Zheng Ting would be looking into and getting priced out. Once I came back with the money, she would be ready to go.

My main role was showing up to several meetings during the first month to smooth over everything. Since a cultivator was backing things and I had the backing of an elder of the Imperial Sect, there would be no issues. I just needed to show my face a lot at the start with Zheng Ting, giving her my full respect to make sure there were no issues from the people she hired. Even the mortals of Imperial City tended to have their noses in the air. We passed on anyone that was difficult to work with. We already had connections, so we didn’t need anything else.

With that done, it was time to work out how I was going to get the money and two green ocean lilies. The first stop was to make a trip to an information broker. As I was going there, I paused when I saw a woman walking down the street with a couple of guards. She looked familiar.

“Excuse me, you look familiar,” I said to her. The guards looked at my robes and let me speak to the lady.

“I am Hou Jiaying of the Hou family master cultivator,” she replied.

“Are there many children of the Hou family with your name?” I asked.

“No? Why do you ask master cultivator?” I frowned and wasn’t sure if I should let this go. It was pocket change for me currently, but there was also the principle of the matter. She had been the wife of my fourth brother and scammed me out of a lot of money. Now she was here, when she was supposed to have died to a beast attack. That was clearly a lie.

“I wish to speak with the Hou family patriarch,” I replied. She winced at that.

“I am sorry, but I can’t speak-“

“This was not a request. If you refuse, things will get difficult. Let us go now,” I replied.

“Very well, master cultivator,” she gave in and she had a carriage pull around. It was pure luck that I ran into her. The information brokers lived in the nice part of these towns around Imperial City, and she just happened to be out at this time. I chose not to get in the carriage but ran behind it as we made our way to an estate at the edge of the town.

I got through several layers of guards to finally arrive at a room with the Hou family patriarch Hao Guiren, her father. “Master cultivator, welcome, but to what do I owe this pleasure?” he asked, but didn’t even bow his head.

“That is nephew master cultivator, if you daughter hadn’t run away from my brother,” I calmly replied as I took a seat, making sure to put my sword across my lap. I had gotten it out of my spatial ring just for this meeting. The man paled and stumbled back.

“You…you are Yuan Zhou?!” he said.

“Yes, I am that Yuan Zhou, the genius under the heavens. Also, your daughter is in debt to me for 73,000 tael plus interest. There was no official divorce. Since she ran away here and faked her death.” It was 73,000 not the 80,000 since I had taken off my brother’s salary.

“We will pay that back at once,” the man said and bowed his head, but I shook my head.

“Plus, interest. I charge 100% per year, compounded. Since it was my brother, I never followed up on this. But for your daughter, it is now, after 15 years, 2,392,064,000 tael. Will you be paying that in silver or spirit coins?” I asked. That was 23,920 rank 3 spirit coins.

Hao Guiren’s face began to turn red, and he appeared to have trouble breathing. “You better be careful, my family has members in the Imperial Sect,” he replied. So, we were having a face off. The pun was terrible but great in my mind, since we were using our backgrounds to one up the other. A battle of how much face each of us had.

I pulled out the note from the Coinage Guild and held it up. “I have the backing of an elder from the Imperial Sect.” I couldn’t call on them for this, just as he wouldn’t call on his people backing him. It was now a battle of how much support each of us could bring to bear.

“I have three family members who are cultivators, including her brother,” he replied.

“I am the personal disciple of my sect leader, who is rank 8.” I easily defeated his attempts at trying to save face.

“Fine! Then you can have her back!” he told me. I nodded at this.

“That would have been the case if you hadn’t stolen her. I know she didn’t have the money or resources on her own to get back here. You had to have paid for it. While she isn’t property, a bride price was paid to your family, not her. It could be you considered stealing from me directly,” I countered. He wasn’t going to weasel out of this.

“The amount is too much. No one but an immortal could afford that kind of price. No woman is worth that much,” he countered. Now we were arguing about price, it was all over.

“What would you consider reasonable for my brother’s pain and suffering. A brother whom I dearly love and cherish. Who helped me growing up and taught me many things,” I said with a glare. The man was wincing with each statement. A bit overexaggerated, but I was going to squeeze everything I could for this man to save his family.

He knew he would lose if this went to the Imperial Sect. If no bride price had been paid, then he could have shrugged and said young love. But with a bride price, a divorce wasn’t so simple. And the fact she had run back here even more so.

I had considered asking the information broker about her family, but I hadn’t considered it important enough or worth my time. But since Hou Jiaying paraded in front of me, I couldn’t ignore that. I had my pride, and the pride of my fourth brother to defend. Also, a lot of money.

“One rank 3 spirit coin,” he finally said through gritted teeth. I considered the amount. It was worth 100,000 tael.

“Very well then, 23,919 rank 3 spirit coins,” I replied with a malicious grin.

“You can push, but you can’t get blood from a stone. We don’t have that kind of money and it is excessive,” he was finally calming down, but still glaring at me. I also didn’t want to push things too far and get enemies. I had my fun and avenged my fourth brother by raising the blood pressure of his former father-in-law.

“Five rank 3 spirit coins and you can keep her, or one rank 3 spirit coin, and she will be shipped back to Half Moon City and put in one of my mines as a debt slave,” I countered, curious to see how much he loved his daughter.

“Five,” he said. He actually did love her. That was surprising. I was sure he would give her up, when he yelled about sending her with me.

“Then we can go to the Coinage Guild to have a contract signed that this matter has been laid to rest and your daughter owes no more debt to her former husband. We can consider it as finalizing the divorce,” I replied.

It took the rest of the day, and he was clearly unhappy with me, but I got my payment. I now had 39 rank 3 spirit coins left. After some thought, I spent one to send 80,000 tael and a letter to my fourth brother. I explained things to him and that her family had paid up as an apology. I included the entire situation and my original demand to her father.

That was enough that he would be able to live comfortably or fund another caravan. Or he might run back to Imperial City. I made it clear the divorce was finalized and included the paperwork. I could do all of this on his behalf since I was a cultivator with backing. In cultivation land, it was all about the backing one had.