Nick raised his right eyebrow in response to Austin's declaration and thought:
(Something isn't right. No one would just randomly want to buy a damaged magic item that they hardly know anything about and from a person that they don't know.)
Nick ignored Austin's words and turned around, trying to re-enter Silent Ark but before he could do so, Nick suddenly sensed the appearance of a soul and the disturbance of the space immediately behind him using Tyrant Sense. Nick sneered, following which, a gold wind blade seemingly came out of nowhere and Nick reacted by casting Pluto.
Without Nick turning around, the gold wind blade struck at the back of his head but then passed through it and hit Silent Ark instead, creating a large cleave in Silent Ark's exterior armor. Nick then manipulated the effects of Saturn to instantly form red spheres of magic power where he had sensed the soul appear and directly onto Austin's abdomen. Austin was shocked but before he could react, the two red spheres' magic power sucked in whatever was around them. Austin cast one of his methods as quickly as possible in response:
(Gold Breeze Escape)
Austin was instantly enveloped in faint gold winds and rapidly flew away, thirty meters backwards from the red sphere within one second, at which point, the gold wind abated. As soon as Austin reached his new position, he heard sickening fracturing and splatter sounds as a figure enveloped in similar gold winds as himself suddenly appeared behind Nick and then flew away in order to float at Austin's immediate right side moments later; the gold winds around Austin and the figure abated at that point.
Nick turned around quickly but he had already clearly seen his two enemies as a result of Tyrant Sense and Spatial Awareness. The two men's appearances looked almost identical, even down to their clothes. Well, they seemed identical except for the wounds that they now sported.
Austin's own right abdomen had a bloody gash in it as if a pound of flesh had been stolen from him and his 'doppelganger', who was now holding his bleeding left shoulder stump, was missing his entire left arm because it had been swallowed by the red sphere that had come into contact with it.
Nick waved his right hand and the two red spheres dissipated. Nick then coldly asked:
"Who are you two?"
The two similar looking men ignored Nick's question and cast their spells almost simultaneously:
(Gold Hiding Breeze)
(Gold Hiding Breeze)
The faint two men suddenly disappeared from view but Nick was not impressed and in response, quickly clasped both his hands in front of him using seemingly superhuman agility. Following that, a thick, cream colored sphere that had a radius of about one meter instantly appeared around the spot that the men had stood. Sensing that the men were new trapped and being crush by the effects of Saturn, Nick acted to deal with them further.
Nick summoned Failed Tool from his space band into his right grip and poured his magic energy into it, which resulted in Failed Tool's blade radiating strong grey blade light. Following that Nick cast Tyrant Aurora and Failed Tool's blade then radiated grey blade light as if it was a flare. Nick then swung Failed Tool diagonally towards the sphere of cream light and a wide arc of grey blade light shot out and enveloped the space occupied by the cream sphere within moments.
"Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!"
"Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!"
Two distinct screams were heard at that point and the grey blade light enveloped and brightly shone at that position for five seconds before the cream sphere and grey blade light were forcefully blown apart as copious amounts of rotating gold winds emerged from that position. One of the men, who was bleeding from head to toe, faced Nick defiantly amidst the gold winds while the other man fled madly while faint gold winds enveloped his body and blood poured from his body towards the ground.
The man facing Nick shouted at his apparent accomplice without turning around:
"Austin! Don't you dare let this fucker get away with any of this!"
The shouting man removed his hand from his previously bleeding stump and sent many gold wind blades at Nick simultaneously but Nick quickly waved his left index finger in response and red spheres of magic power briefly appeared in contact with every single gold wind blade and swallowed it whole before dissipating themselves.
By the time that Nick hand dealt with the gold wind blades, Austin had flown from Saturn's area of effect and his accomplice remained about thirty meters in front of Nick. Austin had already reached kilometers away from the battle site by then so Nick was forced to let him go because the man before him had to be dealt with. Since things had gotten this far, there was no need for any talking.
(Tyrant Domain.)
