NOVGO.NET Chapter 711 - Taming the Fifth Year - Overwork
Chapter 711: Chapter 711 – Taming the Fifth Year – Overwork
The delivery location was again a massive building on the academy outskirts, designed like others to receive and process materials but this was the one specifically for the three best schools during gathering exams.
Long rows of tables where evaluators reviewed, weighed, classified, and valued each delivered material.
By the third day the place would be full of overlapping conversations, crystals clinking, and beasts unloading backpacks like a chaotic but organized market.
For Ren’s team, this was their first time experiencing what happened when you were on Ren’s team.
But for Ren, this wasn’t new at all.
It was the same dilemma as last time.
So…
Ren scanned the place with experienced eyes, ignoring most of the tables. Instead, he headed directly toward the back, where a particular table was located in a quieter corner.
Away from the main flow of traffic. Where evaluators who he already knew could handle unusual materials or enormous quantities without losing their minds.
Three men worked there. One older with a gray beard, another middle-aged with glasses, and a young man who appeared to be an apprentice.
All three looked up when Ren approached.
And two went pale.
“No,” the gray-bearded one muttered, recognition and horror mixing in his expression like someone watching their worst nightmare manifest in physical form. “It can’t be… We changed places for nothing.”
“It’s him,” the middle-aged one confirmed, removing his glasses to clean them nervously with shaking hands. “Patinder…”
The name carried weight.
Not fame exactly… Not here. Here was more like infamy among a very specific population of material evaluators who’d learned to dread certain students not because they did anything wrong but because they did everything too well.
“The one you told me about?” The young apprentice heard that name and remembered. “The ’just to be sure’ reason you hired me? But how bad can he be…”
The sentence trailed off as he saw his mentors’ expressions. The thousand-yard stare of men who’d survived horrors that couldn’t be adequately explained, only experienced.
“Six months without seeing you,” Ren completed with a small smile that suggested he knew exactly what that expression meant and found it amusing. “Hello again.”
The two men exchanged looks of shared suffering. They already knew what was coming.
A mountain of work, overtime hours and the endless classification of diverse materials that Ren would have brought in absurd quantities.
Last time it took four days of non-stop evaluation. Four days of weighing, measuring, testing quality, cross-referencing with market prices, calculating grades. Four days where they’d questioned their career choices and wondered if becoming farmers wouldn’t have been simpler.
And now he was back.
The gray-bearded one sighed deeply, resigned to his fate. Professional pride warring with the exhaustion that came just from anticipating what this would cost him.
“Very well, Patinder. How many hundred-kilogram backpacks this time?”
Last time had been three hundred. Three hundred backpacks of different materials, different qualities, different processing requirements. A logistical nightmare that had required bringing in extra staff and extending building hours.
If Ren had somehow topped that…
“Two hundred between everyone,” Ren responded casually, gesturing toward his team waiting with loads.
The three evaluators relaxed slightly. Two hundred was less than three hundred. This might actually be manageable. Painful, yes, but survivable.
“This time my Wolverine’s space has only half the backpacks… it doesn’t carry as much weight because the fabric’s volume is much larger relative to past materials’ weight. But the external load is bigger in volume because my guys and beasts weren’t as limited by weight.”
The clarification made ’dreadful sense’ now… Less weight but more volume, which meant more total material even if the backpack count was lower.
The three evaluators groaned in unison. Dropping from three hundred last time to two hundred now didn’t sound very relaxing when it seemed the backpacks were about to explode and the materials would end up occupying more space.
Expanded volume could also mean handling difficulty… Mean unpacking and repacking. Mean measuring became more complex because you had to account for compression and air gaps.
“And I suppose,” the middle-aged one said weakly, hope dying even as he spoke, “you have the usual mix of different plant elements, different material ages, different beast parts…”
His voice carried the resignation of someone who already knew the answer but had to ask anyway. His professional thoroughness demanded him to confirm the scope of suffering ahead.
“Ah, no. This time we went to a different place because of the rules changes.”
“Different?” All three straightened, hope being born in their expressions like flowers pushing through mortar or concrete. “Different how?”
Different was good, right? Different meant maybe, possibly, this wouldn’t be the nightmare they’d anticipated. Maybe Ren had somehow found a simpler option. Maybe the universe had decided to show mercy.
Ren pulled his personal backpack off and placed it on the table. “All the cargo is exactly the same material. Giant weaver silk, optimal age, processed in the most ideal Silver 3 ring conditions.”
The silence that followed was profound.
The gray-bearded one opened the backpack with hands that trembled slightly, not from nervousness but from professional anticipation.
Years of experience telling him this might actually be good news. Uniform material meant uniform processing. Meant evaluation would be straightforward. Meant he might actually sleep these days instead of working non stop.
He pulled out a roll of silk.
The fabric gleamed with that characteristic luster that only came from perfect years of natural aging. The fibers were uniform, without irregularities, without sections too weak or too rigid. The color was consistent, a creamy white that indicated exceptional purity.
Professional evaluation running automatically. Thread count. Tensile strength estimate from visual inspection.
“This is…” the man whispered, his expert fingers examining the texture with the reverence of someone who rarely encountered true quality. “This is beautiful.”
The middle-aged evaluator approached, pulling his own sample from another backpack. Then another. And another.
Each examination more excited than the last. Comparing samples, checking consistency, running preliminary tests with the kind of enthusiasm that only came from experts encountering something that made their job easier rather than harder.