The profits raised from the new store opened in the town of Greenlyn were left untouched since its opening. Ben had used his Zoom spell to occasionally teleport to the new continent and see how his store was progressing.
He would attend to any issues which arose before returning to his kingdom.
Autumn had arrived and the new store was doing well. In the past few months, his merchants had used the same tactics he had used when establishing his other stores.
They stood out front and gave out free samples to the passing townsfolk. It did not take long for people to learn how special the spirit food is and to become loyal customers.
Ben purposely left the new store's profits untouched this entire time to be used as funds for a another new store. He wanted to open a store in the Woodford City next which is the capital city of the Caegon Dynasty.
The process was surprisingly similar to what is involved in opening a store back home in the other kingdoms. He had to visit the royal palace and speak with the proper staff who could help him to purchase property in the capital.
The main difference with the process is they are more thorough in their investigation of the people who are looking to purchase land.
Ben was obviously not a subject of the Caegon Dynasty so it turned out to be a longer process than normal. When he had opened his store in the town of Greenlyn it was a simple matter.
For some reason, the capital had stricter procedures. Ben could only assume it had to do with the monarch and his family living here. They must have tighter security to protect him especially with their troubles with the Rodara Kingdom.
It explained that Ben is a cultivator and a king from a small kingdom. He decided against telling them he was a king due to fear of making them either think he was lying or a possible threat.
He was unexpectedly brought before the monarch when they were told he was a cultivator. There was a cultivator present with the monarch and Ben gave them permission to see if he was actually a cultivator.
Ben began to wonder if they were going to ask him to become a noble. This reminded him of when he was brought before the King of Aregard and tested by Brom, Aregard's Royal Cultivator.
Once it was confirmed he was a true cultivator the monarch's attitude changed, but not for the better. Ben thought he would be warmly welcomed and asked to join the Dynasty. Instead of being welcomed, they treated him with open suspension!
They began to question him if he was truly from another continent and what his motives were for wanting to open a store in the capital. Ben could not understand why they acted this way. They were not hostile or accusatory, so Ben did not get mad with them.
He did begin to feel like he was an inconvenience for being a cultivator. For some particular reason, the royal court was wary of cultivators who did not originate from the Caegon Dynasty.
Even though he was suspected and questioned in the end the king granted him permission to open a store within the capital.
He went was escorted around the town by a palace employee from the land commission division to investigate to available properties currently for sale.
Ben found an empty property in a decent area surround by other establishments. The property was large enough to build another copy of the stores he had made in the past.
Once the property was paid for and he was given the deed, Ben did not waste any time in beginning construction. This store was built exactly like all the others inside and out. The one change he had made was to add a fourth floor to the store.
Each of his other stores had three floors. This store was the first to be given an additional floor.
This capital city had a population of 150,000 people living and working within its walls. It was twice if not three times the amount of people living in Goldcrest! He was expecting a much larger customer ratio than his other stores which would mean he would need a larger staff.
The third and fourth floor of his store would be dedicated to housing his merchants. There would also be a system Restaurant, Recreation Center, and Small Clinic built on the third floor.
Underneath the new store, five lower level floors were built with concrete walls, floors, and supports. These floors held the workshops, facilities, guilds, farms, ranches, and any additional structures needed to make his store completely self-sufficient.
Another modification was done to the store's storage room. Because Ben had been treated with suspicion by the monarch he could only assume they would be watching him. He was unsure of how far they would take this so he took measures to protect his secrets.
The storage room behind the office was built with one-foot-thick concrete and rebar walls. Then he anchored one-inch sheets of steel to the inside of the storage room walls.
The steel wall plates were then sandwiched in between another two-feet of concrete and rebar wall. If anyone wanted to break in they would need to chisel through one foot of concrete and rebar, cut through an inch of steel, and then chisel through another two-feet of concrete and rebar!
For the storage room door, he purchased and installed an actual bank vault door and anchored it into the concrete and steel plates.
The large square vault door had thick bars that went into the wall to hold the door secure. It was almost three feet thick and looked like it would take a large number of explosives to get past it.
There was a keypad on the door that allowed anyone who knew the passcode to easily enter the back storage room.
The storage room floor was covered with wood planks and they were used to hide a trap door which opened up to reveal the basement stairs. When the trap door was closed you would have to get on your hands and knees to find the seams where it opened.
