The Happy Days of Being a Factory Owner in London – Chapter 5
by MonoThe Factory
Hurry up and pay!
Never mind how she did it, and never mind the coachman’s mood upon discovering someone emerging from under his carriage—the fact was, Arna, having hitched a ride, arrived at Mr. Green’s law firm precisely at the appointed time.
She scanned her surroundings before her eyes settled on a brass plaque hanging on the door in front of her. A line of text was inscribed upon it.
Nemo me impune lacessit.
…Surely this didn’t mean “No Aisas or dogs allowed,” right?
As a curious illiterate, Arna stood at the door for a moment, staring at the plaque and furiously mashing the System Translation.
Three seconds later, the System Translation popped up.
【He who attacks me shall not go unpunished. (Latin)】
That sounded pretty cool! I want it!
Arna began furiously pressing the Interact Button on the brass plaque, trying to wedge herself into a position to pry it off, attempting to make a miracle happen through brute force1.
Her scraping didn’t produce a miracle, but it did get her sleeves covered in dust.
Before she could give it more than a few tugs, the door was pushed open.
A lady emerged from within.
The lady, wearing a veiled hat, cast a rather astonished glance at Arna’s hand, which was practically welded to the plaque. She walked around her, not forgetting to remark, “The cleaning staff these days are so unprofessional. Do they not even bring tools to work anymore?”
Arna: …
She silently retracted her hand.
It was a well-known fact that interacting with someone else’s property right in front of them, much like picking things out of a trash can, was an easy way to lower their Favorability—you’d either be called “disgusting” or “thief.”
She peeked inside and saw the round solicitor NPC pushing himself up from behind an oak desk.
“Hey, young Aisas, you’re here!” he called out. “Come in.”
Honestly, the solicitor NPC really did look a bit like a walrus.
Arna answered with a grunt and walked in, her feet crossing a rather grimy Turkish rug. She spotted a huge map of London hanging on the wall.
Noticing Arna’s gaze, Mr. Green the solicitor smiled.
“It’s an old map, from a few years back. Luckily, there haven’t been any major urban projects completed in that time, so it’s still usable,” he said with a sigh, pointing to a spot near the eastern side. “Here. This is where your grandfather’s factory is located, on a relatively safe street near Whitechapel.”
He pulled at the corner of his mouth in a somewhat bitter expression. “Of course, the building is still standing, but it’s not like the old days when your grandfather made his first fortune selling nails in Whitechapel. After he fell ill, that stubborn old coot had to sell off many things to cover his daily expenses.”
Tracing the area on the worn-out map, Mr. Green circled a nearby spot. “In the last few years of his life, we discussed renting the factory out. Not only would it cover the building’s maintenance and save us from hiring cleaners, but we could also collect some rent. Unfortunately, the prospective tenant died in a carriage accident soon after, and the factory was left untended.”
Arna nodded, getting the gist of the situation, and asked casually, “Do you have any suggestions?”
“My suggestions? You’ve come to the right person. Your grandfather used to consult me often,” Mr. Green said, stroking his little moustache with pride. “I suggest you rent the land to those… socialists2.”
He winked, looking even more like an evil walrus. “They’re always gathering up rabble and giving all sorts of bizarre speeches, but it’s better than leaving your goods to sit there alone, right? Considering… certain factors.”
Those socialists were always running around, stirring up trouble with their workers’ housing movements. But they had money from somewhere, and renting to them was better than having things stolen or “catch fire.”
According to Mr. Green’s friends, they were even planning to build a new city on the outskirts of London!
To Mr. Green, these people simply had more money than sense.
Arna: …Actually, she just wanted to ask where to start with renovations and who the best carpenter in London was.
She scratched her head and said nothing.
“Alright.” Seeing her expression, Mr. Green knew what she was thinking and couldn’t help but shake his head. “Same stubborn temper as your grandfather.”
