Chapter 329 - 329: Open Conspiracy

The sun was setting.

Luo Xuan's parents returned home, pulling up to their door on their motorcycle.

Luo Xuan's father, a carpenter, saw the lights on in the living room and the sneakers by the shoe rack and knew his son had returned.

"Ah Xuan, you're back?"

Luo Xuan, who was at his computer, heard the familiar shout from downstairs. He looked up and called back, "Dad! I'm upstairs."

His mother, carrying vegetables and eggs, also heard her son's voice and hurried inside. "Ah Xuan, you didn't even say you were coming back! I'll go buy some white-cut chicken."

Luo Xuan turned off his computer and walked to the top of the stairs. "Mom, don't worry about it. I have a gathering with some colleagues tonight, so you don't need to make my dinner."

It was a rare chance for the family to be together. As his mother cooked in the kitchen, she asked Luo Xuan about his work and his life.

His father turned on the TV and made small talk with his son.

After they had chatted for over half an hour, Luo Xuan checked the time. Realizing it was almost time for his get-together, he went upstairs to change into a more presentable outfit and freshen up.

He walked out of the small alley and scanned a QR code for a shared bike on the side of the road.

「Over twenty minutes later.」

Luo Xuan arrived at the entrance of a casual, open-air restaurant.

A middle-aged man in his thirties saw Luo Xuan and immediately walked over enthusiastically. "You must be Luo Xuan, right? I'm Huang Xianjun from the Puning Branch."

"Hello! Brother Huang, please, call me Xuanzi," Luo Xuan said, a little stiff.

Huang Xianjun clapped him on the shoulder. "Don't be so stiff. We're all friends here. Let's head in and eat! Two of our colleagues are already here, and two more will be here in a bit."

"It's very generous of you, Brother Huang."

The two of them entered a small private room inside the restaurant.

The two other colleagues who had arrived earlier greeted Luo Xuan warmly as he walked in. They appeared to be a couple.

Huang Xianjun handed the menu to Luo Xuan. "Xuanzi, don't be shy. Order whatever you like."

Luo Xuan took the menu, but as he looked over the dishes, he was at a loss. Even though prices for daily necessities and food were regulated within the country, the effects of the global economy were still impossible to avoid.

On the menu, the Typhoon Shelter Crab was 80 Jin, the Steamed Mantis Shrimp with Soft Roe was 200 Jin, the Beef with Chinese Broccoli was 40 Jin, the Clam and Winter Melon Soup was 80 Jin, and the Garlic-Fried Dried Shrimp was 80 Jin...

The prices made him scratch his head. Since someone else was paying, he worried he'd make a bad impression if he ordered carelessly.

Huang Xianjun noticed his hesitation and shook his head with a smile. "The Typhoon Shelter Crab is good, and the braised conger eel is pretty good, too."

The other male colleague chimed in with a laugh, "Don't hold back on Old Huang's account, kid. He's a Grade Bing-4."

'Grade Bing-4?' Luo Xuan was, of course, familiar with Homo Sapiens Company's employee ranking system.

'The base salary for a Grade Bing-4 starts at 3,000 Jin. Add in all the miscellaneous allowances and benefits, and it probably comes out to around 4,000 Jin.'

'That was almost four times what I make.'

Instantly, Luo Xuan's guilt eased. He ordered the Beef with Chinese Broccoli and a Golden Pumpkin Soup, then passed the menu to the male colleague who had just spoken.

"Brother Liu, you take a look."

Liu Mingzhi took it with a grin. "You're really good at saving Old Huang's money."

Luo Xuan laughed awkwardly and scratched his head.

Liu Mingzhi's girlfriend asked curiously, "Xuanzi, you're with Dream Country Company?"

"Yes, I'm a manga plot editor there. And you, Sister Hong?"

Lin Lihong poured him a cup of oolong tea. "I'm with the Huaguo Branch of Fengrao House."

Luo Xuan was surprised to hear that. "Fengrao House? That subsidiary has operations here?"

"Who says we don't?" Lin Lihong explained. "We may not have gotten market approval for brick-and-mortar supermarkets, but we have an overseas e-commerce department with direct access to the entire Far East Region."

