A Black Market LitRPG

Deep underground in an unknown location of Versia…

The sound of panting and grunts filled the wide cavern, with the flashes of metal striking metal glinting through the darkness, illuminating the shadows thrown by the arctech lamps situated all over the ceiling.

A dozen rock spiders circled and scaled the walls, their red beady gem-like eyes glinting at the man who was being assaulted now by three of their brethren. The man heaved as he swung a sword in each hand, duel-wielding and spinning while he parried each of their strikes.

The man did not have enough hands to parry, with one spider breaking through and launching a stabbing attack with two of its pointed legs.

His eyes glowed lightning blue, with a surge of lightning arcing like a power line down his skin, accelerating his motions to levels impossible. Within a split second, he had accurately stabbed his sword into the red beady eyes of each of the three spiders.

The rock spiders collapsed with a shriek, their bodies going limp as the man kicked them to the side, his legs bloodied and stained with slimy, dried dirt hardened between his joints. He wiped the sweat off his grimy forehead, grinning to himself as he watched three of the other dozen spiders begin to saunter down towards him, taking the place of their fallen brethren.

The man did not pay any attention to the holographic message in front of him, simply swiping them away as he prepared himself for the new round of enemies. The level of skill that he displayed was more than enough to clear the trial with ease, yet for some reason, the man was still stuck here, slowing himself down on purpose.

“Sir Soren, your breakfast is ready.” A voice called out from the edge of the cavern, showing a servant dressed like an explorer. In front of him were two metal tins filled with what looked like baked beans and a slab of kaya butter on white bread.

“Almost finished!” The man spoke through his gritted teeth as he blocked a stab from the spider, parrying it with his sword as he supercharged it with lightning, cutting the spider’s leg off but not finishing it. “I forfeit the trial!”

He let out a sigh as the spiders began to back off, retreating back into their holes in the cavern walls. One of them even scampered past the servant, completely avoiding him as it burrowed deep into the wall. “That was a good exercise. If I stay here for three months, I’ll catch up to my siblings in no time!”

“Sir Soren, need I remind you that the amount of EXP that you are receiving from these spiders will exponentially drop off over time? This is not an efficient method for long-time levelling. You need to-“

“Yes, yes, I know. Why are you nagging exactly in the same way as Mother? I’ve been changing dungeons, haven’t I?” Soren scratched his chin as he strutted over, plopping down onto the ground in a crude manner and grabbing the metal tin off the floor along with the kaya bread. “Mmm, tastes like home. I’m sure glad you came along with me.”

“I did not have a choice, sir. You used your points to – “

“-to request your assistance instead of asking for a weapon or a specific posting. Yes, Rayner. I’ve heard the story before: I was there, remember?”

“And you will do well to remember that I will not help you for the next phase too.”

“But that can change as well, can it not?” Soren grinned, causing Rayner to sigh in exasperation.

They soon finished their breakfast, Soren licking the leftover kaya off his thumb as he picked up his dual swords again. “Well then, Round 3 it is!”

“Sir, the trial will not reset for another two hours. We should find another place first.”

“You’re right; we can easily clear up some of the mobs nearby.”

Soren and Rayner packed up their equipment, with Rayner hefting the backpack over while Soren whistled as they trekked down through a derelict hallway.

The walls were made of brick, covered in moss and algae which thrived in the damp, moist areas illuminated by the arctech lanterns eternally turned on along the hallways. Countless skeletons lay along the floor through which they gingerly stepped over. A good majority of them were monster skeletons, but a few were distinctively human.

“Remnants from the Heavenly War, it seems.”

“Pah, useless old farts. If it weren’t for their incompetence, we would be masters of this world already.” Soren scoffed. “If I was alive back then, I would have easily turned the tide just with a single blade.”

“It is good to have such confidence, but perhaps you should work on your foundation first.” Rayner insinuated.

Soren scowled at Rayner, ignoring him and continuing to walk down the hallway towards a location they had previously marked. The number of skeletons left behind began to decrease sharply as they approached the hallway, causing Rayner to stop Soren for a moment.

“Be careful – even the elders are wary of entering such a place.”

“Then all the more for the great Soren to show them who’s better! I did not choose you to act like Mother, you know!” Soren berated Rayner, shrugging off Rayner’s hand and storming off further into the hallway.

They soon reached a large throne-like room, except it was filled to the brim with rubble save for the centre pathway that was adorned with a stained red carpet, nearly blackened from the soot and dust accumulating over who knows how long.

On the throne sat a rock golem nearly the size of a small hill. It had four arms along with three crystal eyes embedded into each of its three heads.

