Chapter 13: Mo Wuji’s Worries
Translator: Sparrow Translations Editor: Sparrow Translations
Since the start of the production of penicillin, Mo Wuji had always remained at Dan Han Drug Refinery. Making something like penicillin was too easy for him. Even some universities would set this as a topic for their final exams. Moreover, Cheng Yu state’s technology was also decent, and all the essential equipment could be procured, requiring minimal modification to work as intended.
The only difficulty presented to Mo Wuji would be to change the penicillin from the intramuscular and intravenous injection form to one suitable for consumption. Injection as a method of administering the penicillin was too troublesome, and also brought about all possible after effects linked to injections.
Orally administered penicillin, similar to amoxicillin, ampicillin, potassium chloride tablets, etc, was not something that he could not produce, but rather, two months was too short a period for him to be able to complete the production of it.
If you consumed the penicillin meant for injections, the acid in your stomach would destroy 99.9% of the medicine. Even though the process of converting penicillin from one form to another would seem difficult to someone else, it only mildly irritated Mo Wuji. Back on Earth, he had already stood on the pinnacle of pharmaceutical research. He may not be able to completely prevent the potency of penicillin from being lost after converting it to oral form, but at least would manage to preserve 30 to 40% of it.
For a place where no antibiotics have appeared before, even if five percent of penicillin’s potency remained, its effect would be overwhelming, what more of 30 to 40%.
As for the antibody and allergic reaction that the penicillin may incite, they have been completely ignored by Mo Wuji. Compared to the benefits of penicillin, these side effects meant nothing. At most he would note it down in the drug’s information sheet.
For the people of Rao Zhou City, Dan Han Drug Refinery underwent the greatest transformation recently. Dan Han Drug Refinery originally was downsized until only one shop and one workshop, and the only shop also closed down one month ago, not selling any drugs anymore.
Logically speaking, Dan Han Drug Refinery would be about to close down, then sell off the shop. But what puzzles people the most was that they not only didn’t sell the shop, instead releasing new ads for it in the whole of Rao Zhou City.
Nine Lives Healing Solution, Dan Han Drug Refinery spent tens of millions to come up with this new product. It’s the savior of mankind, with the Nine Lives Healing Solution you never have to worry about your wounds getting infected, and its effects is many times more than any product ever made in the refinery. The slogan of the Nine Lives Healing Solution was that even if your wounds are infected, as long as you still have a single breath in you, it can bring you back to life. Of course, the ads never mentioned anything about whether the research budget was tens of millions of gold, silver, or bronze coins.
The past products of Dan Han Drug refinery worked about the same as other healing medicines out there. The current ads for Nine Lives Healing Solution claimed that it greatly exceeds the effects of any previous healing products by many times, implying that it was superior to other healing products in the market.
One small splash like this created a whole wave of reaction. This ad caused the whole Rao Zhou city to set their sights on Dan Han Drug Refinery. Rao Zhou is Cheng Yu State’s capital, which meant that the whole Cheng Yu State had their eyes on Dan Han Drug Refinery.
Overnight, countless people swarmed to Dan Han Drug Refinery’s shop, wanting to buy a bottle of Nine Lives Healing Solution, wanting to know if it was real.
Cheng Yu state was in a perpetual state of war,with large numbers dying of infected wounds daily. Not only soldiers, but also mercenaries, hunters, herb pickers, prospectors…these people frequently get injured and face the risk of death by infection after. If there was a healing solution like Nine Lives, who wouldn’t want it?
……
On the second floor of Dan Han Drug Refinery Workshop, Lu Jiujun rushed in excitedly, “Brother Mo, our promotion has been too successful. If Nine Lives Healing Solution really that good, no, or even only one third as good, on the tenth of September Dan Han Drug Refinery would have succeeded…”
Lu Jiujun suddenly stopped, observing that Mo Wuji was not in a celebratory mood, even showing signs of worry. Lu Jiujun’s heart skipped a beat. Did the new drug fail? But didn’t Mo Wuji place large metal buckets one after the other in the yard, even with some boilers? Those can’t be fake, can they?
Whether the new drug was a success, he was not entirely sure. Going full force with promotion efforts was Mo Wuji’s intention, saying that there was no chance of failure. But now…
Mo Wuji stood up, walked beside Lu Jiujun and pat his shoulders, “Old Lu, you need not worry, nothing’s wrong with the drug.”
“Then why do you look like you have something on your mind?” Lu Jiujun was half-relieved after hearing that the drug had no issues. As long as the drug was okay, anything else could be resolved.
Mo Wuji sighed, “Old Lu, have you thought about whether we have the ability to protect our turf once the Nine Lives Healing Solution goes into the market and brings us lots of wealth, there’ll definitely be people who are jealous of us.”
Truthfully, Mo Wuji never thought that this small promotion campaign could have incited such a large response. He also did not expect that people of this world would desire drugs that can cure infections to such a great extent. He was sceptical if at this rate he had the chance to earn the first bucket of gold after the drug goes on the market.
Even though no one other than himself knew that the production of penicillin is easily copied, what if someone took action against Dan Han Drug Refinery in secret before they have earned the first bucket of gold? It wouldn’t be good.
Lu Jiujun was momentarily stunned after hearing Mo Wuji’s words, and proceeded to burst into laughter, “Brother Mo, because you were born into the royal family, it is natural that you do not understand how Cheng Yu state’s laws work. Not only for Cheng Yu state, in the whole Xing Han Empire, are workshop businesses protected, as long as you pay a certain amount of taxes. The initial reputation of Dan Han Drug Refinery has spread all the way into the Xing Han Empire, who would dare to take action against us? Dan Han was about to collapse due to my incompetence before.”
Mo Wuji did not let up because of what he heard from Lu Jiujun, Dan Han Drug Refinery was only as strong as a bum. Without any fists backing it up, it would be weird not to have anyone eyeing this business. On Earth there was a company involved in the production of FruitPhones, which looked very big, with many employees. However, it was really only earning sweatshop money, having to bear with the atrocious attitudes of others. The day that company stopped taking up outsourced jobs, would be the day it becomes the next Dan Han Drug Refinery.
As for Lu Jiujun saying that they would be protected by Xing Han Empire, Mo Wuji did not believe in it at all. As long as enough profits were at stake, anything could happen. From his experience of his long-time lover backstabbing him, he knew that some things cannot be regulated by laws and morals.
But he wanted to become a big shot, and this would need him to earn lots of money, making him unable to keep a low profile.
Logically speaking even if someone were to compete with Dan Han Drug Refinery for profits, they should be using the soft approach before the hard approach. As long as he controlled the core products, and sold them when he needs some money, then there would be no danger.
After thinking until this point, “Old Lu, I’ll put it across bluntly first. If someone wants a share of this, they can take my share in the business, but not any of my share of the money.”
“Sure, no problem. Don’t worry about it,” Lu Jiujun agreed to Mo Wuji’s demands without a second thought.
Mo Wuji sighed in his heart, and did not request for Lu Jiujun to sign a contract. Sometimes when one’s ability is not good enough, what use would a piece of paper have?
He’s alone in Rao Zhou City, even if something were to happen, no one would help him.
……
After discussion with Lu Jiujun, Mo Wuji fermented penicillin all day and all night. In order to keep the power in his hands, other than for the collection of Penicillin which requires large manpower, he personally performed all other steps in the production. Two months away from home, he was not resting properly at all, other than when purchasing herbs for the drug to open spirit channels.
Two months passed, and he finally produced the first batch of penicillin mixture.