"So we can buy products from Fengrao House through overseas purchasing?" Luo Xuan asked after a sip of oolong tea.

Lin Lihong nodded. "Yep! You can. And if you use an employee account, the prices are much cheaper. Our company has an exclusive partnership with SF Express, so all online orders here are shipped through them."

In truth, Fengrao House's partnership with SF Express was only part of the picture. The company had also established numerous agricultural procurement centers throughout the Far East Region.

These procurement centers were all established around local specialty agricultural products. After being acquired, these products were processed and packaged before being sold in bulk to Homo Sapiens Company's Southeast Asia Headquarters.

And all these agricultural products had one thing in common: they were required to have organic certification from Homo Sapiens Company.

This organic certification wasn't something you could just buy. Homo Sapiens Company's agricultural division had a dedicated Department of Organic Agriculture, which in turn had its own Office of Organic Certification tasked specifically with this.

Farms and plantations with Homo Sapiens Company's organic certification were subject to random inspections to ensure their products met the required standards. Failure to comply would result in a warning, or even immediate revocation of their certification.

In this way, Homo Sapiens Company extended its reach into various agricultural regions.

And for the sake of earning foreign exchange in Jin, some regions had no choice but to compromise.

In reality, Homo Sapiens Company was perfectly capable of producing these agricultural products itself, but doing so would hinder its ability to project its influence into other regions.

Making various regions dependent on Homo Sapiens Company—that was the strategy.

Of course, supporting local industries didn't mean Homo Sapiens Company was abandoning the sector itself. On the contrary, the company placed even greater importance on protecting its own supply chain.

For example, by supporting numerous organic farms and plantations in the Far East Region, the company's goal was to encourage local farmers to favor cash crops over food grains.

Homo Sapiens Company's sinister intentions were practically an overt scheme.

As long as a region needed foreign exchange in Jin, it had no choice but to make industrial compromises.

So-called "organic agriculture" involved producing goods in a semi-natural way, which meant lower yields per unit and the need for large amounts of organic fertilizer. And as it happened, Homo Sapiens Company was now the world's largest producer of organic fertilizer.

These interlocking tactics would only continue to deepen Homo Sapiens Company's influence in every sector.

The numerous agricultural procurement centers that Fengrao House established in the Far East Region all required their supplying farms and plantations to have organic certification.

In order to earn foreign exchange in Jin, many powerful investment groups jumped into the fray, acquiring large tracts of land in various agricultural zones to develop organic farms.

Although it couldn't purchase land and farmland outright, Homo Sapiens Company had other methods. Using Jin-denominated foreign exchange to incentivize farmers to plant cash crops was a key tactic.

Take the South Asia Region, for example. Homo Sapiens Company was cooperating with large farm owners, incentivizing them to plant various cash crops. At the same time, it was dumping low-priced grain into Tianzhu, thereby suppressing the scale of Tianzhu's own food cultivation. This caused Tianzhu's food deficit to grow ever larger, making it increasingly dependent on Homo Sapiens Company.

Did elites in Tianzhu, like Dharma, not see what was happening?

No. They saw it with perfect clarity.

But they were powerless to resist. Tianzhu's food deficit was only projected to grow, and ensuring food self-sufficiency would mean abandoning the cultivation of cash crops.

There was only one way to get farmers to abandon cash crops and switch to food crops: provide massive subsidies.

The problem was, did Tianzhu have the ability to provide such massive subsidies?

The answer was self-evident.

Homo Sapiens Company could use Jin to subsidize farmers for planting cash crops because it had deep pockets.

Tianzhu had no real industry to speak of, no significant mineral resources, and no advanced technology. On top of that, its agricultural sector could barely achieve self-sufficiency due to its massive population.

What could Dharma possibly use to fight Homo Sapiens Company? Willpower?

This was the fatal weakness of any populous, economically underdeveloped region: as long as it couldn't achieve food self-sufficiency and simultaneously needed to develop its economy, it had no choice but to compromise with Homo Sapiens Company.