After Surviving the Apocalypse, I Built a City in Another World

Ferrol Town, a few days ago

For the first day or two after arriving in Ferrol Town, the team had been predominantly training, and using the rest of the time to study the market and investigate some news.

So far, it seemed that no unusual territories have gathered their forces in Ferrol yet—at least not suspiciously en masse, and there was no one who only stepped on Ferrol right before or after the Protection Period ended.

As for the activities of other territories, it was difficult to say for sure if they were doing anything suspicious. After all, there was an event in Ferrol and it welcomed various territories and visitors at this time.

It was not wise to investigate these territories too closely either, as they were not arrogant and thought they wouldn’t be found out.

They would definitely be found if they weren’t careful—and if they attracted hostility to Altera because of this, then they would have sinned.

This didn’t mean they dropped their guards, of course. They always kept a sharp eye and ear about what was happening around them, assigning most of their members in spying tasks (rotating) while the rest made money for the group.

Other than these, they were also asked to further solidify their knowledge of the indigenous market and analyze whether it was worth being put on their radar with their strength.

After all, selling Alteran products would naturally put the village on the map of the aborigines. Not to mention: They were planning to debut at Ferrol’s annual market festival—which was a conglomeration of various territories.

In Terran terms, this was like a massive multi-territorial Expo, and they would definitely get exposed to all kinds of people.

This was both a risk and an opportunity.

As people who had stayed in Xeno for months, they had a better idea of how charming Altera was to the aborigines. They knew how innovative Altera’s products were.

Even fellow Terrans were amazed by how quickly things were made—let alone the aborigines who were completely clueless about what they were at first.

But sister-in-law said there should be more gain. She was confident they could beat territories around the same level anyway.

There was also a level limit in wars to prevent strong territories from sending ultra-strong professionals to wars of subsidiaries. This was a very kind rule, as it minimized heartless massacres of entire territories.

Although the current generation of Aborigines wasn’t born yet before the wars were established, they had heard plenty of stories passed down from their families. It was truly a horrid time back then, and there was no one who could truly sleep in peace.

At the time, it was said that even with long lifespans, no one really lived beyond 100 because they’d have either been killed in a war or killed because of the injuries accumulated after battling their whole lives.

The exemptions to this rule were extremely protected individuals—oftentimes at the expense of other people’s.

When the Territory War limitations were implemented, everything changed. This relative peace, followed by the appearance of the System, allowed most territories time to grow.

It was just that war, selfishness, and one-upmanship were still the main instinct against each other and against other territories, so even if resources were ample, growth remained slow.

In any case, the Territory War Limitation was only positive, and they were thankful for it.

Interestingly, there was no formal ’document’ on what the rules were. People just… found out through time and experience—receiving warnings and punishments every time they did something wrong.

Eventually, an unwritten summary of rules was formed and it was passed from generation to generation. This became quite long, with differing details.

What was interesting was the fact that knowledge about these ’rules’ had some variances from person to person.

For instance, Oslo (unsurprisingly) knew more rules than everybody else.

This added a lot of dynamics in wars because there could be rules and loopholes that certain territories kept to themselves.

Anyway, the major rule that everyone agreed on was the level limitations that took into effect during wars. This was the level of the citizens allowed to actively participate in wars—that was, to attack and kill.

For villages, a maximum level of 15 was allowed. This meant that even a lot of the members of the mercenary team would be unable to join in. At best, they would only be able to defend within the territory line, and nothing beyond that.

For towns, the maximum level was 30 and, for cities, there was none.

The point was, even if Altera got exposed, they didn’t have to worry. The territory was strong enough with all these limits in place.

The bigger pity would be to hide and miss this opportunity when they’d be found out sooner or later anyway.

It was better to show oneself to as many people as possible from the get-go, showcasing what Altera could offer them—this way, attacking Altera might risk offending others, because people’s interests would be affected.

It was definitely easier to become a helpless victim when there was only the assailant who knew about your existence.

Anyway, after a few days of training during ’work hours’ and studying the market during their rest times, the soldiers finally had a rough idea of the situation.

In particular, they had an idea of the initial markets they would be exposed to (which were predominantly towns and villages) as well as the market prices of similar items—which were much more inferior in appearance, quality, and function.

Eagle estimated they could even charge much more than 15 times the buying price back in Altera.

This was very good news because it meant that they’d be rich! And the Mercenary Team will be rich!

Better, the captain would never be thought of as ’eating soft rice’! After all, sister-in-law was really too rich in comparison to everyone else!

Then again…, as the original source of these items, their selling of the products would also make Ms. Althea richer!

Ah, so complicated!