God of Technology: Creating the Internet in Another World-Chapter 459: The Impact Will Be Enormous

Markets!

Viscount Roster felt this was the key.

A long, long time ago, people’s settlements were generally near rivers and lakes, or around springs. These places had water sources that could be used for drinking, irrigation, and fishing, meeting basic survival needs.

As these settlements became more and more prosperous, gradually some settlements’ food supplies became more abundant, creating the need for trade.

Choosing places with relatively convenient transportation, where both sides’ tribes or even multiple tribes could easily reach, markets gradually formed.

And these markets, as their scale continuously expanded, became towns, then major cities, continuing right up to the present day.

In other words, most cities and towns in this world originated as markets with convenient transportation. Only those built on strategic passes as military fortresses were established for other purposes.

The establishment of the ultra-high-speed rail system meant that every station would inevitably form a large-scale market.

For these nobles, the importance of markets went without saying.

This was also a core selling point for getting them to join this industry.

Especially now when most nobles had suffered terrible losses from the steel futures incident, land prices had hit rock bottom, and farming on their land would probably lose money, they urgently needed this kind of new market.

Forget everything else, just building a factory around a market like this meant the products you made could be sold all over the place. What incredible competitive advantage was that?

Once this was announced, the nobles along the routes would probably become the ones most eager for construction to begin.

They might even fight each other over being first in line for construction. The price they’d pay? That didn’t matter anymore.

As long as it didn’t kill them on the spot, they’d accept anything.

But these things had to be released step by step. Only this way could they gradually break down their psychological defenses and get them to completely agree.

Soon, news about the ultra-high-speed rail system was posted on the Magic Net.

"Oh my god!!!"

"Is this real!?"

"600 kilometers per hour? Doesn’t that mean I can get from the capital back to my territory in one hour? Used to take two days on horseback, five or six days by wagon!"

"This is just too incredible. Magic Conductors really exceed my imagination by a mile."

"Is that cargo capacity for real?"

"Feels like this thing could pull an entire castle around?"

"Magic-tech is getting more and more ridiculous, but when you think about the clerics still fighting north of the watch wall, I guess this isn’t that strange."

"The Church of Technology really exceeds imagination. I just wonder if other places can build transportation systems like this."

"I used to think water transport was the best, you could haul tons and tons of cargo at once. Now it looks like it doesn’t even compare to these rails, whether it’s speed or capacity!"

"The ultra-high-speed rail tracks seem to be built from steel. Does that mean steel prices are going to go up? Did I lose out?"

"Of course you did. Everyone who got into steel futures got screwed. But everyone should have sold already, right?"

"I just feel like Viscount Roster set us up."

"So what if he set you up? You chose to sell. Besides, what was the original steel price? What price did you pump it to? A crash was totally normal."

"I just want to know one thing: when can this ultra-high-speed rail system be built? Where can it reach? If it can pass by my workshop, wouldn’t that mean the things I produce could be transported anywhere on the continent?"

"Actually, as long as it gets built, just Dragon Delivery alone has improved some of our quality of life."

"Exactly. Forget everything else, how much did wool blankets used to cost? How much do they cost now? Buying online, Wool Guild ships it, dragons deliver it, by the time it reaches me, it’s eight times cheaper! What used to cost enough for one blanket now buys 8! Once the ultra-high-speed rail system is built, shipping costs might drop even more."

"..."

There were lots of people online, and their reactions were lightning fast.

One after another they quickly thought of many possibilities.

Among them were quite a few who thought about the steel futures incident that had just ended, but the people who could participate in the steel futures incident were, without question, not ordinary people!

Or rather, even if ordinary people got involved, the losses wouldn’t really affect them that much.

After all, the prices had been pumped way too high.

Compared to these people, there were way more people thinking about the ultra-high-speed rail system’s impact on their future lives.

Of course, this was also because Viscount Roster had already been gradually brainwashing everyone.

Especially when the magic-powered vehicles were built, he’d been instilling a concept in people.

The concept of activity range.

Whether it was magic-powered vehicles or the ultra-high-speed rail system, the core was transportation.

The biggest impact of changes in transportation was expanding people’s range of activity.

Originally a person might spend their entire life unable to leave a 15km radius from home.

15km was a very clever number, basically the limit of how far a person could walk somewhere and then walk back home.

But with changes in the transportation system, people’s activity range would necessarily increase dramatically.

The simplest example: someone originally going to a market would leave in the morning, arrive at noon to buy things, return home at night.

But if there were scheduled buses, they could leave in the morning, arrive in the city in an hour, go to a more prosperous market to buy things, then have a meal, play around for a few hours, then take the bus back.

Using less time, going to more prosperous places, doing more things, where would they choose to go?

And that was just for shopping. What about going to work?

Same thing for merchants.

Take vegetables and fruit for example. Originally they could only transport within a certain range, because these vegetables and fruit would rot; they needed to reach some market and sell them before they spoiled.

This limited the range of goods circulation.

But if you had the ultra-high-speed rail system, wouldn’t that mean they could transport fruit from the City of Gold to the Kingdom of Dawn to sell?

Pick it in the morning, send it over in the evening, sell it the next day, incredibly fresh.

In the old days, completing transport like this would require at least a legendary magician stepping in.

This situation was completely different now.

Of course, this was just an extreme example.

Right now nobody would really think of using this to transport fruit and vegetables.

People’s first thought was: luxury goods!

In the past, only luxury goods could support merchants crossing continents to transport goods, because once you added in shipping costs, any commodity’s price became terrifyingly high.

They had to consider whether they could actually sell it.

Even after Dragon Delivery appeared, it only reduced shipping costs somewhat, supporting long-distance purchases of some things.

Same with the Golden Merchant Guild.

But the appearance of the ultra-high-speed rail system made them realize that even cheaper goods could now be transported over wide areas!