The space within one kilometer of Nick in all directions instantly developed a slight grey hue, which caused the enemy's gold winds to shrink in volume. The robed Magician sensed the suppression of his magic power and attempted to regain the initiative by sending out dozens of rapidly moving, gold wind blades at Nick but Nick immediately used the power of Tyrant Domain to force the man and himself to switch places within its area of effect and before the man could properly understand the change, he was consumed by his own gold wind blades within seconds. The gold winds rotating at the man's previous position and around the man himself immediately dissipated when he was teleported by Tyrant Domain.
Nick mused at this time:
(Tyrant Doman allows me to teleport targets within its area of influence. Although doing so just cost me about 60,000 magic units, it was worth the expenditure.)
The man was hit squarely by many gold wind blades before he managed to generate gold winds around himself again in order to dispel the majority of the other gold wind blades. Before the man could reorganize himself or heal himself of his severe injuries, Nick instantly appeared at the man's immediate right side and swung Failed Tool, using superhuman agility, at the man's right arm, casting:
(Tyrant Aurora)
(Cross Stream Sword Technique.)
Each of the ninety-nine sword movements of the intermediate grade sword technique hit a section of the robed Magician's right arm within moments and briefly, his right arm seemed to be enveloped by grey blade light. The robed Magician did not even have time to scream before he realized that his entire right arm was gone and the gold winds at his right side had been forcefully suppressed and cut through. Blood flowed from the robed Magician's right shoulder stump like a fountain; the man then internally panicked.
The robed Magician knew that he could not endure the pain of his injuries and face Nick at the same time and so in his panicked state, he cast his Gold Breeze Escape spell, following which he turned and fled rapidly. Nick's right eyelid twitched in response and he internally sneered:
(You attacked me first and then you want to freely leave as if this is a picnic? Only in your dreams could you escape from me at this point!)
A sphere of cream colored magic power that was about one meter in radius, instantly enveloped the robed Magician as he reached over two dozen meters away from Nick after one second. Nick manipulated Saturn in order to crush the man using push and pull forces concentrated within the cream sphere while at the same time, Nick suddenly appeared at the immediately right of the cream sphere. The robed Magician was too busy defending against the push and pull forces while using his gold winds to contend with the surrounding space magic, to concern himself with Nick.
Unfortunately for him, the robed Magician's lack of attention to Nick was a mistake. Nick quickly cast Tyrant Armor and Tyrant Form, following which, he instantly covered his entire right arm in black soul magic power, which caused his arm to spark with flashes of red and black lights. Within moments, the red sparks abated, leaving only the black sparks. Nick then poured his magic energy into Failed Tool which resulted in its blade faintly shining with grey blade light.
At that point, black miasma like magic energy exhaust was exuded from Nick's body and he swung Failed Tool at the cream sphere, casting:
(Tyrant Aurora.)
(Cross Stream Sword Technique.)
Failed Tool shone like a flare and it and Nick's right arm moved at a speed that made them seem like a black blur because of the black miasma that still lingered. Failed Tool and Nick were not blocked by the cream sphere and so Nick cut into the robed Magician with only slight resistance. The gold winds enveloping the robed Magician were suppressed and cut apart like they were pieces of paper and Nick's sword technique rampaged over the man's body.
Within one second, the rank 3, robed Magician was cut into over a dozen pieces and his ruined body was then crushed into paste by the still acting forces generated by the cream sphere. Nick dispelled the cream sphere immediately after while mobilizing Tyrant Armor to cover his left hand with black soul magic power, which he then waved towards the man's now falling and crushed corpse.
Following that, an orb of white light appeared and flew into Nick's left hand. Nick then cancelled Tyrant Domain and Tyrant Form and stored Failed Tool into his older space band. Nick cast the rank 3 version of Read Soul originating from Slade's inheritance on the robed Magician's soul and spent thirty minutes going through his memories from birth up to the point when he was killed.
