Seraphina has been quite busy lately, even busier than during the first fifty years of her life.
The Hagi hadn't lied to her; ever since she reorganized Dragonborn Village into the [ Dragonborn Labor Company ], she could genuinely feel "money growing out of the ground."
All he had to do was stay in the bank every day, and the Dragonborn would keep sending him money.
At first, the feeling was quite novel, but as time went on, because the amount of each transaction was too small, Seraphina became a little impatient and had to hand over the task to the village chief again, asking him to keep good records and submit them once a month.
However, due to their lack of quick thinking and various other reasons, the Dragonborn's work did not go as smoothly as expected. Many things even required the village chief to personally consult Seraphina, which kept her very busy for some time. She even personally supervised the manufacturing of some dragon-powered vehicle parts.
The Dragonborn Labor Company's main business now consists of four parts: Dragonborn vehicles, Dragonborn construction workers, Dragonborn shop assistants, and the Dragonborn steelworks that remain in the village.
Although the Dragonborn have not yet escaped the realm of manual labor, they have already established a clear division of labor.
For the first time in her 150-year dragon life, Seraphina felt that she didn't have enough subordinates. When the number of Soul Returner was less than 200, it was fine, but now there were already 1,000 Soul Returner, and the Dragonborn only numbered around 100, had suddenly become a rare breed.
Fortunately, life has become much more interesting, and some of the dragonborn of childbearing age in the Dragonborn Village have recently shown a strong desire to have children. Seraphina did a simple calculation and estimated that, based on the current birth rate and average age of the Dragonborn, there would be about a thousand Dragonborn in about two hundred years...
Still too few.
Seraphina sighed inwardly, wondering if other dragons had as few companions as she did. She knew very few dragons, and most of them probably hadn't survived to this day.
If there's a chance to see other dragons...
Lost in her daydream, Seraphina chuckled softly. She certainly had no intention of learning how to manage Dragonborn from other dragons; her anticipation of meeting them stemmed solely from her knowledge of a method to rapidly increase her Dragonborn—
Rob.
Seraphina didn't really care about reproduction or raising livestock.
If someone told her right now that there was a Dragonborn, she would immediately take off and launch an air raid, then turn all those Dragonborn into her own servants.
As a powerful dragon, Seraphina's understanding of the Demonic Tide's pollution instinctively surpasses that of most species.
Even if the dragon race is divided into many different types, the similarity among dragons is far greater than that between dragons and other races.
So if producing Dragonborn from scratch is like making paper, then stealing other people's Dragonborn and converting them into your own is like painting. You only need to use paint to cover up the traces of the previous painter to achieve the desired effect, which is much more convenient than making paper from scratch.
Just as Seraphina was conjuring up a hypothetical enemy in her mind, Ed suddenly sent her a message.
The dragon girl didn't know how to describe her feeling of wanting to steal something. She thought that she had initially thought of this problem because she was calculating the number of Dragonborn, so she just said that she was doing arithmetic and didn't know what the Hagi wanted from her.
However, the moment the other person uttered "[that word]", Seraphina felt that something good was about to happen again.
At this moment, she only regretted that she wasn't a Space Dragon, otherwise she could easily tear open a rift and appear in front of the Hagis.
"Tell me, what good news do you have for me this time?"
Seraphina sat excitedly opposite Ed, swaying back and forth in the wicker chair as if she were about to shake it apart.
Ed did not answer the dragon girl's question, but simply smiled and said:
"I've noticed you've been quite busy lately. I'm glad to hear you've made money again, and you've even put the knowledge I taught you to use."
Seraphina remained excited, skillfully concealing her true feelings. She was convinced that Ed was unaware that she had been secretly taking notes on the scales and quietly reviewing them when no one was at the bank.
Dragon Girl nodded in agreement with Ed's statement. Seeing that she did not refute it, Ed knew that Seraphina could never return to the way things were when they first met.
This is what is meant by "knowledge is toxic." Once enlightened by knowledge, no intelligent being can look back at its former foolish self.
Over the past few months, Seraphina has transformed from a thug who employed an entire village of thugs into a major businesswoman who supports the economic lifeline of the Second Holy See.
His former thugs now all have legitimate jobs, and his dubious gray income has been completely laundered through repeated spending by the players.
This wave of landing was unprecedented and unparalleled, worthy of being written into the dragon race's textbook for future dragons to study and comprehend frame by frame.
With this foundation of trust, the two actually had a very strong tacit understanding. Ed looked at Seraphina and said:
There are two business deals that want to collaborate with you; they are independent of each other, and you are free to choose whether or not to proceed.
"Speak."
"I call my first business deal 'insurance'."
As expected of a creature with a penchant for hoarding precious metals, Seraphina had a natural affinity for the term. Her golden eyes sparkled with a thirst for knowledge, and Ed was naturally willing to explain the principles to her in detail.
"My Soul Returner have suffered heavy losses in recent battles, often being ganged up on and killed by Blood Corpse or finished off by their own comrades."
"But the price I charge for rebuilding their bodies is actually very high, and many players can't afford it."
"I understand, so what?"
"Therefore, 'insurance' was created for this purpose. You can charge each Soul Returner a certain insurance fee, and then 'reimburse' a portion of the resurrection costs when they rebuild their bodies after death."
Seraphina's eyes darted around as she asked:
"If I'm not mistaken, the 'reimbursement' amount should be higher than the 'insurance' fee charged, right?"
Ed smiled and agreed with the Dragon Girl:
"Yes, you are a genius."
"That's why people will buy it, right? Do you think I'm some kind of dim-witted person?"
That's hard to say...
Looking into the dragon girl's eyes, Ed felt that she definitely wouldn't have said those words a month ago. Indeed, the best way to learn a skill is through practice. Ed had explained economics to Seraphina for so long, and she was still clueless. But after managing the [ Dragonborn Labor Company ] for just a month, she had become so much smarter. He nodded and smiled, asking:
"So you actually want to know where the profit lies, right?"