Food Security (Solved)
Food Security (Solved)
"Yes. On the condition that current market prices are maintained, I'm shelling out a 10,000% subsidy per unit sold."
"T-Ten thousand-?!"
Murmur, murmur-!
The chairmen are shocked by a unit that defies common sense.
I deliberately ignored Elara clutching both her temples and twitching at the anticipated financial burden.
"The critical issue of Lunatium citizens' survival depends on you. I understand a hundred times over that it's difficult to immediately increase farmland or secure import routes. So, whether you pay a premium to import raw materials from other countries or collaborate with cultivation companies, you experts must find a way to produce them at the same unit price. The Lunatium city government will cover any losses incurred in the process."
Subsidies.
Simply put, pouring tax money in to cover corporate deficits.
It's certainly effective for boosting our own companies, but it kills off foreign ones.
That's why it's often pointed out as illegal in modern international society.
Of course, with a war about to break out, I don't give a damn, and besides, the primitive countries in this romance fantasy world, who don't even understand modern commerce, wouldn't be able to argue about it anyway.
"General Director Trixie-nim. I am Donald Kimble, Chairman of the Toastco Board."
"Please, speak."
Among them, a man who looked sharp like a middle-aged gentleman stepped forward as a representative to speak.
"The food industry has been supplying products at prices far below the legal ceiling as a moral measure for the survival of Lunatium citizens. We also regularly conduct donations, volunteer work, and various sponsorship activities. I am proud to say that we are fulfilling our corporate social responsibility more faithfully and actively than any other company."
"Yes, I am well aware of your hard work, more than anyone else. That's why I set this subsidy at a fairly progressive figure, but is there a problem?"
Listening up to this point, it's a buildup to tell me to stop ripping them off.
Just as I was wondering what they were thinking to act like this even when I'm giving them free money.
Mr. Kimble threw out words that were outside my expectations.
"There is a big problem. The subsidy ratio you proposed, Director-nim, is excessively generous, even considering the circumstances of future disruptions in grain supply."
"Oh? Please tell me in detail."
Look at this.
Instead of greedily accepting it with thanks, they want to take less?
"The Lunatium standard Nutritional Block design mandates a shelf life of at least 10 years. Therefore, unlike primitive grain-processed foods, our Nutritional Block processing aims for a level equivalent to preserved food. It means we can store products long-term and sell them when needed, just like other industrial product companies."
"Please get to the point."
Mr. Kimble checks the intentions of other corporate executives with a glance.
Thinking silently and nodding.
Slowly closing their eyes or lightly nodding their chins, etc.
Everyone reaches a silent consensus on the secret Mr. Kimble is about to reveal.
"Each of our food companies, including Toastco, is storing at least 30 years' worth of reserves."
"Hmph."
What does this mean?
Can they hold out for the next 30 years?
No.
The massive, tangled web of corporate loans, collateral, and contracts involves transactions ranging from a few years to, at longest, several decades.
Having 30 years' worth of reserves piled up means, in other words.
"It could even last 50 years."
"That's correct, General Director-nim. Lunatium's food supply is solid. We appreciate the subsidy offer, but we can sustain ourselves."
I had forgotten the fact that businesses always look to the future when managing.
The materials entering the production line today were received yesterday.
And it's natural that products produced today are shipped out tomorrow.
It means the food companies have each taken measures to ensure their production lines don't stop even in the midst of war.
...It would have been fine if I had actually managed a company.
After spending 10 years just happily smashing things, it's quite a headache now that I'm actually in the boss's seat.
"Hmm, in that case, I feel embarrassed for needlessly stirring up trouble and revealing my own hand."
"...Not at all. The fact that Lunatium has become such a comfortable and safe city to do business in is entirely thanks to you, Director-nim. Everyone is deeply grateful."
"That's right, that's right. If it weren't for the Director-nim, some of the bastards here wouldn't even be here right now! Hahaha!"
"Isn't it because you, the General Director, ended the era of barbarism that we are able to make a living so peacefully like this?"
The Director's office brightens up.
Mr. Kimble continued.
"Director-nim. Until you appeared like a comet, Lunatium was a bad city to do business in. Not only spying between competing companies, but assassinations were not off the table. It was a hellscape where you couldn't survive just by running a sound business."
"Thanks to my partner back in those days, I only ended up losing an arm. Indeed. If that guy were alive to see such a cute and beautiful Director-nim here, like a granddaughter, he would have been so happy that the world had truly changed."
