God of Technology: Creating the Internet in Another World-Chapter 415: There Are Always Some Perceptive People

The Emerson family patriarch’s words left his heir stunned.

Right!

Where couldn’t you build a workshop?

Inside the castle, in the fields, on wasteland—there were too many places in this world where you could build workshops.

If it was just for building workshops, why would they purchase large areas of farmland?

That didn’t make sense!

"Then why would the Golden Merchant Guild decide to purchase on a large scale at this time? Could it be..."

The Emerson family patriarch nodded. "The Golden Merchant Guild believes that current land prices are too low and there’s profit to be made."

"But why would there be profit? According to our calculations, the cost of cultivating land is almost higher than grain prices. Building granaries and storage costs are also extremely high."

The young man really couldn’t figure it out. "Plus, Golden Spike Grain is only being planted by Southern Development Company this year. By next year, it’ll be everywhere."

Golden Spike Grain was only being planted by Southern Development Company, and it had already driven grain prices this low. Who knew how far grain prices would fall once it spread everywhere?

Either way, prices definitely couldn’t go up.

Who was grain sold to?

Grain was sold to poor people!

How many rich people were there?

Most wealthy people owned lots of land.

But now poor people only needed one acre to feed an entire family.

Under these circumstances, prices simply couldn’t rise!

So whether it was hiring people to plant new crops next year or storing this year’s grain, it could never sell for high prices.

No matter how you looked at it, it was a loss.

What was the Golden Merchant Guild thinking?

Why would they purchase large amounts of land at this time?

"Actually, you already stated the answer at the beginning."

The Emerson family patriarch understood his son’s confusion, his aged voice emerging. "There’s no one in this world who understands business better than that dwarf elf. Since he made this choice, there’s only one possibility."

"You mean that planting other crops on this land has unlimited potential?" The young man was slightly stunned, feeling a bit enlightened.

"We can’t be sure whether it’s planting cotton or other crops. Like you mentioned—processed foods, brewing, or whatever else—which one is actually more profitable?"

The Emerson family patriarch said, "But I can be certain of one thing—the future output of this land will definitely exceed the cost."

"If that’s the case, then our Emerson family must continue holding land. We can make more attempts, we can approach Roster territory and Southern Development Company, or we can find magic-tech experts ourselves for the next stage of development."

"Bottom line, we can explore this year and next year, we can try things. This little loss, we can bear it."

"As long as we can find a way forward, the future of our Emerson family will still be clear."

"Even if our attempts fail, we can still wait for the Golden Merchant Guild’s moves and then take our next step."

"Either way, I firmly believe one thing—land will always have value, no matter what. Whether it was the agricultural era of the past or the magic-tech industrial era of the future, it’s all the same."

"We can’t be affected by short-term land price fluctuations. That would be extremely unwise."

"Even if land prices really do become worthless in the future, don’t forget our territory still has countless people. In the magic-tech industrial era, human value is actually also enormous."

"Taking it to the extreme, we can temporarily use our vast land to support these people. There are actually still opportunities there."

The Emerson family heir had originally thought his father might be getting old, that his thinking couldn’t keep up with the times. He never imagined he’d already contemplated so many things.

"Understood, Father. In that case, I’ll go refuse the Golden Merchant Guild."

"Just refusing isn’t enough. The Golden Merchant Guild purchasing land is actually very troublesome. They might have it easier than us in other places, but around here, nobody has it easier than us."

Seeing his son about to leave, the Emerson family patriarch quickly spoke to stop him.

"What do you mean?"

"Continue expanding our Emerson family’s territory. This huge crisis has caused most land-owning nobles to panic. They might not have enough trust in the Golden Merchant Guild, but the surrounding lords definitely have complete trust in our Emerson family. Plus we have a track record—others might think we’ve lost our minds."

"Then how much should we purchase?" The Emerson family heir was stunned.

"As much as we can get. As long as it borders our lands, buy it all. Also sell off all our stock market holdings that don’t have particularly great potential. Use everything to buy land."

Good lord!

This extreme?

Are you the young person or am I?

The Emerson family heir was dumbfounded.

In this moment, he had a completely new understanding of his father.

He’d never imagined his father was such an aggressive person.

He’d never seen this in all those past years.

But what he didn’t realize was that it wasn’t actually that his father had become aggressive—it was because their family had been pushed to this point.

For countless ages past, their family had operated in the same mode, because everyone needed grain. As long as they followed the routine, the family would continuously expand.

But now, the era had changed.

Their family had no choice but to change too.

People who’d never changed their whole lives—when pushed to this point, they often became even more aggressive.

After being refused, the Golden Merchant Guild’s regional manager showed a helpless smile. "As expected, not all nobles are fools."

"Actually, where are there any fools in this world? They’re just panicking. When they come to their senses, they’ll realize what stupid things they did—just like their past actions against ordinary freemen."

"Yeah. Just don’t know if they’ll hold a grudge against the Golden Merchant Guild after they realize."

"So what if they hold a grudge? Don’t forget how many people are behind our Golden Merchant Guild! As long as business is conducted within the rules, the Golden Merchant Guild has never been afraid."

Almost identical situations happened in various corners of the continent. The only difference was that most places’ acquisitions went very smoothly.

Land that originally cost one gold coin, or even two gold coins, became incredibly cheap at this moment—you could buy it with just a few silver coins.

Countless amounts of land were brought into the Golden Merchant Guild’s possession.

The two major shareholders of the Golden Merchant Guild—the dwarf elf and Viscount Roster—had become the world’s largest landowners in a very short time.

Even bigger than the Emerson family by quite a bit.

However, this seemed to be just the beginning. Viscount Roster was even already thinking about borrowing money from Dragon Bank to continue purchasing.