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833 - Behind the Doors II
🕑 Added 2025-01-23 21:56:35 +0000 UTC“By setting up guardrails and limiting the ways the empire can easily access this information once they send their initial fleets to the Astral Conclave's territory and attempt to initiate trade and other dealings. Even at their fastest, it’ll take them several years to reach the populated areas of the Conclave, so we should have enough time to create measures that make it as difficult as possible for them to get hold of the information.
Since we control the inter-civilization communication channels, we can also add a filtering layer to ensure that the empire doesn’t gain access to this information through the network. And since only government entities use this system, it should be fairly easy to implement,” Kalron replied.
“We can also create a problem within the empire to force them to focus inwardly before they even consider focusing on us. This internal issue would be more urgent than anything else, possibly even destabilizing the empire.
For example, we can leverage our vast production capabilities to create goods and sell them at a cheaper price, or even at a loss, by using the free trade agreement we previously signed. This would prevent the empire from stopping us, and over time, it would gradually cripple their production industry. Once their industry can’t compete with the cheaper goods we sell, we can immediately raise prices.
As for how we can sell things at a loss, we’ll redirect a portion of the funds we previously spent on expensive mana stones to subsidize this plan. This will either delay the empire from turning its focus on us, or it might even cause civil unrest. In that case, we can fan the flames further and support a faction to gain power, giving us the opportunity to control the star system without breaking the mana oath,” the Yrral Coalition representative suggested, outlining how they could use their large-scale production capabilities to disrupt the empire while benefiting his Coalition and having others fund the effort, accomplishing two goals with one move.
“If, despite all of that, the empire still sends exploration fleets to the Conclave, we can create bureaucratic red tape for their fleets. Once they decide to send them, we can require them to go to a specific location in order to obtain the necessary permits to explore certain areas. This location would require them to take a few years just to get there. From there, we can add further delays in the approval process and other steps, buying us more time before they even make contact with the residents of the Conclave,” the Elara representative suggested.
One after another, the representatives of different civilizations began proposing their own ideas on how to extend the period in which the empire remained unaware of the true value of mana stones. The suggestions grew more sinister, with some even recommending allowing pirates to attack the empire's ships headed toward the Conclave, forcing the empire to send replacements, thus delaying the process even further.
However, it was the Shadari representative's suggestion that stood out as the most extreme. As he spoke, a chilling silence fell over the room, and everyone listening felt a sense of unease.
“Once enough time has passed, and if despite all our other attempts to destabilize the empire not succeeding, by then we would have gained significant influence over them through selling products at a lower price, we can release this information to the empire in a manner that will tarnish their image and destabilize the imperial government, putting their very stability at risk if they don’t take immediate action to address the issue. This would force them to retaliate against us in order to prevent a civil war fueled by their civilians feeling humiliated and exploited. Once the empire takes such drastic measures, we can escalate the situation, pushing them to a point where their actions would void the mana oath, giving us the opportunity to attack and seize control of the star system for ourselves,” the Shadari representative proposed.
Once nearly everyone in the room shared their suggestions, which indirectly showed their support for the plan and their willingness to agree to it if the final version benefited them, they began combining the ideas and fine-tuning the agreement. They quickly crafted an action plan outlining how they would jointly implement the strategy.
It took about half an hour before the final version was ready. Kalron, seeing the completed document, couldn’t help but smile as his plan was inching closer to becoming a reality. He was about to speak, saying, “Now that the final document is here, let’s move to voti…” but before he could finish, he was interrupted by the Trinarian representative.
“Although the agreement is good and will be beneficial to all of us, the scale at which the Trinairians will benefit is small relative to the rest of you,” said the Trinarian representative, a tone of hesitation in his voice. “This makes it difficult for me to say this, but we cannot agree to the agreement in its current version.”
Kalron raised an eyebrow, staring at the representative’s statement. It felt like someone had suddenly thrown a stick into his bicycle wheel as he was speeding downhill, threatening to derail all his hard work. Even if everyone else in the room agreed to the terms and swore a mana oath to keep everything secret, the Trinarian representative would be excluded from that oath. This posed a huge risk, as the representative could easily reveal the plan to the empire, rendering everything they had discussed nearly useless—and potentially drawing the empire's retaliation toward their entire operation. What had been an opportunity for strategic planning might now backfire, causing more harm than if they had stuck with the previous status quo.
From the look of it, the Trinarian representative seemed to have planned for this moment from the very start, waiting patiently until the plan reached the voting stage. By then, all the information and strategy would have already been revealed, putting them in a highly leveraged position. This would force the others to compromise and accommodate his requests if they wanted the agreement and plan to remain secret in the first place.
Caught between a rock and a hard place, Kalron was left with little choice but to ask, “Please, let’s hear the reason causing you to have reservations about voting for this agreement?”
Comments
Norito Menteval
TYFTC!!!! this is really freaking good.
Jade
Lmao the idea of the concave selling items and goods at a loss is funny with the presence of the atomic printer. Jeffrey is right, the conclave is playing checkers and The Emperor just annexed their territory
Jeffrey Iverson
I love all these guys playing checkers, and my dude over here is playing 5D chess with multiverse time travel all with the simple wording of “mined mana stone” 😂
Sol_Invictus
TYFTC!! Oh, villains who think with their heads, not like cultivation emperors of the 13 Swords, 6 Dragons, 9 Heavens, and 18 Asuras, who are 6 quadrillion years old but behave like they're in kindergarten.
Jade
TYFTC!!!!! First!!
