Rise of the Argentine Empire

This trip to the capital was very successful, successfully getting admitted to Buda and completing the established goals.

I also started two new companies and laid out some small goals along the way.

It's just that the expenditure was outrageous, almost draining all of the Plari factory's working capital, which is very dangerous.

I just paid the down payment deposit, and Redwood Company also began acquiring General Motors stock. The remaining Redwood employees formed a new public relations intelligence department, mainly responsible for collecting information on various stock companies to prepare for the future.

Besides arranging future work, Saint Hesser's return to Cordoba had another purpose: to prepare to raise another sum of money. The plastics factory has been completed, and the new factory building can be mortgaged to the bank for a loan. I believe the banks in the city will agree. This time, I have to return to the base camp to get money, otherwise, it will be difficult to pay the first batch of installments, especially since the new production line is about to arrive.

The trip to the capital made Saint Hesser truly feel the benefits of having a large population. He used to think it was a bit difficult, but the problem wasn't that big. The unions' nonsense also made him realize the weakness of elected governments for the first time. Of course, Saint Hesser doesn't like incompetent military governments either.

Cordoba is actually good in every way, except that it lacks people. The power of numbers is indeed an eternal truth. Only mass production can cause qualitative change, as Saint Hesser experienced more profoundly.

The Buda metropolitan area is ten times the size of the Cordoba metropolitan area, and the talent it gathers is far more than ten times the size.

He also didn't bring a suitcase, leaving it in a small warehouse in the capital, only carrying a cloth bag, and the cash was in small bills.

The main reason was to avoid trouble. There's no need to show off with these young thugs, after all, it's not his territory. These train robbers loot every carriage, and there are no security personnel on the broken train.

Saint Hesser hesitated and handed over fifty pesos, which the thug snatched away.

He didn't encounter any problems last time he came to the capital. Now Saint Hesser has learned to be a bit smarter, after all, he only has one life, and he can only slowly solve these problems in the future.

Besides the thugs, there were no other accidents along the way. Nowadays, people who take the train usually don't have much money.

I need to be more careful and cautious in the future. Since Saint Hesser had a late-night snack with Little Knicks one night, he saw dozens of gangsters fighting with watermelon knives and the like, fighting fiercely.

Once, he saw the body of a young man in a stinking ditch, and it wasn't discovered until the next day. The police didn't investigate and didn't find the real killer.

These two special encounters made Saint Hesser completely understand that this is not a peaceful country, and this is not a peaceful era. He misses that great country a bit.

When it's time to be low-key, you still need to be low-key. When you're out and about, you can't be too high-profile, it's easy to get messed with when your strength isn't enough.

I don't know if it's just my imagination, but it seems that there are many people leaving the capital by train this time. The waiting room was crowded, and there were many people in line. After checking his ticket, Saint Hesser entered his seat and sat down.

There were more than half as many people in the carriage today as last time. Several people were even sitting around Saint Hesser, talking loudly and wearing cowboy hats.

Saint Hesser also pricked up his ears to listen to their chat, hearing some gossip.

It turned out that these people had come to the capital to participate in some horse racing festival and were just finishing up on Thursday, catching the Friday train back.

Saint Hesser had heard of the horse racing festival. Back then, he was also considered a little prince of grassland horse racing, but he hasn't ridden a horse since he transmigrated.

Unlike his predecessor, he doesn't like to talk to strangers, so he just listened to these people talking. There were also a few from Cordoba Province, but he didn't recognize them, so he quietly listened to them bragging.

… …

Cordoba, the entrance to the Plari factory area.

Getting off the three-wheeled scooter, Saint Hesser couldn't help but miss the taxis of the capital. He doesn't seem to have seen many taxis in Cordoba.

As soon as he entered the factory area, the air seemed to be filled with a desolate atmosphere. Saint Hesser frowned.

The security guard at the entrance was also gone, and there were even few people in the factory. Today is Friday, normal working hours. He looked up at his watch and it wasn't even 5 o'clock. Could it be that the people at the Plari factory are also on strike? If this is true, it's unbearable.

Saint Hesser was a bit doubtful. He arrived at the factory area, and the Plari First Factory Area was still quite primitive.

The newly built brick walls and hardened floors, the four indoor breeding grounds were connected, and there was no one on the arranged production line.

After walking more than ten meters, he saw some workers, only twenty or so. The factory area was empty, and the production line had stopped.

It didn't seem to be a strike. They were gathering together, and Rox was saying some words to appease them.

“Don’t worry, everyone. Our boss will be back today and will definitely help us solve the problem,”

“Manager, it’s not that we don’t trust the factory director, it’s just that the mad dog Rooney's men are too ruthless. Many people in the factory have been threatened and even beaten. They said that if we still come to work, they will come to our homes,” The middle-aged man who spoke looked terrified.

