Calculating Cultivation
Chapter 122: Long Term Planning

I was sitting in my own booth in the Red Line Club after being dismissed by Garzag. I had units to spend, but since I wasn’t just throwing them away, I was asked to leave. It was humbling, but understandable. This entire Free Port operated under social rules I didn’t understand.

The technology and metallic design of various structures made this place feel quite modern, even with the intricately carved wood paneling. There was no toxic smog, brain-dead people running everything, or architecture being an afterthought, which made it different from the Forever City.

“Flame out newbie?” An older looking man who had no cultivation showed up at the booth I was sitting in. I didn’t say anything even if the person’s name appeared on the glasses I was wearing. There was only so much disrespect I could take from someone much younger with no cultivation. “Ah, I am Yang Zi, a trader of certain goods Mister Cultivator.”

“Cultivator Yuan Zhou,” I greeted the flippant man. I forced myself to calm down. After having respect ingrained into me from cultivator culture for thousands of years, it was hard to set it to the side. However, I couldn’t just crush someone using my combat ability in this place. The Administrator was watching everything.

Yang Zi gave me a toothy smile as he sat down in the booth across from me. I set down my pad to give this conversation my full attention. “What do you want?” I asked.

“You want to make units and you have units. I can help with that,” he said.

“Taking my money? I am sure many people can help me with that,” I replied, being deliberately obtuse.

“Hah, good one. I support a small trade group. The vessels load up on goods from the Free Port and then head to distant locations to sell those goods and get energy and other high value goods in return. The biggest issue right now, and what every trade group wants is a trade route.”

My mind raced trying to put the known facts togeather as Yang Zi continued explaining. “The big routes are controlled by other super organizations. Going back and forth to their domain. The real trick is to find something others don’t have.”

“And you want me to invest in such a venture?” I asked.

“Yes. Or you can do more. Lots of vessels go out, few return. Things move about in the Firmament. Some crews just run away. Others are attacked and devoured by some horror. The only real way to make units in this place is trade. That’s where the money is.”

“Or you could just run off with it all. There has to be some other way to make money in the Free Port,” I replied.

“There are loads of ways to make units. The Administrator never runs out of jobs. But if you want to earn a million units, well that requires thinking outside the box.” The Red Line Club was clearly a hive of scum and villainy. These people had made it to this level, but they weren’t the real movers and shakers of the Free Port.

“Aren’t there maps of the Firmament?” I asked.

“Everyone and their mother guards that knowledge incredibly closely. Sure there are warnings and markers out there for the various groups, but some have died off. Some have back routes you can trade in. The trade route to the continents of the Heavenly Alliance is always a risky but popular one.”

“You trade with the Heavenly Alliance?” I asked with some surprise. I had never heard about such traders.

“It is risky, and the profit is low. Very low. Since they want energy goods as well for the most part. I don’t even make that run, but there are continents on the outskirts of the Forever City that do such trades. If they are caught, well that is just free money for the immortals running the place. The super organizations that are monolithic are the ones that are really dangerous.”

Now it made sense. The Heavenly Alliance created the continents not just to farm resources but to act as a trader buffer against outside forces. That was why they used factions to run their continents instead of handling everything themselves. It created a larger chain that would be harder for Chaos to corrupt. And it would allow them to filter out anything problematic. If a continent was lost, a new one could be built.

Such an operation would cost a lot and be a huge headache, but it could be done. Most likely the Heavenly Alliance sold such locations over time to various factions while making sure no faction gained control over too many continents. That way the Heavenly Alliance could still be in charge and suck the lifeblood out of all the factions beneath them.

It was obvious in hindsight what was happening now that I had the information. The one thing I knew for sure about immortal cultivators, was that the older and more powerful they were, the more shameless they were. Using the continents as buffers sounded correct.

“The real jackpot is to find some super organization that is mostly interested in technology, not energy, where they sell the excess,” Yang Zi said.

“What do you even buy in return?” I asked.

“Metals. The Administrator sells metal incredibly cheaply, since it has the manufacturing process streamlined to an immense degree. It trades knowledge as well you know.” I nodded at this. “But it doesn’t give the knowledge away. A lot of building techniques have been lost over time.”

