No Step On Slime

Chapter 20: Dispolt General Industries

"...And, I formally declare the first civilian factory of Dispolt General Industries established in the Jura Tempest Federation."

Raising my short sword, I ceremoniously slashed at the ribbon at the entrance to the factory. Several people behind me began to clap; many of Tempest's residents were spectating the event.

I looked over the metal and brick structure that stood looming over this section of Tempest. Months of work had gotten me to this point.

This factory was going to be one of the foundations of Tempest's industrial base. 

Over the past few weeks, I had gone out and surveyed the needs of the general population of Tempest, to see what was in demand. It seemed that a lot of people wanted durable kitchen utensils and simple craftsmanship tools. 

That meant the first factory of Tempest would specialize in mass-producing stuff like forks, spoons, knives, hammers, nails, crowbars... 

It sure was mundane as hell. But I needed to begin making the mundane shit first before I start moving onto other forms of mass industry, so I can weed out all the beginning issues. If a spoon fails because of bad manufacturing, no big deal. If a gun fails... well, someone's going to get hurt in that situation, for sure.

But that wasn't the only thing the factory was meant to do. A large portion of it, around half of its equipment, were general-purpose machining tools. The idea was that I would build factories that were around half-and-half for mass production and specialized machining.

You need machining to build more factories, after all. Going for an all-consumer goods factory wouldn't contribute to the construction of the next factory at all, and on the opposite end, a pure machining-only factory wouldn't immediately contribute to Tempest in any way.

A good fifty-fifty split never hurt anyone. Every new factory that was built going forward was both going to contribute to Tempest's production and help with the construction of the next factory.

"This is impressive," Rimuru said. He stood behind me to spectate the ceremony. Although the slime didn't participate in it directly, his presence alone was enough to draw a crowd.

"She's my baby," I replied. "I'm gettin' that same rush I did years ago, when I walked into my machine shop for the first time."

"Euphoria?"

"More like massive, short-term dopamine rush followed by empty hollowness within the same minute."

It took the humanoid slime a dozen seconds to formulate a response.

"...Are you okay, Talleigh?"

I lightly tapped at his side with my elbow. "Of course I am, it's a joke. I think. I'm actually not sure."

Silence.

"Moving on!" I continued. "We've got the actual factory itself built, but now comes the task of manning it. Since you were a general contractor at one point, I figured you'd be better at assigning and organizing jobs 'n such. Any objects otherwise?"

"Nope," the humanoid slime replied. "As far as I'm aware, the factory is up to JISHA safety standards. Everything seems to be in order, too."

That was good. I wasn't much of a good manager, I had to admit. The best I could probably do was tutor them on how to use the tools and teach them basic machining skills.

At some point, Kaijin had asked if I was ever going to take an apprentice. I answered no because I don't know jack shit about teaching.

But I was still just one person. And it was ridiculously stressful having to juggle so many tasks at once, so I might consider it later. But who would I even take as an apprentice?