God of Technology: Creating the Internet in Another World-Chapter 451: Rush Hour to Ruin

There were plenty of people thinking the same way as the head of the Clarkson family.

In the capital of the Gray Fort Empire.

The Gray Fort Noble Alliance—that group of major nobles who’d invited Johnny the actuary to countless events and banquets—now all had twisted expressions on their faces.

Their situation was similar to the Clarkson family’s, or even worse.

The Clarkson family’s main business was commerce, which meant they had far fewer peasants and farmers under their banner.

But these nobles were either traditional landed aristocracy, or they’d become landed aristocracy after the God of War incident and bought up massive numbers of serfs.

Now they’d mortgaged all their land and mortgaged all their businesses too.

If things really went wrong this time, they probably wouldn’t even have enough money to feed their slaves...

"Go find Johnny the actuary right now! I want to hear his explanation!"

One of the nobles suddenly seemed to snap awake, and at that moment the others were jolted too. Like they’d spotted a lifeline, they all jumped to their feet.

Dozens of nobles rushed out of the gathering place, racing toward Futures Trading Report’s headquarters.

Every single one of them acted like they’d gone mad, pushing their carriages to go as fast as possible.

Even though it was already dark, somehow the capital of the Gray Fort Empire was unusually lit up tonight. Who knows how many carriages were racing frantically in one direction.

It almost felt like rush hour traffic.

When these nobles arrived at Futures Trading Report, they discovered the place was already packed with people.

They even saw many church vehicles.

Churches!!

They suddenly realized something!

In the Gray Fort Empire’s capital, they weren’t the only organization—there was another one called the Church Alliance.

It was an alliance formed by countless churches established in the Gray Fort Empire. They often gathered to hold events, just like the nobles did.

Did that mean... 𝕗𝚛𝚎𝚎𝐰𝗲𝗯𝗻𝚘𝚟𝚎𝗹.𝕔𝐨𝕞

They suddenly understood.

Of course!

The churches that loved doing loan business—after losing that line of work, where could they make money?

Same place as everyone else.

"Garden Pope! Where’s Johnny the actuary?"

One noble immediately spotted someone at the Futures Trading Report entrance who looked rather lost and was dressed garishly.

Countless eyes turned to that pope.

None of the usual respect was there.

"Johnny the actuary has disappeared. Don’t know where he went!"

"When we got here, the place was already empty."

"We just got word that his wife and children have all vanished too."

The moment the Garden Pope shared the news he’d gotten, it caused an uproar on the scene.

"Damn it! Was this all Johnny the actuary’s conspiracy from the very beginning? Seems like he bought a lot of steel futures too."

"Seems like? It absolutely was! This guy bought tons of steel futures, basically bet his entire fortune on it. Otherwise, how would I have fallen for it?"

"I get it now. This guy bought a ton of steel futures, so naturally he wanted the price to go up. Then he started talking it up constantly, hyping it nonstop, trying to get us to fall for it too. Then tons and tons of people would buy, prices would naturally rise, and then he could cash out at high prices and run."

"Maybe at first he didn’t plan to run. He just wanted to trick some people into raising the price. If it only went up a little, nobody would pay attention to him. After all, no matter what, he used to be the Finance Minister of the Gray Fort Empire. He just didn’t expect things would blow up this big."

"That actually seems really possible. No wait, not seems—this possibility is really high."

The people on the scene discussed it more and more, feeling the possibility kept growing.

Because everything fit the logic perfectly.

But were there really people this terrifying in the world?

To have such a vicious heart.

Just to gain a little profit for himself, he’d dragged all of them onto this sinking ship.

How much steel futures could one person even buy?

How much money could he make selling it?

And what about all these nobles?

Even their smallest loss would be enough for hundreds or thousands of Johnny the actuaries to earn.

No matter what, that’s what it came down to.

And this guy actually left with his wife and children—didn’t that prove everything was already planned?

At the very least it was premeditated.

This guy definitely knew it would crash all along.

This guy even guessed it would crash at this exact time.

But just half a day ago, this guy was still hyping it up, saying steel futures prices could at least double again...

What kind of twisted mind was this!?

The nobles, the popes, all felt their vision go dark.

They couldn’t help but cry out: "How can such a deranged person exist in the world!"

"We have to catch him!"

Everyone else shouted in agreement, and everyone on the scene united to start searching.

Compared to these nobles, although the churches also suffered terrible losses—maybe even lost more money than these nobles—they had a fallback.

As long as they had believers, even if they didn’t have a single coin left, it wouldn’t take long before they’d recover.

But these nobles? They really had no chance to turn things around.

Whether they had a chance or not, though, to have all this wealth accumulated over generations just disappear like this—how could they possibly accept it?

News from here quickly spread to the Magic Net.

The Magic Net exploded.

Everyone thought the problem was with Johnny the actuary.

Around 3 AM.

Foster Mining Company’s official account also started posting online:

"Really didn’t expect Johnny the actuary would be so deranged. For his own tiny bit of profit, he dragged countless people down with him."

"Never mind you people who bought steel futures—just look at us, the ones producing steel. To complete all these orders, we hired who knows how many workers. Who knows how many vagrants have already gathered around Foster Mine."

"Great, now we still have to rush to complete these orders, and then when that steel hits the market, there’s no way the market can absorb it all."

"Then steel prices will definitely crash, and it won’t sell for a long time."

"Then the people we hired will have no income source and will definitely attack us in revenge. Even if we can resist with force, that’ll still trigger a whole series of problems."

"The only option is to keep supporting all these people."

"Suddenly having to support so many people, and then the iron ore we produce can’t be sold—how are we supposed to keep operating..."