Chapter 573 - 544: Monopolizing the Future (Part 1)

The President’s speech, as usual, garnered attention on the day of the victory, but people soon discovered...

Although Barnes was nearly a hundred years old, his overall demeanor was still quite decent, making him seem like a reliable old politician. This cooled down the not-so-radical factions within the country somewhat, giving a sense of willingness to give him a chance.

Honestly, being moderate at this point in time was already quite an achievement.

But!

The problem arose when Lille simultaneously showcased this to the entire world.

Not to mention Africa, Europe had cooperation, and every major network operator and city in Mei Country were all about the money, unless those states supporting Rocksen, everyone could watch this speech.

However, in reality, as long as people had internet access, Bloom Company could ensure the content was literally pushed to their faces.

Compared to that, Barnes’ sincere speech seemed somewhat... somewhat powerless.

The more chaotic the era, the more extreme people’s thinking patterns become. During a brawl, people only feel that those trying to break it up are biased, and if you keep pulling, they’ll start fighting you too.

Atlas promises big, good; the President muddles through, not good.

Of course, Lille thinking of doing such a showcase at this time, to display his allies, his technology, his industrial scale, and his demands, was something Rocksen had thought of too, but it was much quieter on his side.

After all, he didn’t need too many people to share his profits, power, and future.

Houston, Texas.

Rocksen called it the Houston Mega Oil Industrial Hub—

Refineries, oil plants, oil storage tanks, oil pipeline networks, ports, logistics centers...

The entire industrial area covered 500 square kilometers, with the refining capacity reaching 5 million barrels per day; the giant chemical plant continually produced various industrial ethylene, propylene, polyethylene, polypropylene, benzene...

The longest oil pipeline was 2000 kilometers, connecting all major ports of the Gulf of Mexico, as well as the main oil fields and markets within the United States.

The gigantic mechanized port was capable of docking 20 supertankers at the same time, with trucks and trains running non-stop—

Mostly controlled by automated machines and equipment.

In this vast production industrial area, new robots were continuously manufactured on-site, put into production, and then shipped off to other production areas with large vessels.

In the open land, robots replicated factories making themselves and then built various factories including military and electronic equipment factories.

Goods were made here, weapons were made here, satellites, and rockets were launched here.

A 24-hour full-category industrial production, a super-huge consumption of fossil fuels, the air was filled with high concentrations of sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxides, volatile organic compounds, and particulate matter.

If you looked down from high-altitude surveillance and bridging drones, you could see the rivers around Houston and the Gulf of Mexico turning black.

The soil could not grow a single plant, not even cockroaches could survive on such land.

Most humans, after a rational analysis, don’t really think they can cause any harm to Earth, but seeing all this, they start to feel that they might actually poison the Earth to death.

"Look! This is the future!"

A specially made sightseeing vehicle was driving on the road, Rocksen Group’s CEO Dalio stretched his arms excitedly—

A small convoy of sightseeing vehicles was on the road. It must be said that the vehicles were indeed high-end. Despite the external environment, the people inside enjoyed fine wine and fresh air, along with a smooth ride experience.

These vehicles were also specially made, models never seen before from the manufacturer Ford, a high-end model they had not previously ventured into.

However, Ford had been acquired just days ago, and most of its employees were optimized by Dalio since he, like Lille, needed to expand his industries, but he didn’t need too many employees.

And if given a choice, no one would want to work here.

The others in the sightseeing vehicles were Dalio’s investors and partners—most of them financial moguls who, to avoid risks, could choose to forsake physical enterprises, withdrawing with the order represented by money to another job.

They had been investing in Rocksen for a long time, and in Dalio for a long time.

Most of the time, they were full of confidence in this young man; on rare occasions, they were stunned by his madness...

But regardless, they habitually regarded Dalio as a working man.

But today... today they were a bit scared.

People at their level wanted to rule the world, but when they really sponsored what Rocksen had become now...

"Low-cost, efficient, and exhilarating!"

Rocksen even opened the window to breathe the outside air!

This was insane!

They loved money, but they weren’t fools about what the particles in the air meant!

Dalio took a deep breath of the murky air and was not choked but rather felt as refreshed as if he had taken a puff of a cigar!

Is this human?!

Atlas and Rocksen, the two companies that were commonly seen as adversaries, had such divergent philosophies; could even the physical conditions of their leaders be extremely different?!

Atlas’s Lille had suffered a major accident, and people generally believed his body was still recovering; this breath alone could probably choke him to death!

