Grandpa Joe, it turned out, had a life outside of helping me from time to time. He was traveling for a week to hang with some friends of his. We set a date to meet three weeks later—he had other plans he couldn’t move—to meet at the bank.

  All the while, I made money hand over fist. What had once been around $50,000 was now in the tens of millions. My goal—and stopping point—was to have a hundred million after taxes were paid. It meant I needed around double that amount. When we were going to meet, I would only need a few more weeks to get there. I was excited!

  The money I’d gained came with something even more important: experience. The two hundred million—when I finally got that amount—was worth 200,000 experience! I wished it was more, but it was exponential. I got a small amount of experience when I earned a small amount of money. At bigger numbers, I only got a fraction of that. It still wasn’t enough, even if that was all I did every day. I hoped farming would be better.

  Three weeks later, Mom and Grandpa Joe picked me up from Dad’s house. The added experience from all the quests and money making let me purchase something I’d been wanting for a while.

  With these two features, I could finally refresh medium-term quests. For a lot of those quests, I could get them done in half the time or less. This meant even more experience. They weren’t as important as the ones tied to Quests I had been, but I felt they were worth the experience expenditure.

  The purchases left me with very little in the way of experience, but that was ok. Anything I truly needed in terms of skills or levels I still have enough for. And that was before I earned a bunch over the next couple of years. I wasn’t worried.

  I was pulled from my thoughts when we arrived at the bank. It was a modern building, but otherwise looked like all the other banks I’d seen in my life. Mom led me through the two layers of doors with Grandpa Joe taking up the rear. The inside of the bank smelled slightly musty, with a hint of whatever cleaning products they used. Mom got the attention of a man in a suit who wasn’t a teller.

  “How can I help?” he asked after walking over to us.

  “Eddy, here, needs to open up a bank account,” Mom said, gesturing towards me.

  “Alright,” the man said. “Follow me and we’ll get started.”

  He led us into a small conference room on the side of the main floor. We sat down across from him. He placed a folder on the table and opened it.

  “So what kind of account are you looking for?” He asked. “A savings account with you as the custodian?”

  “He actually needs a business checking account for his company,” Mom corrected the man.

  “What sort of business is that?”

  “Farming,” I answered.

  “I see. And where will the funding for this account come from?”

  “A custodial account with me,” Grandpa Joe said.

  “Then from selling what I grow,” I added.

  “Give me a moment,” he said. “I’ll be right back.”

  The man stepped out of the conference room and closed the door behind him. I sat at the table, fidgeting and growing increasingly bored by the second. Eventually, the man returned. With him was an older man in a slightly fancier suit.

  “Hello,” the older man said. “I’m Jeff, the bank manager here. I hear you’re looking to open a business checking account for the young man here?”

  “That’s correct,” I said.

  “Well, I’m sorry to say, but we won’t be moving forward with that.”

  “Why not?” I asked.

  “That’s my call,” he said. “Please leave and do not come back.”

  “What the hell, man!” I snapped.

  “Please leave. You are no longer welcome here.”

  “Fine. I’ll take the money to a bank that won’t treat me like shit!”

  This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

  I stood up and left with Mom and Grandpa Joe.

  I was bewildered. Why had the guy reacted like that? It wasn’t like I was hiding anything or doing anything wrong. Beyond the confusion, I was also pissed. There was no good reason for them to kick us out like that!

  “The fuck was that about?” I grumbled when we were outside.

  Grandpa Joe shrugged.

  “Well, I’m not going to use that bank,” Mom proclaimed. “Let’s see what the bank across the street thinks.”

  We piled in the car for the quick jaunt. A minute later, we fell out again and walked into the other bank. It looked similar to the first one—except maybe a little older. I got the attention of someone. It was time to go through the same process again—but hopefully without issue this time.

  “So you want to open a checking account for your business?” the person—a woman this time—asked.

  “Yes,” I answered. “I have a bunch of money in an account with Grandpa Joe that I want to use to buy farmland with.”

  “Ok,” she said. “I can take care of that for you.”

  She turned to Grandpa Joe.

  “I’ll need your signature to transfer the money,” she told him.

  He nodded in reply.

  “And, Mom?” she asked my mother.

  “Hmm?” Mom replied.

  “I’ll need the agent’s signature for the account. I’m assume that’s you, yes?”

  “Yes.”

  “Good. And from you, young man, I’ll need the company information.”

  I handed her a small folder with the relevant details.

  “Great! Let me go start the paperwork. I’ll be back when it’s printed out.”

  She stood up and exited the room.

  “Well, that went better,” I said.

  “Definitely,” Mom agreed.

