Douluo: Adventure Begins from Wuhun City

Chapter 317

The Harrick family also used their extensive connections in the business world to build a huge sales network.

Their soul guide products flowed continuously to every corner of the continent. From bustling cities to remote towns, soul guides made by Harik could be seen everywhere.

Relying on high-quality products and clever marketing strategies, the Harik family accumulated huge wealth in a short period of time, which was further converted into capital for them to expand their strength.

They purchased a large amount of land, built strong castles and fortifications, recruited batches of soul masters and warriors, trained them rigorously, and created an elite army.

As for the other noble families, they would naturally not sit idly by and watch the actions of the Harik family.

On the surface, they maintained friendly relations with the Harrick family. At various gatherings and activities, everyone raised their glasses to celebrate and talked and laughed, as if they had really become a family.

But in fact, every family is secretly deploying and closely monitoring the Harik family.

Those seemingly ordinary businessmen and craftsmen might actually be spies planted by a certain noble family. They always pay attention to the business activities, personnel flows and research and development progress of the Harik family's soul guides.

At a grand soul guide exhibition, various families displayed their latest research results.

The Harik family's booth was crowded with visitors, and their new soul guide attracted everyone's attention.

These soul guides are not only powerful, but also easy to operate and extremely practical.

The heads of other families stood aside, praising the products of the Harik family on the surface, but their eyes revealed deep jealousy and resentment.

A family head snorted coldly and whispered to the person next to him.

"Humph, the Harik family is just lucky. They got those soul guide researchers and achieved such results. When we find an opportunity, we must let them know that they can't make any big waves in Sun Moon City."

After returning to the family, the head of the family immediately convened the family's think tank to discuss how to deal with the rise of the Harik family.

They formulated a series of plans to try to suppress the Harik family from multiple aspects including business, politics and military.

In business, they united to launch a price war against the Harik family's products, lowering the selling price of their own family's soul guides in an attempt to squeeze the Harik family's market share.

Politically, they constantly proposed resolutions in the Sun and Moon City Parliament that were unfavorable to the Harik family, trying to restrict their development.

In the military, they strengthened the training of the family army, improved the combat effectiveness of the soldiers, and were always prepared to deal with possible conflicts.

The Harik family naturally sensed the hostility of other families, but they did not back down. Instead, they acted more cautiously. In a business negotiation, representatives of the Harik family discussed cooperation with merchants from other families.

On the surface, both parties acted very friendly and were full of expectations for the prospect of cooperation. However, during the negotiation process, the two sides engaged in a fierce battle over the distribution of benefits and the terms of cooperation. Every word and every clause was like an invisible sword, stabbing the other party's vital points.

The representative of the Harik family, with his excellent eloquence and keen insight, skillfully resolved the other party's difficulties and finally reached a cooperation agreement that was beneficial to his family.

In addition to commercial and political games, competition in the research and development of soul guides is also becoming increasingly fierce.

In order to surpass the Harik family in technology, other families have increased their investment in soul guide research.

They spared no expense to recruit outstanding soul guide researchers from all over the country and established their own research and development team. In the laboratory, the researchers worked day and night to try to break through the technical bottleneck and develop more advanced soul guides.

The atmosphere in the Harik family's laboratory was equally tense. Although the captured researchers were filled with resentment, they had no choice but to go all out under the coercion and inducement of the Harik family.

They knew that their research results were not only related to the rise and fall of the Harik family, but also to the safety of themselves and their families.

In this battlefield without gunpowder, the collection and transmission of intelligence became extremely important. Each family established its own intelligence network and trained batches of spies.

These spies shuttled between various families, collecting all kinds of intelligence. They disguised themselves as ordinary servants and eavesdropped on their masters' conversations in the mansion of the Harik family.

Or they might infiltrate other families' business activities and steal their trade secrets.

Once, a spy from the Harik family successfully sneaked into the core area of ​​a noble family and stole a design drawing of a new type of soul guide.

This blueprint is undoubtedly a precious treasure for the Harik family. They immediately organized researchers to analyze and study the blueprint, trying to gain inspiration from it and further improve their family's soul guide technology.

However, espionage is also full of risks. Once, when spies from other families were operating near the Harik family's laboratory, they were discovered by the Harik family's guards.

The two sides immediately engaged in a fierce battle, and the spy tried to escape the pursuit with his agile skills and superb soul power.

But the guards of the Harik family were not to be outdone. They followed the spy closely and launched a thrilling chase in the night.

In the end, although the spy managed to escape, he was seriously injured, and the intelligence he brought back was greatly reduced.

As time went on, the contradictions between the Harik family and other families became deeper and deeper, and the conflicts became more frequent.

At a trade fair in Sun Moon City, the caravan of the Harik family clashed with caravans of other families. The two sides argued fiercely over the location of the stalls and the price of the goods.

Eventually, the conflict escalated into a small-scale fight, with casualties on both sides varying degrees.

This incident attracted the attention of the top leaders of Sun Moon City, and they had to step in to mediate and quell the disturbance.

The intervention of the top leaders of Yuecheng was like a majestic giant lock, forcibly binding the increasingly fierce struggle between the Harik family and other families into a so-called "stable" framework.

Although some families had flames of hatred burning in their hearts, wishing to crush the Harik family into ashes in an instant, the words of the top leaders were like a sword of Damocles hanging high in the sky, and they could only grit their teeth and swallow their anger, accepting the ruling unwillingly.

