NOVEL WEB Chapter 11 – Unexpected finance
"Thank you!!" People are praising and crying over me, after spending one afternoon working on the cure. The official story is that i spent the last five days working on the cure, this retroactively made me popular with everyone. Over the last few weeks.
But when i stated the price of the cure, they all shut right the fuck up. After the initial wave of sick people that needed the cure or they would die. Another different group started buying my product in bulk. The scalpers, They buy everything and buy me out of stock each time. They would then sell a watered down version for double the price. The elixir is all around useful, It functions as an effective antibiotic.
The already unbelievable large amounts sold in the beginning put the York lands back in the positive. Any sale past this is for those unlucky few or too be taken for different lands that have unending stream of diseases.
I am sitting in the best position, remember how people would complain about how big pharma is super evil. Well, in this situation. I am big pharma. I made a nice profit, scratch that i am made a MASSIVE profit. I was so happy that i went a little number crazy taking account of every little part. Let me explain how well i did.
Each bottle is only 100 ml and a bottle is 15 silver. If you multiple that with the amount of 20 thousand liters sold. Thats 200 thousand each sold for 15 silver THATS 3 million. But hey thats silver and 1 gold is 100 silver. so my salary is 300, a big difference. I would quit if this wasnt a forced employment. Lets see the expenses.
The base ingredients cost 50 copper and 2 silver to produce 1 bottle, Not good. we made 200 thousand bottles thats 500 thousand silver from the 3 mill, Big ouch. The labour is a total of 0 copper, most of the workers were the butlers and maids that are paid for by the state. Lets talk about the price of the glass bottle themselves. I made two types of bottles. Fast bottles and normal bottles, Fast bottles are the cheapest that could be and the normal ones are slightly expensive. They are designed to be given to real clients.
After the point that only scalpers are buying my elixir. I knew that they didn't give a single shit about how the bottles look. So i started getting cheaper bottles. that are sometimes malformed and dont have a perfect seal with the stopper.
The initial 60 thousands were normal bottles. the normal bottle is 20 copper per one. Thats 1,2 million copper or 12 thousand silver. The rest of the bottles from then are the cheap kind, which cost 2 copper per. a tenth of the price, but the amounts that am buying. the glassblowers started getting really efficient. This cost 280 thousands in copper or 2800 in silver.
There are unaccounted for loses that amount to 27 thousand silver, i dont know where that money went. Its just gone. If you add all the loses. thats 541,800 silver. Resulting in a 2,458,200 silver profit. Thats 18.06% lose. Almost 1/6 of the profit.
I must be the richest self made teenager, except for the minecraft youtubers those kids make a mint.
You know with money like this, i can actually finance a mage coven. Get people to help me with magic, do the grunt work for me. Oh i can also start work on my magic tower. Thats something only the high level mages in the academy have, they spend 10s of years building it. I could have mine built, before my tenure as a court mage ends.
Buzz*
A magical signaler stops my lounging over my new fur throne. I connect where the signal is coming from. The ever silent communication orb. it was never used for the whole duration of my stay in this new land.
I run to the walk in pseudo-Vault. it was originally a prison room, but I used alot of magic to make it an impenetrable vault.
Huge piles of silver and gold coins litter the ground, if you walked in, you would think this was a bank vault. I also have the more expensive magical ingredients hidden away here.
I shove mana in the correct order, as my password is accepted. A tone of a female voice echoes out of the communication orb.
"Hello Darrel Ourtsman, I am Tania Dorick. Finance minister of the sylas kingdom. It has come to our attention that you have been illegally practicing business without a medical reseller permit." Fuck, what the hell is that. I even asked a few people and they all said that court mages own alot of personal businesses. They said it as complaint against their corruption, but I took it as a go ahead. Of course the limit of my responsibilities and what I could do was always vague. Its kinda of like if you can get away with it, then its allowed.
"So do I issue a refund. The sales were to pay for the ingredients. Couldn't finance all of the production out of pocket." I am sweating, I try to be slick on voice. But she might pick up on it.
"I understand that you were under difficult situation, if you pay 70% of the profits. The whole thing will be swept under the rug" Wait, is she trying to fleece me.
"That is way to high, if you would lower it to 40%. I don't even have much of that money left, I already spent alot" It's a fine line between an audit and a successful bribe
"Well, if you give us a 40% cut from the profits. I can give you the permit, so you can legally continue business. Of course all profits that you, receive under employment as a court mage is taxed. The base tax is 50%. This initial permit cost and taxes will lose you more money you got." The veil between this being taxes or a bribe is getting thinner.
"So 90% of all the money I have. Has to be given to you" Come on throw me a bone.
"I can forgive all of it, if you sign an exclusivity contract. Sell all your future products to the kingdom" I hear her smile in her voice, she must think shes so sly. Fool the rube to work for you. Keep me in her pocket.
"That's impossible, I would rather take the hit to profits"I rub my forehead, already tired from the negotiations.
"Well that's a shame, You owe the state 2,212,380 silver."Wait how the fuck did this bitch know exactly how much I have. Fuck did she somehow find the business ledger. Was i compromised or does she have some spying magic thing.
"You are expected to transfer this amount to-" She continues to explain how to pay my taxes. After the transmission ended, I start tearing up. My money, it's all gone.
Well actually about 25 thousand silver is left. still a massive amount compared to if I just saved my paycheck.
I gather up all my many stacks of hard heavy metal and make a Scrooge McDuck coin bath. Enjoying It for the last time. Its profoundly uncomfortable, but the thought is where the enjoyment comes from.
A few hours later, a very happy tax collector pulls a big wheelbarrow full of gold and silver coins. He leaves through the same teleport circle i came in. Sensing schadenfreude from the Lord, hes been looking at the whole ordeal. His face is a stone statue, but i can sense true thoughts. His daughter is standing next to him looking wide eyed, she saunters towards me.
"Sir master mage, what happened for you to transfer so much wealth" She doesnt understand, probably thinking that its something serious like war funds or something. I cant help but farrow my brow, as i reply with.
"Taxes"