Chapter Summaries

Xu Yi showed Kennard how farmland magic machinery was transforming the harvest in Bunta City and discussed expanding Cantona’s harvesting business to distant cities. Back at Sankton Manor, he encouraged local merchant guilds to improve component quality rather than diversify production, offering higher prices for better precision.

• Xu Yi visited Baron Nazir’s estate, where Small Magic Harvesters were rapidly harvesting the fields, and went to give Cantona advice about taking machinery to other cities.
• Baron Nazir told Kennard that Xu Yi had proposed expanding Cantona’s harvesting work and praised Xu Yi’s impact on Bunta City.
• Xu Yi returned to Sankton Manor with Kennard and Sophia, where presidents of small merchant guilds asked to expand production and buy more Magic Machine Tools.
• Xu Yi refused their requests to make new components until they improved the quality of what they already produced.
• Xu Yi offered extra payment for tighter manufacturing tolerances, and the guild presidents agreed to work toward his standards.

Xu Yi discussed a proposed sales partnership with Hank Wilson of the Walmart Merchant Guild, but rejected its steep discounts and priority-supply terms as one-sided. When Wilson insisted that priority supply was nonnegotiable, Xu Yi offered a suggestion to address his concerns.

• Sophia complained to Kennard that following Xu Yi all day had exhausted her and said she would stop accompanying him until he went to Falling Rain Valley to see the elves.
• Hank Wilson proposed that Walmart stock Xinfei household magic machinery in its stores across the kingdom, and Xu Yi agreed to discuss a partnership.
• Xu Yi read Wilson's proposal and objected to its demand for a thirty-percent discount and priority supply for Walmart.
• Wilson said the price could be negotiated but insisted that Xinfei prioritize Walmart's orders to meet demand.
• Xu Yi rejected the high-handed terms and offered a suggestion to solve Walmart's concern about customer demand.

At Count Samo’s harvest banquet, Xu Yi discussed a Walmart Merchant Guild household magic machinery marketplace with President Lanke and rallied support for guilds to negotiate together. He also learned that President Cruz had secured funding from four guilds to build seven highways, including three major routes commissioned by the Falkor Merchant Guild.

• Count Samo celebrated Bunta City’s record wheat harvest at a banquet attended by Xu Yi and the city’s prominent figures.
• President Lanke told Xu Yi that Hank Wilson had proposed Walmart’s household magic machinery marketplace, and Xu Yi explained how it could help the industry grow while letting guilds negotiate better terms together.
• President Lanke left to report Xu Yi’s proposal to other guild representatives.
• President Cruz told Xu Yi that the Amli Merchant Guild had agreements with four guilds to build seven highways.
• Xu Yi learned that the Falkor Merchant Guild had commissioned three highways linking its mines to the route toward Anvilmar City, then praised President Cruz’s progress.

Xu Yi handled requests from several merchant guild presidents as Bunta’s road and manufacturing projects expanded. Count Samo and Kennard discussed Xu Yi’s growing political danger and Kennard’s uncertain decision about whether to join him.

• President Cruz asked Xu Yi to supply more road-building machinery and develop new models to address the Amli Merchant Guild’s construction problems.
• Xu Yi reassured President Pombelli that the royal family would honor the toll-road agreement, while postponing plans for two more highways because of ongoing redevelopment and labor shortages.
• President Pombelli described Feilson Carriage Company’s shortage of horses, and Xu Yi refrained from promising a solution through engine development.
• Xu Yi told President Vincent that Canby and the others were working on mass-producing textile-machine components and that smaller guilds could later manufacture them.
• Count Samo worried that Xu Yi’s relentless work and growing influence could put him in danger, while Kennard said he had not yet decided what course to take.

Xu Yi became president of Bunta City’s new Magic Machinery Commercial Association and used industry standards and promised technology sales to win the member guilds’ support. After Stille returned, she pushed him to rest and joined him for a morning run, which ended with them embracing by the Sandy River just before an angry voice interrupted their kiss.

• The Magic Machinery Commercial Association was established with more than a hundred guilds involved in Bunta City’s Magic Machinery industry, and its members unanimously recommended Xu Yi as president.
• Xu Yi issued industry standards and announced that the Xinfei Merchant Guild would sell more Magic Machinery technology to member guilds, silencing objections and encouraging other guilds to apply for membership.
• After returning from Anvilmar City, Stille made Xu Yi rest and took him on a morning jog beyond Bunta City.
• Xu Yi and Stille raced to the Sandy River, where Xu Yi caught her in an embrace and they leaned in to kiss.
• A furious voice from the riverbank shouted at Xu Yi and threatened never to forgive him, even after death.

Xu Yi and Stille rescued Smilla Porter from the Sandy River and learned that Xinfei Merchant Guild’s road and upstream work had ruined his river transport business. Smilla warned that the river’s accumulating sediment could cause a devastating flood, and Xu Yi offered him a job to help address the problem and rebuild his fleet.

