Chapter 1679 – Monetisation

The Colony didn’t, and in many ways still doesn’t, understand money. There is no trade within the family, no exchange of any kind, for most ants. Almost none of them will ever have any sort of interaction with currency. Their needs are provided for, and they labour for the Colony gladly, without any expectation or need for remuneration.

Although there is an enormous amount of commerce that occurs between the Colony and others, these transactions are handled by exceptionally few individuals. If we were to consider the number of ants involved in the negotiating and setting of terms for these trades, those numbers fall even further.

Tthe number of ants who actually understand the value of things, who are capable of navigating the nuances of interpersonal relationships, legal obligations and market forces, then the list is reduced to one.

– Excerpt from the personal notes of Historiant

“Gate travel is cheaper.”

“Gate travel was cheaper.”

The little ant took another puff of her cigar, tapping the ash into a crystal receptacle that she herself had provided. For some reason, Riggurt had the impression that she was smiling at him. Was it the tilt of the antennae? The shape of the mandibles?

And not a friendly smile either. The smile of a predator looking at their prey, knowing they were already caught, knowing there wasn’t any way out.

Riggurt always wanted a way out.

“The Colony has raised prices on gate travel?” he asked, sitting forward in his chair.

If so, it would have ripple effects across all of the independent cities absorbed by the Colony in the second and first strata. Say what you would about the ants, they ran the gate network as efficiently as the Legion setting up camp. Gate operating times were four times what they’d been before, and each trip was practically free. Considering the number of cities added to the network over the last year, Rylleh was connected to more places than before they’d been conquered.

Trade was booming, and that was an understatement.

If the Colony was planning to raise gate prices… several of Riggurt’s own businesses could be in jeopardy. It all depended on how large the rise was. Ten to twenty percent he could absorb, more than that and his margins would be uncomfortably squeezed.

“Indeed, a fifty percent price rise,” Merchant said, twirling her fore limb and watching the smoke spiral through the air.

There was something about the tobacco leaf that appealed to her. Was it the heady, earthy scent? The smoke? Or perhaps she simply enjoyed using it as a tool, a way to display a sense of affluence and power. After speaking to business people all over the Dungeon, many of whom enjoyed a smoke, she’d tried it for the first time and quickly grew to enjoy a fine cigar.

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Already she had invested in Colony-grown tobacco. She was counting on her sisters to unlock the secrets behind the finest and most expensive of cigars. She didn’t even intend to sell them, oh no, that would be a waste. As a gift, an exclusive token of appreciation given to trusted partners, that was what she wanted them for.

“FIFTY?” Riggurt choked, face growing red.

“Indeed.”