Herald of Steel

Upon knowing about Lady Miranda's marriage, Alexander was indeed at first a bit offended that he was sidelined like that.

A marriage with Lady Miranda would have been really useful.

But it seems that the lady had other plans.

And since she had made her choice, Alexander felt there was no reason to harp about it anymore.

So he instead chose to concentrate on other matters.

And frankly, there were a lot of matters that required his attention.

For instance, expanding his workshops.

Given his products had two years to exist and expand, Alexander's unique delicacies had exploded in popularity with his customers, their hunger for every one of those turning ravenous by now.

But unfortunately, his supply had been unable to keep up with even a tenth of the demand, with outputs for some even falling following Tibias's attack.

All of which ultimately resulted in a huge price increase.

For instance, the demand for paper over the last year has gone up multiple times, with the market price for it going up from the initial price of 1 ropal for 5 sheets of A2 paper, to that same ropal getting just one sheet of A2 paper- i.e.- an increase of 5 times.

And similar huge spikes were experienced in all the goods, from the various kinds of soaps to the many types of glassware which even experienced a drop in quality following Gajopk's death, to the largest increase experienced by brwon and more especially white sugar, which was not really a surprise.

And though such huge price increases sound good, it was not really of any benefit for Alexander because he was selling them to his distributors at the agreed upon initial price.

Instead, it was ultimately Pasha Farzah and Lady Inayah who were the true beneficiaries.

And though this might sound like a win-win for both parties, with both parties being able to earn billions even with the transportation and distribution cost, Alexander viewed such wins to be applicable only for the short term, 

Because Alexander felt if he did not rein in the prices, people would either try and find substitutes, even if they were only cheap knockoffs, or his market size would soon cap.

For he knew at the prices some of his products were selling, even many nobles, particularly not so well off ones, found it frightening to enjoy these luxuries.

Thus over the last year, Alexander worked hard to expand all his workshops.

The grounds were stretched far beyond their usual wooded perimeters, even taking over the areas originally belonging to the manor, as Alexander worked to transform that huge 2 square kilometers into his personal industrial estate.

Alexander at one point did want to restore his manor to its former self and even had plans to build it bigger and better, such as with an indoor swimming pool.

But given this was also the birthplace of his unique industry and all these workshops here could use the space, he decided to prioritize that.

After all, all the infrastructure for all the various shops was already here and it made no sense to move and rebuild all of them. 

As for his manor, he could build his manor anywhere he wished after all.

Alexander even had plans to build multiple ones, with a summer home along the southern coast being his priority.

He really wanted to see his girls in a swimsuit.

But all these ideas were simply plans for now, as right now, he focused on getting all the workshops doubled and tripled and then doubled again in size, while also adding new ones, like the gigantic casting shop he was contemplating setting up.

So Alexander gave the orders for the expansion, which was so huge in fact that it looked like he had taken over a part of the Cisran Hills all for himself. 

And with the new walls cordoning off the western side of the city too, this district was also safe from any outside attacks, letting the workers there labor away in peace.

Alexander had of course visited the site throughout its construction, with much of it still yet to be completed as a single year was not even enough to finish all his planned development.

It had to be remembered that Alexander's huge estate had small rivers, dense forests, and even many animals living in it, where Pasha Muazz would even hold hunting parties.

So clearing and reforming such a huge, wooded place was not an easy task, especially in only one year.

But still, even the current semi-completed project was a beauty to behold, with many, many new wooden sheds already built, all arranged in neat rows next to each other.

From above, they looked like huge blocks of Lego, or like train carriages.

Each row represented one particular product, and hence their insides looked nothing like the one opposite to it.

For example in the glass workshops, each of the wooden sed had lots of new furnaces, with many more on the way, as large numbers of new apprentices were recruited to start their careers as a glassmaker.

Now, given the skilled based nature of glassmaking, Alexander of course could not expect to increase production by simply increasing labour and capital.

For instance, a lot of the products coming out from these shops right now were pretty crap, especially the new ones, as the boys there were just starting to learn how to make these items.

But it was a start and Alexander was happy to dump his coin and resources into them, knowing even a few good pieces from them would make up for all the investment.

And it was even not as if Alexander was making much loss on them even now. 

Because many of the failed junks they made still found customers, with them proving to be quite a hit with the general populace.

As to how these sub-standard products made their way to the market, well it was all done above and aboard with Alexander's full permission. 

This had happened when the new in charge of the glass shops, Malikin had come to Alexander with the request to open a shop selling these failed products at comparatively very, very low prices, like 2 to 3 ropals a piece, being just barely above its material, and labor cost.

Alexander had at first laughed at the proposition, thinking it was a stupid idea, but since it did not hurt him in any way, he let the man do his thing, pretty sure it would amount to nothing.

But once Alexander got the sales report for the following month, it turned out he was the stupid one, as the number written on the paper was a staggering 10,000 ropals. 

Out of context, this raw number meant little to Alexander, which in his eyes, was chump change.

But when taken in context, when it was understood that it came from, from a tiny shop selling basically junk, Alexander felt his eyes being opened.

Malikin would inform Alexander that everything they stocked there, regardless of quality, all sold like hotcakes, especially among the poorer populace, who up until now could not even dream of owning such a large piece of glass.

To these people, it did not matter the crooked shape or chipped edges of the glass products, as they simply were content with obtaining the large body of clear glass, finding it mesmerizing.

In fact, it was not uncommon for them to serve their most honored guests wine in such glasses, as a way to show off, and the recipient would even be honored to be given these.

Or to display cracked or partially broken pieces prominently in their houses as a magnificent showpiece.

As Malikin informed Alexander of such practices, Alexander felt like he was a human finding out the habits of birds, like those ones that collected shiny trinkets.

To a person, those things might seem useless, but to those birds, they were precious relics indeed.

And as Alexander came to know this, it made him see that selling glass to the masses in volume indeed had more potential for earning money than simply catering to the tastes of the rich.

Hence he went ahead with increasing his glass production with even more confidence and started to even sell waste scraps of glass that fell off during cutting, recasting them into colorful marbles and letting children play with them.

As a side note, when Alexander had created the marbles, Mean had somehow seen the colorful ball and then thought it would make a nice present for Alexandria.

And then as anyone could guess, this resulted in the little kid promptly putting it into her mouth during one of her playtimes, and then almost choking on it.

She only lived because through sheer luck Alexander was near and had immediately noticed his daughter gaggling, causing him to leap out of his chair with lightning speed and give a mighty big slap on her daughter's back, forcing the small bead to dislodge and shoot out of the tiny mouth.

Alexander in his panic had held nothing back with his slap, which caused the little girl to start crying at the sudden pain, as her fair back even had a clear handprint of Alexander's palm.

While Alexander ignored his crying daughter and even seemed to join her in this loud chorus, fiercely sending a loud scold towards the nearby Mean, greatly admonishing her for her carelessness.

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