When Nick was done reading the robed Magician's memories, he cancelled Read Soul and stored the soul into his older space band. Nick now knew the details of what had led to the earlier events:
(Austin Campbell and Malone Campbell are twin brothers...or were twin brothers coming from a fairly wealthy family based in Denmark. They had only graduated from their magic academy eight months ago, in Grand Earth's time, and came to Forgotten Peril in order to broaden their horizons. When they were passing by this area, they discovered my Silent Ark while outside of its scouting range and noticing that Silent Ark was peculiar and only rank 2, they initially assumed that its operator was a rank 2 Magician and so hatched a scheme to rob me but then they found out that I was a rank 3 Magician after I left Silent Ark's cabin. However, since Malone had already hidden himself using his concealment method, they carried on with their plot because they figured that outnumbering me gave them a significant advantage, which was what led to the events that followed. Both Magicians are rank 3 initial stage but based on what I saw from their memories those two were pampered princes and had very little battle experience or skill in practically controlling their magic. They basically got to rank 3 by nearly bankrupting their family and having mentors guide them.)
Nick spit towards the ground and then cancelled Tyrant Armor. Nick quickly moved to re-enter Silent Ark that was floating stationary a fair distance away by now. Nick eyed Silent Ark's additional damage a result of Malone's gold wind blade and sighed. He soon took his seat within Silent Ark and this time activated its camouflage ability before speeding off to his destination. He had not activated its camouflage before because he generally had nothing to fear at the rank 2 level and the camouflage was not effective against rank 3 methods but now that the damage to Silent Ark increased, Nick wanted to decrease the chances of encountering a conflict as much as possible.
Nick traveled for a few more days before finally reaching his next destination. Below Silent Ark, there was the border of a vast, arid plain where no living creature could be seen for kilometers all around. Nick sat in his leather chair and mused:
(This place is called, Dying Mark. It is an area with hardly any rank 2 magic beasts because of the harsh environment and because quite a few territorial rank 3 magic beasts live here. Now, since Forgotten Peril is not one of the more popular realms for rank 3 Magicians, there is not much activity here. Also, the fact that there are no obvious resources to be found here doesn't incentivize its exploration, but I figured that I might as well try to look here for a couple of reasons. First, the presence of rank 3 magic beasts indicates that this place cannot be completely absent of resources. Second, this place has been entirely avoided by mining companies and the authorities stationed within Forgotten Peril because of their unwillingness to deploy rank 3 personnel here. There indifference is my gain.)
The Realm Exploration Company had just begun its operations and Nick didn't mind picking up scraps of what the others were not interested in.
(Well, I'm not exactly picking up scraps because while using my methods, I am able to search for resources in places like this better than many mining companies owned by rank 2 Magicians and non-magicians, which use less effective means of surveying for magic materials.)
Nick quickly left the comfort of Silent Ark and stored it within his older space band because Silent Ark would no doubt be an eye sore for the rank 3 magic beasts living in Dying Mark and Nick did not want it to sustain any more damages:
(I practically spent tens of billions of pounds developing Silent Ark. I don't want to see it broken apart before it has given me a return on my investment.)
Nick then spent two hours laying the Mining and Detection Formation near the border of Dying Mark and then slowly moved it deeper into the territory while checking for resources that were within the ground every few kilometers after moving from one area to another. Nick met no magic beasts during this time as he flew twelve meters above the ground while the magic formation moved along, powered by his black miasma like magic energy that continuously lingered immediately above the magic formation because Nick was frequently processing free flowing magic energy outside of his body.
Nick slowly traveled like this for two months before he detected resources within the ground that were deposited over forty-five kilometers below the surface. Nick had met no magic beasts during the past two months but he figured that there were likely reasons for that:
(Rank 3 magic beasts were often territorial but smart. I am not a magic beast myself and my power would obviously be threatening to them as is evident by the cloud of black miasma constantly hovering over the magic formation, so I can imagine that they would rather let me pass than risk doing battle with me. When I think about it, the green, dog like magic beast only attacked me in Beast Land when only a small section of woodland was left to be cleared. I had basically destroyed most of the environment and it would have wanted to maintain some of the territory for itself, so my extreme actions forced it to take the risk of fighting in order to ward me off. Maybe so long as I don't destroy or disturb the environment too much, the rank 3 magic beasts here won't bother me.)
