Volume 4 Chapter 43 Consequences
The Frestech Chamber of Commerce working with her highness Seveni to purge the beastmen clan on the Black Rice Wasteland, it didn’t attract too much attention in the Lampuri Kingdom.
Even the «Banta Times» and the «Lampuri Weekly» that paid special attention to Xu Yi and her highness Seveni didn’t mention this matter because Xu Yi cared about this matter.
However, the situation in the Lampuri Kingdom couldn’t be considered uneventful.
Because the Frestech Chamber of Commerce ended their cooperation with those ten companies, the magic machine industry management department had stated that the Frestech Chamber of Commerce had broken the contract one sidedly, so the department would cancel the right to produce any magic machines in the kingdom for their company.
Unexpectedly, the Frestech Chamber of Commerce didn’t resist this at all.
When this decision was made, the Frestech Chamber of Commerce closed their production bases in six cities of the Lampuri Kingdom in half a month, stopping the production of all magic machines.
The others didn’t stop, there were only the service centers from the Frestech Chamber of Commerce in many cities left, providing post sale services to many people who bought the Frestech Brand magic machines.
As for the others, they were moved out of the Falling Rain Valley. The magic research facility and the magic machine development center had been moved to the Sandton Manor.
Moreover, these two places only improved on the current products of the Frestech Chamber of Commerce, not creating any new products and they didn’t produce any magic machines, so they didn’t break the rules of the department.
Other than this, the only normal running factory was the canned fruit factory left in Koror Village.
So in an instant, the Frestech Chamber of Commerce went from the company with the most prospects in the Lampuri Kingdom to a company that couldn’t produce any magic machines. Many people thought that this was a death sentence to the Frestech Chamber of Commerce.
A Frestech Chamber of Commerce that couldn’t produce magic machines, was that still the Frestech Chamber of Commerce?
Of course, people didn’t just show sadness for this current situation, there were many people who were shocked and even enraged.
When the magic machine industry management department forced the Frestech Chamber of Commerce to release their technology and work with the ten companies, everyone thought that this was breaking the basic rule of business and stealing from the Frestech Chamber of Commerce.
Now that chairman Xu couldn’t take this and broke the unfair agreement, the department would actually take the full yard and deal a fatal blow to the Frestech Chamber of Commerce!
The Frestech Chamber of Commerce didn’t reject this, but there were many voices in the kingdom that questioned this.
In many of the kingdom’s cities, there were many citizens that gathered together. They gathered in front of the service centers the Frestech Chamber of Commerce had set up and openly expressed their support for them.
In the newspapers of the cities, there were many articles that supported the Frestech Chamber of Commerce.
Among them, the most direct was the headline in the «Lampuri Weekly».
“The magic machine industry management department = gang leaders?”
With this appropriate title that made people a bit shocked, there was an even more direct and sharper article.
In the article, the spear head was pointed at the magic machine industry management department. They claimed that the department wasn’t worthy of managing the magic machine industry, they were just helping the ten companies openly rob the Frestech Chamber of Commerce, they were just leaders of a gang of robbers!
This article didn’t use vague language like the other newspapers, rather they called out the magic machine industry management department. As for the end of the article, they even mentioned the large nobles behind the ten companies, which gave them the strong support to dare treat the Frestech Chamber of Commerce like this.
When the people who had some inside understanding saw this, they had a heart attack,
This «Lampuri Weekly» was actually daring to open fire at the magic machine industry management department and daring to expose the people behind it, this was seeking death.
However, when people saw the name of the author, they couldn’t help understanding.
It was actually an article published by Baron Hannas, that could be understood.
But thinking about it, the people who had some inside knowledge were even more shocked by this.
Baron Hannas could arrange this «Lampuri Weekly» and the reason why the «Lampuri Weekly» could be based in Anvilmar City, becoming one of the most influential newspapers in the Lampuri Kingdom was naturally because of the support of the important people behind him.
