Corpo Age

Chapter 206: Night Market

The celebration was finally over.

I met numerous new corpos for the first time, each with varying backgrounds. Some operated out in Elevate City, while some mainly stayed on Aegis.

From these new connections, I was even invited to several social gatherings events.

I guess Joey wasn’t lying that these events are usually reserved for middle-sized companies and beyond. He did me a solid for getting me into that last event where people gossiped about my company.

Just like how we got to the spaceport, a small convoy of vehicles escorted us back into the city.

“Is it just me, or did I not get a chance to eat anything at all?” Claire voiced as she held onto her grumbling stomach.

“I ate just fine,” Thorne quipped. “Maybe you should’ve done less talking and more eating.”

“As if I could’ve done that! Didn’t you see all those people always nearby, waiting to start a conversation with me?”

“Now, now. That’s just how these social events are, especially when we were the star of it,” I justified.

I knew it wasn’t uncommon, but it usually didn’t happen to us. Having an unending stream of people trying to get your attention was exhausting. As my COO, it was a given Claire suffered from the same treatment. It would be more surprising to me if she managed to get a bite to eat. Meanwhile, Thorne worked security, so he didn’t have to endure the same thing.

“Well, we should grab a bite before we go back,” Claire suggested. “I haven’t had outside food that wasn’t takeout in ages!”

“That’s a security—”

“Come on Thorne. We can’t be living our lives in cages. What do you say, Rollo? Want to check out a night market? Don’t think you’ve had a chance to visit one yet, right?”

At her suggestion, I quickly web-searched what she was talking about. Before I had enough money to gorge on actual food, I usually just purchased fast food or tasteless nutrient packets. Having sampled how disgusting the synthetic stuff was, I never had any interest in sampling the food markets.

I took a brief glance at our security detail and was just about to say no, but then I spotted the pedestrians out in the streets having a great time. A large friend group laughed and ate as they enjoyed the seaside breeze. They may be armed and ready for a shootout at any moment, but it didn’t change how much fun they were having.

Seeing their fulfillment made me relax all of a sudden.

I may have been too uptight in light of what’s been going on. I’m starting to resemble those stuck-up corpo who lock themselves in their shiny ivory office towers. It wasn’t healthy to segregate myself from the rest of the populace.

“Okay, just for tonight. Let’s go check it out.”

“But Rollo, you know how—”

“It’s fine. Lighten up,” I placated Thorne. “This is a sporadic decision, so it’s unlikely any planned ambush will be waiting for us, and our security department isn’t just for show, right?”

“...”

“If we’re comfortable heading into Haven, where there are armed mercenaries everywhere, then we should be fine walking into a civilian night market right?”

After several minutes of persuading, Thorne finally gave in. His concerns were warranted, as even regular people in this world were most likely armed and had training with their weapons. However, if our security couldn’t even handle these regular folks, then there was no way I could trust them to handle the forces of large corporations.

With that decided, our convoy began changing destination under the guise of our holographic disguises. Now that we weren’t around the spaceport, we could transform the appearance of our vehicles to blend into our surroundings. Using this strategy, a part of our security team split off and went ahead to secure the perimeter.

We pulled up to a spacious open parking lot, right next to a bustling plaza. Elevate City had hundreds of millions of people, so it was expected that most of these places would be crowded.

The three of us disembarked from the car and walked straight into the crowd. I was still wearing the same suit I had on for the celebration, and so did Claire. Only Thorne adjusted his appearance to hide his power armor. To compensate for the added bulk, he projected himself as a wide, portly gentleman.

The night market we chose mostly catered to the bottom rung of the corpo caste. That included their families and friends, so there was a good ratio of folks who didn’t work a corporate job as well. Some of them seemed dangerous, but I let my security detail worry about that for me.

Instead, I took this rare opportunity to enjoy the visit. There were dozens and dozens of food stalls, neatly lined up around the plaza. There were several seating areas at the center, with enough space to sit thousands.

“Oh, can you get us three of those?” Claire called out to a worker behind a stall.

I glanced down at what she wanted, a weird-looking sausage that was being seared. I read the signs and learned that it was called ‘New-Tro Sage’, but learned nothing from the name.

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While I didn’t exactly want to eat it, it was too late. Claire had already placed one in my hand. She bit into it without hesitation, but I cautiously searched for what it contained first.

Seriously? Someone thought to make sausages with the paste they use in nutrient packs? No matter how you cook tasteless junk, it’ll still be tasteless junk.

From my investigations, I found that it wasn’t exactly filled with chemicals that were harmful. Nutrient packs were one of the healthiest things one could eat. The corporations that made them tried to cut corners, including only the necessary vitamins one needed to survive. As a result, it became a type of healthy sustenance, if one could trust the company to have handled the paste with proper hygiene procedures.

It wasn’t like the health inspection bureau was trustworthy with how easy it was to bribe them. Perhaps that’s why they seared it. It was due to this dubiousness that corporate executives normally only ate from vetted restaurants, carrying the best ingredients.