“Mad dog Rooney? What the hell is that?” Saint Hesser was full of question marks. Could it be that a dog appeared nearby and would threaten employees?

“Yes, several of our factory's security guards have been beaten into the hospital. It's useless to call the police,”

“We are just small employees, and we also want to continue working, but safety is also very important.”

I've only been away from Cordoba for a few days and I'm already being targeted. Okay, okay. Saint Hesser listened for a while and finally understood. I don't know which idiot is trying to cause trouble.

Saint Hesser stood behind Cross and called out, “Cross, what's going on?” Cross jumped in fright, and his face turned pale instantly.

“Bo… … Boss, you’re finally back,” Cross's voice trembled a little, startled.

“I'll settle accounts with you later. You didn't report such a big matter,” Saint Hesser was a little annoyed. The factory is almost collapsing, with only a few of the five hundred workers left.

“Everyone, don’t be afraid. Who is this mad dog Rooney? I'll solve the problem.” Saint Hesser calmed down and relaxed as soon as he returned to Cordoba. This is the base camp.

When everyone saw that the real boss had arrived, they breathed a sigh of relief.

They started talking one after another. It turned out that this Mad Dog Gang was a branch formed by the notorious foreign gang “Bird Brothers” from North Deannes Town.

During this period, it expanded into the city and cooperated with the local gangs in the Grand Market, absorbing many new gang members, and its power expanded.

Seeing that this Plari factory was developing very well, they targeted it.

At first, they sent their underlings to collect some money, and when Cross saw that it was better to avoid trouble than to cause it, he gave it to them, but they became more and more arrogant.

The day before yesterday, they threatened to give 1 million pesos a month as “tribute”, otherwise, the factory wouldn't be able to continue operating.

Of course, Cross wouldn't agree and directly rejected their request.

The next day, almost all the employees were warned not to go to work,

Even the people in the security department were injured in a sneak attack at night, and most of the employees didn't come to work today.

Even those coming to work were threatened. Kross reported it to the police, but they refused to handle it and even detained some of the security department personnel, planning to deal with it when Saint-Hesse returned.

Oh ho, some more short-sighted people have set their sights on us, huh?

Saint-Hesse thought for a moment that it probably wasn't as simple as it seemed on the surface. A foreign gang, plus some locals, dared to assault and extort people, and the police weren't doing anything about it. Interesting.

"The factory will be closed for today and tomorrow. Even those not working will receive their basic salary. Please inform each other, and come back to work the day after tomorrow," Saint-Hesse instructed, ignoring the workers' discussions.

Then, without looking back, he left the factory directly, leaving the workers a bit bewildered. They could go back to work the day after tomorrow? That was too fast.

"Does the boss mean he's planning to pay up?"

How could he possibly pay? Now it was a penniless revolution. Since money couldn't solve the problem, he'd definitely have to solve the people causing the problem. Saint-Hesse was already planning to go all out.

Now he needed to comfort the security guards in the hospital, get the people out of the police station, and then gather intelligence to deal with this "Bird Brotherhood." That would make it easier to deal with them.

Saint-Hesse flashed his military officer's ID and bailed out the police station's staff, paying a bail of 20,000 pesos. He definitely wouldn't get it back, which almost made Saint-Hesse curse. Corruption was everywhere; fighting was neither a big deal nor a small one.

This time, it was clear that the police department was in the wrong. Saint-Hesse gave them a small step down, and they took it. After all, the police department still remembered the power of the former City Defense Force. Of course, the brothers couldn't miss out on their extra income.

Those who ended up in the police station for fighting weren't seriously injured. The more serious cases were sent to nearby hospitals.

Saint-Hesse took his men to the hospital to offer condolences, saying that everyone who was injured would receive a bonus of 50,000 pesos for the month, and instructed them to rest well. He would avenge them tomorrow. The security guards cheered. The ones in the police station couldn't help but want to punch themselves. This was too good! Getting punched twice earned them 50,000 pesos.

Saint-Hesse said that those in the police station would receive a reward of 30,000 pesos, thanking them for their hard work.

This left the security team members dumbfounded. These people were all recruited by Saint-Hesse from veterans. They were actually decent fighters, but they couldn't withstand being outnumbered. Plus, the original City Defense Force's training was average, so they were caught off guard and suffered a great loss. They were taken down by underhanded tactics.

These gang members didn't hit too hard, and their fighting was relatively organized. They even sneakily took turns attacking.

Saint-Hesse planned to train his security team subordinates properly in the future. These people actually had a good foundation.