• Xu Yi pulled Smilla Porter from the Sandy River after hearing him cry for help, and Smilla angrily accused Xu Yi of destroying his fleet.
• Stille recognized Smilla as the former president of the Porter Merchant Guild, and he explained that the guild had closed after Xinfei Merchant Guild’s road diverted transport business from the river.
• Smilla warned Xu Yi and Stille that sediment from the Sandy River’s upper reaches was making the water muddy and could raise the riverbed until a rainstorm caused a flood.
• Xu Yi examined the muddy water, thanked Smilla for alerting him to the danger, and accepted that he had some responsibility for the problem.
• Xu Yi offered Smilla a job and promised to help him build a new fleet once river transport regained its importance.

Xu Yi persuaded Count Samo to address the Sandy River’s changing condition, offering funding and magical construction machinery while insisting the city repay or compensate his guild. He then questioned Anise about the river’s beastman-occupied upper reaches and suggested they travel there, provoking Stille’s displeasure.

• Xu Yi convinced Count Samo that the Sandy River’s changes warranted action, and Count Samo ordered officials to survey it and report on possible repairs.
• Xu Yi agreed that the Xinfei Merchant Guild would provide funding and machinery, while Count Samo accepted responsibility for repaying or compensating the guild.
• Xu Yi met Stille, Sophia, and Kennard outside the City Lord’s Manor, then summoned Anise to ask about the river’s upper reaches.
• Anise explained that beastman tribes occupied most areas around the upper Sandy River because they settled wherever water was available.
• Xu Yi suggested that Anise accompany him on another business trip, and Stille responded with a surge of killing intent.

Xu Yi explained that he wanted to regulate the Sandy River to expand transport and support Bunta City’s growing magic machinery industry. After he shared his ambition to advance technology enough to reach outer space, Kennard offered to become the Xinfei Merchant Guild’s general manager, and Xu Yi accepted him on probation.

• Xu Yi told Kennard that regulating the Sandy River would improve river transport and help Bunta City ship its future goods, protecting its developing magic machinery industry.
• Kennard asked why Xu Yi encouraged competitors, and Xu Yi explained that he wanted magic machinery to improve life across the Sains Continent and eventually enable people to travel into outer space.
• Xu Yi described his hope of finding his true home among distant continents, leaving Kennard puzzled but impressed by his ambition.
• Kennard said he wanted to help change the world and offered himself as the Xinfei Merchant Guild’s general manager, explaining that his family and Walmart Merchant Guild experience qualified him.
• Xu Yi accepted Kennard as general manager on probation and warned that he could dismiss him if he performed poorly.

Kennard Emma reviewed the Xinfei Merchant Guild’s pay structure and proposed grading factory workers by the difficulty and technical skill of their jobs. Xu Yi assigned him to produce a detailed report in half a month, then went to Great Mage Camilla’s laboratory, where he discovered she had completed a magical project.

• Xu Yi explained Kennard Emma’s role as general manager at a press conference and reassured him that he trusted his abilities.
• Kennard showed Xu Yi a report on employee wages and argued that factory workers’ pay should reflect the differing demands of their jobs.
• Kennard gave examples from the Automatic Magic Rice Cooker production line, and Xu Yi assigned him to prepare a detailed job classification report within half a month.
• Xu Yi visited Great Mage Camilla’s laboratory after Stille told him she had two pieces of good news.
• Great Mage Camilla beckoned Xu Yi to help with her experiment, and he exclaimed with joy when he saw she had completed it.

Xu Yi and Great Mage Camilla tested a miniaturized Storm Array as the power source for a Wind-Powered Engine, while also learning that the Mages' Guild was moving closer to approving magic patent rights. Xu Yi left encouraged by the engine research and the prospect of building an industrial system on the Sains Continent.

• Great Mage Camilla showed Xu Yi her palm-sized Storm Array, and they discussed how to transfer its power safely into a Magic Fan-sized device.
• Xu Yi and Great Mage Camilla conducted preliminary experiments on the Storm Array, then realized they had worked through lunch and dinner.
• Great Mage Camilla gave Xu Yi the latest Guild Journal, where articles discussed specific rules for magic patent rights and Great Mage Eisenka declared his support.
• Great Mage Camilla told Xu Yi that she and Great Mage Eisenka had been invited to a Mages' Guild meeting on patent rights, and she agreed to attend.
• Xu Yi left for Night Market Street, reflecting on Kennard's help, Camilla's research, and his hope to develop engines and eventually install streetlamps in Bunta City.

Xu Yi traveled to Falling Rain Valley with Kennard, Sophia, Stille, and Anise, where their conversation revealed Anise's unusual understanding of grief and friendship. After arriving, Xu Yi welcomed Kennard to see the Xinfei Merchant Guild's true strength.

