Establishing the Commercial Alliance

"Alright."

The Witch let out a sigh.

More than a century had passed since the Demi-human Kingdom fell. No one knew where the great nobles of old had gone; those with money had already immigrated to countries that did not discriminate against demi-humans.

Lilim's status could indeed raise a banner, but many practical problems still lay before them.

Raising a banner was one thing; balancing the interests of all parties was another.

Not to mention that this royal family had arrived with humans in tow.

The cat demi-human chieftain signaled with his eyes, then brought out the things they could offer.

Some Magic Beast pelts, dried meat, and a basketful of iron ore.

"Lynn, come over here."

"Is there something?" Lynn walked over, his eyes lighting up. "Nice, a winning start."

Bypassing Lilim as a translator, Lynn impatiently began negotiating the trade. "You, these, us, all want!"

With dead fish eyes and a vacant look, Lilim said, "He means we want all this iron ore. However much you have, we'll buy it all."

"Humans lack iron? That can't be right, can it?" The cat demi-human chieftain's gaze held a trace of uncertainty. "Aren't humans very wealthy?"

Smiling, Lilim said, "Chieftain, I'm afraid I cannot tell you about that. Let's continue discussing how much cloth this iron ore can be exchanged for."

The chieftain and his poor tribe looked at the luxurious cloth, the durable rainproof clothes, and the army outside. Somewhat uncertainly, he said, "We're too poor. We really can't afford it. Holy Tribe—no, Princess, we're all demi-humans. Are you really going to force us into a sale?"

Though the cat demi-humans showed respect for Lilim's identity, they were still afraid of Lynn's army. Was this really here to do business?

To do business, bringing a few supplies and personnel would be enough. Who brought an army along to trade?

"Ah, you needn't worry about that. Our cloth is very cheap. The main purpose is to strengthen our exchanges and trade." Lilim recalled Lynn's words.

They would use trade and Wooden Tracks to transport goods by horse-drawn carriage, strengthening the ties between the scattered tribes and Aningsbe. At the same time, they would carry out cultural and economic infiltration, drawing everyone into Aningsbe's tariff trade system. Any tribe connected to Aningsbe's tracks would not need to pay tariffs, and everyone could trade without discrimination.

Lynn called this system the Tariff Union Assimilation Plan.

Lilim thought about the concept of the Aningsbe people.

Freedom—therefore, slavery could not be permitted.

Fraternity—no discrimination against humanoid species, no insults, unity and friendship.

Democracy—community representative assemblies would be formed, electing representatives to bring proposals to the Lower House and vote on laws, though the Grand Commander held veto power and the army ensured his authority.

Aningsbe was nominally an Imperial force, but the Empire had simply treated Lynn as a sacrificial pawn. Rather than saying she had sold the demi-humans to the Empire, it would be more accurate to say that Lynn was starting a business—drawing support from the demi-humans.

Lilim told herself that this was entrepreneurship. After all, barriers between races still existed. Though Lilim did not care, others would, and Lilim cared greatly about how others judged her.

"How about this? One bolt of cloth for ten baskets of iron ore?" After weighing the pros and cons, Lilim came up with a trade condition that was not too exploitative, yet still favored Aningsbe.

According to Lynn's description, this Slime cloth was merely an industrial product. It was very cheap; for the factory, three hundred bolts of cloth could be produced in a single day. (This figure assumes one bolt of cloth equals thirty meters.)

At first, they could only produce sixty-eight bolts a day. After Lynn remarked that their efficiency was too slow, he demonstrated a centralized production method in Assembly Line Mode. With the workers gradually becoming more proficient, daily output now truly hovered around three hundred.

Lynn said this was because he had yet to develop a Steam Engine or Magic Engine. On top of that, they did not yet have enough materials and did not know how to make spinning machines, so they could only use the existing simple Textile Machines.

Once resources became abundant in the future, even with simple Textile Machines, cloth production could rise much higher as long as they installed power devices.

This price should be affordable for the cat demi-humans as well. Ten baskets in exchange for a bolt of cloth was not too expensive for them.

"Really?"

"Really, Chieftain. Is this trade acceptable?"

"Yes, of course it is!"

The chieftain agreed at once. How could they not be happy to have cloth for making clothes?

This price was simply too cheap. They worked themselves to the bone mining iron ore and hauling it away to sell. To buy human ironware, clothes, tea, and salt, they normally had to spend enormous amounts of iron ore and pelts.

Don't really think the pelts of animals from fishing and hunting tribes were easy to obtain. Compared to animal pelts, why do you think humans all wore clothes made from plant fibers?

The fundamental reason was that there simply weren't that many animal pelts available for making clothes.

The demi-humans also had to use animal pelts to exchange for human cloth. That was the only way to earn more.