After Quirick jumped down from the Public Carriage, the sight before him immediately startled him.
This was his second visit to Falling Rain Valley, but he found it several times livelier than when he had last come to deliver goods for the Sandir Merchant Guild.
Not only were the Xinfei Merchant Guild's factories inside the valley bustling with crowds, but a vast, unbroken stretch of factory workshops had also appeared on the open land across the Falling Rain Highway outside the valley.
With a single glance, Quirick spotted the very familiar emblem of the Sandir Merchant Guild among those workshops.
Remembering that he had lost his job at the Sandir Merchant Guild precisely because he had refused to travel all the way to Falling Rain Valley for work, Quirick could not help feeling some regret.
Besides not wanting to be too far from his parents, he had refused because he thought this place was too far from Bunta City and too remote. Surely it would be dull, with nothing fun to do.
Yet now that he had come back to take a look, he found that although it was not quite as lively as Bunta City yet, it was not far behind.
Judging by the crowds here, it was not hard to imagine that it might someday rival Bunta City in liveliness, or even surpass it.
Quirick knew perfectly well why this had happened.
Because the new city lord had deliberately suppressed the Xinfei Merchant Guild, it had been the first to move out of Bunta City and vigorously develop Falling Rain Valley.
And because this city lord had introduced the Damn Commerce-Suppressing, Agriculture-Promoting Policy, which almost everyone cursed in private, the other merchant guilds in Bunta City had followed the Xinfei Merchant Guild's example and moved out as well.