📖 Excerpt from “The Spice Must Flow: Memoirs of a Burned-Out Tycoon”
By Lord Alain of the Azure Archipelago
Steam Review: Dawn of Discovery

They called me the Spice King.
Gold-plated trade routes. Silk on demand. Pearls so plentiful I once used them as ballast.

But it started simple.
A lone ship. A lonely island. A dream.
“Build a fishery,” they said. “Keep the peasants fed,” they said.
Nobody mentioned that peasants evolve into aristocrats who want books, wine, and carpets softer than your dignity.

I was a merchant.
Then a mayor.
Then a god.
And then, one Tuesday, I snapped—because a warehouse ran out of tools.
Not gold. Not prestige.
Tools.

That’s when I knew I was in deep.

I once spent three in-game years trying to balance beer production.
Had monks on retainer just to calm my nerves.
Tried therapy. Ended up exporting it.

Built cathedrals, sure.
But did I build peace?
No.
Just bridges between islands I forgot I owned.

They said I had it all:

400 tons of spice

Noblemen cheering my name

An Orient alliance held together by diplomacy and paprika

But I hadn't seen sunlight in days.
I dreamed in supply chains.
I breathed hemp and dried dates.
My only friend was a trade ship named “Please Don’t Sink V.”

In the end, it wasn’t war that broke me.
It was cider.
A tavern without cider triggered riots across four islands.
I wept into my grain silos.

Still... would I do it again?
Absolutely.

Because in Dawn of Discovery, power isn’t taken.
It’s imported, refined, and delivered on time with 120% efficiency.

10/10.
Signed,
A Tycoon with 98,000 gold, 1 dignity, and no idea where my spice fleet went.