Yama Rising

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.

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 assistance with these affairs.”

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.”

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.

Jiro Takeno’s status in the organization wasn’t low at all. He was the personal assistant to Iwasaki Kyouya himself. Most people who saw and recognized him would invariably address Jiro Takeno respectfully due to his association 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.

Thus, Jiro Takeno found Iwasaki Kyouya’s instructions incredibly peculiar.

What man is this that was worthy of Master’s attention?

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 passion - These are supplies worth a billion altogether… It encompasses 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 Hell would even have the heart to rebel when they see everything I’ve got prepared for them!

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.”

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!

He casually picked up one of the books - How coincidental… Super Entertainment Dynasty…

“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 classics, and short stories.”

“There are some.” Jiro Takeno responded, “The one who handed me the particulars of this assignment 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.”

Qin Ye shook his head. The principles of physics and chemistry were completely useless in Hell. He sighed in amazement - Iwasaki Kyouya had been incredibly thorough and thoughtful in his gifts.

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?

Books are practically godsends 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.

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?”

Jiro Takeno chuckled, “Sir, these are… three containers’ worth of diesel generators.”

He hadn’t included these items in his shopping list earlier only because he thought it would be too difficult to procure these items.

In other words, only generators with an “island mode operation” would be able to operate in isolation from the grid.

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 mass.

“Open it.” Qin Ye grinned widely. He was unable to hide his joy this time.

I’d expected no less of the Mitsubishi… Their heritage and influence sure runs deep. After all, not even the tycoons in Cathay would possess the resourcefulness to gather these goods in the span of a single day!

Qin Ye couldn’t resist the urge to give Iwasaki Kyouya a hug and a kiss!

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!

Iwasaki Kyouya has expressed his gratitude to me, but what about Mount Koya and the Onmyojis?

How ignorant of them!

“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.”

There was a wide variety of goods, ranging from basic necessities, to the goods required for engineering and printing, to playgrounds, footballs, basketballs, ping pong balls, mahjong, poker cards… All in all, Qin Ye simply refused to believe that Hell would riot in the near future with so many things to occupy their minds!

He had never expected the process of kingdom-building to be so delightful.

“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 passion in his heart, Qin Ye waved his hand dismissively, “Tell Mr Iwasaki that I accept his kind gesture with gratitude. 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.