Chương 431: 426. Progress Check - I

On the eastern bank of the stream, the first steelmaking furnace would finally cool down in a few more days after the whole process which took nearly a month, and then they would get the first batch of steel. The second furnace had also stopped belching smoke, and had started the process of cooling down for the next two weeks. The third furnace had been finished recently and iron was still baking in it right now. So from now they would get a new batch of steel every week.

It was only a small amount in each batch, but it was still steel. Once it started coming regularly, he had plans to upgrade as many things to steel as they could afford, including the weapons used by the guards. The coke which had been produced in the beehive oven was being used by Cedoron everywhere and he couldn't stop praising the material, saying that it was so effective that he wanted a second coke-making oven made soon. Kivamus had agreed and allowed him to use more clay to make the second one.

On the western bank, the sawmills had been working every day with the help of the powerful water wheels, and even with just two log-movers taking fedarus logs to the place, they were still making more timber than could be used in the village. There was already enough timber stacked at the place to take to build the losuvil processing encampment in the east, so Taniok would leave for it right after the guards returned.

There was already a good, flat space on the slope of a hill identified by the hunters in the past, and a group of guards would accompany the workers so they could secure the place and help in clearing it. The surplus timber from the sawmills was now being used to make the fourth longhouse block, right across a new wide gravel road encircling the third one. By now the side walls of the fourth block were already complete, and soon the construction workers would start making the roof of the ground floor.

It would still take a couple of weeks for it to finish, but this was still an unimaginably fast speed compared to what was happening before the sawmills were built. It also helped that these longhouses were double story structures and could hold twice the number of people of the initial two. The wainwright's apprentice who had come with Feroy from that farmhouse in the north had been put to work after Darora had made all the necessary tools of trade for him.

Right now, he had taken on another two workers to help him, and they would finish the first wagon within a week or so. The best part was that he knew how to make the axles. So as long as they had enough iron available in the village and Cedoron provided the iron bars in the desired designs and with the necessary notches, the wainwright would be able to make as many wagons or log-movers as they needed.

The young but talented carpenter Darora had also been hard at work and had already crafted all the wooden parts for the second scorpion, and was now in the process of making the parts for the third one. Of course, he would have to wait to assemble them until the blacksmith provided the steel components, but at least the process of making scorpions was being streamlined now.

Darora had already trained his apprentices in that, including the talented girl Layita, and everyone had been assigned a particular part to work on, which had improved the efficiency of the whole process. His other apprentices were already making crossbows by themselves, and they were providing two new crossbows every week, while the village fletcher was making more bolts than they could use.

Of course, once the steel started coming in, Darora already had the blueprint for making a lathe, and he would start working on it soon after that. Once there were a few lathes in the village, the speed of making everything would increase again by a good multiple. He started walking again and this time stopped at the edge of the roof facing south. The farming foreman Pinoto had told him that the crops were growing steadily, and the recent rains had helped a lot in that.

Of course the plan was to make a canal connecting the reservoir at the dam to the pond near the farms, but until that was completed, at least the intermittent rains were helping in providing enough irrigation to the crops. Find this and other great novels on the author's preferred platform. Support original creators!

The two dozen loggers had never stopped clearing the forest in the south, and by now there was a good few hundred meters of empty space on all sides of the farm to serve as a firebreak, as well as dozens of new stockpiles of Fedarus logs kept under the sun for drying. Once the guards returned, they would start patrolling there as well. Now all the potatoes they were buying from the merchants were being used to plant new fields across the wheat farm.

Pinoto had said that the first crop of potatoes would be ready just before winter, as expected, although the plan was to replant it again so they could get a good source of food after winter. Pinoto had also suggested that they needed to make an apiary here to increase the production of crops. The reason was that this was the first time farming was done in this region of the kingdom, and while there were some bees present here, they weren't enough to pollinate the whole fields.

The old farmer didn't know how to run an apiary, but thankfully one of the slaves who had come from a farmhouse near Kirnos and had been working as a farmer had good experience in that. He had suggested that he could manage the apiary as a beekeeper as long as he was provided enough wooden boxes in the design he wanted. Kivamus had immediately agreed, since with the sawmills working, it just needed thin planks which an apprentice of the carpenter could cut and nail together in the dimensions needed.

So in the last week dozens and dozens of such boxes had been built, with all the holes and thin parallel planks described by that beekeeper. By now, all those boxes had been placed in strategic positions all across the farms. It would take some time until they were occupied by bees fully, but the signs were positive and a few of them had already been discovered by bees. Of course a side benefit of this would be access to a good amount of honey by the start of winter.

That was a long time away, but he couldn't wait to taste some new type of pie baked by Madam Helga. Her Toloraberry pies were already famous across the village, and Kivamus had also suggested she start selling them if she could make enough. But right now there were just not enough of those sour-sweet berries for that, although that shrub had been replanted in a lot of places in the empty space all around the village. The future was looking sweet for the village.

Madam Helga had also told him that the mushroom barn in the south was mature enough that they could replant them in a separate barn if one was made, while continuing to provide a small amount of mushrooms to the village. Kivamus had agreed and said that making a new mushroom barn would be next on the list after the fourth longhouse block was completed.

That block would take care of all the housing shortage in the village for now, so they could make a new mushroom barn after that, and then build the barracks in the east. Pydaso had also returned two days ago to the village, and had told him that he had been able to successfully sell the paper, as well as the Acelos tablets, to that merchant in Ulriga.

He had said that the medicine was not yet famous but the news was already circulating in high circles, and that there would be no shortage of its demand any time soon. This time he did not need to place an advance order because the manor already had enough tablets ready for selling. However, the portly merchant had wanted to buy 300 tablets this time, instead of the usual 200, at the same rate of 20 silver per tablet. That was apart from the 200 tablets he needed from the advanced order he had given last time.

Kivamus had checked and confirmed that they had eight full jars of 100 tablets kept in the laboratory room. That was 800 tablets, as well as another half-filled jar, which was from the second last batch of the medicine made here, while the last one was still under processing.

But instead of selling 300 tablets immediately, Kivamus had told the merchant that for now their production was not high enough to manage that much sales, so he could only sell 200 tablets for now, so that he could maintain that rate of sales consistently. He did not want nobles to start getting greedy in Ulriga, thinking there was a mountain load of tablets kept in this place.

Nobody knew about its true source at the moment, but eventually the news would get out so he didn't want anyone to think they could produce as many tablets as they wanted. For now, he had to manage the perception that the medicine was a rare resource. So he had explained that it was difficult to produce the medicine at the usual rate in summer months, and he was giving basically all the stock he had, hiding the fact that he had more.