Nick carried on with that assumption in mind and was more mindful of the effects that his actions had on the environment. Nick summoned Silent Ark and had it float ten meters above the ground while the magic formation brought the resource deposits to the surface. Nick stayed within Silent Ark during that time and observed the magic formation from the cabin while practising the use of Cursed Vessel and Spatial Awareness. Some days after his mining operation began, he received a call from Keller Oxar, which surprised Nick because he had not spoken to the former in years.
Nick answered the call politely:
"Hello, Keller. How's it going?"
Keller replied with an annoyed tone:
"Hmph! How's your sister going? Nick, what the hell have you done? Are you really in Forgotten Peril?"
Nick was confused by Keller's apparent interest in his whereabouts but he answered honestly:
"Yes, I have been within Forgotten Peril for over a year now."
"Do you know someone named, Austin Campbell, and did you kill his brother?"
"Yeah...I dealt with those two a few months ago and I had to rough them up because they tried to harm me."
"Well, his brother has been here in Sidon recruiting rank 3 Magicians to help track and deal with you. It's really making a mere rank 2 Magician like myself uncomfortable. Oh right, I heard that you are rank 3 now, congrats. But what the fuck are you going to do about this?"
Nick indifferently replied:
"Austin is just a scrub. I read his brother's soul, which pretty much indicates as much. Whatever he is setting up, I'll deal with it myself if it becomes a problem. I'm working right now so I can't pay attention to him."
"Fine, but don't you dare come to Sidon to cause trouble. Veera would like to see you before you returned to Grand Earth, so if you don't mind, stop by my mansion on your way back."
"Sorry Keller, after I'm done working, I have urgent business to take care of on Grand Earth and I will probably use my own space path magic formation to return there from where I currently am."
"Hmph! Fine."
Keller hung up the phone and Nick got back to his cultivation and observing the mining process. The resources that the Mining and Detection Formation dug up were all magic ores but Nick didn't mind that because that was what he expected, anyway. He had learnt from Keller the last time that he was within Forgotten Peril that gold and other magic metals and metalloids were the realm's major exports.
Nick spent the next six months mining that one area and in doing so, earned himself, by his estimation, fifty-four thousand tonnes of assorted magic ores. At the end of those six months, Nick laughed maniacally for ten minutes straight before collecting the remaining ores from above the magic formation. Nick then moved the magic formation deeper into Dying Mark.
One month later, Nick finally found another deposit but this time, it was an ocean of some kind of liquid that was buried, starting at about thirty-five kilometers below the ground. Nick was forced to spend a few days creating a space path sub-formation that he integrated into the Mining and Detection Formation in order to capture the liquid within a space bubble that had a magically compact space, once the liquid rose above the surface.
Nick then spent the next seven months mining the liquid deposits. During that time, he observed the liquid that the magic formation extracted from the ground but had no idea what it was. The liquid was a viscous, blue, smelly substance that radiated the distinct and formless aura of water path. Nick was sure of something, though:
(This magic material is a higher rank than myself. I did not expect to find that in Forgotten Peril because I know that rank 3 magic beasts should be the strongest magic beasts that live within this realm. Usually, the ranks of the magic materials within a realm match the possible ranks of the magic beats within it too...weird.)
The space bubble that was used to store the blue liquid had only expanded to about three meters in radius and floated immediately above the Mining and Detection Formation. This space bubble was produced by the sub-formation integrated into the Mining and Detection Formation to have a compact space where one cubic centimeter of capacity could hold the equivalent of hundreds of cubic meters of a magic material. Such a magic formation was easy enough to design once Nick kept in mind how space bands worked.
Nick estimated that he had collected about over 1.5 million liters of the blue liquid. Nick stored the space bubble into his newer, advanced, apprentice grade space band and willed for his Mining and Detection Formation to self-destruct. He then also stored Silent Ark into his older space band, cancelled Saturn and declared aloud:
"Finally, it's time to go home."