“What are you waiting for, Rollo? Bite into it before it gets cold.”

“Hmm, it’s fine, right?”

“Yeah, come on. There’s no need to be scared. On the off chance that someone ate some contaminants, SocialCorp had even made a food poison tablet to flush out the harmful elements.”

“It’s concerning how you knew about that. I’m hoping you’re not a regular here?”

“No, but we sometimes order this kind of street food.” She glanced over at Thorne and shared an incriminating grin. “It’s a nostalgic taste. Way better in person, too!”

Before I could respond, a voice called out from behind her. It was a skinny lady from the stall that handed Claire the food.

“Girl, you still have to pay for those if you don’t want any trouble.”

Just great, I’ve made them hole up in our compound so much that she forgot she had to pay for food.

“Apologies, ma’am,” I intervened. “Here, a tip for your troubles.”

Using my SAID, I swiftly transferred her a hundred credits. I then ushered my companions away, as the line behind us wasn’t lightening up.

“Sir…Are you serious? Thank—”

I didn’t bother waiting until the stall worker finished their words before we went out of earshot.

“What are you doing, Rollo? You’re drawing attention to us,” Claire complained.

It was only then that I looked back and saw a bunch of people staring our way.

“I only gave her a hundred credits…”

“That’s way too much! One New-Tro Sage only cost five credits. Geez, someone’s lost touch with the value of money.”

I held my tongue and continued walking away. I had only just thought how sheltered she had become, forgetting to pay only to have my own faults on blast.

Thankfully, the large crowd meant it was easy for people to lose sight of us. We freely roamed from stall to stall, sampling everything that caught our attention. As I expected, none of the savory food tasted edible to me. Instead, I focused on desserts as I tried to branch out from just milkshakes.

The results were mixed, but we only sampled about half of what was available. Our stomachs could only hold so much.

Our fun and eventful day only came to an end when midnight came. I decided to return to our main compound instead of lab zero just for tonight. Now that our corporation had become a D-Class entity, we would be having a meeting tomorrow afternoon.

There was a lot of paperwork I had to oversee and reports to go through. I could only do so much remotely. It was much more convenient to be there so I could keep up with the various departments.

The next morning, I started off by viewing our financials. We now had to pay twenty-five million credits per annum to maintain our status. That about drained a good portion of our war chest, and we relied on our new games to bring in the cash flow.

“The numbers have been looking good, but our employee suggestion box has been filled with ideas to improve our monetization model. What do you think about that?” I asked the moment I stepped into Claire’s office.

She glanced up in surprise, completely caught off guard that I was there, but recollected herself quickly.

“From what I read, they’re just nitpicking faults without coming up with an actual idea. We’re already doing subscriptions and micro-transactions. Isn’t it almost too much already?”

“I mean, we can still add some vanity items to see how the consumers react. We could do stuff like virtual collectibles, and the option to gift others our subscriptions or buy the virtual game currency.”

“Collectibles? Like what?”

“You talk about it with consumer research. It can be anything. Like cards or pets or anything,”

I’ve seen a large variety from experience, but it was better to cater to this world’s populace as precisely as possible.

“Okay, I’ll get it sorted by the end of the day and send you an update, along with the report regarding our situation up on Aegis.”

“No need. You guys can sign off on that much.”

“...I’m assuming you’ll be unreachable, then?”

“Oh no, I’ll be reachable. It’s just I may choose not to respond.”

“That’s the same thing!”

I walked away with a smirk as I prepared to return to my lab.

I had done everything that was needed of me. The rest could be completed by my employees. It was time to focus on my research. The only thing I would respond to was if there were some incidents regarding renting out space in Aegis.

With our promotion, our company took action immediately, seeking out properties up on the space station. Just like Elevate City, real estate was precious up there. The lowest-costing commercial properties were comparable to the most expensive areas down in the city. Then there were all the new fees associated with operating in space.

Up on Aegis, we had to pay a premium for the air we breathed and the water we used. We were charged maintenance for the station as well, which amounted to higher tax rates. However, few corporations were deterred by these costs. The business environment up there made it easy to earn it all back.

Some specialized businesses, like delicate processing chips, needed the zero-g environment to thrive, while others made use of the lower material costs. The main supply of new ores came from space mining. By being closer to the source, the cost became cheaper with less logistical burden required.

The economies of scale that were allotted to businesses were hard to resist.

In summary, doing business in space was profitable. I left my personnel to set up the groundwork for that, so I simply need to focus on what only I could do for now.

I had picked up new knowledge, and it had to be put to good use. I didn’t dare record everything into cassettes yet. It made it too vulnerable to theft and diminished my value.

That was why I kept my head down and got working as soon as I returned to my workshop. That wasn’t going to change until things in Aegis were ready for us. And from the look of things, that was going to be very soon.