Now that he published this article, it represented the will of the people behind him, which explicitly showed their attitudes.
The article was this intense, the people behind him that supported the Frestech Chamber of Commerce really were dissatisfied with the magic machine industry management department this time.
Among these people the one who reacted the strongest was Sowell City’s Count Sean who made his attitude the most clear.
When the department decided to raise the taxes for magic machines, Count Sean had done the opposite by giving more tax cuts to magic machines, allowing these companies to balance out the tax payments to the department.
Moreover, at the same time, Count Sean had taken a very bad attitude towards the special taxes. It caused the magic machine companies in Sowell City to do much better than the other magic machine companies of the Lampuri Kingdom this year.
Because of Count Sean’s policies, there were many magic machine companies that had moved to Sowell City.
Surrounding the Frestech Chamber of Commerce’s previous production base, there was a large magic machine industrial zone being built outside Sowell City.
Although it couldn’t compare to the previous Banta City, this magic machine industrial zone contained many companies related to all the magic machines released, so it could be considered a perfect little industrial zone.
When the department announced that the Frestech Chamber of Commerce couldn’t produce magic machines in the kingdom anymore, Count Sean didn’t give them any face and directly announced that he wouldn’t follow the rules of the department, he would go against it.
As a City Lord, going against the rules of the kingdom’s department was a very serious matter, but Count Sean firmly sat in the position as Sowell City’s City Lord, not being moved at all.
Of course, the battle of the people above was far out of reach for the commoners of the kingdom.
For these commoners, they only noticed one thing. It was that now that the Frestech Chamber of Commerce was banned from making magic machines in the kingdom, the large number of jobs created by them had been lost and many people directly lost their jobs.
Although the ten companies began recruiting people, the wages that they gave were just far too lacking and there were many welfare policies that were gone. Naturally it caused many people to be dissatisfied.
Other than this, the most seriously affected by this other than the Frestech Chamber of Commerce were the small companies that depended on them.
After the Frestech Chamber of Commerce stopped producing magic machines, the small companies that were related to them were naturally all influenced.
For example, the small companies that produced components for the Frestech Chamber of Commerce. Because the Frestech Chamber of Commerce stopped producing magic machines and the ten companies had their own component producing system, it was hard for these small companies to receive orders.
In just a month after the Frestech Chamber of Commerce announced they stopped producing magic machines, there were more than ten companies that specialized in components in Banta City that had closed down.
Adding in the other companies that had stopped after the special taxes on magic machines, in less than half a year, Banta City had lost half the companies related to magic machines.
The current Banta City could still be considered prosperous, but it was far from being able to compare to half a year ago.
The most important thing was that the Frestech Chamber of Commerce’s logo disappeared from the streets. The half wing symbol that could be found everywhere had gradually disappeared and what replaced them were the logos of the ten companies.
Everything seemed to be announcing one fact.
The Frestech Chamber of Commerce disappeared from Banta City.
However…..would the Frestech Chamber of Commerce really disappear?
Eyes shifted from Banta City to the southwest, arriving at the Black Rice Wasteland around two hundred kilometers away from Banta City. Or perhaps going a bit more south, going to the Stantine Duchy, they would find that not only had the Frestech Chamber of Commerce not disappeared, they had quickly grown in these two places.
Through the roads in the Black Rice Wasteland and the Stantine Duchy, there were countless transportation Magic Cars that ran, shipping the Frestech Chamber of Commerce’s magic machines to different places.
The department had only forbidden the Frestech Chamber of Commerce from producing magic machines in the Lampuri Kingdom, but they didn’t forbid them from selling them.
The reason?
It was very simple, this matter was for the kingdom’s business department, the magic machine industry management department couldn’t meddle with this.
Even if the business department wanted to target the Frestech Chamber of Commerce, how could they dare issue this ban while everyone’s anger was cresting?
Even King Eric didn’t dare give this order…..