Nick summoned a tennis-ball-sized projection stone from his older space band and was about to throw it at his feet when he heard a question directed at him from above, in Valteese:
"You're a strange, little human aren't you? You took away liquefied wet qi within the ground and now you want to leave. He, he."
Nick's spine straightened and the hair on the back of his head rose when he looked up and saw a large, brown-scaled dragon gradually loom over him, as if out of thin air, with a human like sneer plastered on its face. The dragon had four legs as thick as tree trucks and as it stood on them, its height was about five meters. It had two scaled wings, a tail that was over two meters long and a head that was almost one-meter-long, which featured a maw that housed many rows of sharp, jagged teeth.
Nick asked a question in Valteese while in complete shock at seeing the magic beast and realizing that it could talk to him:
"Where the hell did you come from?"
The magic beast immediately replied:
"You idiot. I've been looming over you for months and you didn't even notice. Weren't you the least bit suspicious as to why no magic beasts came to interfere with your...plans while you were within my territory?"
When the magic beast mentioned that point, Nick's shocked expression became bitter and he thought:
(Sure enough, being a Magician and gathering resources is not easy.)
Nick was certain that the dragon in front of him was at a higher rank than himself, so there was little hope of escaping from it. Nick openly sighed and soon, his indifferent expression returned. Nick then asked the dragon:
"Are you going to kill me now?"
The dragon's sneer became plain before it spoke again:
"Not yet. I was following you discreetly for the past few months because I was curious as to why a human had the faint aura of one of mine own."
Nick repeated the dragon's words:
"Mine own? You mean to say that I seem like a dragon, like you."
The magic beast replied:
"Dragon? If that is what you humans call one such as myself, then yes. But not in form; your body has a power that tells me that you are one of us. It also makes me want to rip you apart but don't worry, I am not so wild that I would do that on a mere instinct."
Thoughts rapidly spun within Nick's head and a phrase quickly appeared within his mind:
(Dragon's Advantage.)
Nick had met with the name of that talent in a dream years ago. After researching it, he found out that it was a talent possessed by dragons that increased their agility and endurance in proportion to combat experience. The talent also supposedly attracted the ire of other dragons. Nick thought it was weird that he had a dream about a talent that a human could not obtain but the situation now was indicating that he did in fact have the talent.
(I had such an awesome talent and did not know? Hmmm...if I did know, I might have found a way to push my cultivation to another level.)
Nick explained to the dragon:
"Do you know what magical talents are? It seems that I somehow have one belonging to your kind and that is what you are sensing on my body."
The dragon stared at Nick silently for a few minutes before saying:
"...I see. That makes sense. Well, since you solved that mystery for me, go ahead, get lost."
Nick was stumped by the dragon's words for a few seconds before he asked with a blank expression:
"You mean...you're not going to eat me?"
"Eat you? I just wanted to know what was so peculiar about you. You are too weak to be of interest otherwise or nutritional value to me. I could kill you for invading my territory but truth be told, I hardly kill humans that come here because their presence usually has a positive effect on the magic energy here. The method that you were moving around with for the past few months is one example. Because of it, the magic energy within the atmosphere has become richer in earth, space and soul magic energy. That is of benefit to me."
Nick asked in response:
"You know about paths. What kind of path does a magic beast like you have affinity for?"
The dragon seemed to not mind talking to Nick, so it continued:
"I like qi magic the best and when the air becomes filled with all kinds of magic energy, the qi within my territory gets stronger and nourishes me better."
Nick mused:
(Oh, so this is a qi path dragon. Even if it is stronger than me, it is definitely not at the regular ranks yet, so why can it talk? Is it a mutant magic beast?)
It was common knowledge that mutant magic beasts were strange and in fact, Nick had met two mutant shadow goblins in the past that could also talk but not as well as this dragon.
After a while, the dragon seemed to become annoyed and asked:
"Why are you still here?"
Nick snapped out of his deep thinking when he heard the question and asked one final question in response:
"Aren't you bothered by my taking the blue liquid. You said that it was liquefied wet qi. Don't you want it."
