Lord of Industrialization

As the tulip trade became increasingly prosperous and more and more people participated, Amstel opened up a market for retail traders and became one of the busiest places in the city.

On June 18, 1034, retail investors found that the tulip bulbs that they used to sell with ease could no longer be sold, so they continued to lower the price. Unexpectedly, during lunch time, they heard that the large chamber of commerce had begun shipping in large quantities.

Those chambers of commerce purchase products at wholesale prices, which are not profitable and are cheaper than retail investors' cost prices. People who believe that bulb prices are just technical adjustments purchase directly from them.

At four o'clock in the afternoon, retail investors changed from maintaining capital to not losing so much. Soon after, the chamber of commerce followed suit and prices continued to fall.

Count Rank had no intention of negotiating with Frederick. He asked his entourage to keep asking about the prices in the market, and he drew a trend chart. The red bars that kept descending represented the disappearance of a large amount of wealth out of thin air, which was shocking.

He took out a wax-sealed silver bottle from his pocket and placed it beside the table. He asked Frederick to help him put a piece in his mouth if he covered his chest later.

Frederick thought for a while and asked him tentatively: "Has your family invested in tulips?"

Earl Rank nodded with a dark face: "I bought a lot of contracts last month."

After speaking, he asked his entourage to bring a wooden box, which contained several contracts for delivery in three days.

When Frederick saw that the prices of several tulip varieties bulbs on the price chart were almost halved, he shook his head and said, "Well, just think of it as a fire at home."

Unexpectedly, Count Ranke said in frustration: The money was borrowed, 5,000 florins, an unsecured credit loan. "

Frederick blinked, good guy, isn't this the business that Wesson Bank provides to the nobles of the Rhine League? These days, he also provides them with low-interest, limited, and unsecured loans. This is done to win people's hearts. of.

"It doesn't matter." He shook his head, "It's only 5,000 gold coins, this little money..."

Earl Rank immediately asked nervously: "No need to pay it back?"

Frederick smiled and shook his head: "If I cancel the debt now, someone will accuse you of betraying the royal family's interests for personal gain in the subsequent negotiations, so I should force you to pay back the money as soon as possible."

It is a joke to say that the Rank family does not have less than 5,000 florins. They may not have that much liquidity, but they pick and choose unimportant collections from the warehouse and sell them back in minutes. This is the heritage of an old family.

Count Rank just muttered "just like the Venetians" and stopped mentioning the matter. The use of Venetians to describe ruthless moneylenders became popular after the performance of the play "A Piece of Meat" edited by Frederick.

A small confrontation ended with Count Rank failing to achieve his goal. He planned that if Frederick would forgive his debts, he could offer an outrageous price during negotiations, and then lower it to the original price on the grounds of repaying the debt of favor. It seems that a lot of benefits have been given away.

By the time dinner started, the prices of several tulip varieties invested by Earl Rank's family had dropped by half, and the prices of other varieties had also dropped to 40 to 60% of the price this morning.

The Amstel city government issued an emergency decree prohibiting tulip trading between the time the sun goes down and before it rises. At the same time, invitations were widely distributed to all major chambers of commerce to participate in the dance held tonight.

The Dawn Chamber of Commerce naturally got the post. When Shupaiya sent the invitation, Frederick asked him: "Have Mrs. Franken and her party made arrangements?"

Shupaiya replied: "They have been arranged to go to Baron Adikon's warship and have left the port now as planned."

The impact of today's turmoil is extremely bad. Mrs. Franken, who was the first to cut prices, will definitely be punished, so Frederick arranged for her to run away with a bucket.

Of course, this is not free.

Frederick glanced at the invitation and asked Count Rank with interest: "Are you interested in seeing how the gentlemen here deal with this crisis?"

Earl Rank shook his head and said: "We don't want to reveal our identity."

It's not that I don't want to go, it's that I don't want to expose my identity, that's simple.

Put on a wig, change clothes, put on makeup, and say it's the scholar Albus Dumbledore invited by the Dawn Chamber of Commerce to identify the treasure, and the young man next to him is the student Tom Riddle.

Lilu will also attend the ball tonight, and Frederick is eager to dress her up beautifully. However, she is famous for wearing clothes that are easy to move around, and there is no evening dress at all.

At eight o'clock in the evening, the auditorium of the city hall was very busy. In addition to the local chamber of commerce, there were many chambers of commerce from the Kingdom of Gaul, as well as many pagan merchants from the Kingdom of England, the Rhine League, and the dark lands of the north.

