Ves did not like what he heard from Calsie. When he initially founded the Open Consortium, the Larkinson Clan was still a small player in Davute. It was hard to get any company and material supplier to take the Larkinsons seriously. Much of that had changed. The reputation of the clan had grown so much that the Larkinsons may have become among the most famous and renowned groups associated with Davute! That along with years of rapid growth had improved the business circumstances of the various companies and institutions of the Larkinson Clan. That said, the Open Consortium still played an immensely useful role to the Larkinson Clan and especially the Davute Branch. Calsie made a good case for why the Open Consortium should not only continue to exist even after its original purpose became redundant, but also expand its membership so that it could increase its weight in Davute! Although her proposals all made sense, the problem was that it made the Open Consortium and by extension the Larkinson Clan a more integral part of Davute's industrial economy! This was yet another important contributing factor why the colonial administration paid so much attention to the Larkinsons these days. He did not immediately respond to her proposals, but instead held out his hand. "Give me the Open Book. I want to take a look at it and see how it has grown." "Ah, certainly. Here you go, sir." Calsie had been attentive enough to bring the relic that has made the Open Consortium so successful. Modeled after the Larkinson Mandate, the Open Book was a silver ancestral heirloom that contained the written contracts and commitments of all of the members of the trade consortium. Presided over by the Solemn Guardian, every signee of the contract received constant encouragement to abide by the terms of the organization and never double-cross its members! With the swelling of the membership ranks of the Open Consortium, the Open Book had grown a lot more powerful as of late. Ves could feel how the hopes and good intentions of most of the signees had positively affected the development of this living artifact. As he opened the book and browsed through his pages, he noticed that the earlier ones were occasionally crossed out, but that it stopped taking place the further he went. "How many members have left the Open Consortium since its founding?" He asked. "Dozens." Calsie replied. "Some members have clearly entered our consortium in order to get over a rough patch. Once they have reached a healthier state, they no longer want to meet the obligations of our organizations, so they eventually submit applications to leave our organization. Luckily, they have also done so in an orderly manner. There were only a few times where we had to strike a member off the book because they had become bankrupt. Lately, neither of these two events have happened because we are only taking in successful and promising companies." Ves hummed and nodded. "How often have disputes arisen between the members?" "Not often." She said. "It happens a few times every year, but everyone is remarkably honest towards each other. Much of that has to do with the Open Book, but the companies are also increasingly more afraid of getting on the bad side of our clan. Compared to a year ago, our deterrence has doubled if not tripled." "I see." Even though the Open Consortium was no longer entirely aligned with his goals, its operating model was still a smashing success. It was too useful for Ves to get rid of, and that made him feel a bit mixed. "Sir, about our expansion…" "Stop." Ves raised his palm. "I have my own ideas, Calsie. Let's not rock the boat too much. I think we have been focusing too much on quantity in the past few years. That has been useful to us, but I think it is time to elevate the quality of the Open Consortium. I don't mind if its membership numbers decrease as long as the participating companies become more useful to us. Let's focus more on building a support network rather than an empire, alright?" "I see…" Calsie replied. She couldn't hold in her disappointment. Her importance was tied to the size and significance of her organization. If the Open Consortium could no longer expand any further, she would remain stuck without making any further progress. However, this wasn't all that Ves had in store. "Calsie, all of the members of the Open Consortium are based in Davute, correct?" "Ah, yes." She said. "There are a number of exceptions, but the rule that states that every company must send their effective leader to sign the Open Book makes it difficult for organizations based in other zones to join us. Besides, the Open Consortium's main business network is based almost entirely in this region. It is not so useful for companies who are entirely based in other zones such as Magair to randomly become a member." Ves looked thoughtful. "Does that mean that our clan and trade consortium does not have a strong footing in any of the other middle zones of the Red Ocean?" "I thought you already knew that, sir." Calsie said. "While we have explored possibilities to found new open trade consortiums in the Magair Middle Zone and so on, we are hindered by two factors. One is the fact that we have only a single Open Book that can only stay in one physical location. Another is our non-existent foundations in the other zones." The Larkinson Clan in the past was still too small to set up a strong presence in multiple zones. Ves wanted to focus on building up a stable foundation in Davute first before looking outward. Now that his clan completed the first time, it was high time for the Larkinsons to build up a more visible presence in the other zones! "These problems shouldn't be an issue to us given how much we have grown. Calsie, I want you to lead the initiative to found