“Can’t anything be recreated with enough energy?” I asked with a frown.

“Yeah, but there is never enough energy. It is about efficiency and cost. The Free Port makes the best stuff. Metals, weapons, vessels. Sure, super organizations can build this stuff on their own, but it can be a hassle. Some places make sure to use only their own production like the Heavenly Alliance, but that is artisanal for the most part.”

“I have been in the Forever City, they have a lot of automation,” I countered.

“For internal consumption by the factions. They don’t sell the really good stuff. A good example is the material that makes up super structures. Getting the mass to zero while having the density be off the charts is incredibly hard. You have probably run into stuff like that, if you were traveling about the Firmament before coming here,” Yang Zi said.

I recalled the outer portion of the Infinite Ring Complex and other structures. Some material had been incredibly durable. “And energy comes back here from these trades?” I asked.

“Exactly. The Administrator taxes energy quite a bit, but the best way to make units is by trade. Find some super organization you can deal with and trade as much as possible. The problem is finding one that is friendly and has energy that can be traded,” Yang Zi replied with a shrug.

“Hence funding exploration and keeping a map secret,” I said.

“Yep. The Firmament is infinite in every direction. You go far enough you will find something no one has run into before. The best part for the Administrator, the vessels it makes are some of the best and there are known safe routes to traders to get further away. Sometimes these traders release their information freely for one reason or another, and the map expands just a bit. Also, things shift and change.”

“Is that what everyone here does at the Red Line Club?” I asked.

“Not everyone. Other people manage more mundane activities. Also, there are larger trading organizations that have mixed crews. If you run into a squiddy or a bot, then you want a squiddy or a bot to speak to that super organization. Makes things much easier. Unfortunately, I am as small time as it gets in such things.”

“You clearly want my units. So, what is the problem?” I asked.

“Vessels are expensive. The loss rate is around 95%. I have gotten lucky once in the past, with a single large trade, unfortunately I got muscled out after that. I won’t starve and my debts have been paid up, but to send out more vessels, well spreading the risk around is safer.”

“You don’t go out yourself?” I asked.

“And die horribly? I know better than that. Got one of those immortality implants from the Heavenly Alliance. Not as good as cultivation of course, but it lets me keep going, even if the taxes are brutal.”

It was an interesting proposition and a clear way to make money. I also got a better understanding of how this Free Port actually worked. For mature super organizations like the Heavenly Alliance or the Soaring Star Society this place was a curiosity. But for super organizations that were at the bottom of the pecking order, the Free Port and the Administrator controlling this place sold stuff these groups would want.

Unique construction materials, vessels to move about the Firmament, and weapons. This was a pirate port, which should have been obvious. The outer sphere was called Free Port. I just didn’t realize since there were such strict laws governing the place. But that made sense since it was the only way to keep order and conduct business.

“How much does it cost to send out a vessel?” I asked.

“A decent exploration vessel costs 50,000 units. The price goes up from there based on size, speed, weapons, and other factors. Then a sample kit would be needed to see if any groups are interested in purchasing. A low level sample kit is the best option, which is another 1,000 units. Then another 9,000 for supplies and contracting a crew.”

“And if they all run off?” I asked.

“Well, they won’t be coming back here. The Administrator takes contracts seriously. And where else would they realistically go?” Yang Zi said. That was a good point. There weren’t many pleasant places to actually live and conduct business.

“I will need to give this proposal some thought,” I replied.

“I know where vessels disappeared in the past. The older the trader, the more knowledgeable,” Yang Zi said as he got up and left the booth. It was an interesting business opportunity, but the risk was incredibly high.

I also wouldn’t be getting the knowledge of all his previous exploration attempts either. I would be investing blindly. If anything of significance came up, then it would all depend on luck. He wanted to reduce his risk, while I would have to depend on luck to make my units back. High risk, high reward, but I didn’t like the business model.

If this one man was doing something like this, I had no doubt there were thousands of other beings here in the Free Port doing the same thing. Yang Zi had even suggested as much when we had been discussing his business opportunity.

Picking up my pad I looked for trading groups or companies. There were some, but all investment had to be done at the individual level. There was no stock market to bet on. Also, I had no doubt that the Administrator had all the information that these traders collected, stored in its digital brain somewhere.

