Filed to story: A Bullied Boy Died: A Mafia King Woke Up In His Body
It will serve as a good recruitment zone as well.
Suddenly landing on another idea, Kyle quickly called for Keith to come. “Keith, I need you to find potential casino locations, preferably ones we can strongarm or buy over in good condition to reduce the amount of construction work needed.”
Keith nodded. Casinos were par for the norm among gangs in Raktor. “I’ll work with Damian on it. He knows much better than I do how to properly cover up a casino.”
“Good. Try to get it done at the same time as the pub.”
Kyle felt restricted; his movements were watched from every corner. It seemed as though he had been locked into his own sandbox by Sebastian and the other slightly larger gangs. He currently did not have the power to break through the implicit blockade, so he needed to find more advantages if he wanted to avoid succumbing to the debt.
Forgoing payment of the debt would also leave a big target on his back. Kyle was sure he was not the strongest person in the city, so enticing hitmen and assassins to target him was not an ideal scenario.
Best case, we pay off the Crimson Swords, and it’s a done deal.
The completion of the loan repayment would also further boost their reputation, improving their influence in the black market and allowing them to take out bigger loans.
Kyle’s eyes wandered to the map of the city beyond its borders, where the forests and monster regions lay.
If I can’t expand in the city, perhaps I can obtain benefits from beyond its walls. Out there, I would be less observed and tracked.
He still had to determine what benefits he could obtain outside the city.
Come to think of it, I have never left the city since I came here. I should ask Damian and Keith.
However, for today, he would need to make some personal preparations before leaving, such as boosting his knowledge of arcia and its uses. Kyle was well aware that arctech would be the key focal point of many battles to come-it would be wise to learn as much as he could over the next few weeks.
The technological level of the world he was in was haphazard, and unlike historical advancements, thanks to the existence of arcia. The past few days had him setting up the in-house brewery. In the night, he studied the tome left behind by Theorin in order to understand arctech better.
The book taught the basic engravings and how to combine them and overlay their effects. Kyle had already done a preliminary implementation of the fermentation of mash in the kegs, allowing him to implement a simple decay engraving, accelerating the fermentation process and subsequently the production of alcohol.
If he had his way, he could implement microgravity brewing fermentation processes from the Galactic Era here. However, such engravings that could manipulate the very laws of physics were naturally extremely rare.
Arcia is far too amazing. If discovered, such an exotic material would have the entire human quadrant scrambling for it.
Kyle had yet to find evidence that he was even in the same universe or timeline as his original one, though he still did not believe that arcia was magic or fantasy.
It was more like electricity-radiation and oil-which the locals might also consider magical.
Anti-gravity, plasma weapons, and faster-than-light travel would be considered “magic” by the people here…
The study of enchantments had yet to yield a title or a bonus of sorts from the reading. Kyle surmised that it was a lack of implementation-he had always been rewarded for repetitive action rather than learning.
He returned to his room, where there were more than two dozen ordinary metal pipes on a table, along with Riker’s next to it. A single needle-like etcher hooked up to a portable arcia generator was placed as well, Kyle having bought it to practice.
Repetition is the key to success, after all. Kyle sat down and began etching away at the metal pipes, copying the engravings on Riker’s. Right now, he only had a few pieces of arctech equipment, most of which were stolen from the Red Lions’ members.
It would be good if he could customize his own armor set and weapons. He dearly missed his exosuit from his former life, which made him wonder if he could replicate it in the future. The overlaying of enchantments and engravings reminded him of how nanocircuit boards were made. An arcia-printed circuit board did not seem too far out of the question.
Something to keep in mind.
The title was not as easy to reach as previous titles were, requiring multiple days of non-stop practice. As he reached his hundredth copied metal pipe, a title was finally awarded to him.
Title Obtained:
Arcia Engraver (Basic)
Those scribbles look like they might blow up soon.
+5 INT, +3 DEX, +10% chance at improving quality of final arctech equipment.
Beyond Raktor
A week later…