“Fair enough,” Cha Ming said. “Though failure rate isn’t the only way to create beneficial knowledge.”
“Right,” Director Yong said. “Reducing material costs, like you did with this blade, is also very valuable. Though you’ve reduced material costs substantially—likely by twenty percent, when everything is said and done—I already know the core of how savings can be accrued. For material savings, we multiply the percentage savings and materials by ten. Normally, a spiritual weapon’s materials will amount to roughly half the value of the weapon. You’ve reduced those costs by twenty percent, so I would offer you double the weapon’s value.”
“I take it there is a reason for the lower payout?” Cha Ming asked.
“Yes,” Director Yong said. “Materials are easier to emulate and copy. We can only maintain a monopoly on such things for so long before our competitors discover it.”
“Then that leaves new products,” Cha Ming said.
“Indeed,” Director Yong said. “For your own innovations, we would award you a percentage of sales. Sometimes, however, clients ask us to make something according to their specifications. In this case, it depends on a few things, like contributions to the project, material wasted, and the like, but all things said and done, it could be as much as ten percent of the project. The final design would go to the client, of course.”
“Hmm…” Cha Ming said. “Interesting. That actually doesn’t sound so bad. It seems I’ve misjudged companies.”
“I’m afraid you haven’t,” Director Yong said. “Our company is the only one who would dare do such a thing. The Blackthorn Conglomerate has substantial backing. In addition, our knowledge base is quite large. It’s difficult to innovate something that doesn’t already exist.”
Cha Ming nodded. “About this blade. I’ll accept your terms.” He took out a jade slip and poured his transcendent force into it, inscribing a full record of the technique he used. Then he took out a small orb, which he’d taken from a stand downstairs after he’d finished forging. He took out another identical-looking orb and touched them together. They glowed softly as he poured qi into them.
Then, when the glowing faded, he handed one to Director Yong, who reviewed it, nodded, and stowed it in his storage ring along with the sword. He then placed a large pile of top-grade spirit stones beside the tea table. Cha Ming swept them up quickly.
“Now that this trivial matter is behind us, Pai Xiao, I was wondering what you thought of my offer,” Director Yong said.
“Offer?” Cha Ming replied.
“Don’t play coy with me,” Director Yong said. “I won’t believe for a second if you tell me you thought I’d come to buy a simple sword off of you.”
Cha Ming hesitated. “Let me think about it. It’s a big decision to make.”
“Good,” Director Yong said. He flicked his wrist, and a small black scroll appeared in his hand. “The full details of our offer are here on the scroll. If you decide to accept it, simply bind the scroll, and assuming you have no other employment marks we aren’t aware of, you’ll immediately become one of our employees. The offer is valid for three days, and we expect you in Bastion one week from acceptance.”
“I’ll think about it,” Cha Ming said once again. Pai Xiao was a careful man who had long since grown used to freedom. “Would you like more tea?”
“I’m quite all right,” Director Yong said. “I wasn’t sure if making you an offer was a good idea at first, but then you served me tea. A man with such good taste couldn’t possibly be a mediocre individual, could he?”
“I’d expect the same of an employer,” Cha Ming said. “Your offer seems good according to what we’ve discussed. Still, I like to take my time with things like this.”
“Don’t take too long,” Director Yong said, pulling open the door. “The world is changing. There are great works under way. If you’re late, you’ll miss them and regret it for the rest of your life.” He then headed down the stone steps, shutting the door behind him as he exited the building.
Once he confirmed Director Yong was gone, Cha Ming inspected the contract. As he’d expected, the contract was onerous but not unreasonable. It had clearly been crafted assuming Cha Ming would make a breakthrough to peak-grandmaster rank. Two million top-grade spirit stones might seem like a ridiculous sum to others, but to someone who’d just made ten thousand of them as a mid-grade smith in a single afternoon, it wasn’t an unbearable one.
The main restrictions in the contract was that an employee couldn’t work for another and couldn’t share knowledge obtained during his employment with the Blackthorn Conglomerate. Should he pay off his debt, however, he could use the knowledge gained for his own benefit but couldn’t disseminate it for ten years, unless he paid a penalty ten times larger than his initial contract value. Dissemination included inscribing it on any medium or transferring to another individual. Cha Ming was surprised by how thorough it was in eliminating any avenues knowledge might be transferred.
That aside, his work hours would be very flexible, and he would gain full access to their libraries. The only exception, however, was that twenty-five percent of his time, at the minimum, would be allocated to “special projects,” for which he would be duly compensated.
One of these special projects must be the one Wang Jun noted in the folio, Cha Ming thought. Zhou Li’s pet project.
What should have taken him over a decade to accomplish, according to Wang Jun’s plan, had only taken him about half a year. Now, all he had to do was wait.
A small hand knocked on Cha Ming’s office door. “Master, you wanted to see me?” a feminine voice said
