Optimizing Your Isekai - Progression Fantasy w/ Slice-of-Life and Biz Building Elements

Chapter 45 (Alt PoV) Part 1 - Optimizing Your Isekai


Merchant Baron Travis Hozjan, Assistant Vice Underminister to Morgan Abolina, the Merchant of Might, Delving and War

"Yes, yes, I'll let you know the outcome of my decision in the coming weeks. Oh, ha, yes, no pun intended." Travis leaned back on the sofa, exhausted after the 'interview'. It was a couple that wanted to get into his good graces, trying to ride his coattails. He was, after all, a man on the rise.

The sex with married couples was usually mediocre but he always liked to see if their relationship would last after watching the other try to gain his favor. Would jealousy, sexual or otherwise, come between them?

Playing favorites, especially with gifts afterwards, was always a fun way to drive the wedge in just that bit deeper.

Travis was rather cross as the sex was not great, their business pitch worse, and their gift… a plush bathrobe so trite and unflattering?

Navy blue? With tassels?

It was usually better to offer one in the couple personal gifts and the other business opportunities if he really wanted to try to blow up the relationship but neither were adept enough, in the bedroom or otherwise, to want to actually interact with again.

He noted to send the husband something very nice that he wouldn't want and the wife a cheap bouquet.

This close to the border, everything is terrible, even the people.

Despite the few recent setbacks in that awful backwater of a silly little neighbor Kingdom, Travis knew he would turn things around. He always did. As the third son – and fifth child – of David Hozjan, a Merchant Earl directly under the Merchant of Might for war and delving, he was destined for great things.

He had the lineage, the connections, and the talent. Even his Innate Capability, one focused on proper delegation, said he'd rise to the top. Everything would come together.

Travis just had to get through the null essence bullshit that was hampering his profits. Two bad quarters in a row was not going to make his father happy.

Why did I run into these issues just as I got my first rift portfolio?

But he had ideas. He always did. If the null essence was that painful to absorb, there was always money in the sadistic tendencies of his fellow Merchant Nobles.

"Krastina, get in here!" Travis yelled, summoning his assistant.

The squat man, short, round, and with a toady face, entered, wearing his customary black shawl over a black shirt, black trousers, and matte black shoes. Krastina's only extravagance was a thin silver belt around his waist. The man faded into the background, just like Travis wanted.

"Yes, Baron Hozjan, what do you need of me?" Krastina said in a voice clearly laced with deference.

So glad I stole him from Ursula, ever attentive and great for business ideas. Plus, so awful on the eyes, I won't get distracted like my last assistant. I do hope she's enjoying digging ditches.

"First is obvious," Travis said, rolling his eyes. "This place needs cleaning. I can't have my only bedroom in this shithole town smelling of sex and failed business. Really, farming? They want me to invest in farms?" He scoffed. "When are we scheduled to return to the Capital?"

"We can set the schedule as you please of course, but first I'd recommend you see the latest report on your rifts in The Verdant Kingdom, sir. It seems someone finally brought the essence down on the rift you so excellently sold as an experience for the young Duke Urba. Their results were… interesting." His voice fell to less than a whisper as though just the mere mention might set Travis off.

That's ridiculous! I am always calm and level-headed!

Whenever Krastina said something was 'interesting', it usually meant trouble. While trouble could be fun, it rarely was the last few months since he'd taken over the rifts in the east of The Verdant Kingdom.

They were an opportunity to grow though and grow he would.

"What the hell is this?" Travis bellowed. "How the fuck did they get thirteen and a half gold, that means… they killed…"

Krastina cut in. "That's right, nearly 300 monkeys, just as you were about to say, sir. It didn't violate the contract from the Adventurers Guild, they never left the rift." If Travis didn't know how loyal the man was, cleverly breaking his contract with Travis' sister to join his side, Travis would have thought there was genuine mirth in Krastina's voice.

Shit. Just… shit.

"Where does that leave us for Duke Urba? Will the rift have enough essence for him to Tier up?" Travis was starting to feel his anxiety rise.

