When the Saint comes, she does not collect food

Chapter 976: Gentlemen, welcome to the age of steel!

Walking on the soft green grass, Horn led everyone forward while talking with Herman and Knight Moenie.

As for the former nobles of North Mound County, they stayed three to five meters away, walking along, chirping constantly.

"Steve, Steve."

Steve, who was originally walking, turned around and saw Brunok, who was also the director of the smelting plant, patting his shoulder.

"What do you want from me?"

"We all want to talk to you about something. His Royal Highness the Saint was so sudden this time, so we can only take this opportunity to unify our attitudes."

Steve suddenly understood that these were the elders of the Steel Guild colluding with each other.

"What do you want to do?" he asked cautiously. "I don't want to get involved in these things. The Cheka is scary."

"Who said it was related to the Cheka?" Brunok lowered his voice. "You ask for a high price and then pay it back, don't you understand?"

Seeing Steve's stunned expression, Brunok had to continue explaining: "Moriati, what I mean is that if Her Highness Carrie stands on the side of the Holy Grandson, we will definitely not be able to keep our family business.

But that doesn't mean we have to hand over these mines and smelters unconditionally!
As long as we are firm enough and unite together, we can at least get more capital.”

"What's the story?" Steve didn't want to get involved in this mess, but he asked anyway.

He had already applied to be transferred to the Internal Security Corps, but Her Highness Carrie had not approved it.

Brunok was overjoyed and grabbed his wrist: "You don't need to do anything more, just don't give in at the critical moment."

What do the elders of the Steel Guild fear most?
If the Holy Alliance offers a high price and one person gives in and comes ashore, then the rest will naturally be unable to hold back.

At that point it would all be down to luck, which was absolutely the most unacceptable situation for the so-called “elders” of the Steel Guild.

They are the source of metal parts for all the large and small workshops of the entire Holy Union. If they collapse, it will only bring harm to the Holy Union and no benefits.

So it must be a peaceful takeover, which will give us room for maneuver.

How can you give up without squeezing out wealth for the rest of your life?

"But this seems to be the latest technology of the Holy Alliance? Are you sure the dwarves won't turn against us?" Steve was still skeptical.

Originally, when Hot Spring City was established, it absorbed a large number of reformed dwarves from the Dragon Sleep Mountains.

The smelters and forges therein have visibly squeezed the market of the old-school dwarves.

As the saying goes, if you can't beat them, join them. The old-school dwarves might just surrender.

In any case, the Holy League has granted citizenship to these dwarves, which is a very generous condition.

Brunok shook his head proudly, "No, they want to make the mine public property, depriving the dwarves of the ownership granted by Her Highness Meliati, and no old-school dwarf will agree to that.

Besides, they actually dared to say that they surpassed the dwarves in steelmaking, which angered many dwarf masters.

The quarrel was so serious that the dwarves went back to the mountains and stopped smelting steel for the Holy Alliance.

Then the Holy Alliance will have to build a steel smelter and forge from scratch, which will definitely interrupt the Holy Alliance's four-year plan and cause losses to both sides."

After talking for a long time, Steve didn't understand at all. He waved his hand impatiently: "I don't understand these beating around the bush. Anyway, I'll just keep quiet."

Bruno was naturally overjoyed. Since Steve didn't care about the smelter, it was even more impossible to persuade him.

"That's a deal." Bruno let go of Steve's hand and hurried to persuade the next one.

Soon, there were cheers of encouragement coming from the crowd.

"When it comes to steelmaking, dwarves are the ancestors of humans."

"Well done."

"Don't lose points. We all came here from the battlefield."

Hearing the voice behind him, Horn couldn't help laughing.

Mo Nei on the side was worried: "Your Majesty, do you need me to stop them? This is too outrageous."

"No need." Horn continued to walk with a smile, "It won't cause any trouble."

Mo Ne turned back and glared, then turned back again and saw His Majesty stretching out his hand: "Oh, it's raining."

Transparent raindrops floated in the air from time to time, fell on the branches, and made the leaves shake.

At the end of September, the rainy season finally arrives in Qianhe Valley.

The dark clouds spread out like ink, staining the originally grayish-white lead clouds bit by bit.

By the time Horn and others arrived at the location of the lightning furnace, raindrops were already hitting the roof of the red brick house.

In this factory area covering more than 2000 square meters, a tall three-story factory building with exposed red bricks appears in everyone's sight.

"Holy Temple Steel Refinery?" Steve tried hard to read the words.

"Welcome to the Holy See Steel Refinery, a place that produces more than 150 tons of steel annually." The door opened and Horn opened his arms to introduce it to everyone.

But when they heard his words, the dwarves laughed.

With an annual output of 150 tons, you plan to surpass the Kingdom of Leia within a year, right?
If one zero is missing, the dwarves will still believe it. 150 tons is really...

want to laugh.

Follow Horn into the refinery yard.

Instead, you can see a half-open stockpile area, where tons of pig iron ingots, cave rose crystals, and other raw materials are piled up. There are also criss-crossing wooden tracks inside for transporting iron materials.

