City of Desire [Kingdom Building]

"It would have been nice if I had more than a day with this beauty," I said with a sigh as the massaged brown leathery seat gently.
 
I got the delivery of my enchanted carriage yesterday, and it is perfect; it is not the best one, but currently, it is great for me, especially with the level 20 driver I had hired paying good money.
 
It is comfortable, and I could even make a long journey with it; as long as we are not attacked direct, the carriage will not suffer any problems.
 
"You can use it as much as you can after you return from Namdar," said Carla, “I will,” I replied. 
 
I have handled everything I could in the past few days, and now everything is on Carla's shoulders.
 
I am confident she will be able to handle everything perfectly with the directions I have left behind.
 
"Use guards if any problem occurs and if it is something you cannot handle, then send a message to Damon Hardt; he owes me a favor for this," I said. 
 
To that, she nodded.
 
Since the girls came, I have increased the number of guards to twenty-five, but there was a small incident two days ago when an inebriated construction worker sneaked inside the tent.
 
The guards stopped him the moment the girl screamed, but I hated that something like this had happened, despite the precaution.
 
I hired ten more guards, and now the area around the tents is better protected. It still didn’t stop me from worrying.
 
"Don't worry, everything will be fine," said Carla as she pressed her hand to mine and froze, but seeing I did not pull away, she relaxed and kept it there.
 
Soon, the carriage rode the inside the gates of the merchant guild and stopped. 
 
"Take care, Carla," I said as I slowly pulled my hand from her and was about to leave the carriage when I found her beautiful face in front of mine, and before I knew it, I found her soft lips on mine.
 
Her lips stayed on my mine for a second before she pulled away, leaving behind the most wonderful feeling on my lips.
 
"Return safely, Remus," she said, and all I could is nod as I got out of the carriage while trying to process what had happened.
 
Soon, I reached the office of Damon Hardt and cleared my thoughts; I will think about it in my free time, it is a time for business.
 
"Mister Silver, the Guildmaster had asked me to let you as soon as you have appeared," said the assistant and tapped on the few runes, and soon, the door began to open.
 
I walked inside and saw there were a lot of people inside; aside from Damon Hardt, there was John Ramos, the vice Guildmaster, and four guild masters of various sub-guilds.
 
Aside from them, there is mister Oakley and the people from the legal department.
 
"Remus, have you made all the preparations?" asked Damon Hardt. "Yes, Guildmaster," I replied.
 
"Good. As I had told you before, vice-Guildmaster Ramos will lead the delegation; there will be four heads of sub-guilds and seven people from the legal department," he said, motioning toward the people.
 
"The legal team will be led by Rip Daniels, and you will advise him on the matters you think is important," he added, motioning toward the tall raven-haired man in his early forties.
 
I nodded at Rip; I know the man, and he is quite good. If old man Oakley leaves the job, he will be the next person to get it.
 
"Namdar is a hub in continental trade; it is important we form good relations with it," he said with his expression turning serious.
 
"We will try our best," said John Santos.
 
The next hour, we discussed the specifics; I largely remained silent, speaking only when asked while observing everything.
 
This is the reason why I have taken this post; the things that are being discussed here are confidential and important. This is a type of information that will give me an edge and help me shape my business.
 
"Best of luck to all of you; I hope, when you return, you will bring the good news with you," he said; we nodded with a smile and walked out of the office.
 

Soon, we stepped into the carriages, which began to ride toward the port.
 
"Things will be tough; the people from the Merchant Guild of Namdar will eat us up and not even spit out the bones," said Locke Hercule, the leader of the paper guild.
 
His words made everyone smile; we obviously knew they would have an edge, which is fine; it is a huge city with big bucks and powerful people.
 
They have their advantage, but we also have ours, and ours are bigger than theirs; we have direct trade with a merchant city-state of Meldhorn, and they did not.
 
They used to have huge trade with the coastal merchant state of Belnin and Nereim, but that stopped with the trade blockade. So, we are the only ones with access to merchant city-state.
 
They need us more than we need them.
 
"It will be a success, even if we are able to sign the lowest priority agreements," said John Santos.
 
There are a huge number of contracts we had to sign, and agreeing to all of them in a limited time would be hard, but as John Santos had said, even if we are able to sign, a third of priority agreements will be a great success for us.
 