Ben had it set with a lock that could only be opened with his system interface. The only person who would ever go down there is Ben, so it wasn't necessary to have an accessible lock.
In the basement, Ben recruited a large staff of both men and women merchants from the Merchant Guild. They were given separate living quarters by gender on the fourth floor and trained in how and what to sell.
Ben left them to arrange tables out in front of the store to give out free samples and draw in customers when they were caught up with what was expected of them.
He returned to Dragonshome to continue managing his kingdom and improving his military strength.
With having to check in with his many businesses, regents, and making time to hang out with Mythia he was becoming stretched too thin. Ben did not complain though, he enjoyed watching his kingdom continue to grow and prosper.
Ben even began to have thoughts of building towns around Dragonshome fortress soon. Dragonshome would eventually run out of available land and he would need to find suitable locations on the grasslands near the fortress to build new towns.
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He kept busy at home, Ben allowed his new stores to continue to grow in the Caegon Dynasty. They were still growing and it would be sometime before he would need to worry about adding additional merchandise to their stocks or hiring any type of management.
Ben eventually went back to his new stores a few weeks later to see how things were progressing.
When he made it to his store in Woodford City, he was told a group of people claiming to be cultivators had come by the store. They asked to speak with the owner and when they found out Ben was not around they left a message.
They were demanding protection money from him. They were told there were the bad types of people in the capital and Ben's store could be broken into or vandalized if he did not pay them to protect his store from these thieves and vandals!
'Are you shitting me? Isn't this old school mafia tactics! They are actually going around and shaking down businesses for protection money!'
After thinking about it Ben told them if they returned they would need to speak with him when he was in town. Ben went into the basement and built a Spies Guild.
He already had his two level five spies, but both of them had returned to Dragonshome. Ben needed information about these mafia cultivators as quickly as possible. He hired two more level five Human male spies and gave them clothing and money.
They had orders to investigate the city to find who these cultivators were and where they operated from. Ben told them to begin with the other businesses if they were trying to shake him down then the other stores would also be in the same situation.
He arranged rooms for the two spies on the fourth floor and then left them to begin gathering information. He told them he would return in a week find out what they could tell him.
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A week went by and Ben used his Zoom spell to teleport to his office in Woodford City. He had told his spies he would return then to see what information they could dig up.
When he appeared in his office he knew immediately something was wrong. The expensive furniture in his office was smashed and scattered around the room as if a bomb and gone off.
Ben quickly left his office to find out what had happened while he was gone. The lights were on in the store but there were no customers or employees walking around. He walked from one department to the next and found only destroyed merchandise and smashed display cabinets
The furniture, paintings, statues, clothing, products, and even the displays were completely destroyed! Thousands of gold coins worth of inventory lay scattered around now unsellable.
Concerned for his employees, Ben ran upstairs to find the one-inch steel doors he had installed blown in off their hinges. The facilities on the third floor also showed signs of damage.
He did not bother to stop and look if they were still operational. He ran up to the third floor to where his employee's rooms were. Once again he found destruction but he also found dried blood on the floors and walls.
He could not find anyone and by the amount of blood, there must have been people who had died there. The individual bedrooms were covered in black dried blood as well. It looked like someone had cornered his employees in their rooms and attacked them.
He then remembered they all had the passcode for the storage room. Some of them could have maybe escaped into there to lock the vault door behind them.
Downstairs the vault door was locked, but there were large indentations in the door. It looked like someone had punched the door and left half inch deep fist-sized dents in it.
This was a solid steel door no normal person could have punched this door and damaged it to this extent. This had to have been done by cultivators! Ben then remembered the cultivators he was looking for.
Did they come back to destroy his shop and attack his employees to send him a message?
Ben angered continued to rise as he opened the vault door to find the storage room empty and unused. The cultivators never made it inside to destroy his Warehouse and Market or to find the basement.
It was obvious his employees never made it in here either. Not sure on what to do Ben decided to leave the store and see if he could ask around to find out what had happened and where his employees were.
When he stepped out the door he almost ran into two palace guards who were standing outside with their back to the door.
His sudden appearance startled the two guards. They spun around and unsheathed their swords.
"Halt! Who are you and how did you get past us into this store!" One of the guards yelled out with a stern look.