He thought for a moment, then lowered his voice. “If you plan on repainting the place, I suggest you hire a night watchman. You don’t want to be in that area at night. I heard just last Thursday, two gangs got into a brawl near the Ten Bells Pub3.”
“…A night watchman?” Arna was bewildered. “What’s that?”
For some reason, she felt an instinctual resistance to the suggestion of spending money to hire someone.
…Perhaps it was the piteous cry of her near-empty wallet!
Mr. Green sighed at the layman before him.
“You can think of them as people responsible for patrolling the area at night to maintain security,” he explained, taking a sip from his teacup. “For you, a stranger in a strange land, it’s safer to hire someone to guard the warehouse. Of course, that’s after your goods arrive.”
Looking at the clueless young Aisas, Mr. Green chuckled to himself, thinking he must be getting old to be worrying about things that hadn’t even happened yet.
Rebuilding a factory? How difficult a task was that?
But doing business required capital. The solicitor sized up the young man again, figuring Aisas probably hadn’t saved much money over the years.
Putting the matter aside for now, Mr. Green stood up, leaning on his cane. “Well then, let’s go have a look at your factory.”
He led Arna to the door, hailed a carriage, and climbed in first.
Arna and the coachman stared at each other.
This guy looked so familiar. Wasn’t this the same coachman who had given her a free ride this morning?
Seeing the coachman’s narrowed eyes, and then looking at Mr. Green urging her to get in, Arna chose to board the carriage with a straight face.
It was fine. As long as she wasn’t embarrassed, the awkwardness belonged to someone else.
But wait, do the background NPCs in this game have such long memories?
—This is getting interesting!
In any case, the carriage ride from the more respectable solicitor’s office to Whitechapel was by no means a comfortable one.
The closer they got to the East End, the thicker the smell of coal smoke became. When the carriage turned onto a bumpy cobblestone road, jolting Arna so hard her teeth clattered together, Mr. Green produced a handkerchief from somewhere and held it fastidiously over his nose.
Arna, however, peered curiously out the open window.
In the distance, the factories looked like a pack of beasts crouching in the undergrowth, looming in and out of the hazy fog, continuously spewing thick smoke into the already murky sky.
The streets were teeming with people. Men with hollow cheeks and flat caps walked in small groups toward the factories. Women in tightly wrapped shawls led toddlers by the hand, while a group of older children silently pushed handcarts, their movements slow and cautious, like little animals long since domesticated and accustomed to a life of toil and danger.
Although the heart of industry was steadily shifting towards the expanding railway network and new docks, the East End, as a mature industrial zone, remained vitally important.
“The land here isn’t exactly the finest inheritance.” Mr. Green clicked his tongue in disgust, indifferent to the scene. “However, land is land, even here.”
The carriage turned onto a small lane, gradually approaching the factory. He let out a breath. “Right, there’s something else I haven’t told you.”
He made a gesture. “I’ve already mentioned that this place has been abandoned for a long time. In fact, the factory has been untended for three years. After your grandfather passed away, considering the security situation in the area, from time to time some… squatters have been seen around the factory.”
“Squatters?” Arna was a little excited. “Robbers?”
“Not quite,” Mr. Green said vaguely. “You’ll know when you see them.”
The carriage stopped near the factory’s main gate. He disembarked and handed the key to Arna, clearly unwilling to risk going in himself. “I’ll wait out here. You be careful.”
He glanced down at his watch. “In about… one hour, if I don’t hear from you, I’ll send someone to call the police from Scotland Yard4.”
Arna, who had already jumped down from the carriage, gave a quick acknowledgement and took the key, approaching the gate.
The rusty iron gate hung on a mottled hinge, with faint traces of some old sign still visible.
She inserted the key into the lock and turned it forcefully.
The lock clicked open.
Arna then pushed the heavy gate open with all her might. The rusty hinge scraped along the ground, screaming like a small animal caught in the door.
A cloud of dust fell from above, nearly hitting her in the face. Luckily, Arna dodged in time.
