81 Growth

After the attack by Grimoire Heart, the Magic Council reconstructed their new headquarters which was located in a location that was hard to find. They received a donation from Bourne which enabled them to create a more durable and extra defensive mechanism that was able to protect them in the future.

Of course, in exchange for donations, Bourne's business was even more smooth and his media also became even more popular since it hid the fact that the headquarters of the Magic Council was destroyed.

There was some unscrupulous newspaper which tried to uncover the fact that the Magic Council was a weak organization, and its headquarters was destroyed by a Dark Magician, but this newspaper was banned then it was bought directly by Bourne with a very cheap price which made his strength in media became even stronger.

The Magic Council didn't condemn Bourne since, with his help, they were able to keep their reputation as the strongest organization in this continent.

Bourne felt that among all the organizations in this world, the Magic Council was really the strongest, but it wasn't because of its members rather it was because of the hidden weapons which were kept by the Magic Council.

The members of the Magic Council were weak, that was without a doubt and in exchange for their weakness, they had a quantity and a weapon which made them able to protect the continent.

Bourne knew that the Magic Council had two powerful weapons which were known as Etherion and Face. With two weapons alone, the Magic Council was revered and feared by anyone, and by controlling this organization from the shadow made him able to affect some decisions on this organization.

The time moved quickly and the year had turned into X781.

This year, Bourne was able to see the power of Etherion. He had heard that the Alvarez Empire tried to invade Ishgar, but it was stopped by Etherion.

Bourne had to admit that Etherion was a very powerful weapon that was able to shoot an extremely large, destructive beam of magic upon the desired location, that completely obliterated the target area, leaving only dust behind. Its energy was strong enough to reduce matter down to its smallest components.

The other advantage of this weapon was that it was located in the sky so no one was able to escape from it unless they were moving fast enough or strong enough to block an attack from this weapon.

Of course, the Magic Council wanted to have revenge on Grimoire Heart after the destruction of their headquarters, but the movement of the Grimoire Heart was very fast and they had moved to another place.

Unlike other Dark Guilds, Grimoire Heart's headquarters were located on aircraft which made it hard for them to pinpoint.

Grimoire Heart also knew about the power of the Magic Council so they were hiding since they had caused a lot of damage to this organization, and after they saw the power of the Etherion, they had decided to be low-key for a while.

So it had become a cat and mouse game, where the Magic Council tried to chase after the Grimoire Heart.

Bourne didn't care much about the conflict between Grimoire Heart and Magic Council and used this chance to develop his business better.

His focus over the past year had been on the food business, he had opened retail stores in various places on the continent, developing this business quickly with money from his beauty business.

Almost all of the Ishgar continent, in the most crowded town, there was his retail store which was known as Volvo.

There were a lot of people who tried to imitate him, but it was hard since they didn't understand his business model and he was sure in another five years no one would understand so he was able to monopoly a retail business and with that five years time, no one would be his opponents.

Besides the retail business, he also owned a wheat farm, tobacco farm, fruits, beef, pig, poultry, etc which was related to the main foods of people in this continent along with their processing company.

Bourne processed wheat into various brands from low-grade to high-grade that were targeted for people with low economic to wealthy nobles.

Even though he hadn't monopolized it since there wasn't enough time, he was sure that he was going to monopolize it as soon as there was time.

However, Bourne wasn't that greedy and also gave a chance to his competitor to fight him since it would be terrible if this continent was being monopolized by him.

Bourne remembered a quote from someone famous in his previous world.

"Who controls the food supply controls the people; who controls the energy can control whole continents; who controls money can control the world."

Bourne agreed with this quite, but it was impossible for him to control the energy and the money so what he could do was to control the food supply.

To control the energy which meant, he needed to control the magic itself since magic was the source of energy in this world.

Bourne felt that his thoughts in the past were quite wrong.

Unlike oil and coal, magic was clean and this world was so abundant with magic.

Bourne was also able to absorb the magic in the air by a device and Lacrima which was very convenient. The magic itself was free, so he couldn't control it, but he could sell the Lacrima itself in the future.

To control money, unless he opened a bank and loaned it to various countries then it was impossible for him to control it.

Bourne wanted to open a bank, but he wanted to focus on his retail and food business first. His time was limited and he didn't want to sacrifice his time with his loved one because of business.

Spending time with his loved one, that's what he did right now.

Looking at Ur and Tear who was sleeping by using both of his arms, Bourne had to admit that his life was quite good.

---

Meredy woke up in the early morning. Yawning, she was ready to help everyone cook breakfast.

It might have become her habit since she had been living together with Ur, Bourne, and Tear that she felt that she needed to work hard since she wanted to help them.

However, there was one thing that she didn't understand and made her confused.

Meredy was wondering why every night she heard a quite strange sound which came from Bourne's room. She was young after all and she didn't think too much, but when she came to the kitchen, she saw Bourne who was helping Tear.

"Bourne! Tear!"

"Oh, oh.. you've woken up, Meredy?" Tear seemed quite flushed at the moment and quite panicked, she also gave an elbow to Bourne, but that elbow attacked Bourne's solar plexus directly which made him groan.

Bourne groaned painfully, holding his stomach, but he also quickly tidied up Tear's clothes and his pants.

"Bourne, are you alright?" Meredy became worried when she saw Bourne seemed to be in pain.

"It's alright. My stomach hurts. I need to go to the toilet." Bourne glanced at Tear with a helpless expression. He stood up and walked toward the bathroom to wash.

Tear laughed and said, "Meredy, can you help me to set up the plates?"

"Yes!"

Meredy nodded with a smile and thought that Bourne, Tear, and Ur were her family. She thought that it was a very good life, but then she smelled something strange from the kitchen.

"What smell is this?"

"Oh, it is a squid," Tear said without a change on her face. "It has quite a fishy smell. I've thought about cooking it at noon later." Even if she didn't have a squid, she could ask their employee to buy one later.

"Oh..."

Meredy didn't think too much about the origin of this smell and quickly set up the plates since soon, it was their time to have breakfast.