His newest spin on the null essence rifts, selling them as a legal way to hurt indentured servants or misbehaving employees – or just some sadistic fun – was barely in its infancy. There were even a few inquiries about how to legally damage or even collapse someone's essence channels but his father's legal team hadn't prioritized the review yet so it was still in limbo.

Travis needed the teenaged Duke Urba to tell his father, a man very important to Travis' own Merchant of Might, how great it was working with him. Word of mouth was always the best advertising, especially in the vice-adjacent trade as the Baron hoped the null rifts would be.

Travis only managed a few Tier 2 rifts and one Tier 3 so gaining popularity with the younger crowd was crucial to get the most from his Tier 1-heavy rift portfolio.

Is everything going to crumble away again? No, I can't let it!

Then Krastina held the tablet in front of Travis, showing him the moment the team dispelled the rift reward.

As they passed their prone teammate through the shimmering crack in space, laughing all the while, four stones fell towards the ground, only to be snatched from the air at the last second by the woman who was barely functioning milliseconds prior.

"Yes sir, those are essence stones," he heard Krastina say from far away as his mind swam. Finally focusing on his assistant once more, Krastina said, "The projected output for that rift over the next two quarters was automatically adjusted to reflect the loss of essence. That's… that's going to push us further into the red. Quite a bit further."

Even just lowering that one rift's projected profit was bad. But what it could mean was far worse.

Travis had increased the projected profit from all the null essence rifts based on the deal with Duke Urba. The entrance fee for the Duke's delve – where the teenager planned to slow his contingent of carry team guards as much as possible and make them fight the monkeys for his amusement – was about three times the typical fee for the amount of essence in the rift.

Travis, with Krastina's help, had justified increasing the projected profit for all null essence rifts by 50%. That put his next quarter profit projections very solidly in the green. If the value of the Duke's deal decreased, even slightly, it was a series of dominoes waiting to fall, one that could see him fall into obscurity.

At best.

***

Merchant Baron Travis Hozjan, Assistant Vice Underminister to Morgan Abolina, the Merchant of Might, Delving and War

After two hours of sulking and watching a few episodes of The Wandering Lotus, Travis knew it was time to figure out next steps.

He checked his messages and, if possible, his heart sank further.

[Message from Earl David Hozjan, Lead Director of Delving, Received One Quarter Bell Ago: I saw. I'm not impressed. Talk to your assistant.]

Starting to panic all over again, Travis called frantically for Krastina.

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The man ran into the room, panting and with a sense of urgency that made Travis' panic spike. "He… well sir, it's better if I show you…" Krastina beckoned Travis to follow him to the conference room in the tiny, four bedroom villa.

One bedroom was reserved, as was the case for all family houses, for his father. Krastina had a bedroom to himself and the three indentured servants Travis brought occupied the last.

As Krastina pushed facts and figures onto the large-screen tablet on the wall, Travis' headache worsened.

"Give me the high level first. How bad is it? This quarter was looking fine this morning. The loss from that specific delve will hurt but not that bad. I can't see a singular write-down of future profit really impacting much."

None of it was exactly true; the quarter had been in the red from day one. But as of that morning, he was still going to be able to spin the past three months as 'a quarter focused on investment over profit'. His father never seemed to mind those. Travis needed to grow his portfolio and any good business person knew you had to spend money to make money.

And when you made a profit on an annualized basis most years, who could reasonably complain? Especially about a few down quarters. Focusing on the most recent results instead of the potential is utter folly.

"As discussed, the portfolio's projected profit was increased based on—" Krastina began.

Travis cut him off. "I know the projection math! I created the math! How the hell did they get away with it?!"

"It's… well sir, the feedback was… the contract needed some protections that were missing. Here is the instructions sent to the Adventurers Guild and here is the contract."

Both were placed on the large wall-mounted tablet side-by-side. It was exactly as he'd feared: the Guild put a contract out that allowed someone to kill as many of the monkey-like creatures as possible with no upper limit.

The instructions had been vague, it was true.

But it was still clearly the Guild's fault.