The dragon seemed to chuckle before saying:
"Is it that you want me to take it from you? A word of advice, when you have benefits in hand, just run away with them and don't talk too much. No, I am in no need of the wet qi. It is merely precipitation from the ruins below. Now leave!"
Nick didn't need any more encouragement and so he threw the blue projection stone onto the ground, following which, a blue magic formation appeared at his feet. Nick spoke the magic formation's trigger phrase and it then adopted a bright, silver light, enveloping Nick and his vision.
When the bright, silver light abated, Nick found himself within the underground parking lot of his commercial building within Richter Order Academy's campus. Nick had not thought to move this formation to his new commercial building just yet before he left for Forgotten Peril. The jade-green wyvern could be seen sleeping in one corner of the parking lot.
Nick wearily went up to the ground floor and took a seat within the waiting area. He summoned three bags of butter bread from his older space band and spent thirty minutes slowly eating them in order to relax his mind. When he was finished eating, Nick called Dewy on his smartphone and instructed:
"Dewy, I've returned to Grand Earth. Come pick me up at the old building using the car."
Dewy accepted the instructions and Nick hung up the phone. Thinking back on the dragon's last words, Nick realized that it let something significant slip:
(Ruins below? It seems that there is more to Dying Mark than meets the eyes. If I am ever going to explore that place again, it will be when I am stronger, much stronger.)
Nick waited thirty minutes for Dewy to arrive in front of the building. At that point, Nick went outside and entered the right side of the car's back seat section while Dewy remained in the driver's seat. Dewy greeted Nick:
"Welcome back, sir. Was your trip fruitful?"
Nick relaxed in the back seat and replied:
"Yeah, it was very fruitful."
Dewy proceeded to drive the car to The Realm Exploration Company's building. On the way, Nick gave Dewy instructions:
"I need you to hire someone with expertise on refining magic ores in order to manage the refinement of magic materials that I have obtained as soon as possible. Has Riley outfitted the first floor with refining equipment like I asked?"
Dewy replied:
"Yes, I personally watched as the refining equipment was put in place. The equipment seemed too expensive for my taste but that's just my opinion."
Nick was already aware that the refining equipment was expensive, which was why he made a deposit to the corporate account before he left. He further instructed Dewy:
"I also want you to hire and have workers trained to refine the materials that I have obtained. The company will sharply grow in personnel going forward which means that we will need a human resource manager and related personnel too. Also, I'll need someone that can market and sell magic materials. I'll leave getting all of that done to you."
Dewy smiled and replied:
"Consider it all done, sir."
When Dewy and Nick arrived at the company building, James came out to meet them in his signature blue suit. Following that, Nick had James escort him to the storage area for magic materials. James led Nick inside the building and guided him to the rear of the ground floor that had the entrance to the magic material storage area.
The magic material storage area was a large room that was the size of a medium scale warehouse and it had two industrial elevators to help move materials within the building. Nick then unloaded all the magic ore stored within his newer space band into the storage space which amounted to about seventy-one thousand tonnes of unrefined magic material.
James was shocked by the quantity. He could not sense the magic energy emanating from the materials as clearly as Nick because he was not a Magician but he knew the value of even an ounce of rank 1 magic materials, which was usually, in his experience, far greater that ordinary gold. James mused:
(This much magic material represents a lot of money. It looks like our boss isn't a wastrel, after all.)
After unloading the ores, Nick went to his office on the fifth floor and slept on the carpet for a few hours before taking a shower and then getting dressed in an orange silk polo shirt, a pair of straight legged, dark-blue jeans pants and a pair of laceless dress shoes.
Nick then went to the conference room on the fourth floor and called Sai and Kurt to have them bring to him overdue documents that he had to sign. Sai and Kurt entered the conference room at about the same time and greeted Nick politely before sitting on the two chairs opposite him. They handed him two piles of documents and Nick spent three hours looking over and signing them.