In Sun Moon City, a prosperous city controlled by many aristocratic families, the balance of power is never absolutely balanced.

In this family dispute, not everyone is eager to engage in a life-and-death struggle with the Harik family.

Some noble families, under the strategy of the Harik family's spending lavishly and granting favors during this period, began to quietly shift their positions, and there was a subtle tendency to lean towards the Harik family.

This is the powerful magic of money in the game of power. It is like an invisible hand, quietly stirring the delicate relationship between various forces. Seeing that they cannot eliminate the Harik family physically through force, those aristocratic families who are full of dissatisfaction can only shift the battlefield to the business field, trying to deal with the Harik family with the business model they think they are best at.

These noble families were confident in their own business methods. In their view, although the Harik family had found a new way and caught up with them in soul guide technology, they had only caught up.

If the Harik family wants to keep pace with them or even surpass them, they obviously still have a long way to go.

However, just as these families were immersed in their confident dreams, a series of abnormal phenomena began to attract their attention.

They were shocked to find that the production capacity of the Harik family's soul guides was very abnormal.

In the past, although there were differences in the production of soul guides among the various families, they were generally within a comparable range.

But now, the products of the Harik family are like a tide, pouring into the market continuously. The large quantity and rapid growth rate have caught other families off guard.

In order to explore the mystery, several families united together and organized a group of top business spies and soul guide research experts to conduct meticulous research on the products of the Harik family.

They are like hungry vultures, not letting go of any possible clues.

After countless disassemblies and analyses, and the use of the most advanced soul detection equipment and ancient mysterious soul power perception methods, they finally discovered an astonishing secret.

The ore used by the Harik family to make soul guides was not any of the ones they were familiar with. This ore had never been seen before, and it had a strange luster on the surface, deep and mysterious, as if it contained endless mysteries of the universe.

When the researchers used their soul power to sense it, they were shocked by the tremendous energy contained within it.

It was a surging force, whose quality was countless times better than the ores produced in the mines that the major families guarded as their lifeblood.

Just a small piece of this mysterious ore contains energy that is several or even dozens of times that of ordinary ore.

This discovery was like dropping a bombshell into a calm lake, causing all the noble families in Sun Moon City to go wild.

Originally, they thought that they had absolute advantages in business competition, whether in terms of technical background, market channels or financial reserves, which were enough to crush the Harik family.

But now, the appearance of this mysterious mineral has completely shattered their fantasies.

If the Harik family possessed a large amount of this ore, they would have unparalleled cost and performance advantages in the manufacture of soul guides.

This means that the Harik family can not only produce more powerful soul guides at a lower price, but also completely suppress other families in terms of production.

For a time, the heads of various families urgently summoned the family's think tanks, elders and core members to hold secret meetings one after another.

In those dark and luxurious meeting rooms, the atmosphere was as heavy as the depression before a storm.

The faces of the family heads were clouded with gloom, and their eyes revealed anxiety, anger and unwillingness.

"How is this possible? Where did the Harik family get this ore? Did they discover a mysterious mine?"

A family head roared angrily and slammed his fist on the table, causing the teacups on the table to jump.

"No matter where they got it from, it is a huge threat to us. If we don't find a solution soon, my family's business will plummet."

The other family head said worriedly, and the wrinkles on his face seemed to deepen a little bit.

The members of the think tank also fell into deep thought. They paced around the room with frowns on their faces, trying to come up with a solution to this dilemma.

Someone suggested sending someone to investigate the source of the Harik family's ore and find out their secrets at all costs.

Some people advocated uniting to completely block the Harik family's business channels, preventing their products from entering the market.

Others suggested increasing the development of their own mines, looking for ways to improve the quality of ore, and competing with the Harik family in ore quality.

However, these proposals all have many problems and risks. It is not easy to investigate the source of the Harik family's ore, and they will certainly protect this secret closely. If they are not careful, the people sent out will never come back.

To jointly block the business channels of the Harik family, all the families need to work together, but now the families already have their own ulterior motives and it is difficult to reach a consensus. Moreover, doing so may cause dissatisfaction among the top leaders of Sun Moon City and lead to more serious consequences.

Increasing the development of its own mines would not only require a large investment of money and manpower, but would also be difficult to achieve significant results in a short period of time, and would be completely unable to cope with the current crisis.

"Those old guys are probably in a mess now."

Norton chuckled, his voice full of confidence and sarcasm.

The family think tank standing nearby, an old man with white hair but still sharp eyes, nodded slightly and said.

"Master, the ore that Lady Brigitte gave us this time really caught them off guard. However, they will definitely not give up, and I'm afraid there will be more troubles next."

Harik narrowed his eyes slightly, thought for a moment and then said, “Of course I know.

But the more anxious they are, the more likely they are to make mistakes. We must make good use of this opportunity and further expand our advantage.

On the one hand, we should speed up the production and sales of soul guides, and quickly seize more market share before they react; on the other hand, we should strengthen the protection of the source of ore, and never let them find any loopholes. "

"With Brigitte and the guy behind the other team here, as long as we don't make any mistakes, we'll be invincible!"

"Yes, Patriarch. I'll arrange it right away."

The old man said respectfully, then turned and quickly left the study.

(End of this chapter)