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Ch 50 Northern Wolf Shipping Part 2
🕑 Added 2024-01-13 13:19:59 +0000 UTCDarrio quickly left the Barge towards a boat waiting nearby that would take him through the canals in the city towards the port.
Darrio's body finally sagged in relief at finally having completed the task set by Jon. The dark circles under his eyes would easily tell anyone how stressed he had been over the past week.
In fact, it was only when he was sailing over water that he could be completely relaxed nowadays. Since at least on water there weren't a lot of chances for him to run into animals or... spiders under 'his' control.
A piercing cry of a loud seagull suddenly echoed from above him immediately sending a shiver through his spine, almost as if... as if someone was reminding him that there was nowhere that he was completely safe.
It was only when the boat lurched to a stop near the bustling market at the entrance of the port that Darrio was able to regain his composure. He quickly paid the driver who was looking at him weirdly and left the boat to push through the crowded streets.
His brown and grey banker garbs made sure that people gave him a wide berth. And he tried his hardest to only look straight ahead and not flinch every time a cat or a dog happens to pass by.
Before long he had left behind all the stalls selling seafood and came near enough to the port that most of the shops were now either inns for sailors or were dedicated to selling people advance tickets for scheduled ships going to the nearby cities such as Pentos, Kings Landing, White Harbour and many more.
Right in the middle in the most prominent location on the road was a newly renovated shop with a huge board on it that read, "Northern Wolf Shipping", the words were written beautifully in both the common tongue and in Valyrian. But even though this shop was the biggest and the most impressive of all the nearby shops it was the only one with no customers.
Darrio sighed while looking at the empty-looking shop... he could still remember the crowd that had flocked to the shop when it had been newly opened especially because of the advertisement up front that boasted of a fifty per cent discount. But when the people went inside and found out that this newly born company not only provided shipping to the cities across Stepstones but also boasted a hundred per cent guarantee, the people left as quickly as they had arrived, knowing that it was just a scam.
Darrio shook off his wandering thoughts and went inside the shop but he came out soon after and started walking towards the port. The fat teenager manning the shop had told him that Jon wasn't inside and that he would find him by their ships at port.
Darrio hurried along as he passed one ship after another in the massive port and only after walking for about half an hour did he reach the area where the seven Northern ships were docked. They were all standing in a single line with each ship flying a flag with a roaring wolf head drawn on it. Of the seven ships, four were of normal size while the other three were massive trade galleons, but even though they all seemed to be freshly painted they couldn't hide the fact that they were many years old.
About a dozen workers were slowly loading goods into the four normal ships while the three trade galleons remained stationary and empty, but Darrio knew that they wouldn't remain vacant for long with the agreement that he had gotten from Mario.
He was easily able to spot Jon standing nearby in the shade of the ships and started walking towards him. Jon wasn't alone and had two middle-aged with Northern features standing beside him and he seemed to be explaining something to them while occasionally pointing towards a map on the table in front of them.
Darrio came to a stop a few steps away from the table and stood there silently, waiting to be called. Other than a single glance towards Darrio Jon completely ignored him and continued speaking with the two Northerners.
Darrio didn't understand much of what he was saying as he wasn't too proficient in the common tongue but after seeing the lines and dots on the map, which had the Narrow sea prominently in the middle as well as from the bits and pieces which he could comprehend, he guessed that they were charting the path that the ships would take for the trip. The most unbelievable thing for Darrio was that most of the paths traversed directly through the middle, in the open sea and not hugging the coast like was common.
Just as he was lost in his thoughts Jon suddenly stopped talking and looked towards Darrio with his hands outstretched and ordered, "Give me the list!"
"Huh?" Darrio asked in confusion before he realised what he was talking about and hastened to take out the list of goods that Mario had given him and handed it over to Jon. He didn't even want to think about how Jon already knew that Darrio had succeded in his deal or that he had also gotten the list from Mario because he knew that the less he thought about it the better for his sanity.
"Take this list, Uncle Sam," Jon said giving the list to Merchant Sam, "Workers belonging to the Big Mario should start arriving soon with the goods written in there. I want you to thoroughly check everything in there, and that nothing is missing and then have them properly stored. And also make sure that our ships are ready and stocked to leave in two days."
"Yes. I'll get on it right away!" The merchant answered confidently, and after taking a quick look at Darrio, he left along with the other man towards the ships.
Merchant Sam and his assistant had only walked for a few minutes when the assistant finally couldn't hold himself back, "D-Did you just see that?!!" he asked visibly shaking with excitement, "Did you look at the way that banker was standing there with that submissive look on his face as if he was meeting his superior. He didn't seem like a mighty banker at all."
"Shh!! Don't speak so loudly." Sam rebuked but it was hard for his assistant to take him seriously when he saw his master's lips quirk up into a smirk, "And of course I saw that, It would be hard not to. That look on that banker's face was completely different from the last time when he kicked me out of his room. I almost didn't recognise him with all the arrogance and pride missing from his face," he said smugly.
"B-But how did the boss do it? How did he make some like that bend..." he asked in an incredulous voice while sneaking a glance back at Jon who seemed to ordering the Banker to do something with a cold face.
"The boss has his ways," Sam said in a mysterious tone, "I told you that day, didn't I? That everything will be solved once he's here."
"Yes, you did." the assistant said with a fawning tone before he suddenly had an enlightened expression on his face. "I finally know now why those people back home revere him so much," Before the assistant joined Sam's ships here in the East, he had spent a few months with the crew in Bear Island. And when he was there, he had been quite bewildered by the worship and awe sailors held for Jon... but only now did he understand that he was completely deserving of all the worship and adulation.