Ben stopped and said, "I am the owner of this shop. Where are my employees and who destroyed my store?"
The guards wore wary expressions while still holding Ben at sword point.
"You are the owner? How did you get inside there? This is the only door and this store was searched from top to bottom. Were you hiding behind the heavy metal door in the back of the store this whole time?"
Ben shook his head in anger and slowly began to release his Aura Assault to apply pressure to these guards.
"Listen carefully I am in no mood to be screwed with right now! My store has been completely destroyed and there's blood everywhere on the fourth floor! I am the victim here so if you do not tell me where my employees are and who did this right now!"
By the time Ben was finished speaking a crowd had gathered and the two palace guards were forced to their knees.
They had to drop their swords to prop themselves up from being crushed into the ground.
"W...we...believe...it...was done by...Rodara cultivators!" The guard stammered out as he struggled against the force crushing down on him.
"What! Why would Rodara cultivators attack my shop and what of my employees!"
Ben left off on his Aura to allow the guards to respond to his questions.
"I am sorry to inform you that the store employees we found were all dead. We are unsure of how many there were but we found the bodies of ten men and ten women. We have not been able to provide proof yet but there are rumors and complaints from city business owners being forced into paying protection money by a group of cultivators.
We are not positive yet but we believe these cultivators were sent here by the Rodara Kingdom to make the monarch look bad for not being able to protect the city. If the Rodara Kingdom invades they want to turn the Dynasty's subjects against the current monarch so they will accept the rule of the Rodara King."
Ben unconsciously released his aura assault when he heard what the guard had said.
"Ten men and ten women? That is every one of my employees. Why would they kill innocent people who had nothing to do with this?"
Ben staggered backward from the sudden adrenaline and shock with an incredulous look. While he was trying to accept this as truth two people came through the crowd to kneel down next to the two terrified guards.
One of the arrivals looked up at Ben and said, "My lord we are sorry to report, we could not arrive to help protect the store in time. We were out in the city attending to your orders and did not realize the store had been attacked until we returned later. The two of us are the only survivors...they...slaughtered everyone without mercy...both men and the women!"
The spy had trouble repeating his last sentence. Everyone could tell he was both sad and outraged at what had happened.
Ben shook off his shock and pat the two of them on the shoulders. "There is nothing you could have done to stop them. This was done by a pack of murderous cultivators who would have killed both of you if you had shown yourselves. I am glad to see you are both still safe and uninjured."
The palace guard who spoke earlier interrupted, "My lord we were sent to watch over your store to make sure they did not return to cause further damage and were ordered to bring you to the monarch when you came back."
Ben asked, "What does he want with me? The last time I stood before him he looked at me like I was here to only cause him trouble."
The palace guard had to look down to hide the angered look he had from hearing how Ben had spoken so casually of the monarch before he quickly remembered he was before a powerful cultivator who was strong enough to behave this way. He was a captain in the palace guard and was proud of his fighting skills but it was obvious not only him but the entire palace guard could not stop this young man.
"The monarch may have suspected you to be a part of the cultivators causing trouble recently in the capital. I am sure he can see this isn't the case since they have attacked your store and killed your people."
Ben sighed out loud and said, "Alright, I see what is going on now. Then I will have to ask you to please escort me to the monarch"
"You to follow along with me to the palace. These cultivators might know you two are related to me now that all these people here have seen us speaking together. I want you to remain close to me where I can protect you from them."
"Thank you, my lord!"
"Thank you, my lord!"
The two spies thanked Ben and stood up. The group walked through the crowd that began to disperse when they saw the drama was over. Many people had already heard about what had happened to Ben's store. His store was beginning to become popular for its spirit food which made it the talk of the city.
The people outraged at what had happened here. They had all heard of what these cultivators were doing to the shop owners and now a store they all began to frequent was not only destroyed but the friendly employees who went out of their way to help them with a smile every day had been killed!
The angered crowd had heard Ben claim he was the owner so they shouted out words of encouragement to him as he was led to the palace.
"I hope they find out who did this Spirit Store owner!"
We are behind you Sprint Store owner and hope to see your store reopen!"
"May the gods bless your employees! They were all great people!"
Ben waved and nodded to each of them with a sad smile on his face. Fifteen minutes later they walked through the Palace gates and made their way toward the throne room.