  “Still have no idea why that happened at the other place,” I shrugged.

  I was over my anger by now. I was still a little confused, but found it harder and harder to keep caring. That this bank’s fees for a business checking account were similar to the other bank’s was the icing on the cake.

  The woman returned ten minutes later with a stack of paper. It had already been filled out with the information we’d given her. She handed copies to me and Mom. Each copy had several clear red stickers on them.

  “I’ll need you to sign where each of those stickers are,” she said. “Before you sign, look it over to make sure everything is correct.”

  I read the documents in front of me before signing. The names of myself, Mom, and the business were correct—as was the type of account and everything else. Assured that it was correct, I signed my copies and handed them back to the woman. Mom finished moments after I did.

  “Awesome!” the woman said, before handing me a folder stuffed with paper. “This is everything you’ll need for your account. It has what you’ll need to create a login. There is a booklet of ten checks. You can order more online if you run out. Finally, we need to set the pin for your bank card before you leave.”

  She handed me a small machine with a number pad on it. I punched in the digits I wanted. She swiped the card through and had me enter them again. Satisfied, she handed the card to me.

  “Thanks,” I said.

  “You’re most welcome. I hope you succeed in your venture.”

  I nodded and got up. Mom and Grandpa Joe followed me out of the bank. I looked through the folder before we got in the car to go home. Everything was where it should be.

  “I’ll move the money over in a few weeks,” I said while Mom was driving. “I should probably move a couple thousand over this week, just in case, but the majority won’t go over until I get the money where I want it to be.”

  “Makes sense,” Grandpa Joe said.

  “Thanks for taking me to do this,” I added.

  “That’s what I’m here for,” Mom said with a smile.

  Grandpa Joe grunted, and I chuckled.

  A month later, I moved all the money from the custodial account and into the business account. I left enough in the custodial account to cover taxes—which was still a lot. Trading in the last few days before the cutoff was stressful. There were a lot of trades I needed to make. That left me with little time to actually prepare for the next part of my plan: buying land.

  Once the money had been sent, I began trawling through the land listings. I knew the rough area I wanted to be in—the casual searches I’d done before the reset had narrowed that down. The specific plot of land was a little more difficult. I would—ideally—need several plots. I needed as much as I could conceivably plant on my own. Extra wouldn’t do me any good—but I also didn’t know exactly how much I’d need. Plus, it wasn’t like any of the plots of land gave me something in the ballpark. I needed at least a few of them.

  In the area I was looking, there were four different towns. To me, they looked the same. To get a better idea of what I’d prefer, I would need to go see them in person. Before I could do that, though, I needed to get an agent to help me navigate buying the land.

  Finding an agent shone a spotlight on other things I’d neglected. Now that I had a business with real money, I needed a dedicated lawyer and an accountant. That was just the basics, too. I could do with an assistant and maybe some other help. Bringing other people into the enterprise felt like a dangerous thing. But it was something I had no choice in. If I wanted to farm experience, I would have to pay for the support team that allowed me to do it.

  I brought this up to Dad after showing him the land listings.

  “I need to hire some people,” I said.

  “Why do you say that?” he asked.

  “I can’t do everything on my own. At least not if I want to get the most from farming.”

  “What sort of people, then?”

  “Someone to handle legal stuff. Another for money. Then I’ll probably need at least an assistant—if not other, more general laborers.”

  “Starting an entire industry, huh?”

  “I guess. I mean, my goal is to plant everything I can and harvest it all. If I can’t harvest it all myself, then I’ll have to hire help. If I need to be out planting all day, I’ll need someone else handling the other stuff around the farm while I do.”

  “I see,” he said. “I don’t know much about it from that side of things. I’ve never hired or fired anyone before… only been hired and fired.”

  He laughed at his own joke.

  “I guess I’ll add ‘recruiting’ to the list of things I need help with.”

  I rolled my eyes and sighed.

  “Well, bud, I think you’ll figure it out.”

  And figure it out, I did. After copious amounts of research, I had a plan. The legal and financial stuff could be done by any number of firms. I’d get a recommendation from some other business folks and go from there. The recruiting was similar. For a fee, I could have someone find candidates that met my requirements. Prime among those ensured that person’s silence.

  To that end, I poked around the Search function. There were a few options. One of them stood out to me and so I picked it up.

  It wasn’t too expensive—just a thousand experience. It was powerful and exactly what I needed. Per the description, its terms were absolute. The penalties associated with breaking the contract would be enforced by the system itself. I hoped it would work. I was bound by the system, but I wasn’t sure what would happen when the other signer wasn’t part of the system yet.