Chapter 271
Qin Ye went out, flagged down a taxi, and then traveled some distance to purchase for himself a cup of hand-ground coffee that he had so longed for. He had read somewhere that coffee was perfect for someone like him who was suffering from both physical and mental trauma. Thereafter, Qin Ye traveled all the way to the meeting point which he had earlier arranged with the Imperial Furniture Group.
Warehouse AC28. It was located in a semi-abandoned dock that was quite some distance away from the heart of the city. This used to be a state-funded shipyard, but it was soon rendered obsolete by the reformation in Cathay. Just like most state-funded factories, they were unable to adapt to the new wave of industries despite further funding by the state, and they soon declared bankruptcy and called it quits after seeing no improvement in the situation.
The land located in the heart of Eastsea City itself was incredibly expensive, even exorbitant. However, the suburbs were quite different altogether. The location of the warehouse was already on the edge of Eastsea City’s borders, right next to the boundary lines of Stillriver Province, Ample Town, and Goldhill District. The journey to the warehouse took him several hours, and he was presently located so far from Eastsea that he could hardly see any of Eastsea’s police presence in sight.
Screeech… The car finally stopped at the entrance of the warehouse. As soon as Qin Ye got out of the car, a man in a suit walked up to him and warmly extended his hand, “Mr Qin, welcome. Let me introduce myself. My name is Jiro Takeno. I’ve remained behind in Eastsea in order to lend you my a.s.sistance with these affairs.”
Qin Ye was slightly taken aback, but he still shook Jiro Takeno’s hand nonetheless, “There are Nipponese managers in the Imperial Furniture Group?”
Jiro Takeno made a small gesture of invitation, and smiled as they walked along, side by side, “I don’t belong to the Imperial Furniture Group; I work for Mitsubishi Corporation. I received direct orders from the owner of Mitsubishi Corporation yesterday, instructing me to negotiate with the Imperial Furniture Group and take over this warehouse and its contents. Additionally, we’ve also taken the liberty to add a few small gifts of ours to the stash of goods within the warehouse.”
Qin Ye raised his eyebrow, acting all high and mighty as he nodded his head casually.
The duo were silent for the rest of their stroll. That said, it was evident that Jiro Takeno was sizing Qin Ye up all this while.
That’s odd.
Jiro Takeno’s status in the organization wasn’t low at all. He was the personal a.s.sistant to Iwasaki Kyouya himself. Most people who saw and recognized him would invariably address Jiro Takeno respectfully due to his a.s.sociation with Iwasaki Kyouya. And the converse was true as well - the fact that Qin Ye didn’t recognize him meant that he wasn’t well-acquainted with Iwasaki Kyouya either.
Jiro Takeno had been by Iwasaki Kyouya’s side for many years now, and he possessed astute observation skills. Therefore, he was able to tell with a single glance that Qin Ye didn’t belong to the ranks of the ultra-rich. The clothes worn by Qin Ye cost no more than a thousand RMB. Qin Ye didn’t behave like the spoilt child of a rich tyc.o.o.n either. In that regard, it wasn’t so much Qin Ye’s taste or preferences than it was his demeanor and the manner in which he held himself out.
Thus, Jiro Takeno found Iwasaki Kyouya’s instructions incredibly peculiar.
Not only was he instructed to personally fly over from Nippon at once and take over the entire warehouse and its contents, he was even instructed to go above and beyond that with the gifts in the warehouse. And throughout the course of his instructions, Iwasaki Kyouya had reiterated thrice that Qin Ye was not to be taken lightly.
What man is this that was worthy of Master’s attention?
He couldn’t wrap his head around these peculiarities no matter how much he thought about it. Thus, he remained taciturn, and so did Qin Ye. After walking in silence for ten minutes, they finally arrived at the warehouse. It was only then that Qin Ye discovered to his pleasant surprise that Iwasaki Kyouya had truly pulled out all the stops for him. The first thing he noticed was the fact that the security forces guarding the contents of the warehouse had now increased to a hundred or so personnel - To think that Iwasaki Kyouya would be able to mobilize such a great security force on short notice.
A cool night breeze tousled Qin Ye’s hair gently. As they drew closer and closer to the warehouse, Qin Ye’s eyes gleamed with a burning pa.s.sion - These are supplies worth a billion altogether… It encompa.s.ses a list of everything I could possibly think of. I’m blowing a billion on a tiny little village. I refuse to believe that the citizens of the new h.e.l.l would even have the heart to rebel when they see everything I’ve got prepared for them!