Through the details of the documents, Nick learned that purchases made in order to equip the building with supplies, non-critical machines, buy vehicles, buy and install magical security systems, install a magical telephone and internet network and obtain and install the magical refining equipment amounted to more than £150,000,000,000, mostly because of consulting fees.
Nick was momentarily at a loss, looking at how much it was costing him in the short term to establish The Realm Exploration Company.
(The reason that this is proving so expensive is because everything magical has a premium attached to it because of the danger involved in obtaining magic materials as well as because of the licensed Magicians, who are involved requiring large fees for their services in order to support their cultivation. Sigh. I wanted progress and to obtain it in a reasonable amount of time, it means burning money. That's fine, I can always make more money but I cannot recover wasted time.)
Nick came to terms with the high expenses and dismissed Sai and Kurt once he was done signing documents. Nick then summoned his laptop from his older space band and spent the next few days planning his return to Forgotten Peril.
(At first, I was only planning to use Forgotten Peril as a start for my operations but the realm seems to be more valuable than people realize. The green dog magic beast and the qi path dragon are proof of that. I should mine it for resources more deeply than go looking to explore a different realm, for now at least. I can use my house in Sidon as a base of operations and I'll need to install my own space path magic formation in order to travel from that house and my workspace on the third basement floor...)
Within four days, Dewy had hired an operations manager, human resource manager, sales manager and other human resource and operations personnel. Since Dewy and the four administrative assistants, which included Nate, Joy, Leon and Heath, could not manage all the workload involved in the hiring process, Dewy used a head hunter agency to speed up the hiring and so at the end of the four days, about forty personnel were added to The Realm Exploration Company's payroll.
The operations manager was named, Carl Ogilvie. He was a fifty-year-old, dark-skinned man that had a head full of curly, grey hair and a full, grey beard. He had spent most of his career working for a mining company so he knew a lot about magic ores and how to refine them using magic equipment even though he was not a Magician. Nick immediately gave Carl the task of refining the magic ores within the building so as to save himself from possible bankruptcy.
Carl organized and trained the operations staff within days and began refining all the magic ores. Half a month later, all the magic ores had been refined, shaped and packaged. About one quarter of the refined materials gained was Forgotten Peril gold while the rest were relatively common rank 2 metals and metalloids but they would still fetch a high price if sold correctly.
For that task, Nick had his sales manager arrange the selling and distribution of the magic metals and the over one million liters of wet qi after getting them all appraised, which was a £2,900,000,000 expense for Nick. The sales manager was a thirty-year-old man named, Hank Turner, and he had been an appliance salesman before being hired by Dewy but he was a committed and hard worker
It turned out that the wet qi was a rank 4 magic material that was very useful in agricultural projects on Grand Earth and so Hank was able to arrange the sale of all of it within hours to a few private companies. The magic metals and metalloids were sold within days and a month after returning to Grand Earth from Forgotten Peril, Nick had made £820,000,000,000 in revenue, successfully saving himself from bankruptcy.
The first persons who had been hired by Dewy were overjoyed at The Realm Exploration Company's success, mostly because it meant that they did not have to find new jobs. During that time, besides signing documents and overseeing the actions of his managers, Nick spent most of his days cultivating by meditating, practising the Cross Stream Sword Technique and practising the use of Cursed Vessel and Spatial Awareness.
Nick also designed space path magic formations that he would use to connect his workspace to his house within Forgotten Peril. After getting Riley to purchase rank 2 magic materials and a relatively small amount of rank 3 space path materials and then receiving some of them, Nick laid a space path transportation magic formation within his workspace and now all he had to do was lay the corresponding magic formation within his house in Sidon.
Nick also used some of the magic materials to repair Silent Ark completely, which took days. Nick received the rest of the rank 2 magic materials after that and they would be used to lay his Mining and Detection Formation when he returned to Forgotten Peril. Despite Nick's large gain in revenue, he ended up spending over £400,000,000,000 on his cultivation and preparing for his next trip to Forgotten Peril, leaving about £600,000,000,000 left to his name.
That might look like a lot of money but Nick knew that it was not for a Magician that was trying to build the kind of company that he was building.
