God of Technology: Creating the Internet in Another World-Chapter 440: They’ve Started Taking Out Loans!

"Let me ask you something—what do you suddenly need to borrow so many gold coins for?"

Nidhogg the Dragon of Despair didn’t know what came over him, but he suddenly wanted to confirm this.

"I can’t say." The Western Grand Duke shook his head very seriously.

"Oh, you really shouldn’t say. I forgot the rules."

Nidhogg the Dragon of Despair shook his head and quickly said, "Sorry... but rest assured about your loan. I’ll get it sorted as fast as possible."

"No worries." The Western Grand Duke shook his head, indicating he didn’t mind. 𝑓𝘳𝑒𝑒𝓌𝘦𝘣𝘯ℴ𝑣𝘦𝑙.𝘤𝑜𝑚

As long as the loan came through quickly, that’s all that mattered.

Lately, through steel futures, he’d already made a full 20 million gold coins. Of course, he hadn’t cashed out that 20 million.

It was just that the steel futures he currently held were worth 20 million gold coins.

And buying all those steel futures had cost him less than 6 million gold coins total.

Those 6 million gold coins were what his family had passed down through generations.

But in just this short time in his hands, he’d already made over 14 million gold coins.

His family’s accumulation over countless generations couldn’t match what he’d made in a few days—how could he stay calm about that?

Plus, he’d gotten in pretty late, and being cautious at first, he hadn’t bought much. Most of it he’d picked up later, which only fueled his ambition even more.

He’d entered so late and still made over 10 million gold coins—how much could he make in the future?

So much good news had come out recently—prices would definitely keep climbing.

All the cash in his hands had already been fully invested.

So he turned his attention to Dragon Bank’s loans.

Dragon Bank’s interest rate was only 10% per year. For him, that was basically like getting free money.

On one hand, he was also an old pro at lending money. His family had run that business for generations. They usually charged 30% interest, then used predatory repayment terms, threw in some compound interest, or used other tricks—basically multiplying it several times over no problem.

Compared to people like him, Dragon Bank was practically doing charity.

Only needing that tiny bit of interest each year.

Plus, he didn’t need to worry about losing face like when borrowing from other people, and he didn’t have to worry about compound interest spiraling out of control.

On the other hand, just in the past few days, the steel futures in his hands had gone up that much.

Compared to those gains, what was a measly 10% interest?

If his luck wasn’t terrible, he could basically earn that back in a day.

Under this kind of stimulus, he really couldn’t sit still anymore. He just went ahead and put up his land as collateral.

He figured that compared to other people, he was actually being pretty rational.

After all, he was just mortgaging it to Dragon Bank. He could easily pay that 10% interest every year, and the land would still be his.

This was leveraging other people’s money to multiply his gains.

But what about those other nobles?

Who knows how many of them had already sold off their land.

What a shame—that was all stuff their families had accumulated over generations.

Not long after the Western Grand Duke said goodbye to Nidhogg the Dragon of Despair, Dragon Bank and company got moving.

Over the next period, every few days they’d release 1 million gold coins to the Western Grand Duke.

Just as Nidhogg the Dragon of Despair had guessed—or rather, just as Viscount Roster had said—without exception, the Western Grand Duke threw all that money into futures trading.

And it was all steel futures.

After getting the funds, he started frantically buying up steel futures on the market. At the same time, he’d also purchase some future orders.

And he wasn’t the only one doing this—countless others were acting the same way.

Viscount Roster looked at the account statement from Dragon Bank that Nidhogg the Dragon of Despair had sent him, and he was honestly a bit stunned.

"This... have they really gone this crazy?" Viscount Roster felt his throat going dry.

Nidhogg the Dragon of Despair nodded. "The world says we dragons are greedy, that we’re insatiably greedy, but compared to these people..."

Nidhogg the Dragon of Despair didn’t know what to say for a moment.

Were dragons greedy?

Of course!

They’d love nothing more than for all the gold in the world to gather on Dragon Island.

But Nidhogg the Dragon of Despair felt that even dragons couldn’t be this insane.

Or maybe dragons just weren’t in this position. If they were in this position, who knows—maybe they’d be even greedier.

"700 million! 700 million! These people actually borrowed 700 million gold coins from Dragon Bank."

Viscount Roster still couldn’t help but sigh. "I originally thought if it reached one or two hundred million, that’d already be pretty impressive."

"Yeah, I didn’t expect that with land prices having crashed, they could still come up with assets worth over 2 billion to use as collateral for loans."

Nidhogg the Dragon of Despair couldn’t help but marvel. "Just how massive are the assets I’m holding right now?"

"Will all this money really flow into steel futures?"

Even Nidhogg the Dragon of Despair was starting to lose confidence.

All the steel futures combined right now were probably only worth around 300 million.

If all 700 million came in, it could probably push prices up another two or three times.

At that rate, steel would end up having shot up about eleven or twelve times from the beginning until now.

"Of course. That’s exactly what they’re going for." Viscount Roster sighed. "If nothing unexpected happens, a new round is about to begin."

"I originally thought many families’ funds were starting to dry up, and growth should be gradually slowing down."

"If that were the case, once we hit the Frigid Moon, I could start flipping the table and harvesting them all in one sweep."

"But now it looks like we’ll probably have to wait until the coldest part of the Frigid Moon before we can get to the table-flipping stage."

"What a shame. Their actions have seriously hindered the progress of magic-tech industrialization."

The magic-tech industrialization process required massive amounts of steel.

Now that steel prices had been driven up to this level, even if most people wanted to start workshops or do other things, they didn’t have much confidence to proceed.

Never mind anything else—a lot of the Gray Fort Empire’s reforms had already been put on hold temporarily.

Fortunately, this process wouldn’t last too long. Once he flipped the table, steel prices would crash to a level where everyone would think they could get it for free.

At that point, all the progress that had been dragged down would be fully activated.

Viscount Roster still couldn’t help but sigh. "These people are truly terrifying."

Then he stopped paying attention to this matter. It would still need to ferment for quite a while, and during that time there wasn’t much for him to do. He should focus on developing the Southern territory properly.

With the farm matter, everything had been completely settled this time. Agriculture and animal husbandry in the entire Southern territory had entered a stable development phase and could be handled by dedicated personnel.

But the magic-powered vehicle factory and the ultra-high-speed rail transit system still needed his close attention.

Especially the magic-powered vehicle factory!