Click-clack-
The elderly chairman adds a word, ostentatiously rolling his expensive prosthetic fingers.
"Trixie-nim. We hope that you will continue to lead Lunatium as a city good for business. You have overturned the inertia of Lunatium that had accumulated over 200 years. Thanks to that, we have been able to experience unprecedented growth over the last 10 years. In that sense, this time, we want to help you, Trixie-nim."
I'm speechless.
No, what did I even do to make these people so favorable?
Of course, it's true I struggled a liiiittle bit to solve a lot of incidents and accidents.
I haven't even gotten to know these people yet.
Did they hit MAX internal intimacy without me even knowing?
What on earth are these people....
"If a war breaks out in the future, our companies will cover all additional food demand occurring outside the city until the war ends, free of charge. Supplying military rations, humanitarian food aid, dispatching cooking personnel to occupied territories, literally everything."
"???"
Swish-swish-
Documents for an unlimited, unpaid food supply contract, prepared who knows when, are moving across the desk.
The chairmen sign one after another with pens embedded in their fingertips and slide them over.
Of course, not only analog paper documents but also digital electronic copies are filled out on the hologram signature field and sent to Elara.
"What is this."
"You just need to sign, General Director-nim."
[Contract review OK! There isn't even any room to interpret the contract clauses differently from what Chairman Kimble said!]
Is this a hilarious hidden camera prank?
Why am I the one receiving when I was the one trying to give?
I signed them, mesmerized, on the paper and digital documents that were left blankly in front of me as if they had been planned from the start, targeting me.
"Uh... so. Your spirit of patriotism is excellent...?"
"Thank you, Director-nim. We trust that you will continue to lead Lunatium excellently. We, too, will strive endlessly for the healthy and happy diet of Lunatium citizens. Whenever an official document comes down later, we will gladly cooperate with your instructions."
Clatter-!
I could barely spit out rhetorical praise because I couldn't believe what was happening.
When I came to my senses, the haunted-like meeting had ended.
[Eek! General Director-nim! Thanks to that, the financial health forecast has gone beyond turning positive and is rising by 300%!!]
"What just happened, Elara."
[What do you mean! Trixie-nim's usual popularity is shining through, bleeegh-!!?]
Squelch-!
I pull and stretch the cheeks of Elara, whose holographic pupils are sparkling with excitement, to the limit.
Seeing her in pain, it's not a dream.
There are problems in the world that solve themselves?
"Perhaps I shouldn't have trusted businessmen after all... Scary people. Even I, who have been through all sorts of trials and tribulations, was swayed by their momentum and couldn't even talk back from the middle, just nodding in agreement."
[If someone heard you, they'd think you were the one who got hit with an unfair contract...?]
"But for corporations in a cyberpunk setting to take the initiative and propose voluntary, free devotion without wanting anything in return. Where in the world is there a more terrifying and sinister proposal with unknown ulterior motives than this...."
[According to the logic you just stated, you, Trixie-nim, are the scariest and most dangerous person in the world!?]
"It is true that I am the most selfish and sinister person in the world."
[Yes. Let's go with that..]
Elara shed tears and stopped talking.
How could one stop this Director, who is hell-bent on belittling herself despite deserving recognition more than anyone else?
It was thanks to the high-level reasoning capability of the learning, high-intelligence autonomous personality AI, which allowed it to give up on persuading the user.
<Your Excellency, the President. This is Valkyria, the autonomous personality AI assistant of the Lunatium City Defense Bureau, reporting.>
"Oh, Valkyria. It's been a while."
Pop-!
At that moment, the communication terminal projected another hologram in the Director's office besides Elara.
It was a heroine in a crisp military cap and uniform.
Valkyria delivered the message clearly in an 'at ease' posture.
"Oh, it's fine. If it's a report from Valkyria, the sharpest among the four sister AIs, it's always an important matter. What is it?"
[...]
<Heh.>
The corners of the usually serious Valkyria's mouth seemed to rise for a moment like a winner mocking a loser, but since it was a time when the sunlight was pouring in, I assumed it was just a holographic reflection.
Because what mattered was Valkyria's subsequent report.
<Currently, a dragon is circling Lunatium airspace in a fixed orbit.>
[D-D-D, D, Dragon!? Those crazy arsonists again!?]
"...It certainly is a major issue."
Dragon.
Self-proclaimed world adjusters, old-fart, human-lusting, pedophile lizards who physically interfere with Lunatium whenever they're bored.
I'll have to find out what kind of fresh trouble they're trying to pick this time.