I looked at the publicly available map. Known areas were mapped out quite far in a spherical pattern. After the initial sphere, there were tendrils snaking outwards. Thousands of them in all directions, with much less information listed. I did a search and the Heavenly Alliance did show up at the end of one long exploration tendril. The Soaring Star Society and the Infinite Ring Complex weren’t on the map.

The scale of everything was massive. Incredibly massive, which made it hard to understand in some ways. Vessels would fly through the Firmament, looking for anything of interest. If this was the known map, then the actual exploration had to be ten or even a hundred times this amount. The problem was that all of this exploration was a gamble.

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The failure rate for exploration vessels was incredibly high. If they ran into anyone powerful they would instantly be crushed and everything taken from them. I felt even more stupid, not realizing why the Administrator had set up everything like it had and it left me impressed and terrified to some degree about the amount of social engineering that took place on a large scale.

The Forever City and the Heavenly Alliance controlling it, liked stability and being insular. Sure, they would accept some change and churn from the factions under them, but it was an aloof and separate group. They would monitor everything entering the Forever City, but as long as nothing serious got through they wouldn’t make a fuss.

The constant fighting over the towers and between factions was just to keep the masses engaged in a pointless struggle against each other. The winners of such competitions would earn a place at the kiddie table of the Heavenly Alliance and get a pat on their heads. All energy would eventually flow into their hands.

Here in the Free Port controlled by the Administrator, the calculator had taken a different approach. While it might seem like the taxes on old people and on energy were to keep things stable, it was also to create disposable beings. I knew that making physical items was fairly cheap in terms of effort, materials, and knowledge.

The Administrator would create vessels and trade goods in vast quantities. It would then draw from the population of the Inner Sphere where some beings wanted to do more than farming or working jobs handed out. This would be the pressure valve to prevent unrest and also prevent powerful beings from using this place as a base long term without paying a protection fee.

Young humans and probably other beings had less of a sense of risk. So, they would hop on the trade vessels, sail out to make it rich, and most of them would die horribly. The statistics of trade vessels were out there on the network, but one had to dig. Instead there was much more information and profiles about traders who had made it rich, hyping up the exploration lifestyle.

The Administrator was cultivating disposable assets that weren’t threatening and only needed to succeed a small percentage of the time. The calculator was gambling on quantity not quality. Even people like Yang Zi who knew what was going on and the rate of failure for exploration, were content with this set up. Since they were the facilitators organizing such expeditions. No doubt trying to get funding to help get more people out there and collect a percentage. The Administrator would collect a percentage of that percentage.

The knowledge would be accumulated by the Administrator along with a lot of energy. It just had to remain hands off and the wealth would come to it, while it just had to maintain and protect the Free Port.

The fact that this place had lasted so long, implied that it had a high level of defense. With the amount of energy coming through and technology, this place was probably a super fortress. All of that didn’t take into account any high level deals the Administrator might make with certain factions like the folk of the Great Tree.

That was why the Administrator didn’t want people to use the implant Yang Zi was using to get immortality. It wanted a churn of beings that were ignorant and were easily disposed of. The farms of the inner sphere weren’t meant to grow food, but to raise people so they could be used up.

The nice part about all of this was that the Administrator had to leave paths open so people could get energy themselves. Even if only one out of a billions of beings ever made it far enough to become an immortal cultivator or its equivalent, that was just the cost of doing business and motivating all the people running to their deaths.

What looked like a nice federation on the outside managed by a benevolent caretaker calculator, was in truth one giant set up to advance the Administrator’s own goals. Looking through the network there were beings who even mentioned this, but one had to dig for the information. What did it matter if people or other beings knew?

The Administrator was so far above everyone that it was impossible to resist, and it didn’t make anyone do anything. If you didn’t like its rules, you could always leave or live out your life. There were certain subsidies for having children. Due to the different birth rates these were different between each section of the Free Port and the beings in question, but everything was managed through economic pressure.

This was why just looking on the network was no good and I had come to place like this. I needed to understand this kind of information to plot my future path and to figure out how to get units. The problem was getting that many units through internal trade or processes at the Free Port would be near impossible to completely impossible.