Shupaiya and Lilu greeted the familiar chamber of commerce president and got to know the new chamber of commerce.

Doing business involves connections, and daily accumulation is the most important.

At a table in the corner, Count Rank seemed to be tasting wine casually, but in fact, his ears were slightly illuminated with white light, and the voices in the entire auditorium could be heard.

Before the official speech of the government official before the ball started, he told Frederick: "The city government plans to purchase a large number of tulip bulbs tomorrow morning at a price that is 50% higher than yesterday, in order to raise the price back."

His tone sounded very relaxed. If he could seize this opportunity and sell the tulip contract at home, he would not owe Frederick any money and could still make a fortune.

"It seems to be working well." Earl Rank continued, "Many businessmen are willing to follow the footsteps of the city government."

After he finished speaking, he noticed that Frederick frowned slightly, seemingly thinking about something.

Frederick was also listening to the conversation in the auditorium and said in a deep voice: "Something's wrong. You also know that Duke Wesson predicted the collapse of the tulip market in his just-published "The Nature and Research of Wealth." With the current communication speed of telegraph, this The news should have reached here, but I didn’t hear anyone mention it.”

Earl Rank also discovered this problem after he reminded him. He quickly understood it after being in a high position all year round. He said expressionlessly: "It is possible that others think this prediction is nonsense and there is no need to pay attention to it, so they did not waste money on spreading it." return."

"There is another possibility that someone has blocked the news."

Frederick was too lazy to pay attention to the first possibility, holding his chin and said: "No one can block the telegraph station. The telegraph station in Amstel City has the shares and people of Duke Wesson. If this happens, it will definitely be reported to Wesson." Duke Sen."

"Who knows." Count Ranke smiled, "Maybe someone blocked the telegraph station in Weissenburg without Duke Wesson's knowledge. It seems that Duke Wesson's territory is not as stable as imagined. Woolen cloth."

Frederick curled his lips. His control over the territory was both top-down and bottom-up. Financial power, military power, and personnel power were all firmly in his hands. Government orders could be issued to villages, and there were no inheritance disputes. There is no breeding ground for rebel thieves.

"It's impossible for something like this to happen in Wesson," he shook his head. "No one can control the telegraph station silently...probably..."

Frederick said that he got stuck in a very uncertain manner at the end. Earl Rank suddenly concentrated his energy. It seemed that there was a force hidden in Wesson State that could interfere with his governance. If it could be found and used, it would be good for the royal family.

Just now, Frederick remembered that there was indeed someone in the territory who could command the entire Wesson state "as if I were personally present" when a major incident occurred and he could not handle it. This power was given to him when he decided to travel after regaining Constantbul. When I came back, I didn't take it back because the war was coming.

He was sure that when he went back to investigate, he would be able to see relevant official documents on the second to last piece of paper in the last box of the half-meter-high file box.

The dance was about to begin, and there were more and more people in the auditorium. Shupaiya and Lilu also returned to the table to take a rest.

At this time, the waiter's roll call at the door attracted the attention of many people.

"President of the Sea Flame Chamber of Commerce?" Shupaiya was surprised, "Why does this person appear at this time?"

Many people have the same idea as him. This chamber of commerce has been very popular in the tulip circle in recent years, but the president has never appeared. Unexpectedly, he suddenly appeared today.

A woman who looked about thirty years old soon walked in outside the door. She was wearing a green evening dress and a pearl hairnet. She had a round figure and sickly white skin.

A big local businessman at the table next to him whispered to the friends around him: "I heard that the city lord personally invited the chief commercial officer of their chamber of commerce this afternoon. I didn't expect that the president came in person."

Another businessman said: "They have a lot of goods. It is said that many of them are stocks from three years ago. They were tested and sprouted last month."

At Frederick's table, everyone except Count Rank was stunned. They didn't expect that the president of the Sea Flame Chamber of Commerce was actually Altasha.

Artashia was defeated and captured in the Six-Day Defense War in 1026, and then worked as a servant for Frederick for a period of time, treating him like a winter melon, and later taught him some basic summoning skills.

After the Battle of the Elbe River in 1027 years ago, Frederick obtained the southern part of Cod Island during negotiations, and Artashia's territory was in the northern part, and then went back to help mine the fire magic crystal there.

