Chapter 237: The Firearms Factory
The two arrived at their destination.
On the rusty iron gate, the faded paint spelled out "Logget Machinery Factory".
Lorne lightly sniffed, and a strong, pungent smell of coal smoke wafted into his nostrils, making him instinctively frown. The environment around the factory was even worse than he had imagined.
"Old Kohler, come inside with me and take a look," Lorne said to the middle-aged man beside him.
"Alright."
They walked into the factory, but the expected roar of machinery was absent. The entire factory area was eerily quiet, and hardly any workers were seen moving about.
Could it be that the workers had all left because the factory couldn't pay their wages?
But to say there were no workers at all wasn't quite right. In front of a three-story office building, they saw about thirty people dressed as workers gathered, all looking agitated, seemingly arguing about something.
"I'll go ask," Old Kohler volunteered from the side. He was familiar with such situations and knew how to talk to workers.
Lorne didn't stop him; he just stood quietly, observing. After about five minutes, Old Kohler hurried back.
"They're demanding their wages," Old Kohler said, a hint of sympathy and helplessness on his face. "The factory owner hasn't paid them for two months."
"Two months?" Lorne's mouth twitched slightly. If he were to take over the factory now, would these overdue wages also fall on him?
Sure enough, Tarkin's judgment was never reliable.
"Since we're already here, we might as well meet the main person," Lorne sighed, stepping towards the office building.
"Excuse me, excuse me, we're here to see your boss." Old Kohler helped clear a path for Lorne.
"If you're here to collect debts, let me tell you, we were here first!"
"That guy won't pay, don't waste your energy!"
Complaints and taunts from the workers came from all directions. After a good deal of effort, the two finally pushed through the crowd and arrived at the office building's entrance.
"That – you're going to discuss business in a moment, I –" Old Kohler's eyes darted around, asking if he should step aside.
"It's fine, let's go in together," Lorne patted his shoulder. "Two people have more presence."
He raised his hand and knocked on the tightly closed office Door.
"Debt collectors, please leave. I don't have a single penny now!" a tired and hoarse voice came from inside the office.
"I'm not a debt collector."
"Then you're here to take my life? Taking my life is useless too!"
"No," Lorne raised his voice, "I'm here to discuss business. I am James Scott."
At this, the room instantly fell silent. After about a minute, the Door opened with a creak, and a middle-aged man with bloodshot eyes and a haggard face peered out from the gap.
"Are you… James, who wrote the letter about acquiring the factory?"
"Yes," Lorne nodded.
He had come today as James Scott. He had mentioned in a letter under Lorne's name that his friend, James Scott, was interested in the firearms factory and wanted to acquire it. Therefore, he had recommended him. At the same time, he had also corresponded with the other party using Scott's name, dispelling their concerns.
This way, Lorne's identity was merely that of a minor shareholder, not too conspicuous, and it also avoided the other party playing the emotional card to prevent him from lowering the price.
The middle-aged man eyed Lorne suspiciously for a few moments, then glanced at Old Kohler, who was shabbily dressed beside him, but said nothing more, slowly pulling open the Door.
"Come in—let's talk slowly."
The two walked in.
"Sorry, too many debt collectors have been coming lately, I'm a bit on edge," the middle-aged man explained hoarsely, pressing his temples.
He pointed out the window, "You've seen the factory's current situation. I apologize, I concealed some details in the letter."
"The workers have all left one by one. Besides those downstairs demanding wages, I'm the only one left in the entire factory now." "Are there no goods left in stock?" Lorne asked.
"Yes, there's still a large batch of bullets in the warehouse," the man sighed, his face full of bitterness. "But—they simply won't sell. The market is already saturated; even at a loss, I can't sell them now."
He gave a self-deprecating laugh: "They were all made with the highest quality copper back then, but now they've become the last straw that broke my back." "Can't you expand into new sales channels? Like the military?" Lorne asked again.
"If I had military connections, would I be in this predicament today!" the man exclaimed emotionally, collapsing entirely.
There was still production capacity, but a lack of sufficient funds and stable customer channels—Lorne quickly analyzed the situation in his mind.
"Can you show me around the factory?" Lorne asked.
"Alas—come with me," the factory owner, Ted, sighed and stood up. He didn't dare use the main entrance, as that would mean directly encountering the workers demanding wages downstairs. He led Lorne and Old Kohler out through a hidden small Door at the back of the office.
Ted led the two through the silent factory building and into the production workshop.
How to put it, the scene here was completely different from the roaring machines and orderly assembly line production workshop he had initially imagined.
It was more like a slightly larger handicraft workshop.
Peshawar. Lorne's mind suddenly recalled certain videos he had watched before transmigrating, about that legendary village that lived by handcrafting firearms.
The facilities here were strikingly similar to the scenes in those videos.
No, it might even be inferior to Peshawar. After all, the workshops there at least had modern tools like electric machine tools, while here, most of the machine tools still seemed to be human-powered.
Thankfully, I was mentally prepared. Because he had learned about the situation from Old Kohler beforehand, Lorne wasn't too disappointed.
He looked at Old Kohler beside him, lowering his voice to ask, "How's the environment here? Compared to the factory you used to work in?"
Old Kohler looked around, even reaching out to touch the cold machinery, before speaking: "Sir, although I haven't worked in a firearms factory, the environment here is better than the machinery factory I was in before. Look, there's hardly any rust on these machines; they're quite well maintained."
Lorne nodded, taking his words as reference.
Although the equipment was a bit rudimentary, it should be sufficient to produce the shotgun he designed. After all, he had originally hand-crafted the prototype gun in the "Golden Dream"'s repair room.
After visiting the production workshop, they went to the warehouse.
The moment the heavy warehouse Door was pushed open, a strong smell of gunpowder wafted out.
Boxes of bullets were neatly stacked on the ground. But next to them, there were also some scattered gun barrels and ammunition that hadn't been boxed, but were piled up haphazardly.
It seems he can't even afford to hire people to box them, Lorne analyzed in his mind.
"May I inspect them briefly?"
"You may." Ted nodded weakly.
Lorne stepped forward, picked up a bullet, and examined it carefully in his hand.
The cartridge case surface was slightly oxidized, but the material was indeed good, using high-quality brass, much better than the hand-crafted ammunition he had seen at sea.
Lorne glanced at Ted, who was bowing his head, lost in thought, and without further ado, asked directly:
"Mr. Ted, how much do you plan to sell this factory for?"