There was an abundance of material goods, as well as everything that was required for the establishment and operation of a system of currency. And once that was set up, together with the establishment of his military system, then his base of operations would finally have a solid and firm foundation for further development.
Click… His thoughts were interrupted with the soft sound of the door’s locking mechanism. Jiro Takeno smiled and gestured for Qin Ye to enter at will. As soon as Qin Ye walked into the warehouse, his eyes instantly flickered, and he turned back to stare at Jiro Takeno with great astonishment. Jiro Takeno continued to smile faintly at Qin Ye as he bowed respectfully, “This represents a gesture of appreciation from Mr Iwasaki himself. He wants you to accept it.”
Qin Ye stared at the additional containers that had been placed in the warehouse. The first container was already open, and its contents pleasantly surprised him.
To be more exact, the Mitsubishi Group had added a total of five containers in the warehouse. Each of these containers were forty feet flat rack containers - the largest containers available for shipping purposes. It was forty-seven square meters in size, and carried a maximum weight of thirty-nine tons. And the first container had been completely filled to the brim with books!
This was something that not even Qin Ye had thought about!
He casually picked up one of the books - How coincidental… Super Entertainment Dynasty… [1]
Qin Ye had read books by this author before - I’ve heard that the author’s a fatso who doesn’t have any intentions to get married. I wonder if he’s been hiding something in his closet… Regardless, his novels aren’t too shabby…
“Sir, of these five containers, two of them contain books. Container number one here is packed with novels, ranging from famous works from the published novels era, to the print publication of the online web novels. There are also the usual sci-fi, fantasy, foreign cla.s.sics, and short stories.”
Qin Ye couldn’t help but exclaim in his heart, “Are there any educational books?”
“There are some.” Jiro Takeno responded, “The one who handed me the particulars of this a.s.signment is none other than Chief Iwasaki’s first secretary. He mentioned that books pertaining to scientific knowledge might not be very useful to you, so we’ve only included books on cookery, astronomy, nature, psychology, and so on, to the exclusion of books on mathematics, physics, or chemistry. We’d basically scoured all of the bookstores in Eastsea City, Stillriver Province and the other neighbouring provinces for these books, and purchased all of the applicable books.”
He continued to size up Qin Ye, wondering what his ident.i.ty was to have been able to move Iwasaki Kyouya to such action, “Sir… do you need those books? Please let us know if you do. We’ll have it sorted out and ready in the warehouse by evening tomorrow.”
Qin Ye shook his head. The principles of physics and chemistry were completely useless in h.e.l.l. He sighed in amazement - Iwasaki Kyouya had been incredibly thorough and thoughtful in his gifts.
A poorly thought out gift could likely backfire on him. But a gift as considerate as this would likely remain fresh on Qin Ye’s mind in the years to come.
Qin Ye had purchased a large number of implements for production lines of every sort. However, it would take time to set up these production lines. And then, who would take on these jobs? Would there be training required? How is the company going to be structured? These were issues that would take at least a month or two to sort through on a conservative estimate. How was he going to fill the time before that?
He had purchased production lines for the production of basketb.a.l.l.s, footb.a.l.l.s and carpentry tools, and yet he had forgotten all about the existence of books.
Books are practically G.o.dsends when it comes to killing time… Two containers weigh close to a hundred tons in total. This contains sufficient information to last us for at least half a year, wouldn’t it? And two months later, as soon as the prints industry has been fully established, we’ll be able to start production on a new batch of books. I doubt we have any professors and experts within our numbers who are able to devour books at such a rapid pace anyway.
“Not bad.” He responded chirpily. Jiro Takeno was secretly relieved, and he smiled at Qin Ye, “Please come this way.”
He promptly led Qin Ye to the other containers in the room, “The second container here also contains books, but they contain more specialized knowledge, such as the treatises used by professionals. We’ve already sorted them out in categories, and there’s a special catalogue placed inside. Would you like us to open the container for you inspection?”
Qin Ye shook his head, before turning to the other three containers, “Tell me about what’s in those containers.”
Jiro Takeno chuckled, “Sir, these are… three containers’ worth of diesel generators.”
Qin Ye was taken aback, and then his heart leapt wildly with great ecstasy!
He hadn’t included these items in his shopping list earlier only because he thought it would be too difficult to procure these items.