(Once I have to buy fuel for Silent Ark again, that £600,000,000,000 would go up in smoke. Not to mention that I cannot afford to lay many rank 3 magic formations because purchasing rank 3 magic materials in bulk would bankrupt me as I am now. I want to purchase more magic swords but that is too low priority to spend the company's money on, right now. Forget about designing a rank 3 magic formation similar to Silent Ark; I simply cannot afford to create such a thing. Without these resources, my cultivation is being held back which means that the rank 3 magic beasts within Forgotten Peril are still a threat to me. I need to work harder and smarter.)
Two months after Nick returned from Forgotten Peril, his preparation for returning there was complete. He had his human resource manager, who was a white woman in her early forties named, Joyce McLean, inform all his staff of his departure and then he used the space path magic formation laid by the Space Travel Company to teleport to Sidon once again, following which, Nick went to his house in Sidon and spent the rest of the day laying a space path magic formation within it that was connected to the corresponding one located on the third basement floor of his company's building. The two latter space path magic formations consisted of rank 3 space path magic materials.
Nick was not done there because he laid a main space path transportation formation within the house as well using rank 3 space path materials and then spent a week creating multiple copies of a transportation sub-formation that he imprinted into crystal-blue projection stones, also using rank 3 space path materials. These transportation sub-formations were linked to the main transportation formation within Sidon so Nick would not have to cross large distances to get back to Sidon after conducting his mining operations. Nick mused:
(The only reason why I was still able to use my rank 2, main space path magic formation and transportation sub-formations when I last returned to Grand Earth is because my rank 3 cultivation begun relatively recently and so my mindscape and body don't have enough magical laws embedded into them yet that overwhelms those magic formations. In the near future, that may not be the case, anymore, so I can no longer rely on them.)
Having laid the magic formations that he wanted to use in order to make his life easier, Nick left Sidon by using Tyrant Armor to run through its gates at a speed that didn't allow anyone below rank 3 to discern his identity and after he ran five hundred meters away from the settlement, Nick summoned Silent Ark.
He entered Silent Ark's cabin, activated its camouflage and scouting abilities, raised it forty meters into the air and then sped off to his next destination. Nick spent three weeks traveling to a heavily wooded area called, Common Bark. Unlike the previous areas that he had mined, this area was actually frequented by people but Nick did not care about that and left Silent Ark's cabin using Saturn's effects, following which, he cast Tyrant Domain in order to start clearing out large sections of Common Bark.
This included removing the vegetation, trees and rank 2 magic beasts by turning them to dust using Saturn's effects. After hours of doing this, over two dozen kilometers of land had been cleared and thousands of magic beasts killed. Dozens of rank 2 Magicians that Nick had not attempted to harm noticed his activities and were forced to flee from the area. Some thought about cursing him or even fighting him but when they sensed his rank 3 magic power, they turned tail and ran for the hills.
Within Forgotten Peril, rank 3 Magicians were the equivalent of kings and Nick noticed this quickly. No one tried to stop him even though he was basically hoarding entire areas for himself. Nick did not feel bad about doing this since no one really owned any of the land in a realm like Forgotten Peril, where everything except the human settlements were up for grabs.
Did other rank 3 Magicians not realize that there were valuable resources to be collected within this realm?
(Of course they do but many of them don't have the fine skills and means that I do to find and collect them at a profitable enough scale within a reasonable amount of time. Mining is apparently not an easy thing to do even when using magic. My high magic energy reserves and special mindscape also help me a lot in persevering through the difficulty and strain.)
As soon as Nick was ready to lay a Mining and Detection Formation within Common Bark, a rank 3 Magician, who wore a red magician's robe, suddenly appeared floating in midair, over one hundred meters away from Nick. The robed Magician shouted at Nick using a magically amplified voice:
"Bastard! Who do you think you are? You cannot just do as you please to Common Bark!"
In response to the robed Magician's question, Nick indifferently glanced at him and spoke aloud:
"Who do I think I am? I'm god damn Nick Capitol!"