God of Technology: Creating the Internet in Another World-Chapter 476: The Advantages of Long-Lived Species

"Think this price can hold steady?" Nidhogg the Dragon of Despair asked curiously.

"Hard to say."

Viscount Roster paused for a moment and shook his head.

"Huh? Why?"

"People’s funds aren’t stable right now, and building the rail transit system is a long-term investment project. I’m not sure how long their patience will last."

Viscount Roster spoke his thoughts frankly: "Besides that, there’s another issue—expectations."

"I figure you dragons have been managing the financial markets for a while now. You must’ve realized that how high the stock market’s valuation can go mainly depends on expectations, right?"

"Of course I know that. What I want to know is, people have pretty high expectations for this ultra-high-speed rail transit system right now, don’t they?"

Nidhogg the Dragon of Despair didn’t let Viscount Roster keep going, directly jumping in at the pause to ask his question.

"Right now they definitely have high expectations, and we’ve built up a huge sense of anticipation."

Viscount Roster didn’t deny this point. "But during the construction process? There are way too many variables."

"So I can’t guarantee anything."

"If I were you, I’d prepare two plans. Plan one: near closing time today, sell off a big batch of stock to make sure you don’t take any losses from this whole thing."

"Keep the remaining funds on standby, waiting for the ultra-high-speed rail transit system to be completed. When that happens, the stock will definitely be way higher than now."

"Then why don’t we just keep holding and wait for the future?" Nidhogg the Dragon of Despair was speechless.

If this stock was bound to be higher later, why sell now?

"Because this process might take several years." Viscount Roster paused before saying that.

"It’s just a few years! That’s like taking a nap—free money!"

"Fair point!" Viscount Roster couldn’t even complain.

The advantages of long-lived species really showed here.

Thinking about it, it made sense. How could regular humans compete with long-lived species?

Take banking deposits as an example.

Deposit 100 gold coins now, withdraw the principal and interest at the start of each year and redeposit, with 5% annual interest.

After one year: 105 gold coins.

After ten years: 163 gold coins.

After a hundred years: 13,150 gold coins.

After a thousand years: ~154.6 trillion gold coins.

Sure, banks definitely wouldn’t work like that—they’d adjust interest rates and related rules later on. But the advantages of long-lived species in this area were already crystal clear.

For other stock traders, waiting several years meant countless fluctuations that could eat up a good chunk of their lifespan. Lots of people couldn’t afford that gamble.

But for these long-lived species, what were a few years?

As long as they believed this thing would definitely go up later, they could just ignore everything else.

After confirming Rail Transit General Company’s opening day success, Viscount Roster stopped paying attention to it and refocused on building the rail system.

Even if Rail Transit General Company peaked on day one and went downhill from there, Viscount Roster didn’t care.

All he’d promised was that buying one share at 0.5 gold coins wouldn’t be a loss.

With current market conditions, selling now wouldn’t be a loss, so whatever happened after wasn’t his problem!

Around noon.

All of Rail Transit General Company’s platform accounts finished registering and posted an announcement—

[Thank you to all our shareholders and stockholders for your support. As of 12 PM today, Rail Transit General Company’s stock price has risen from its issue price of 0.5 gold coins per share to 1.7 gold coins per share...

The stock market performance has been excellent, proving everyone’s anticipation and support for Rail Transit General Company. We will not let you down. We’ll work hard to operate well, improve the continent’s transportation environment, and promote commerce...

Effective immediately, we will begin construction on the rail transit from Kingdom of Dawn’s Northern Duchy—County Herrick to the City-State Alliance’s City of Gold, passing through...

We expect to recruit 200,000 workers, deploying...]

Whether or not it was Ren the God of Technology’s orders, almost the instant this announcement was posted, every Magic Net user who opened their Magic Net could see it.

It immediately caused an uproar.

"They’re moving this fast!?"

"That’s Viscount Roster for you!"

"I can understand the first rail line going from south to north, and I can understand going to the City of Gold, but why that County Herrick place? Where even is that guy’s territory?"

"??? Dude, do you really not know or are you pretending?"

"The current Count Herrick is Wolf General Lucina! Her territory is right by the watch wall! It’s the place where they opened a breach!"

"Oh wow! So it’s from the watch wall to the City of Gold—now I get it."

"They’re recruiting 200,000 people all at once—that’s wild!"

"This railway goes through our territory. Will they recruit people from our lands?"

"Jealous. Going out will be so convenient from now on. Wonder when my area will get connected."

"Viscount Roster’s really an honest guy. Other companies go public and talk big for a while, but this is the first time I’ve seen one start working on day one!"

"..."

Whether it was Rail Transit General Company’s attitude or speed of action, it earned tons of praise.

As for the planning and selection of the first main line, most people had no complaints.

Connecting the continent from south to north, passing through pretty much every important territory and nation along the route, plus going through Dawn Kingdom’s capital, Gray Fort’s capital, Roster territory, and the City of Gold—there were definitely no complaints about that.

At most, some people were just jealous.

While people marveled, the Rail Transit General Company construction managers that Viscount Roster had already selected were fanned out across the continent.

To speed up construction of the ultra-high-speed rail transit system, he didn’t choose to start from one direction and concentrate forces toward the other. 𝘧𝓇ℯ𝑒𝓌𝑒𝑏𝓃𝘰𝘷𝘦𝘭.𝒸ℴ𝓂

Instead, he chose a more complex plan—sending people to start construction everywhere, dividing the whole line into eight sections that would all work simultaneously.

When everything was done, they’d come together perfectly into one main line.

Each of these managers had enough autonomy to freely recruit talent, purchase raw materials, and carry out construction.

If they ran into any problems they couldn’t solve, Viscount Roster would step in.

And so, people saw something even more shocking.

One second they were marveling on the Magic Net about how Viscount Roster was truly swift and decisive, the next second they saw that near where they lived, Rail Transit General Company had already started recruiting people.

What was even more ridiculous was that the local lords would often show incredible goodwill and support beyond imagination.

They’d even temporarily loan out their labor force to Rail Transit General Company.

Lots of people were baffled and didn’t understand what was going on.