"Of course, they revere him. Now stop daydreaming and get to work. We have a lot of shipments coming and need to finish everything by tomorrow so we need to hurry along or we won't be sleeping tonight."
...
Jon didn't immediately start speaking to Darrio after Merchant Sam and his assistant had left, instead, he was occupied with the map in front of him as he drew marks on it charting different lines. And only after he was completely satisfied with the paths did he close the map and look up towards Darrio.
"Good work with Merchant." he said with a cool nod, "You stood up to my expectations."
"Thank you, Ser. I didn't do too much" Darrio answered meekly, not daring to look into Jon's eyes. Even though more than a week had passed since that day, he was still a bit traumatised by the close experience with death that he had and was deathly scared of Jon.
Jon was quite amused while looking at the grown man almost quivering in his shoes in front of him. Normally he would have felt a little bad for scaring someone to this point but considering all the things he had found about the man during his research into the banker... his sympathy didn't last for very long.
The was spoiled rich scum through and through. He was cruel and heartless and had destroyed a lot of small and struggling businesses and had also killed and crippled a lot of people without mercy in his quest to follow his uncle. But that wasn't a very unique thing in this world as every other rich asshole here was just another Joffrey just without that many tantrums. Plus the man also had a fetish for tormenting and assaulting any girl he took a fancy to, so Jon didn't have a lot of pity for him.
In fact, the incident with the spider hadn't been an accident instead it had actually been a deliberate act on Jon's part. He didn't really have a pet spider named Widow that he acquired from a mysterious island and all of that had been just a ruse to scare the banker, in truth, the spider was just the scariest-looking one he could find on the way to the bank.
Spiders and other small insects and arachnids belonged to a category of small living beings that didn't have a developed enough brain and soul that Jon could connect with on a deep level. The best he could do with them was take over their bodies and control them forcefully when they were in front of him, much like the other wargs in this world do. But this crude method meant that there could never be a long-term bond between them and that they would forget Jon the moment they got out of his sight making it impossible for them to follow long-term orders.
As for how he had actually poisoned the man? Well, that had just been a simple use of the poison he had created using the book he had gotten from Oberyn. Tweety had delivered it to Darrio's glass of water before Jon had even entered the room. Which was also the reason that he had the antidote already prepared beforehand.
"And what about the warships? Did you find out when I can get them?"
"Y-Yes," Darrio answered in a nervous voice, "I-I've checked the records and found out that there is a backlog of pre-orders lined up for the next two years... S-So it's hard for anyone to get any at the moment—"
"Do you think I don't already know that?" Jon asked quietly with a raised eyebrow.
Jon had laid the foundation for recruiting and training sailors in White Harbour way back when Merchant Sam first left Winterfell which means that it was even before the school in Bear Island started. So there were more than enough men, young and old, waiting back at home with months and months of practical training at being a sailor. While at the moment they may be doing some other jobs, he knew that he only needed to give one call and he would have them all rushing to join.
Plus, it was only a matter of time before the shipping company took off. He only needed a few trips successful trips to show on his resume before he would have lines of people waiting to get on.
This means that he would have sailors, and all the customers he could need in the future so the only thing that could hamper the growth of this company is the number of ships... and luckily for him, the world's biggest shipyard was right here.
The Arsenal of Bravoos was world famous for its ship-building capacity, and the war galleys made here were all of the same design allowing shipbuilders to work on separate parts at the same time. It is said that if it was needed then they were even capable of creating a war galley in a single. So of course they would have a lot of customers lining up to get them to build ships for them.
"N-No! I mean yes—"
"Why do you think I wasted so much time on you if not for this? If I could have gotten the ships through normal channels then there would have been no use for you. You're not saying that you're useless, are you?" he asked with a raised eyebrow.
"N-No!" Darrio gulped and answered, "B-But it is impossible for me—"
"Fine. I won't ask for too many... How many warships can you get me?"
"N-No more than one in t-two months..." Darrio answered as if forcing the words out of his mouth. Even swiping one in two months would be as hard as climbing the titan barehanded, he would have to grease a lot of hands, speed up production, delay other people's orders and spend a lot of time carefully messing up the papers so that no one finds out about the missing ones.
"That's too little..." Jon said with a frown, "Fine I'll manage, but you also need to add two trade galleys with every warship..."
"I-I'll try my best," Darrio said with a relieved look, as getting trade galleys was easier than warships.
"Make sure you do." Jon said nonchalantly, "After all we are all in the same boat since you also have shares in my company."
Darrio quickly nodded with a forced smile. The shares Jon was talking about were nothing more than a formality of one per cent which he had given Darrio to smooth most of the process involved in setting up the shop and shipping company here. If it wasn't for Darrio's name as one of the owners and investors, it wouldn't have been possible to set up everything so quickly.
"What is it now?" Jon asked as he looked at the banker who was making a face as if he was constipated.
"Umm... About the money..." Darrio said as he hoped with all his might that he wouldn't have to pay for all this from his own pocket.
"Money will be no problem." Jon said waving his hand nonchalantly, "You'll get the proper payments for every single one of them. I'll send one of my men..."
...
While Jon was talking with Darrio, not far from them were two shifty-eyed men wearing sailor garbs looking at all the Northern ships with greedy eyes.
"Did you see all the goods being loaded, Uncle Frank?" one of the men said in an excited whisper.
"I did," the other man replied his face splitting into a sinister smile showing all his rotten teeth, "Looks like we caught a big fish, boy. Captain Jack will be quite happy with it..."
Comments
Abe 7
Poor captain jack…
