Birth Of The Crafts-God

Lucas had in fact failed to register the store under the Baylands City-state Commission for Technology, and he had also not been paying taxes. The reason? Lucas was bad at running businesses.

Back in his first life, there was no such thing as an elaborate tax commission that went after businesses. Taxes, or rather tariffs, were paid on imported goods. Taxes were also paid on land properties and buildings. However, not all kingdoms charged businesses to pay taxes

What's more, Yohan was a wanderer and not a man with a fixed shop. At times he could be spotted in Kingdom A, then on the next month at Kingdom B. As such, he didn't really have to follow the rules of paying monthly taxes from his business to a kingdom or nation since he was a nomad.

On Earth, it was even more straightforward. At the start, the only taxes Lucas paid was income tax, but as soon as he got his 'National Treasure' status, he was excused from that as well. Lucas had no knowledge or experience running a business on Earth, so it was inevitable that he would have failed to realise how modern trade and businesses worked.

After sighing at the concurrent series of bad news, Lucas calmed down and faced Kelvin.

"Why did you say we're being targeted?"

From the looks of things, apart from the EVL's notice which could easily be blamed as Lucas' relationship with them, the other two seemed natural.

"This is a typical strategy used by some popular companies in the industry. If they can't get to you, they get to your business. Also, there's this." Kelvin projected a final piece of information.

It was a document much like the other ones, although most notably not from a public body. It was also a bit more detailed with the information it was passing out.

The whole gist of the document was related to a statement made by an alliance of top vestige-smith companies. The alliance had stated that since the SS vestiges were pushing in a new era for vestige-smithing, the designer of the vestiges was expected to make the information about the vestiges open to other local vestige-smiths for the greater good. This way, other local manufacturers would be able to produce similar vestiges, and in turn, boost the strength of Baylands city-state and also its revenue due to exports.

The alliance had also argued that having only one vestige-smith possess this secret would limit the advancement of Baylands city-state's technology as well as the proliferation of the vestiges into the market. In a situation where at least four other vestige-smiths knew the secret of the SS vestiges, more freelancers and individuals would be able to get access to the vestiges, than in a situation with only one vestige-smith possessing the knowledge.

They would also be able to export completed vestiges to other city-states, increasing the exports being generated by Baylands city-state.

The more Lucas read, the more he couldn't hold back his thoughts about how bogus this entire write-up was. However, the problem lay in the reality that some would agree with this crap. To be specific, those who wanted to get their hands on the SS vestiges but could neither afford to do so, or didn't want to be on a waitlist.

If there were more manufacturers of SS vestige rip-offs, they could just order those without having to apply for a waitlist or go through a backdoor. Also, more manufacturers meant that the price would inevitably drop, making the vestiges much cheaper than they are now.

"What are we going to do about this?" Kelvin worriedly asked.

While he knew that the SS vestiges would bring about great change in the vestige industry, even threatening existing companies, he never expected them to reply like this. This alliance had utilised their connections to the government, the EVL and even made an official public statement; it was a three-pronged attack.

"What are we going to do? We can only handle each problem one at a time. That's all I can say." Lucas calmly gave an answer before walking towards his workstation.

Kelvin was surprised at Lucas' tranquil mindset, and it rubbed off on him a bit as he began to regain his composure. Since Lucas wasn't worried, it probably meant that the latter had a solution thought up.

'As expected of the boss.' Kelvin couldn't help but praise.

The truth however, was far from that.

The reason why Lucas could maintain a serene mind in all of this was because there would be one party more worried than him.

Novanio Tech, or to be specific, Legacy Crafts dealership was Lucas' major and sole trading partner. Although they had other vestiges being sold, the SS vestiges were their flagship products and their best sellers.

The idea of having the knowledge about these vestiges publicised, while it might sound beneficial, harmed the interests of the Legacy Crafts dealership. Publicising the knowledge meant more manufacturers of the vestiges. More manufacturers of the vestiges, meant more competition, and more competition would inevitably affect the prices and sales of the SS vestiges. This was something the executives of the Legacy Crafts dealership would definitely not want to see happen. As such, Lucas believed that they would be more worried than him about this matter. Experience exclusive tales on empiren/o/vel/b//in dot c//om

One might ask how could that be, but as long as you were to recall that Lucas never had any interest in running a store and was forced to do so by the system, it would all make sense.

Being unaware of how to properly run a business or the most suitable course of action to take from this point on, Lucas decided to wait for his partners to reach out to him. Once they did, the two sides would then discuss their next move.

'But it's not the way of a Grandmaster to just sit back and wait for help. Since they dared to mess with me, I have to pay them back with interest.'

Lucas grinned as he approached the work bench and unfurled a blueprint on it.

Being a creative genius like himself, Lucas had tons of ideas stuck within his head, but wasn't willing to bring them all out. He didn't want to upset the balance in the vestige industry by doing so, as such, Lucas had only made two types of unique vestiges: the Blue Spear and Dark Dagger.

Since the stakeholders of the industry came for his head first, Lucas firmly believed that there was no reason to play nice again. He might not know how to run a business, but it didn't mean that Lucas didn't know how to put one out of business.

Unfortunately for the alliance, they had believed that their plan was foolproof and would profit them greatly; unbeknownst to the group, they had forced the hand of a devil. A couple of companies would fall at the end of this, and the event would become a memorable one in history. When the fallen CEOs would be asked whether they would back out of their plan if they could go back in time, they would unanimously give the same reply: yes.