After speaking with Seberus, Michael left the Magic Tower with a lot on his mind.
Although the Tower Master’s advice was sound, Michael wasn’t planning on seeking the help of any organization for now.
He might accept their help if they offered it, but Michael wasn’t going to approach them with the intention of asking for their help. That would not be a good basis for cooperation between them.
For example, he never approached the Dwarven Kingdom for help. If he did, then the Dwarven King would have immediately refused to talk with him, closing off any future where they could establish a friendship.
Instead, he let the Dwarven King approach, letting him see the good intentions of the Reborn Nation for himself, leading to the two territories becoming allies.
This became even more important since he didn’t know anything about the Guild of Arcana, the Lionheart family, the Montgomery family, or any other organization in the Queens region.
He didn’t know the political landscape, wherein allying himself with one family could end up going against another organization.
As for his grandfather, Michael didn’t feel the need to ask him for help either.
Although he was a Vanderbilt in name, Michael never really felt attached to his surname. He was especially more detached once his grandfather failed to show up at their important meeting about a year ago.
Michael didn’t want any bigger inheritance from the Vanderbilt wealth. He was incredibly satisfied with inheriting the ‘desolate’ and ‘useless’ Parched Lands.
However, Michael thought it would have been nice if his grandfather had taken the time to actually meet with him. Sure, Yze was a busy man and he probably had a reasonable excuse for being absent especially since he was in charge of the biggest company in the entire world, but it would have meant a lot for Michael if he had shown up.
That was the reason why Michael didn’t want to ask for help from his grandfather.
He didn’t need to anyway. He was confident in Castelle and his Reborn products that they could break through the Queens region market by themselves.
…
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…
Michael walked out of the Magic Tower and saw that just on the other side of the street, there was a large line of people queuing up at a ticketing booth with the name ‘Reborn Taxi’ painted in large text on its signage.
This was a new business that the Reborn company started, acting just like the taxi services in Michael’s previous life.
And even though they produced a lot of automobiles for this taxi business, it seemed that the demand for them still far outweighed their supply.
There was a very long line that crossed the entire street, filled with people waiting for their turn to hire a Reborn taxi.
Michael walked to the end of the line and waited for his turn for an entire hour.
Even though Michael could have arrived at Castelle’s office in a single moment, he decided to go there the normal way. He waited in the Reborn taxi queue just like everybody else.
Once it was his turn, he bought a ticket from the booth attendant.
“Take me to the Reborn office,” Michael said to the Satyr in charge of tickets to the automobile taxi service.
“Of course!” the Satyr replied as she led Michael to the line-up of Reborn taxis that patrolled around Kingsbridge City.
The foremost automobile opened its doors and let Michael board in its passenger seat.
Soon after, the car roared and started its journey through the streets.
Throughout the whole ride, Michael kept his eyes on the window, observing everything that was happening in the City after the introduction of the automobile.
For example, the novelty of automobiles was still at a high even after a month of its introduction. It became the accepted mode of transportation, especially since it was so fast compared to normal carriages.
Of course, since automobiles had taken over the taxi industry, this left the horse carriages out of work. There were barely any of them left in the streets.
To remedy this, Michael started a program to give those carriage riders a chance to learn how to drive and to become an employee of the Reborn taxi service.
This turned out to be a huge financial success for those drivers since there were a lot of customers who hired their services just to try out the novelty of the automobiles. They could also travel a lot further out of Kingsbridge City without it taking months at a time for every trip, earning them more money in the long run.
Michael’s driver, for example, was a middle-aged human man who was part of the program.
“Sorry for the delay, young man!” the driver apologized as he stopped the car to the side. “The roads are still getting worked on so there’s a lot of traffic. But since they’re using that magical concrete, it’ll be done by tomorrow!”
The business with concrete was going all right as well.
With the rise of automobiles, the entire Kingsbridge road system was currently being reworked to have flat, concrete roads perfect for cars.
“Isn’t the Reborn company so amazing?” the driver said in admiration. “They’re changing our city for the better!”
Michael smiled, inwardly a little bit embarrassed when hearing such a compliment since the driver had no idea who he was.
As the car slowly advanced through the traffic, Michael saw the construction workers pouring concrete on the road.
Most of the workers who got their hands dirty were human, while the managers who were overseeing the whole construction project were Rebornians.
Michael recognized them to be Kong’s loyal students and his employees. The HobMankeys inspected the blueprints in their hands, the Satyrs instructed the human workers on how to dig the ground better, and the dwarves taught the workers how to properly install the steel reinforcements.
“What do you think about the demi-humans?” Michael asked the driver.
The middle-aged man looked to the side and saw the demi-humans taking charge of the project like it was normal. Yet in his eyes, this was very unusual.
“To be honest, I am quite surprised that they’re so smart. I would have never thought that they could even cast magic spells.”