He had been somewhat careless, thinking that nothing major would happen in Cordoba, assuming that the most serious situation would be like the small gangs he encountered in the vegetable market last time. He didn't expect that the people from the town he almost got hacked in the past had developed into the city.

Old grudges and new scores could be settled together. Was he, Saint-Hesse, being too merciful?

As for the factory, it could only be shut down. Fortunately, there was good news. Saint-Hesse had prepared for the summer beverage sales surge, producing enough quantity. During the off-season, he had expanded wildly and stockpiled a large amount of product in advance to prepare for the market explosion when summer arrived.

The large warehouse at the central train station had already stockpiled at least a month's worth of sales for the summer. This could support the current winter and spring seasons for two months. This was good news; at least there were no major problems at the warehouse, and the subsequent sales wouldn't be affected in the short term.

Since the glass factory incident last time, plus when canned goods sales had stabilized, Saint-Hesse had intentionally purchased all new production lines as beverage production lines and expanded production wildly. So even if production was halted for a few days, it wouldn't be affected.

Originally, Kross and others felt that there was no need to aim for a 120% operating rate. It was too tiring. Wouldn't it be better to go home on time every day and have a beer? But Saint-Hesse was very generous with wages, which inspired the passion of the lazy Argentinians.

Although this affected the lifespan of the production equipment and the inventory occupied a very large amount of capital, now the management of the Plarry factory also admired Saint-Hesse's foresight. But he didn't have any foresight, no, he didn't.

At the time, he just felt that he had to quickly convert the current pesos into means of production and inventory. The devaluation was too much, which was not good. Anyway, the old batch of equipment would be phased out and replaced with a new generation. It didn't matter whether it was maintained or not. It was also cheaper to hire workers during the off-season, so he could just stockpile more inventory.

Fortunately, the payment terms with the suppliers had been changed to monthly settlements. He asked Kross to appease the suppliers' emotions. It had to be resolved as soon as possible. If the new factory in Bu City and the old factory in Ke City weren't resolved, even the Maria Town factory, which was about to start construction, would collapse.

To prevent problems at the warehouse, Saint-Hesse sent more people over there and systematically dumped the inventory to business companies in various places to spread the risk.

……

At 6:10 PM, after arranging things, he arrived at the Cordoba Argentine 8th Infantry Brigade Headquarters, which was also the original City Defense Force Headquarters.

Saint-Hesse entered the headquarters with his credentials.

The reformed infantry brigade was clearly much stricter. The intensity of military training had increased, and the soldiers on duty didn't recognize him, questioning Saint-Hesse for a long time.

The staff department got off work at 7:00 PM if they didn't work overtime, with weekends off. Saint-Hesse's workstation was still there. He greeted the chief of staff.

Then, he chatted with old colleagues in the staff department, bragging and boasting, and learned about the latest situation in the brigade and the city.

In particular, he asked about the "Bird Brotherhood," getting the information he wanted.

It turned out that this "Bird Brotherhood" was an Italian gang that originally only dared to develop in the suburban satellite towns. Some time ago, they seemed to have colluded with the police station and the council in the city, and their development was very rapid. They also cooperated with local small gangs and did a few big things.

"Mad Dog Rooney" was the branch leader of the "Bird Brotherhood" in Ke City, responsible for development and expansion here.

Rumor had it that he grew up in a Catholic welfare home, dropped out of school at the age of eleven or twelve, and became a street thug through swindling and deception. Later, he was absorbed into the "Bird Brotherhood."

After joining the brotherhood, he fought fiercely. He was ruthless to others and ruthless to his own people, like a mad dog. He also successfully expanded his territory. He had seen blood. It was said that when a subordinate disobeyed his orders, his teeth were knocked out one by one. Of course, he was also capable. Later, he was appreciated by the brotherhood's higher-ups and sent to Ke City as the person in charge of Deannes Town, absorbing many people and expanding rapidly.

In the past six months or so, because of the infighting between the City Defense Force and the National Defense Army, Ke City had become somewhat chaotic. The "Bird Brotherhood" took the opportunity to develop. They originally only dared to stay in the suburbs, but after hooking up with the "upper class" in the city, they began to develop into the urban area.

As for the Plarry factory incident, it was just a part of it. They dominated major markets to collect protection fees, even engaging in illegal activities, extortion, and all kinds of vices. They opened underground small casinos, bars, dance halls, screening rooms, and so on, providing everything. In the short time that Saint-Hesse had been away from Ke City, less than half a month, they had expanded into a tumor in the city, creating a foul atmosphere.

They also seemed to have intervened in the labor union, beating striking workers and illegally detaining people. The police department didn't care much.

Saint-Hesse made an appointment with Commander Kane's secretary, planning to have dinner with the commander after work to chat and solve these Bird Brotherhood's bastards at the same time.