The market economy of the Free Port and how it operated had been streamlined to an insane degree. There was no bureaucracy or politicians to get in the way. There weren’t even any peers to the Administrator. If it thought something was valuable to do, it would do it. It also took a very long view of things as well.

A good example was creating the arteries for vehicles to move about the Free Port. They weren’t really roads since they operated in three dimensions and zooming out on a map of the Free Port, they looked like arteries. It had been a major construction project in the distant past. The network deleted information after 1,000 cycles unless a fee was paid.

Information that had been put up in the past disappeared over time. There was a consolidated history site, but I had no doubt that the Administrator was the one running such a site. Or they had arranged things so that whomever took over its management would be favorable to the Administrator. There clearly was a cult of personality going on as well. The public map also fell into this category as well.

I let out a sigh of frustration and set the pad on the table. There needed to be a way to make a large amount of money. Unfortunately, if something like that were easy other people would do it. Even if it was hard and annoying, other people would still do it, due to the sheer size of this place and the population inhabiting the Free Port and the Inner Sphere.

See a need, fulfill that need was the basic premise for making money. What need was unfulfilled in the Free Port? That was the question that I needed to answer in a post scarcity society. Well, not completely post scarcity, since there was always a demand for energy, but close enough since all material goods could be manufactured with varying degrees of ease.

The Administrator leveraged its knowledge to make production as cheap as possible and sold goods at cost. There were extensive analysis posted on the network about such things. If anyone could figure out a cheaper way to make certain goods, they would get the difference for a 100 cycles.

Unfortunately to get access to such knowledge one would be stuck in the Free Port for the rest of their life, unless they could pay back the value of the knowledge they had learned. With the Administrator monitoring everything, it clearly was looking to keep information leaks to a minimum.

I had no doubt that super organizations sent spies here to try and steal information. Some probably even succeeded, but that would just make the information valuable, and they wouldn’t sell it. Since the Free Port didn’t attack anyone or send out vessels that were a threat to super organizations, they were content to let this place be. In time it would get more knowledge they could steal in the future.

The Administrator clearly was old and powerful. Based on my experiences in the past, that meant it was incredibly shameless. The fact that its operational methods were so easily figured out, showed just how shameless the calculator truly was. It didn’t brag about any of this and suppressed the information slightly, but it didn’t hide the truth.

Everything and everyone in the Free Port was contributing to its success. Even me, since I had paid the cost for living here for the next 100 cycles. There were expensive estates set up in the Free Port and the Inner Sphere were individuals had retired. One just needed to look at the map and see larger areas that were blocked off and owned by specific individuals. Their wealth and knowledge contributing to the Administrator over time.

I thought about if this was a capitalist or socialist society. While there was a market and trade, everything was controlled by the Administrator one way or another. Adjusting fees and taxes, allowed it to have unparalleled control over everything. And as long as someone worked, they would be able to live.

After giving it a moment of thought, it was both and neither. This was something completely new. I would call it a calculator society. Everything managed by a single entity, with everyone else not getting a say in higher level decisions.

Some sections had political groups and did organize, but they weren’t granted any special rights or privileges. Most groups were like the Red Line Club, associations people could use for business contacts, groups of family members, or friends. The Administrator rarely made an appearance if it wasn’t about punishing someone or defense of the Free Port. The hands-off approach was what made it appreciated, despite the Administrator controlling everything. That was the only reason I still had hope about my future path.

I needed at least ten billion units worth of energy. While it was nice to put a number to progressing, I now knew why Yang Heng had warned me away from applying numbers to cultivation. It forced me to conform to the system of trade that the Administrator had set up. If I made ten billion units worth of energy, then the Administrator would make a third of that in fees and taxes and probably another third in ancillary trade.

That meant I needed thirty billion units worth of energy, not ten. That number was also an estimate from the folk of the Great Tree based on my hyper compressed energy cannister I had in my possession with a small margin of error. The margin of error could be greater than that. The sheer amount of wealth that I needed wasn’t something that anyone was just going to hand me.

Even with future promises, no one would part with that much wealth unless they were already rich. The only being who might have been able to do something like that was the Administrator and they didn’t hand out loans. Otherwise everyone would take a loan and its entire model of operation would shift drastically.