The air inside smelled of mould. Battered machines stood in the vast hall like lingering ghosts, so decayed they were practically unusable.
Cobwebs were everywhere. The windows were boarded up, and the only light came from a large hole in the ceiling, casting a dim glow.
Of course, on a rainy day, it would probably be leaking rain.
Arna walked around the machines. As she neared a corner on the western side, her steps slowed.
It was a makeshift area cordoned off with tattered cloths and wooden frames. It was hidden away and, compared to the rest of the factory, almost clean.
Before she could get any closer, the cloth was flung aside by someone from within.
The burly man was clearly unfriendly. He spoke in a coarse, low voice: “Whitechapel’s a new place for you. Took you a long time to find your way here, eh?”
He had a prominent scar down one cheek, and a grizzled beard covered half his face. His arms were crossed over his chest, his clothes stained with layers of grime. “So you must be young Aisas. We’ve been waiting for you. Took you long enough.”
Behind him, two other similarly ragged men stood up.
Arna: “…Hello?”
What, do the homeless NPCs in London live in the protagonist’s house now instead of in tents by the bridge?
The burly man seemed to find her polite greeting suspicious.
He exchanged a look with his two cronies before turning his gaze back to her. He stuck out a thumb and pointed at himself. “Jack.”
He nodded toward a skinnier man to the side. “That’s Tom. And the one next to him is Rat.”
The young boy called Rat, who looked to be only ten, flinched instinctively at the nickname but didn’t object.
Surrounded by two Red-name NPCs, his name, which glowed green, seemed exceptionally gentle, making Arna look at him for a second longer.
The glance didn’t attract Jack’s attention. He scratched his beard, his shrewd eyes sizing Arna up and down.
“Never heard Old Man Aisas mention he had a grandson,” he said with a grin. “So let me guess, you have absolutely no idea where you’ve just walked into.”
He took a step forward, and a stench of gin5 and rotten food washed over her.
“Now, here’s how it is, Mr. Aisas, Jr.,” he said, pausing deliberately for a threatening effect. “We’ve been maintaining this factory. Chasing off thieves, cleaning the rust, patching the leaky roof.”
He snorted. “Seems to me, that kind of work ought to earn a man some… deserved compensation, wouldn’t you say?”
Tom, standing just behind him, also took a step forward. His coat fell slightly open, revealing the perfectly timed glint of a knife blade.
The author has something to say:
The combat round makes its grand entrance!
- Nemo me impune lacessit. A Latin motto. It is inscribed on the Order of the Thistle in the UK and on some pound coins. It also appears in Edgar Allan Poe’s short story “The Cask of Amontillado” and is a legal maxim.
- The socialists mentioned here are currently engaged in social reform, labor rights protection, etc. Utopian socialism originated in the early 19th century, so there might be more mentions later, but it won’t be a major focus.
- Ten Bells Pub, a pub near the scene of the Jack the Ripper murders.
- Gin, a spirit that originated in the Netherlands, became wildly popular throughout Great Britain after its introduction in the 17th century. In Harry Potter, Dumbledore uses it to bribe the orphanage matron when he goes to meet young Tom Riddle.
Footnotes
- A Chinese internet slang phrase, 'dàlì chū qíjì,' meaning to achieve a surprising result through sheer brute force, often used humorously.
- In the 19th century, various socialist movements emerged, many focused on social reform and improving workers' rights and living conditions, distinct from later state-led socialist ideologies.
- The Ten Bells is a real, historic pub in the Whitechapel area of London, famously associated with several victims of Jack the Ripper in the late 1880s.
- New Scotland Yard, often shortened to Scotland Yard, is the headquarters of the Metropolitan Police Service, responsible for policing most of London.
- Gin (dùsōngzǐ jiǔ), a spirit originally from the Netherlands, became extremely popular and inexpensive in 18th and 19th-century Britain, where it was often associated with poverty and social problems in urban areas like London.
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