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I would invest in the infrastructure of the factory, built on a corner of the training school. Then I would gather paper makers from other places, or retired ones, and hire them to draw diagrams of all steps of the paper-making process so that anyone could follow them, given that the actual workers would be beginner adventurers.

After that I would compartmentalize the process into sections, building an assembly line so that anyone could come in to work at any day and be useful, their wages slightly higher than what they would make through requests. The actual contracts with the adventurers would be renewed every month, for up to twelve months, since I did not want them to become permanent workers, all I wanted was to build a place to help newcomers. If I kept the terms short, it would incentivize the flow of new workers, allowing me to help more people.

“If you employ struggling beginners I can see how the factory would remain active, and if the guild is the sole consumer of the paper produced there, I doubt any merchants will protest except for our current supplier. Still there’s something I’m unsure about, where will we get the funds for this?”
“I’m sure it won’t be too expensive if we build it near the training school grounds. And if we employ a few magicians to help with the construction, that will lower the cost as well. I’ll help with anything I can as well.”
“Hmm…will that be enough incentive to pull workers though?”
“Rather than thinking of a regular day job, we could list their work as a contribution to the guild and make it easier for them to rank up, I’m sure many workers will want to come then.”

The terrain around the training school should be pretty cheap. It was built a considerable distance away from the center of the city, and there were barely any houses near it. Considering my own house was in the outskirts of the city and how cheap it was to buy, somewhere even further away ought to be dirt cheap.

“Even if the construction is aided with magic, we still have to pay the builders a suitable salary. We could try hiring day workers and newbies too, but even then the money has to come from somewhere. This whole project will be a massive money sink until the factory is in business. It could cost upwards from a hundred to two hundred gold coins. That’s a very large sum…the guild can’t shoulder that, and even if it’s for the betterment of the city I doubt governor Grom will be too willing either.”
“There’s no problem on that front. I have two hundred gold coins saved up.”
“Are you serious?! Though…knowing you anything can be true…”

Two hundred gold coins is a very large sum for the layman. It still pales in comparison to the national budget, but it’s more than enough to jump-start a small business or allow an average person to live without worries for the rest of their life. Normally anyone claiming to own that much money would be taken as a clown and ridiculed, but I was a member of the hero’s party too. Krieck, the guild master, knew enough to assume my exploits with the rest of the party would have amassed me a small fortune.

“There was a small incident in Barius when we went to visit, and as a reward, the queen gave those two hundred gold coins to me. I stored them safely without knowing what to do with them, so this is the perfect opportunity.”
“That would be a great help if you mean it…are you sure about this?”
“It’s not like I’m giving all that away for free. Once production starts, I’ll take a small portion of the items as payment. I won’t claim any interest though.”

I would be the sole investor, so the guild had nothing to lose. The location also was supposed to be owned by the guild already, so using a bit of it to construct a building that should better the lives of many adventurers sounded like a good idea. And in the off-chance the plan failed, I would be the only one losing money. I would obviously be shocked to see two hundred gold coins flushed down the toilet, but I had gotten it with so little effort that I had no real attachment to it. Krieck seemed to weigh the future prospects for the guild and my personal financial risks on a mental scale, and eventually, he decided to go for the guild’s future.

“…Alright. If you’re this willing to try it, let’s do it. I’ll get in contact with papermakers to help as soon as I can, what are you going to do?”
“I’ll look for potential first workers. Can I leave the construction stuff to you?”
“Sure. I have a contact in the merchant’s guild who can get me the best workers.”
“Thanks.”

Having gained the guild master’s approval, I quickly returned to the break room to tell Rick and Amy about the news. They seemed a bit unsure of how to react at first, but I could tell they were happy knowing their life was going to turn for the better.

“While the plan has been decided, it’ll still take some time before the whole factory is built. But I have a job for you two already. I’ll give you a proper reward for it as well, so don’t worry about that.”
“A job? Is there something we can do already?”
“You can gather raw materials. If we want to manufacture paper, we need to collect ingredients first. While we build the factory, I want you two to constantly go through the city and out in the forest to collect all the materials we need.”

Luckily there were many forests near Surfour with trees that would make suitable materials to produce paper. Gathering medicinal herbs was one of the best paying requests for beginners, so if I priced gathering materials to make paper at around the same level, the project should be a success.

“I’ll write out the details as a formal request for you in a bit, so you can just follow it and everything should work out. Shall we return to the front desk then? We’ll get nowhere by chatting here any longer.”

I had come up with the plan in a very short time, but I was starting to feel it would work out well. Thinking that, I returned to my seat on the front desk with the two.