The room shuddered as the rock golem began to shift slightly, the crystal eyes filling up with life as they shone emerald. The rubble around Soren began to form into humanoid shapes, albeit some with additional limbs and many featuring a tail. All of them were made of rocks, consolidating around a single core well protected by various layers of metal.

“Well then. Good luck, sir. I will see you for lunch.”

“Thanks, Rayner. Alright, bring it on then!” Soren grinned as he brandished his two swords.

Kyle surveyed the new potential site for the steel factory to be built on the outskirts of Raktor. Gordon and Reese were accompanying him, along with the rest of the Golden Snake Construction Company, who were marking the field.

“Where is the closest iron ore deposit?” Kyle asked.

“Too far from here, but this is the only location that Count Leon has authorised for the factory.” Gordon shook his head in dejection.

Despite the Baron’s high rank and landed title, his authority only extended the range of the South Sector up to the defensive walls of Raktor. The county was ultimately owned by Count Leon, who had the final say in where the factory was placed.

The military buildup and imminent war was not a secret to those in the know and within the circle of relations with the nobility. Nearly every major gang knew about it – Kyle was even sure that the Red Lions knew about it.

While the general populace was still in the dark, believing that the tensions between Yual and Versia had been solved by the reparations resolution signed recently, the landowners and businessmen were scrambling for the prime land to build up infrastructure to support the upcoming conflict.

As such, Kyle’s proposed steel and weapons factory was not the only one competing for resources. Count Leon had his own gaggle of businessmen that supported his every move, forming a sort of corrupt conglomerate that had the best locations and adjacencies to iron mine deposits as well as coking coal for steel manufacturing.

Instead, Kyle got a plain, arid plot of land, completely filled with grass and weeds with nothing to show for it. Behind him was the city of Raktor, while in front of him was the Culdao Peaks, which had no proven iron mine deposits at all.

Gordon traced on the map the distance to the closest iron mine deposit. “The nearest one is already owned by another company – we will definitely need to pay them an additional fee in order to get them to supply us with the necessary materials. Furthermore, the transportation would take more than four hours one way via wagon.”

In the Galactic Era, I may have succumbed to the economies of scale and bought the raw materials commercially from established suppliers… Kyle pondered for a moment before deciding not to go ahead with buying from another supplier. He believed that he could do it better and potentially create a vertical integration system which would lower the cost completely and beat every other competitor in terms of scale.

However, this was not so easy to be done – he needed to first find a nearby iron ore deposit that was unclaimed. The only thing he could think of was the abandoned mines that were now goblin dens in the Culdao Peaks. He had long been digging a tunnel from there to Raktor. It was nearly complete, with only a few weeks left of work to do. The tunnel networks left behind helped ease the amount of digging needed to be done on their part.

“We will need to have prospectors enter the goblin den and figure out if we can establish a direct route for raw materials.” Kyle was not sure if there were any iron mine deposits deep in the depths of the mountains that used to be dormant volcanoes. Perhaps there may be a few deposits as a result of the volcanic flow. Further work will need to be done in order to extract them.

They spent a few more hours working out the details, with Reese and Gordon working in tandem to plan out the structure of the assembly line. Each time, Kyle would intervene and prompt them not to rely on workers where possible, instead creating a dedicated specialised arctech machine for it.

“The blast furnace will need to be of sufficient scale to achieve a profit when heating up.” Kyle pointed out. “And the entire method of delivery from the iron ore deposit to the blast furnace and out into a basic oxygen converter.”

“A what converter…?” Gordon was confused, having no background in chemistry. Reese too, was utterly lost, having no idea what Kyle was talking about.

Kyle sighed, quickly drawing out an system diagram, his style of labelling and shapes completely different to whatever Gordon and Reese were used to. Gordon and Reese looked at each other, sharing a knowing look.

“Let me simplify it for you – raw iron and coking coal is mixed into pig iron, then slammed into a large pot where we blast oxygen, a constituent of air, into it, blowing away the excess carbon and forming steel. We then pour it out into a mold. As much as possible, this entire process should be completely automated, save for the mining.”

Kyle was working on his understanding of the automated mines that he used to deploy on the asteroids or moons of gas giants. If only I could buy a starter package like what they used to offer in the Melsura Star Sector. He sighed as he recalled easier days.

“Okay, we’ll work on it. But we still need to find the iron ore deposits!” Gordon pointed out. “I know that right now we only have access to two goblin dens, but what if neither of them have anything? It will be such a waste!”

“I understand. There are more than two goblin dens in the Culdao Peaks. We simply have to expand.”