In recent years, Lilu had met her several times when she accompanied Baron Adikon to Codfish Island. Shupaiya had also met her several times because of the matter of transporting fire magic crystals from Codfish Island to Weisen State. We got to know each other.

"I see."

Frederick understood that Altasha was not only the princess of the Green Island Kingdom, but also a member of the Witch Sisters, and Psyche had a very good relationship with this mysterious organization. It seemed that the two parties had joined forces, and Psyche was in Wesson State. The radio station used tricks to block the news. The Witch Sisters made a fortune in the tulip market, and maybe they would get a share of the final dividends.

So he whispered: "Stay as far away from things related to her as possible. If you do something bad with good intentions, it will be over."

But the development of things went beyond Frederick's expectation. Altasha did not engage in any plot of overt and covert fighting in business war novels when he came here. Instead, he chose to scald other people's money trees with boiling water: "Haven't you heard that Duke Wesson has already It was predicted that the price of tulips would collapse like a dilapidated house, so we cleared the goods at a low price."

The Lord of Amstel City was immediately confused, and asked cautiously and tentatively: "Which Duke Wesson is it...?"

Altasha said matter-of-factly: "Who else could it be, Duke Wesson? He's the one who rented a lot of swamp land here and reclaimed it as farmland."

The city lord, the surrounding officials, the nobles of the Kingdom of Gaul, and the big businessmen suddenly broke out in cold sweat.

Count Rank was involved in academic circles but not in business circles, so he didn't know Frederick's status in the hearts of businessmen. All of Frederick's business-related speeches in the "Wesson Daily" would be studied letter by letter by them. Those in the church Priests don't study scriptures that seriously.

Especially some time ago, Frederick published a declaration to fight for businessmen in the "White Stork Times", which further improved his status.

Duke Wesson said that Tulip was going to be doomed, so it probably really was going to be doomed.

When the city lord personally came over to ask Shupaiya and Lilu about this matter, his feet were shaking and he couldn't speak clearly.

Shupaiya said calmly: "Duke Wesson said a few years ago that the tulip market has gone astray. It is not a normal commercial trade, and the price of the goods seriously exceeds its own value. Therefore, the Dawn Chamber of Commerce has never participated in the tulip trade. .”

People who had dealt with the Dawn Chamber of Commerce suddenly recalled that Shupaiya and Lilu had never touched tulip trading in these years, and they secretly laughed at it at the beginning.

As if someone had planned it, many people came to the auditorium at this time. They were all stewards of major chambers of commerce. After whispering a few words in the ear of their president, the president's face suddenly lost all color.

The news from Wesson is timely: the Duke of Wesson predicted in his book "The Nature and Research of Wealth" published on June 14 that the price of tulips will fall like a waterfall.

The merchants left immediately, and the first one was followed by the second one. Soon everyone had to rush back to deal with the inventory in their hands. The door of the auditorium was blocked for a while, and one unlucky guy even fell down and was trampled on. rib cage.

The dance could not be held, and in less than a quarter of an hour, only Frederick and others, who were not involved in the matter, and Artashia, who had already cleared out their inventory, were left in the auditorium.

Altasha did not come over to talk to Frederick and the others, but nodded politely and left.

When the sun rose again, the situation was completely out of control.

The tulips in Count Rank's hands were still worth about 8,000 florins on June 17th. On the evening of the 18th, they were only worth 4,000 florins. On the morning of the 19th, they could not be sold for 3,000 florins. Towards the evening, a chamber of commerce finally offered them 250 florins. Bought for florin.

The chamber of commerce immediately picked up the goods and loaded them on the ship, went to sea overnight, and rushed to the Piast Kingdom to make up for the losses before the news spread quickly.

There were many people who had the same idea as this Chamber of Commerce, so much so that in the following period, many Hussars' horses suffered from diarrhea after eating tulip bulbs.

News of the collapse in tulip prices quickly spread through the radio. The first to be affected was the Kingdom of Gaul. Tulips began to be sold across the country, so much so that after drinking wedding wine in Cologne, members of the Gallic trade delegation were preparing to go to Wesson. They all crowded into the telegraph station, and even little Louis was so frightened that he broke his teacup.

The turmoil soon spread to the Rhine League, the Kingdom of England and the Kingdom of Sardinia. For a time, coffin shops and churches were overwhelmed, and the priests who presided over the funeral had to work overtime.