new open trade consortiums in several nearby middle zones. I want you to focus on setting up modest groups in the Magair Middle Zone and the Torald Middle Zone in particular." Both zones directly neighbored the Krakatoa Middle Zone. The importance of Magair Middle Zone didn't need to be stated. If Ves ever decided to move his expeditionary fleet to a different zone, then he would probably move to the much less stable but more exciting Torald Middle Zone. Calsie understood these reasons as well. "The Magair Middle Zone is relatively familiar to us. We have many members that have set up branches of sorts over there. We need to think carefully about where we want to place the headquarters of the regional consortium." "Let's not make it more complicated than it needs to be. Just set it up in the New Scimitar System of the Hex Federation." That got a reaction out of the chairwoman. "The Hex Federation!? Are you sure, Ves? I thought you disliked the Hexers. If we found an Open Consortium over there, its members will consist entirely of Hexer companies. It won't be able to spread its influence outside of the borders of the Hexer state. Besides, I just looked up New Scimitar and it isn't a port system." "I am sure." Ves said. "Your concerns are valid, but the Hexers are our most reliable allies and partners. The Wodin Dynasty will take excellent care of the consortium based in Magair. If we establish the headquarters anywhere else, the Fridaymen are liable to come and blow it up. I don't want that to happen, so I would rather forgo the choice of a port system in order to ensure that our best Hexer allies will keep watch over our holdings. As for the membership problem, just institute a special rule that at least half of the signees must be non-Hexers. This should at least encourage those women to open up its borders if they haven't already done so. The Hex Federation needs to develop more trade ties in order to accelerate its growth." Setting up the regional consortium in the Hex Federation was anything but ideal, but the Hexers would probably complain if Ves chose a different location. Besides, it should be a lot easier to gain the cooperation of large and powerful Hexer companies. The Open Consortium of Magair should be able to gain easier access to rare and maybe even strategic goods and materials as a result! "Do you have any special instructions about the trade consortium that you wish to found in Torald?" Ves nodded. "This will be a much more difficult task as we don't have any obvious friends in the middle zone. Try and see if the existing members of your consortium have built a strong presence in Torald. Try to take advantage of that to build a headquarters that won't get knocked down. Don't worry about attracting a lot of business yet. I want the Open Consortium of Torald to function as an outpost for our clan. If my expeditionary fleet ever operates in the Torald Middle Zone and needs to make a pitstop, I would prefer it if we can stop at a port system where we have existing business relationships with a bunch of local suppliers and service providers." "Understood. I will make sure to prioritize that for the Torald consortium." Ves smiled and leaned back on his chair in satisfaction. "Good. Once these two regional consortiums are up and running, we will have gained enough know-how to make it easier to set up similar organizations in other zones. I want you to keep this up until we have formed a small but permanent presence in every middle zone." "That will take a long time, Ves." Calsie cautiously said. "The further we go, the harder it is to control our actions in the distant zones. We will need to expand by layers." "I understand. You can settle these matters on your own. I can be patient, so you don't need to complete this right away. I want you to make sure you are doing this correctly because I don't want to see our Open Consortiums get uprooted, do you understand?" "I understand, sir." "Great. Do you have any questions?" The woman hesitated for a few seconds before she decided to bite the bullet. "It would help in my job if you can tell me your purpose or strategy for trying to establish an open trade consortium in every middle zone." "It's not about the money." He told her. "I don't mind if their balance sheets are in the red, though I at least want them to break even over time. What I truly want is to hedge our clan's business activity and reduce its geographic concentration. We can't keep returning to Davute whenever we want to do anything big. I want our expeditionary fleet to be able to resupply in a friendly and familiar star system in every zone. I want the LMC to diversify its business activities so that if Davute ever loses the war or kicks us out, our support network won't be significantly impacted." "I see. We will need to open up small branches of our clan in each of the star systems where we set up our regional open trade consortiums." "That is a given. You can work this out with the chief ministers of our clan. The Davute Branch carries too much weight now. Also make sure to talk with Director Calabast to ensure that the Black Cats set up regional intelligence networks in each of those zones. It would be nice if we can spread our branch members far and wide. We may not be able to protect them all if they are more dispersed, but the loss of a single branch won't turn into a calamity for our clan." It became abundantly clear what Ves was trying to accomplish with these new initiatives. He wanted to spread the Larkinsons across the stars! Not only would the clan become less beholden to the outcome of the eventual war between Davute and Karlach, the expeditionary fleet would also have a much easier time operating in regions that were far away from Krakatoa! "Our clan is about to go galactic!"