The Administrator most likely had an elite force of some kind, but it would be a small group at best and for defense. The entire point of the Free Port was to churn out weak individuals to explore and get knowledge. Quantity not quality was the Administrator’s mode of operation. If some got strong enough to become immortal cultivators or their equivalent, then they could take more risks. Or retire to live out a long period of their life however they wanted.

There would be no loan worth billions of units. There would be no help from other super organizations. I could return to the Heavenly Alliance and ask for help from Yang Heng, but then I would be stuck with that super organization going forward. There were higher level traps set up in their cultivation method like karma. Most likely from the energy used to help advance high ranking cultivators and supply them with energy. Then there would also be rules imposed by the super organization.

I had a safety net, but it was one I didn’t like or look forward to. If I could advance through my own efforts from a high quantity of energy, that would be true freedom. That was why I had started this journey, to make my own choices about my life. Choosing the Heavenly Alliance, would be the last free choice I would make.

Getting kicked out and having to travel the Mechanical Layer had been frustrating and painful. But it had freed me mentally from sticking with what was safe and comfortable. The fact I had come so far made me not want to give up right before I reached my goal. That was why I had no plans to leave the Free Port.

The situation reminded me of my early years of cultivation. Trading early hardship to make my path in the future easier. I wasn’t sure if it had worked out well in the past. It had made my cultivation beyond complicated, but it had created the strongest base possible, which was what the Heavenly Alliance had originally intended by creating its cultivation system.

“Just a matter of earning units,” I muttered. Now the difficulty wasn’t knowledge or the unknown, but the impossibility of earning a tremendous amount of wealth. Even if I only earned a fraction of that wealth over a period of time, as long as I could generate a sizable enough income, then eventually I would reach my goal. I didn’t need to earn it all at once.

The worst part was that I couldn’t just use an implant to grant me immortality. That would interfere with my cultivation. There was a reason Yang Zi had no cultivation and was clearly quite experienced. He was saving up. No doubt his expenses were high and he was desperate, which was why he had sought me out. Eventually the fees of living here would outstrip his ability to pay them unless he could generate enough income.

He needed investors to help him out. I still had a lot of time before I had to spend the units in my possession or make a move. I lifted up my pad once more and began going through the various industries and services that were offered across the Free Port.

There would be no failing businesses I could purchase like Half Moon City. Out of curiosity, I checked if there were rocking chairs, and there were. There was a massive catalog of items people could order from. The item would be produced in one of the factories that the Administrator controlled but had people working in. The Administrator would assign someone the task of delivering the ordered good to me.

Anything material was dirt cheap. The most expensive part was the transportation cost. The price only really went up with anything that used energy or exotic materials that were most likely manufactured with energy. Metal that had no mass or super high density was not cheap. The manufacturing equipment sold was of the lowest quality. This was the same as the Forever City.

Clearly these super organizations didn’t care much about trash, but high end manufacturing techniques, knowledge, and materials was where the real value lay. I checked on the golem I had up for sale, but there were still no offers. I increased the price to a billion units. If no one purchased it, that was fine, but I just needed one buyer. It was a unique item that would never be found again.

No doubt the Administrator had already scanned it, but there was nothing I could do about that. If it sold, I would be two tenths of my way to my goal. I just needed to find a way to go the rest of the distance to earn all those units.

I looked at the cultural options offered and there was an insane number of stories, games, movies, shows, and other forms of entertainment that were offered. Not just from the human section, but I could watch squids do intricate tentacle dances or robot battles.

The entertainment industry was completely tapped out. The problem wasn’t just what was being produced, but everything that came before it as well. After a certain time, things would fall into the public domain and be offered for a very small amount, by the administrator. The entire society was completely saturated that I had to force myself to stop looking at all the options.

I shuddered in fear, since it would be too easy to get sucked into such things with no escape. The answer of what business I could get into was not going to be an easy question. Sure, financing exploration vessels might sound worthwhile, but it was basically high stakes gambling to get a successful trade route set up. I also had no doubt that the real movers and shakers of this place would pounce onto others to take such trade routes from them.

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