Soon the carriage had passed through the gates and entered the port. Soon, we reached the pier where our ship was waiting.
 
The ship is named Constance; it is neither big nor small. It is around a hundred feet long with the blue enchanted scrip painted across its hull and masts.
 
This ship is city property, given to the merchant guild for this trip. 
 
The crew of the ship used to be part of the imperial navy, and the security was provided by the city's guards.
 
Still, learning a lesson from last time, I had brought my guard; Damon Hardt declined it, saying it is a city that would be providing the security for the trip, but I directly said I would not leave without the personal guard.
 
He finally accepted, but only a single guard. I had asked for four but had accepted one.
 
Dan was already waiting by the ship, and as I walked out of the carriage, he walked behind me as I climbed the ship's ramp to the deck, where a man in his mid-sixties and a man in his early thirties was standing side by side.
 
“Welcome to Constance, gentlemen; I am Angus Perry, the captain of the ship,” said the slightly plump man in his sixties and turned toward the lean man in his early thirties.
 
“I am Captain Julian Pierce; I will be responsible for your security,” said the man in the city's brown uniform with the captain's insignia on it.
 
He is quite handsome with blue eyes and light brown hair. He had a sword at his waist and a shield on his back.
 
“All your things have been sent to your cabins, and the staff will take you there,” said the old man, and just as he said, the staff took us to our suits.
 
Click!
 
As I walked into the suit, I found it small, but it had all amenities that I would need, including the attached bathroom. 
 
I will be here for two days.
 
The ship will travel through the river route till we reach Inam, which will be by tomorrow afternoon, and after that, the ship will enter the sea, where it will take little more than a day to reach Namdar.
 
If everything goes well, then we will return to the Greltheaven within a week.
 
I had just sat down on the bed when I felt the ship moving, and it was moving as I looked out the window. 
 
I lay comfortably on the bed as I watched the ship sail out of the port.
 
I looked at the small watch in my cabin, which showed exactly five; by eleven, we should be able to reach Deerpond, the capital of Renwell Region, and its bigger city; from there, it will be Riverbell and then Iman by the afternoon.
 
I watched till the city left the view before picking up the book; there will be a lot of work later, so I should read at whatever time I have.
 
Soon, an hour passed, and I walked out of my cabin into the deck, which was mostly empty, aside from sailors and security at their position, including Captain Pierce.
 
He nodded at me, and I nodded back as we turned to watch the beautiful sunset; there was nothing except for the wasteland around us and the disappearing sun.
 
Soon, the sun had completely disappeared, and a beautiful moon appeared through the clouds, lighting the world in its silver light.
 
I looked at the peaceful wasteland and sighed; the Renwell region is really a wasteland. Nothing grows here except for the green patches, which is why it was not fiercely contested as other parts of the continent.
 
Even resources-wise, it is not great; there are no big metal deposits or precious ores though it did have something.
 
Magic crystals are everywhere, it is resources that power every enchanted thing, but they are not exactly rare resources, especially lower-grade magical crystals.
 
They could be found in every corner of the world.
 
There are few middle-grade and high-grade mines, but it is completely in control of the state.
 
There is also a thing about processing them; like the rare earth metals on the earth, processing them is a lengthy and experience process. 
 
It becomes harder as the grade increases, which is why most places only mine them and ship them somewhere else to process.
 
The merchant city-states and the Empire had a few cities which are famed for their crystal purification industry.
 
Inam is one of them.
 
The city of Inam used to be part of the Renwell Region three hundred years ago before the Empire conquered it, and now more than 50% of crystals mined in the Renwell region are processed there.
 
I heard Lord Darrow had signed a contract with Owlspring to send the middle-grade crystal there for processing; the city is also opening the crystal processing facility in Greltheaven.
 
Though, it will only process the low-leveled crystals, which is, I think, very good news. 
 
The city should have the capability to process the only thing it had in abundance.
 
I stayed on the deck in silence for an hour before returning to my cabin and, this time, picking up the contracts.
 
I have already studied them and found the loopholes, and corrected the language, but still, I had decided to study it further. The negotiations are going to be tough, with powerful people and frustrating skills.
 
The better prepared I am, the greater benefits I will have during the negotiations.

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