"Without those incompetent workers, those troublemaking parasites, we wouldn’t need employee dormitories, wouldn’t need to consider their living costs, wouldn’t need to care about their ridiculous unions...

All we’d have is a continuous flow of money! Think about our future! People like us are destined to stand at the pinnacle, to trample the world beneath our feet!"

However, even though Rocksen said this, people still saw some workers looking sickly appearing in view.

Honestly...

It was kind of scary.

But who were the people in the car?

They were the kind who recognized money, not faces. As long as someone showed greed, foolishness, or desperation in finances, they would use their money to strike them hard.

These were people who could crash a country’s currency, even if it meant the nation would go bankrupt, its people living in poverty and chaos...

They would merely remark: So why be so greedy? The financial market is a survival of the fittest.

But in reality, they were the same kind of people who caused financial crises in other countries. Once someone made money in emerging markets, they would mingle on the international stage with these old aristocrats, so the likes of these guys were everywhere around the globe.

Subprime crises, financial crises...

These fed them.

Thus, they were more concerned about whether the things Dalio spoke of were true.

Someone pointed at the workers in the industrial district and asked, "And them?"

"Ah," Dalio smiled slightly, "they are the parasites. I guess you all remember that during the subprime crisis many people had massive loans. These deadbeats who don’t pay back their loans should be working hard, shouldn’t they?

The robot programs are still iterating. I must admit there are still some work processes that need their intervention."

Someone frowned, "Won’t they cause trouble?"

"See those ports on the back of their necks and the equipment on their bodies? We also have brain-computer interfaces, this device can help them pay back better.

Brain-computer interfaces can release electric currents to directly stimulate the brain, and it can connect to the internet, do you understand?

I mean... they should focus on paying off their debts, how could they have time to create trouble?"

Dalio winked playfully, as if to say all was unspoken—

The implication was: You can’t think of causing trouble when there’s a remote-controlled bomb in your brain, right?

"Look, I know that some stray parasites in society can destabilize us, not paying loans, gathering to make trouble, striking...

But no worries, the parliament is preparing to pass the Anti-Monopoly Delusion Prevention Act. Some people just can’t stand to see others doing well. We need to prevent these lunatics from disturbing our social stability, maintain stability, I too have a great sense of social responsibility.

They need to be managed, these troublemakers have always needed management since the beginning."

"Oh..." someone stroked their chin, "That sounds like a big expense, right? We looked at your cost sheet, and it seems like you’ve invested quite a bit in this area.

And could this possibly involve some... legal issues? I mean, we shouldn’t give our competitors any loopholes, making such obvious... backdoors in the products we sell to customers."

These words struck right at Dalio’s heart—

The market value of Rocksen Group had skyrocketed after just recently completing a substantial monopoly, now even approaching two trillion US dollars. If only Barnes hadn’t suddenly changed sides, we might have already seen this happen.

But Rocksen’s investment in many aspects of research and development was far beyond Atlas, whether in terms of funds or time. Without Stark, many things might still be unsubstantial...

This resulted in his product costs actually being slightly higher than those of Atlas, only by fully implementing Stark’s automation strategy could there be a hope of breaking even or even surpassing them.

This was the only shadow in Dalio’s heart right now—Atlas was a rapidly developing competitor, and very adept at influencing society.

Seeing a superhero on the streets only felt interesting to him, but seeing someone named Lille...

He began to feel the pressure.

Thinking this in his head, Dalio quickly responded:

"Don’t worry, although we are kindly helping them pay off their loans, we are not a charity. These are all company assets, they only have usage rights, and the brain-computer interfaces belong to the company until they finish paying off their loans.

As for usage risks, that is a common occurrence. If they are worried, let them buy some insurance."

Everyone nodded—

This is good, this is high, this money could even earn so many parts, truly a business genius.

The car drew closer to the core of the industrial park, where the heart of the entire Houston industrial cluster’s primary buildings were located, and also what the residents of Houston could see from a great distance through the haze:

Towers more than 800 meters high for high-energy condensed oil refining.

[Tony: The people from the United Nations are a bit distracted, Atlas seems to have brought out nuclear fusion as a huge promise.]

[Dalio: Nuclear fusion? Tony, I need to have a serious talk with you later. I remember you said you were the most advanced, and that it was unachievable.]

[Tony: For now, let’s show them something exciting, let them see the Singularity Particles.]

Dalio looked toward the giant refinery tower that was the most polluted, "Now, let me show you something— the real future."