Crossing the wooden tracks and pushing open the oak door, the scene before them immediately made the dwarves and old nobles stop.

Their heads all slowly raised up, and their faces reflected the green flash.

Standing in front of the huge lightning furnace with his hands on his hips, Horn looked at her with a complicated expression.

The idea of ​​a lightning furnace was proposed six years ago, in 1447-1448.

It took six years from research to design to experimentation to formation and then to official construction, and cost nearly 100,000 gold pounds.

It’s finally built.

Even though Horn had inspected this giant tower-like lightning furnace several times, he still couldn't help but sigh.

No matter how you look at it, it looks like a device that only evil organizations have.

Under the dim light in the house, the brass furnace, narrow at the top and wide at the bottom, sat on a base, covered with rivets and iron hoops.

On one side, there is a gourd-shaped metal container about one meter tall, fastened by a round gate with rotating gears.

As for the lunar mercury, it is transported from this metal container into the lightning furnace through a thin iron pipe.

Streams of white steam shot out from the gaps, with green, thin lightning bolts wrapped around them.

The huge lightning furnace in front of him was like the god of casting in Norn mythology, breathing out fire mist and turning hard pig iron into soft molten steel.

Horn was still lamenting that the style of painting was wrong, but the other old nobles who were seeing this kind of lightning furnace for the first time did not find it unusual.

Looking at the giant furnace, the enthusiasm that they had encouraged each other suddenly relaxed.

When faced with a giant, especially one that is almost as tall as a house, they have an innate sense of fear.

Seeing that everyone was stunned, several guild elders scratched their heads and couldn't help but pull their sleeves and remind them with their eyes.

The old nobles finally reacted, and whispers of "don't lose points" and "keep your spirits up" were heard again from the crowd.

But compared with the previous one, this whisper was much softer.

The dwarves carefully looked at the giant tower furnace in front of them, but did not dare to approach it for fear of being struck by green lightning.

But they didn’t see the furnace and the reagent feeding port. Without these, how could they produce steel?

Some of the dwarves frowned and seemed to remember something. They shuddered all over, remembering the rumor circulating among the reformist dwarves.

"The Holy Sun has found a way for giants to smelt iron. Your outdated technology should have been eliminated long ago. Do you know what the key is? It doesn't hurt to tell you - lightning!"

In principle, lightning seems to be able to melt iron ingots, and this is also recorded in the "Book of Casting".

But the book also says that lightning is the divine power of giants and dragons, and even if mortals have lightning, they cannot use it to make steel.

"Is the Holy Grandson a mortal?" This question came to the minds of the dwarves.

Regardless of the danger, several dwarves rushed forward, but were stopped by several workers: "Do you want to die? Electrocute your whole body and turn it into charcoal."

Standing behind the fences and yellow paint, the dwarf craftsmen were eager to stick their heads into the furnace.

No way? This thing can't really make steel, right?
As the dwarves watched nervously, a rumbling sound suddenly came from the pipe.

"Fuck!" Suddenly, a dwarf pointed at the concave pit in front of him and shouted, "Steel!"

The molten iron, emitting a dark red luster, gushed out like the magma in a dwarf volcano, splashing everywhere like red meteors.

Liquid iron!
It was the first time for many people to see iron become liquid after being heated to the extreme!
The dwarves' crucible iron can only produce soybean-sized steel, which can then be forged into ingots bit by bit.

But the furnace in front of us can directly turn pig iron into steel, and it is high-quality molten iron steel.

No need for forging, no need to remove impurities, just take a mold and let it cool, and you will get a high-quality steel ingot.

One, two, three...brick-sized steel ingots were formed and neatly stacked.

Thirty-six steel ingots, about 720 pounds of steel, based on three furnaces per day, that's about one ton.

Based on the calculation that it takes three tons of pig iron to produce one ton of steel, the Cold Spring Steel Works produced 70 tons of pig iron a year, which was not enough for the refinery to produce steel in a month.

This steel can be sold for thirty to forty times the profit, and both the Franks and the Leians will need it.

They originally thought they had grasped the iron lifeline of the Holy Alliance, but now it seems that no one is irreplaceable.

“Currently, due to some restrictions, the Flash Furnace can only operate 15 days a month, producing about tonnes of steel, which is then refined into orichalcum.

In addition to being refined into mountain copper, it is also used to make lathes, tools, winders, cans, rivets... and of course, weapons.

Therefore, next year we expect to place an additional order for 300 tons of pig iron with Cold Spring.

By the end of next year, we plan to build another refinery, a canning factory, a bicycle factory, a machinery factory...

Don't worry, the iron smelting furnace is already on the research agenda, and the current pig iron production can still be sustained. It will be developed in ten or eight years."

No matter what Horn said at this moment, the elders of the Steel Guild and the dwarves all had buzzing heads.

It was not until a loud thunder and lightning from the dark clouds woke up the dazed people.

Horn stood in front of them, the strong wind created by the green lightning blowing his clothes: "Gentlemen, welcome to the age of steel!"

(End of this chapter)