While the thirteen and a half gold he had to pay for the number of killed monkeys was far too much for a single delve – he'd waived the damn entrance fee! – the loss of essence was the far bigger issue.

That large of a decrease would trigger an automatic change in the projected entrance fee he could charge for the rift given the expected rift reward was so much less valuable. Just the amount of essence that group stole in a single delve meant an 80+ gold write-down.

And, because of Travis' recent changes to his accounting methodologies, that loss would all be recognized in the current quarter. It took Travis' business segment from a minor loss to bumping up against the dreaded 100 gold loss level.

"What idiot allowed a contract with that obvious of a loophole!? I want names. I want them fired!" Krastina looked nervously towards the door. "Out with it!"

"Well sir, the contract was sent for review and only one person on our side had final approval status. It was never reviewed fully so they placed the contract per standing instructions…"

Travis' felt the bile rise in his throat. He knew who had that review status. It hadn't seemed like a big deal; everyone said null essence was too damaging to absorb much so how could anyone exploit the loophole? "No one could survive that much null essence, it should have killed them! This doesn't make sense. It shouldn't have even mattered!"

Krastina wouldn't make eye contact. "I'm sorry sir but I have no idea how it happened. It does seem impossible. Unless they were able to Ignite a baby with a null essence affinity, I don't see how they could have run the rift twice without utterly collapsing their essence channels, let alone eleven times… Possibly that's what's in the backpack contraption the large man with the morningstar is wearing?"

Travis waved for Krastina to put up any other figure than the bad contract.

The next was far, far worse.

An official document that could seal his fate appeared. [Your current quarter projections put you in the bottom 10% of Assistant Vice Underministers under Her Merchant Majesty, Morgan Abolina. As such, your expense accounts are restricted until a complete review of your operation is conducted.]

Travis felt absolutely panicked for a second. "We need to fix this! If we get the essence levels back up, everything goes back to normal!" He shoved back from the desk and started pacing.

Turning to Krastina but talking as much to himself, he asked, "What are the main ways to increase a rift's essence level? We could toss in dead rift monsters." Travis was feeling a bit of hope. It would only be a tiny bit of essence per body but if he could move a few thousand corpses, the numbers probably penciled out.

"Unfortunately, with a lock on company funds, we only have your personal funds to use. It will be hard to move enough money around to purchase monster corpses and doing so will bring a lot of scrutiny. And…" Krastina looked like he was afraid of getting hit, "your father just put a spending limit on as well…" His assistant pushed something else to the screen.

A picture of a handwritten note, written in the beautiful loopy script he recognized as his mother's, took over his entire vision:

"Baron Hozjan, your most recent gambit – and supposedly clever accounting practices – have me extremely concerned as to the nature and quality of the business you are conducting. See to it that you make it back into the green before you have access to your discretionary funds.

– As dictated by Earl David Hozjan, Lead Director of Delving in service of Merchant of Might Morgan Abolina"

In a far more brutal writing script, that of his absent father, it read:

"This is a chance to show those skills you so proudly proclaim to have. Do not disappoint me."

Didn't even use my name…

With only a few tens of gold, to spend, Travis felt the walls closing in on him. He said with a quiet calm, knowing he'd have to do anything he could, "So we can't spend to buy rift monster bodies. But… there are other ways. A high Tier dying in a rift means most of their essence is absorbed by the rift, right?"

Krastina visibly gulped. "That was the rumor, sir. The studies were never conclusive before those conducting them suddenly perished. The researchers' corpses were said to have exploded from the inside out… There is also the fact that any spending related to someone or someones of a sufficient Tier to accomplish that goal would be noted…"

"But we need to increase the essence in the rift in the next seven days, before the quarter close," Travis pleaded.

"An essence stone might do it?" Krastina asked more than said. Then a look of excitement passed across his face. "Oh, there was some finished research on this."

The toady man muttered to himself as he read for a few minutes. "Yes sir, found it! If someone throws the essence stone a rift produced back into the rift that produced it, there is a small net gain to that rift's essence beyond even the essence stone itself. The projections would be close but you'd surely be out of the bottom 10% of Assistant Vice Underministers."

