Chapter 157: One Chicken a Week (5)
Even if the construction company specializes in civil engineering, it’s rare for the chairman or president to personally visit the site. They are often buried in work, logging six-day workweeks with endless overtime, unaware of how unusual their schedules are. Moreover, when high-ranking individuals do visit a site, it often creates more problems than it solves.
It’s like having a division commander living in the same barracks as a squad or platoon—nobody would enjoy it. Still, despite knowing this, I chose to stay on-site and oversee the project personally.
"Because if they don’t follow the blueprint exactly, a disaster is inevitable," I muttered.
Regardless of the era or country, construction sites tend to have their fair share of problems. Missing materials are a universal issue. Order 100 marble tiles for a noble’s mansion, and 20 tiles mysteriously disappear, finding their way into someone else’s pocket. Untraceable funds miraculously teleport into the hands of craftsmen. A beam specified to be 1.5 meters thick in the blueprint gets “optimized” to 1.2 meters on-site to save costs. Of course, those savings conveniently go towards the workers’ “welfare.”
But my real concern wasn’t petty embezzlement or material substitutions.
At that moment, the on-site supervisor raised his voice.
"Safety first!"
The workers, mostly hired serfs and craftsmen, echoed back loudly.
"Good! Good! Good!"
"Alright, get to your assigned positions! Work as much as the Baron has paid you for!"
Although my family isn’t on the level of dukes, marquises, or counts—essentially the “conglomerates” of the nobility—we likely pay our employees the highest wages in the empire. A junior butler earns four silver coins per month, plus a biannual bonus of 300% and additional benefits unheard of elsewhere. Even the Viscount of Visconti was stunned when he heard about our compensation structure.
"How do you not go bankrupt paying that much?" he’d asked.