The Vastness of Magical Destiny
Chapter 389: Volume 7: Spring Thunder Awakens the Hibernating Creatures, - 11: The Fisherman_4

Chapter 389: Volume 7: Spring Thunder Awakens the Hibernating Creatures, Chapter 11: The Fisherman_4

It was only a two or three li distance from the dock to the Mattdam township area, and the land prices in this region had skyrocketed several times over after Mattdam was designated as an open port. The profit gained from this alone made Puber laugh until he was short of breath. The port dock was severely lacking, as the original design was primarily for river transportation. After all, before obtaining the status of an open port, only the river transportation from Bahomon to Mattdam supported this dock. But now things were different. Facing the vast Nether Sea and Mediterranean, and with the Catania River’s long and wide waterways, the special location at the confluence of river and sea bestowed Mattdam with significant importance. It was set to become the window for the Caucasus’s external exchanges. The Mattdam Customs, under the jurisdiction of the Caucasus Prefecture, officially opened for business, inspecting goods and collecting taxes as their rightful duty.

The chaos in the Leon Region was quickly reflected in Mattdam. The closure of Bruce Fortress caused the transportation of coal, iron ore, and crude iron from Leon to come to a halt, triggering a domino effect in the entire region that urgently needed these commodities. The prices of these goods soared and even affected the kingdom’s weapon production. Although deep down, they did not wish to see the security situation in the Leon Region restored, it seemed somewhat uneconomical to allow the kingdom’s weapon production to be compromised. While mines in other parts of the kingdom were operating at full capacity, the side effects of closing a major export base like Leon were not so easily compensated. At this time, the opening of Mattdam’s port caught many people’s attention.

The coal mine owners at the foot of Volt Mountain had originally been worried about how to digest the coal they mined, and as the iron mines in Bahomon entered formal operation and increased their output, both types of surplus materials were transported to Mattdam via land and water routes. The iron furnaces in Mattdam and Bahomon could not consume such vast amounts of raw materials, and it was at this time that the benefits of opening the port became apparent. The merchants who urgently needed these materials to replace those from Leon could finally breathe a sigh of relief, as the goods piled up in Mattdam were loaded onto just over a dozen ships and shipped away.

Authorized foreign merchant ships entered directly into the Catania River and sailed up to Bahomon, where the mountains of iron ore and crude iron finally gave traders from the kingdom new options. Meanwhile, the coal mine owners at the foot of Volt Mountain recruited workers to increase production and discussed the possibility of digging a canal to Mattdam. It was only an area of thirty li from the Volt Foothills to Mattdam, much of which was narrow, sunken valleys. If it were possible to dig through several higher areas to let the waters of the Catania River flow in, such a possibility was not out of the question. Of course, such a large-scale project still required further discussion at the moment.

The arrival of foreign merchant ships further spurred the commercial prosperity of the Caucasus, especially the slave trade. Although Komer detested the slave trade, he did not prohibit it. A large influx of slaves from various races, particularly a surge in elven and dwarven slaves, quickly turned Mattdam into the Caucasus’s central slave market. Merchants in need of iron forging laborers and various servants flocked to Mattdam to purchase slaves, which objectively even stimulated the southern slave hunter teams to engage in more frenzied hunting, something Komer had not anticipated.

The dock expansion project was swiftly put into motion. Under Puber’s plan, the first phase of the dock expansion would triple its size, and in the second phase, it would double again, allowing Mattdam to reach the scale of Odessa to the north in the shortest possible time. And it was only natural that the 500,000 gold shields obtained from Gray Skull would become the startup funds for the first phase of the expansion project.