Chapter 579. Shopping for New Technology

Chapter 579: Chapter 579. Shopping for New Technology

"Mr. Wattson, I’m happy to present this list that headquarters sent over in an effort to entice you to trade with us," Captain Reyes said as he handed over a holographic tablet. "I’m even happier to announce that they’ve really opened the treasury for you if they’re willing to make offers like these. Based on my knowledge, this is about as much as they can afford to give. Anything more would be considered too strategic a resource for them to part with. I really hope this list satisfies you."

Alex looked over the list. It was divided into 3 tabs covering raw materials, technologies, and information packages. Each item included its official name, description, points of interest, and price, with the cost measured in the number of soldiers that could be brought to power suit level. In essence, they were offering each resource in exchange for enough food to raise a soldier to that level of strength, assuming they trained as seriously as Alex had suggested.

The list was remarkably comprehensive. It included not only the cannons mounted atop the walls, known as Arclight Cannons, but also schematics for their military and commercial technologies. Tons of raw materials were available as well, although Alex had little idea how valuable most of them were without any knowledge of material science. He was therefore more interested in the finished products.

Several items immediately caught his attention, including powerful engines, the technology behind their light-based weapons, advanced computers, and, most importantly, their space compression technology. One item in particular stood out, a military-grade backpack capable of storing more than 10 times the volume of his own.

That was simply insane.

For reference, his current backpack had a storage capacity roughly equivalent to a 10-story building in the shape of a cube, just enough space to store the Azure Voyager, a 30-meter-class luxury yacht. The backpack they were offering, by comparison, had a capacity roughly equivalent to a 20-story office building with a 60 m × 60 m footprint, or a large shopping mall. Such an increase would allow him to haul far more resources from each expedition and transport construction materials to his island far more efficiently.

Of course, the price was equally absurd. Just the items that interested him added up to thousands of soldiers. The initial prices were clearly heavily stacked in their favor, so Alex expected they would be willing to settle for considerably less. That was something he could address once negotiations began. First, he needed to determine exactly how much leverage he had.

He still had roughly 6 months’ worth of food for himself and his 50+ Pokémon. That was equivalent to about 25 years of food for a single Champion. His Pokémon ate three meals a day, while an average human training like a madman would need at least a week to fully digest a meal. By that measure, his remaining supply was equivalent to roughly 525 years of food for a single human. If a human could reach Expert rank within a year using resources like these, Alex effectively had enough food to train 525 soldiers to Expert rank.

It was substantial, but not nearly as much as he would have liked. Still, it was all he had, so he would have to make it work.

"How is it? Did anything catch your interest?" Captain Holt asked warily.

He wasn’t particularly interested in the deal itself. His priority was keeping Alex calm and satisfied.

"There are quite a few things that caught my interest. Unfortunately, an entire tab is practically useless to me because I’m not an expert in the field. I don’t want to waste my resources on raw materials when I have no idea what they’re actually used for. They could be critical components for these technologies, or they could be easily replaced by something I can acquire back home. I can’t afford to waste anything on materials I don’t understand.

"The same goes for the schematics," Alex continued. "I’ve already collected a lot of technology, so I have no way of knowing whether I’d just be wasting my resources on things I already have. That leaves the light-based weapons and space compression technology as the only things that really interest me. It’s times like this that I wish I had my engineer with me."

"You have your own engineer?"

"I run my own bounty-hunting organization, so yeah, I have my own engineers."

Captain Holt and Captain Reyes’s eyes widened at the sudden shift in Alex’s demeanor. Bounty hunters weren’t an unknown concept to them. It was a profession that dealt with both the light and the dark, with the best possessing levels of expertise even the military found difficult to match. After all, they had to navigate both the government and the underworld to get paid.

Seeing Alex in this new light somehow terrified them even more. It meant he wasn’t some pushover making empty claims. He was the owner of a bounty-hunting organization and had apparently come here on a dimensional expedition, something they still found difficult to believe.

"You can still afford them, though, right?" Captain Reyes asked nervously. "Exactly how many soldiers could you raise to the level of our power suits?"

"About 500 to 600, give or take," Alex replied. "That’d be after roughly a year of intense training, though. Food is only the minimum requirement. They’d have to work themselves to the bone to truly maximize its effects. Otherwise, they’ll just shit it out."

Captain Reyes’s eyes widened before he quickly schooled his expression. That was an insane number of soldiers by their standards. An additional 500 to 600 power-suited soldiers would allow them to establish more settlements, push their scavenging operations deeper into the city, and recover resources that were currently beyond their reach.

Power suits were a limited resource, after all. They only had a few hundred in total, and they lacked both the raw materials and industrial capacity to produce more. Even if they had enough materials, they simply didn’t have the infrastructure to manufacture them on any meaningful scale. They had just been scraping by ever since the apocalypse.

"I’m sure you’ll be able to get everything you need once the negotiation team arrives," Captain Reyes said. "They’ll be the ones bargaining with you, and I can guarantee they won’t be willing to go home empty-handed."

"I just hope they’re civilized," Alex said with a nasty grin. "If they try to push me around, we might have to fight it out."

He laughed.

Captain Holt and Captain Reyes laughed along with him, though their laughter was considerably more strained. Neither wanted to point out that if Alex actually decided to fight it out, everyone in the city might end up dead, with the two of them likely being among the first to go.

"Of course," Captain Reyes said, his smile twitching slightly. "Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that."

"Yeah," Captain Holt added quickly. "Would be a shame."

Neither captain found the thought particularly funny.

For the rest of the day and well into the night, Alex continued going through the list, gradually putting together a sort of wish list. At the top were the Arclight Cannon, several laser guns, a space-compressed backpack, and a few top-class vehicles with the best available speed or carrying capacity, along with the schematics for all of them.

Even after being as thrifty as possible, the total still came to the equivalent of more than 5,000 soldiers. Honestly, Alex considered that a fair price for everything he wanted. Unfortunately, he simply didn’t have that much to spend, so he was prepared to offer some of his own technology in trade to bring the cost down. The BOMB, Stormline, the Mauler, and a few grenades and turrets were all on the table.

It was definitely an excessive expenditure, but this was a one-time investment. As long as he could eventually upgrade his existing gear, Alex figured it would be worth the cost.

The next day, the negotiation team arrived, and fortunately, they proved to be quite amicable. The group consisted of a general, a team of heavily equipped soldiers, and several scientists, each specializing in a different field.

"You must be the alien," the middle-aged general said as he approached, his uniform covered in too many medals.

He extended his hand, and Alex shook it.

"Sure, let’s go with that," Alex replied through holographic text.

"Good. I’m General Stroud, and I’ll be leading the negotiations." General Stroud said, getting straight to the point. "So, what do you have to offer? Doesn’t matter. I doubt it’ll be enough to get you much anyway. The idiots back at headquarters would never approve anything too valuable. That’s why I’ve got a proposal for you."

"Oh? Do tell." Alex was immediately interested.

He would much rather deal with a man who got straight to the point than waste time going back and forth with some bureaucrat trying to squeeze every last advantage out of him.

"I’ll personally offer you a 50% discount if you help me with a little mission that’s been biting me in the ass for a while. Remember where my men picked you up? The hydroelectric power plant? I want your help taking that place down while keeping the dam intact. We could use the extra power, and we could do without a potential threat sitting right in our backyard."

He grinned.

"So, what do you say? Interested in fucking some shit up?"

"Sounds like music to my ears," Alex replied with a smile. "You’ve got yourself a deal, General."

"Hahaha! Good! You’re an alien after my own heart." General Stroud said, clapped Alex on the shoulder. "Let’s deal with that first, then."