Mass Production

"A total of 137?" Xu Yi stared at the preorder list Heinz had handed him, his head aching. For a moment, he didn't know whether to be pleased or worried.

The Magic Fan's popularity came as no surprise. In this sweltering weather, everyone wanted something to bring them a little relief, but setting up a Large Frost Array was far too expensive for most people. The Magic Fan met that need perfectly.

After all, a Large Frost Array cost thirty gold coins to set up and more than a hundred gold coins a month to maintain. A Magic Fan cost only two gold coins to buy, and its monthly Magic Crystal expenses would never exceed one gold coin. There was no comparison.

The Magic Fan couldn't match the effects of a Large Frost Array, but it only needed to make people feel a little cooler and take the edge off the heat.

Even so, Xu Yi had never expected Heinz to receive preorders for a full 137 Magic Fans in a single day.

According to Heinz, many more people hadn't committed to buying one because they hadn't seen it in person. Once enough Magic Fans were available, sales would likely far exceed 137.

"My dear Xu, you must make those 137 Magic Fans as soon as possible. Our future reputation depends on it!" Before, Heinz had treated Xu Yi with ordinary politeness. Now he looked at Xu Yi as though he were a mountain of gold, his voice full of eager anticipation and even a hint of flattery. "And if you can make more, make as many as possible! Trust me, plenty of people in Bunta City want Magic Fans! Even if no one else here does, people in other cities certainly will!"

Heinz's enthusiasm was almost too much for Xu Yi, but when he thought of the seven gold coins and handful of silver coins Heinz had just given him, excitement rose in his own chest.

"All right. I'll do my best!"

Making that promise was easy. Carrying it out was another matter.

Xu Yi couldn't possibly fill all 137 Magic Fan preorders by himself.

He was already skilled at making Magic Fans, but each one still took him at least three hours of uninterrupted work. At 137 fans, that came to 411 hours—more than half a month!

After seeing Heinz off, Xu Yi thought it over. He went to the Blacksmith Shop where he had previously ordered the fan housings, placed an order for two hundred more, then hurried back to Camilla's Magic Tower.

He had met Heinz during his lunch break, and when he returned to the research room, his colleagues were all there.

Under their puzzled gazes, Xu Yi handed out the large bag of Chilled Ale he had brought back. When he reached Rem, however, Rem made no move to take one. Instead, he frowned. "Hey, Xu Yi, if you want something, just say it. My mother taught me that once you eat someone else's food, it gets harder to say no. If you don't tell me what this is about, I'm not drinking your ale."

Rem's reaction caught Xu Yi slightly off guard. He glanced at him and smiled. Seeing that everyone was looking his way, he raised his voice. "I do have something I'd like your help with. But the ale is just a little treat. It doesn't count for anything, so drink up. I haven't poisoned it."

His lighthearted remark drew a few chuckles. He went on, "Of course, I'll pay you for the work. Think of it as a way to earn a little extra. Anyone interested?"

"How much does it pay?"

"What exactly would we be doing?"

"How long will it take? Is it a lot of work?"

Their questions varied, but everyone wanted to know about the pay.

They received a monthly wage for assisting Great Mage Camilla with Magic Research, but it was fixed and hardly generous. The prospect of extra income caught their attention.

"The work shouldn't be difficult for any of you, and it won't take much time. As for the pay, that depends on how much you complete. The more you do, the more you earn. Here's how it works..."

When Xu Yi explained that they only needed to draw a simple Wind Spiral Array, everyone relaxed. For them, drawing a low-level array like that took little time and posed no difficulty.

But when Xu Yi said he would pay ten silver coins for each completed Wind Spiral Array, their enthusiasm surged. Even Vena, who had shown no reaction until then, seemed tempted.

As Xu Yi described it, the work was so simple that they could draw a few dozen Wind Spiral Arrays and earn several gold coins. That sounded easy enough.

By the time Xu Yi finished explaining, ten of the sixteen other people in the research room had taken the job.

Among those who declined were Rem and Vena, along with several of the strongest mages in the research room.

Xu Yi merely smiled and said nothing.

He understood that they probably looked down on the work, and perhaps on him as well.

It didn't matter. Convincing ten colleagues to help was already more than he had expected.

With the assistance of these ten colleagues, filling the 137 preorders for Magic Fans would be no problem. They could even produce more, as Heinz had suggested.

Over the following week, Xu Yi was so busy he barely had time to stop.

For one thing, he had to keep a close watch on the quality of the fan housings coming out of the Blacksmith Shop.

As a senior mechanical engineer back on Earth, Xu Yi knew that consistent specifications were crucial to mass production.

On the Sains Continent, however, smiths relied entirely on experience and craftsmanship. They had no strict, precise standards, so identical products were out of the question.

Xu Yi had no way to change that for now. All he could do was mark the plans clearly and insist that the smiths follow them.

He also had to teach his ten colleagues how to draw the Wind Spiral Array, guiding them through it step by step.

At first, they scoffed at the idea. Why would they need Xu Yi to teach them how to draw a mere Wind Spiral Array? They could do it without a second thought.

But when Xu Yi showed them the array he had modified, they discovered it was far more complicated than they had imagined. Many of its nodes and array lines made no sense to them.

One colleague, unconvinced, made a rough copy. But when Xu Yi fitted that array into a fan housing, everyone saw that the Magic Fan produced such a feeble breeze it might as well not have been running.

After that, they followed Xu Yi's instructions and set about studying and drawing the array in earnest.

Despite the time he devoted to both tasks, Xu Yi couldn't neglect his work at Camilla's Magic Tower.

Heinz had urged him to quit. Given the Magic Fan's sales prospects, Xu Yi could make enough from their partnership to live comfortably. Why wear himself out trying to do both?

Xu Yi only smiled. He didn't tell Heinz his reasons and continued going to the Magic Tower every day.

At the end of that hectic week, work on five hundred Magic Fans was finally complete. Thirteen were defective for one reason or another, leaving 487 finished fans—enough to fill all 137 preorders, with another 350 to spare.

During that time, Xu Yi's rented room had become a makeshift workshop. Each day after finishing work at the Magic Tower, he and his ten colleagues went there to keep drawing arrays for the fans.

Today, the mood in the workshop was brighter than usual. With work on the five hundred Magic Fans complete, Xu Yi had paid everyone as promised.

Each of his ten colleagues had drawn an average of fifty arrays. At the rate they had agreed on, that came to five gold coins apiece.

Strictly speaking, it wasn't a huge sum. But for Low-Rank Mages, who rarely had other chances to earn money, it was welcome income.

Xu Yi also gave each of them a Magic Fan in thanks.

Magic Fans had become so popular in Bunta City that even people willing to pay for one couldn't always get one.

In private sales, the price of a Magic Fan had been driven up from two Gold Coins to three—a fifty-percent increase!

If they resold the Magic Fans Xu Yi had given them, that would mean another three Gold Coins each!

Xu Yi smiled faintly at his young colleagues' excited faces and their efforts to hide it, then turned toward Heinz's shop.

Tomorrow was the day Heinz had set for selling Magic Fans in large quantities. Xu Yi had used the deposits on those 137 preorders to make five hundred fans. If sales took off tomorrow, he stood to make a fortune.

But if something went wrong and the Magic Fans didn't sell, he would lose every coin he had put in.

Success or failure? He would find out tomorrow.