• Xu Yi questioned why Sophia had insisted on joining the trip, and Kennard backed him until Sophia grabbed Stille's and Anise's hands.
• Anise bluntly told Sophia not to lie about being hurt, prompting Stille and Xu Yi to explain that humans express sadness in different ways.
• Anise said she would avenge Xu Yi if an enemy killed him but would accept his accidental death as part of nature, leaving Xu Yi to theatrically lament that she would not cry for him.
• The carriage reached Falling Rain Valley, where Kennard and Sophia marveled at its scale and beauty.
• Xu Yi invited Kennard to see where the Xinfei Merchant Guild's strength lay.

Xu Yi showed Kennard the Xinfei Merchant Guild’s expanding production base in Falling Rain Valley, convincing him that the guild was far stronger than he had assumed. He then selected ten trained elf workers to take back to Elder Elusia, while wondering how the orcs would react to seeing them.

• Xu Yi showed Kennard the Steelworks and expanded factories in Falling Rain Valley, where rising demand had prompted major increases in production and hiring.
• Kennard saw the guild’s large workforce of dwarves and elves and concluded that the Xinfei Merchant Guild was not weak and could become one of the kingdom’s first-rate guilds.
• Xu Yi went to the Tire Factory to choose elf workers for Elder Elusia to assess after several months of training.
• Anise presented ten elf workers whom the others had judged to be the best performers, and Xu Yi noted their precise discipline and improved skills.
• Xu Yi told the ten elves that Elder Elusia would likely be pleased to see them, but that the orcs might not be.

Xu Yi persuaded Elder Elusia to expand the Night Song Tribe’s resin-processing work and move more elves into human society, while explaining that the Sandy River’s water problems threatened both the tribe and Bunta City. Elder Elusia agreed to send three hundred elves to Xu Yi’s Plastic and Rubber Processing Factory, leaving the specific arrangements to him.

• Xu Yi told Elder Elusia that the Sandy River could cause catastrophic flooding downstream and said he wanted to negotiate with the Orc Tribe to address its water problems.
• Elder Elusia allowed Xu Yi to bring ten trained elf workers to the Night Song Tribe, where their improved performance impressed the other elves and led them to request training in his factory.
• Xu Yi revealed that the Xinfei Merchant Guild had more than a hundred thousand tire orders backlogged and proposed moving production to his larger factory in Falling Rain Valley.
• Elder Elusia said the tribe had received abundant supplies through its work with Xu Yi and that two children had been born in the past three months, then agreed in principle to expand the arrangement.
• Elder Elusia agreed to keep one hundred elves working at the current factory and select another three hundred for the Plastic and Rubber Processing Factory, leaving the arrangements to Xu Yi.

Xu Yi traveled with Stille, Anise, and ten elves to Samora, where he met the merchant guild presidents and proposed building a highway from Bunta City into the Black Rice Wasteland. The chapter ended with Cruz and Reilsa stunned by Xu Yi’s plan to extend the road all the way to the beastmen’s doorstep.

• Xu Yi and his companions arrived in Samora and met Presidents Cruz and Reilsa, who questioned why elves were joining the trip.
• Xu Yi assured Reilsa that the elves would use the Veiling Spell inside beastman territory, then told Cruz he wanted to investigate building a highway to the Black Rice Wasteland.
• Reilsa explained that his caravan relied on veteran guards and described the unspoken rules governing robberies and ransom between human traders and beastmen.
• Reilsa agreed that a highway to Samora would help his caravans and offered to discuss funding it with Cruz.
• Xu Yi clarified that he wanted the highway to reach directly into the Black Rice Wasteland, leaving Cruz and Reilsa astonished.

Xu Yi revealed a valuable nonferrous metal deposit beneath a hill near the Worrel Werewolf Tribe and recruited President Reilsa to help pursue it. He also discovered that the Black Rice Wasteland was rapidly desertifying, and Anise said the elves could restore it, though the Orc Tribe had rejected an earlier effort.

• Xu Yi identified a rich deposit of aluminum, copper, tungsten, and lead beneath a hill near the Worrel Werewolf Tribe, and explained its industrial value to President Cruz and President Reilsa.
• President Reilsa agreed to help Xu Yi and President Cruz investigate the deposit, and the three planned to enter the Worrel Werewolf Tribe first.
• Stille showed Xu Yi that the wasteland’s soil had degraded into loose sand, and Xu Yi warned that overgrazing could turn the region into a desert.
• Anise told Xu Yi that the elves could easily improve the wasteland, but that the Orc Tribe had refused an earlier proposal to plant a forest there.