"So we just need to get our hands on the essence stones that dropped. Seems easy." Travis felt his nerves calming again.

"Yes sir, but without the funds to buy them…" Krastina stopped that thought at the look on his boss' face.

Travis' smile was one of determination and excitement.

Well, there's an easy way to extract what you want from a Tier 1 team. Especially from their corpses. Now I just have to find them.

The cold calculation in Travis' voice was evident. "Get me as much information on this 'The Order of the Ever-Consuming Glider' as you can. With a childish name like that… I'm sure we can find a good solution… Do have it in front of me in the next two hours Krastina, you know how I hate waiting."

"Yes sir, and I know you'll be able to punish these miscreants appropriately," Krastina said with a small bow before leaving the room.

Things will go my way, they always do.

***

Robert Krastina, Special Assistant to Merchant Baron Travis Hozjan, Assistant Vice Underminister

Robert hated being called Krastina, the name of his family that sold him into indentured servitude when he showed the smallest bit of talent at business.

The man Robert was currently attached to ignored the first fifteen times Robert asked him to use his first name and thus, he'd given up.

As soon as Robert left the room, instead of digging into the group of delvers, he left the building to send a message. He had asked for the requested information the second 'The Order' took on the contract, not just after they'd collected a sizeable reward, as was his duty.

It's what any competent business person would do.

A group taking on a delving contract was normal but the rift was of special importance to both Travis' and Robert's plans so he kept an especially close eye on it.

While it was heavily coded, the underlying message Robert sent to his contact via his sister was clear: We have a rather unique opportunity here to advance the timeline. Potentially significantly. Please advise.

Robert knew the other side would do the necessary digging and smiled.

***

Merchant Baron Travis Hozjan, Assistant Vice Underminister to Morgan Abolina, the Merchant of Might, Delving and War

Travis spent the rest of the day stewing and spewing, invectives raining through the house to scare his staff every few minutes, his moments of cold fury and calculation long-since gone. The man ordered a courtesan but was even denied, his request for someone to take his anger out on deemed too dangerous for the meager amount of funds he offered.

This shithole doesn't even have proper Tier 3 whores?! Why are we here!?

Worse, Krastina returned with the news that the group of Tier 1s Travis had to kill to reclaim his stolen essence stones was actually well-connected; quite well-connected in fact. Any attack on the group would likely lead to inquiries and retaliation from multiple cities, possibly escalating to the Kingdom-level itself.

Currently, the group of Tier 1 nobodies had two Tier 3 guards escorting them and were known to travel often with a Tier 5 and a Tier 6. Even Chazin Mark, so under the thumb of his Merchant of Might, would likely raise hell if they went missing.

While rumors abounded that Morgan Abolina wanted war between The MM and The Verdant Kingdom – there was always money to be made in conflict and profiting from all sides of a war was where Morgan excelled – she wouldn't allow the casus belli to be someone from her organization causing any issues. That could be used as justification to reduce her holdings by the other Merchants of Might.

Anyone in Morgan's organization that caused another Merchant of Might to even consider reviewing her holdings would wish they were dead rather quickly.

Travis would need to actually meet with these lowly beings, people who were still Tier 1s into their twenties.

What low-born creatures couldn't get Tiered up to at least Tier 2 by the age of twenty?

He had earned that right by excelling at business in his teens, reaching Tier 3 by age twenty one through his accomplishments. While he hadn't progressed his Tier in the intervening decade, he still looked to be in his early twenties through some excellently-skilled healers on his father's payroll.

Krastina provided an entire novel's worth of research but it was obvious that the Tier 1s, politically protected or not, would crumple under pressure.

Especially the kind of pressure Travis could exert.

The one bit of not horrible news of it all was the group was headed to Chazin Mark. While he despised the city, their awful accommodations and worse people making him feel the constant need to bathe and screw to take his mind off it, Travis had the connections in the city to easily corner the team.

It was a five hour journey by carriage so he sent Krastina to make the proper preparations.

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