After all, diesel generators were hardly produced in Cathay anymore, especially in light of its flourishing infrastructure. Furthermore, not all diesel generators are able to generate electricity without being connected to the grid. The diesel generator he needed had to have an “island mode operation” in order to achieve this effect.
In other words, only generators with an “island mode operation” would be able to operate in isolation from the grid.
Furthermore, h.e.l.l didn’t have any residential buildings right now, and if these diesel generators were to be useful in h.e.l.l, the power output would have to be high enough for industrial purposes. Otherwise, it wouldn’t be able to sustain the operations of production lines. Additionally, the cost of diesel would also form a considerable expense for h.e.l.l. Thus, all things considered, he chose to omit diesel generators from the list which he had earlier prepared.
There were definitely diesel generators around that ticked all the boxes. The main problem lay in the availability of stocks, while a secondary issue was locating these readily available stocks. A third issue would be the fact that these generators wouldn’t be useful unless he had a certain number of them acting as a critical ma.s.s.
Yet, who would’ve thought that the Mitsubishi Corporation would come through for him with such a miraculous a.s.sist?
“Open it.” Qin Ye grinned widely. He was unable to hide his joy this time.
Whoosh… The containers opened up, revealing a series of densely filled generators that appeared new, or at least refurbished. This caused Qin Ye’s heart to leap with great joy.
I’d expected no less of the Mitsubishi… Their heritage and influence sure runs deep. After all, not even the tyc.o.o.ns in Cathay would possess the resourcefulness to gather these goods in the span of a single day!
Having noticed a smile on Qin Ye’s face for the very first time, Jiro Takeno finally felt a huge load come off his chest. Again, he made an inviting gesture to Qin Ye, “Sir, the Mitsubishi Corporation has looked through the inventory of items which you’ve previously sought for, and these gifts are the results of our projection of what might be useful to you. Furthermore, taking into account the efficiency rating of these gensets, we’ve taken it upon ourselves to replace some of the production lines you have with those capable of being powered by these gensets…”
Qin Ye couldn’t resist the urge to give Iwasaki Kyouya a hug and a kiss!
This old man knows what he’s doing!
He saw the production lines I had, and immediately thought about the lack of electricity source. And not only has he taken the initiative to provide me with the requisite source of energy, he has even replaced the production lines with more suitable ones! This saves me an entire trip! It’s practically a home delivery right now!
It was worth every bit of the effort saving that old man’s life… Then, the more he thought about it, the more frigid his expression became.
Iwasaki Kyouya has expressed his grat.i.tude to me, but what about Mount Koya and the Onmyojis?
b.l.o.o.d.y h.e.l.l… would they have survived if I didn’t trample over Honda Tadakatsu and give Izanami a good slap in the face?!
How ignorant of them!
“Which lines have you replaced?” He shelved the dismal thoughts about these Nipponese factions, and perked up his spirits once more with the exciting display of goods before him.
“Based on our calculations, we’ve replaced the printing line, the engineering industry lines, as well as the garment manufacturing lines. Some of the lines belonging to the smaller industries such as the handicrafts and carpentry lines can all be powered by the existing gensets as they stand.”
Excellent… Qin Ye followed closely behind Jiro Takeno for the next hour and a half, inspecting all the goods which he had purchased as well.
There was a wide variety of goods, ranging from basic necessities, to the goods required for engineering and printing, to playgrounds, footb.a.l.l.s, basketb.a.l.l.s, ping pong b.a.l.l.s, mahjong, poker cards… All in all, Qin Ye simply refused to believe that h.e.l.l would riot in the near future with so many things to occupy their minds!
The more he looked, the more he couldn’t wait to get back to h.e.l.l to see the flabbergasted looks on their faces as soon as these items appeared in front of their very eyes.
He had never expected the process of kingdom-building to be so delightful.
Perhaps… this is the joy of being in power…
“Sir, the tour of the goods is over. Would you like us to ship the goods to you? Mr Iwasaki has instructed us to comply with your instructions in this regard.”
“No need.” Suppressing the blazing fire of pa.s.sion in his heart, Qin Ye waved his hand dismissively, “Tell Mr Iwasaki that I accept his kind gesture with grat.i.tude. Additionally, he can come look for me in Cathay If there’s anything that Nippon is unable to deal with in future. Here’s my number.”
1. This is one of the author’s previous books.