Xu Yi proposed that the Worrel Tribe partner with the Xinfei Merchant Guild to develop a nonferrous metals mine and build factories and roads in the Black Rice Wasteland, then returned to Bunta City to arrange a million-gold investment with the Amli and Rexton Merchant Guilds. The chapter ended with Xu Yi and Stille learning that Great Mage Camilla had suddenly closed her Mage Tower.

• Xu Yi persuaded the Worrel Chieftain to hear his proposal and offered five hundred thousand gold coins to purchase the tribe's nonferrous metals vein.
• Xu Yi left Anise and ten other elves in the Black Rice Wasteland to map its terrain and locate beastman tribes.
• Xu Yi, President Cruz, and President Reilsa agreed to invest one million gold coins in the mine and roads, with Xu Yi's Xinfei Merchant Guild holding a sixty-percent share.
• Xu Yi refused President Cruz's request to invest in the smelting and cement factories because their technology belonged to the Xinfei Merchant Guild.
• Xu Yi and Stille returned to Bunta City and learned that Great Mage Camilla had suddenly closed her Mage Tower.

Great Mage Camilla decided to close her mage tower and join Xu Yi’s Magic Research Institute after seeing how the Xinfei Merchant Guild’s industry had transformed Mildan Village. She explained that committing to magic machinery research would show other mages how magic could improve people’s lives, and Xu Yi recognized the choice’s advertising value.

• Great Mage Camilla told Xu Yi and Stille she intended to close her mage tower and work at the Magic Research Institute, surprising them both.
• Camilla revealed that Mildan Village was being demolished and relocated as part of Bunta City’s redevelopment, and Xu Yi explained that the villagers would receive replacement homes and job opportunities.
• Camilla described how the Xinfei Merchant Guild’s machinery and industry had improved village life, earning Xu Yi the villagers’ gratitude.
• Camilla said her visit had changed her view of magic and led her to dedicate herself fully to magic arrays for magic machinery.
• Xu Yi explained that Camilla’s decision to join the institute would also have an advertising effect.

Great Mage Camilla’s decision to become an official employee of the Xinfei Merchant Guild drew widespread attention and brought the guild a surge of orders and mage applicants. Xu Yi helped the other magic machinery guilds recruit the surplus mages, and the chapter ended with Princess Royal Servini confronting him about their numbers.

• Xu Yi announced that Great Mage Camilla would join the Xinfei Merchant Guild’s Magic Research Institute as a special-grade researcher, shocking the kingdom and drawing extensive publicity.
• The Xinfei Merchant Guild received a huge increase in orders, while mages flocked to Bunta City hoping to work for the guild.
• Xu Yi turned away some applicants because the Xinfei Merchant Guild lacked the capacity to employ them all and needed quality researchers more than sheer numbers.
• Xu Yi convened the Bunta City Magic Machinery Commercial Association, and its member guilds recruited the mages who had come seeking work.
• More than three thousand mages arrived in Bunta City, and Princess Royal Servini asked Xu Yi whether he planned to use them to stage a rebellion.

Servini warned Xu Yi that the Xinfei Merchant Guild’s growing workforce had attracted suspicion, then brought him together with two military officers to discuss the new arms factory. Xu Yi agreed to transfer the skilled slave workers to Servini in exchange for compensation, but his demand that the guild mine all mineral resources in territory controlled by the Kingdom’s military shocked the others.

• Servini told Xu Yi that critics had accused the Xinfei Merchant Guild of plotting and warned him to file Labor Permit applications for its newly recruited elves.
• Servini introduced Xu Yi to Major Maikongli and Major Sahas, who had come to discuss the military’s arms factory.
• Xu Yi said the guild had finished the magic machine tools for two production lines and had prepared skilled workers to train the military.
• Xu Yi offered to transfer the workers’ ownership to Servini, and Servini agreed to do so in exchange for appropriate compensation.
• Xu Yi demanded that the Xinfei Merchant Guild receive the right to mine all mineral resources in territory controlled by the Kingdom’s military, and Servini immediately refused.

After Servini left Bunta City without accepting Xu Yi’s proposed mineral-rights conditions, Xu Yi discussed the Xinfei Merchant Guild’s pay structure with Kennard. They then went to the Orchid Grass Residential Community, where villagers were preparing to move into newly built replacement homes.

• Servini, Maikongli, and Sahas departed after three days of talks, while Xu Yi honored the existing agreement and transferred the arsenal workers’ slave contracts to Servini.
• Xu Yi explained to Kennard that he would continue supporting the Princess Royal as long as she shared his goal of improving people’s lives.
• Xu Yi pressed Kennard for a pay restructuring proposal, and Kennard promised to deliver one in ten days.
• Kennard asked how to compensate Great Mage Camilla, and Xu Yi agreed that her pay should be boosted through research bonuses.
• Xu Yi and Kennard traveled to the Orchid Grass Residential Community, where villagers welcomed its sturdy, attractive replacement houses and residents of other villages also asked to move there.