Imperial Crown.

Chapter 177 New Factory, New Castle

Gul'dan left in anger, leaving behind the gold coins; Hyde also stayed for only one night, left a deposit and decided to return to the city.

Hyde's territory is in a state of disrepair and there are many things that need his attention.

It is worth mentioning that Raven tried to sell granite to Earl Tyrone through Hyde, but was unsuccessful.

According to Hyde, the Slater family had been badly damaged before, and granite was so expensive, Earl Tyrone felt that instead of spending the gold coins on repairing the castle of Monn City, it would be better to use them on more practical things.

For example, expanding the size of the Hippogryph Knights, promoting some private soldiers with outstanding performance to become extraordinary, and replenishing the lost equipment.

Of course, Hyde’s situation is different. His territory was newly built, and the castle’s facade cannot be faked. After all, it will be passed down in the future.

After learning this, Raven admired Earl Tyrone even more and felt like he was a close friend.

It is an extremely rare quality to be able to not be trapped by the false reputation of nobility and to proceed from a practical perspective in everything.

No wonder the Slater family was passive in the war with the Death Hand Cult, but still firmly suppressed the Fox family.

Outside the Eagle Fort, the sun was shining brightly. The ground had just been sprinkled with water, and the horses' hooves made crisp sounds when they stepped on it.

Hyde smiled and said, "Baron Raven, please don't try to persuade me about the granite."

"Of course, you're not Gul'dan, you're not that easy to fool." Raven continued to promote his product: "Granite is not urgently needed, but equipment and weapons are needed, right?"

Hyde said, "You mean the Gray Mountain Mine? Taking it is indeed a good move."

"But if you don't have an iron furnace to lead so many craftsmen, how much goods can you produce?"

"It's hard to say." Raven smiled mysteriously, "But at most in half a year, you will be able to see the results. It will definitely not be worse than the previous Iron Furnace Territory."

If someone else said this, Hyde would definitely not believe it, but when this sentence came out of Raven's mouth, Hyde couldn't help but take it seriously.

This time when he came to Eagle Territory, what shocked him the most was not the fact that Raven became a second-level magician, but Eagle Town.

Raven's ability is unquestionable as he was able to transform the dilapidated town of Eagle Town into a prosperous place that is no less prosperous than the inner city of Mon'en City in just over a year.

"Well, I'll mention it to my father." Hyde nodded: "If you can do it, even if my father doesn't buy it, I will buy it from you."

"I will give you a discount when the time comes." Raven then changed the subject: "Slater family, are you interested in selling some hippogryphs?"

Hyde looked at Raven with a little caution. "Don't think about targeting the male Hippogryph. The air force is destroyed. It will take at least 20 years to recover to its previous size. If I dare to mention it, I will be scolded by my father."

"Don't worry, I'm not that ungrateful." Raven spread his hands and said, "I want to buy a batch of female hippogryphs - the kind that can lay eggs."

In the entire Nord Province, the Slater family is the only one capable of producing a large number of female hippogryphs at once.

Hyde breathed a sigh of relief: "That's easy to say. How much do you want? If the quantity is not large, I can decide for myself."

"… Let's start with 200."

"How much!?" Hyde was shocked: "Why do you need so much?"

The cost of Magical Beasts is not just the purchase price. They have a huge appetite, and specific Magical Plants must be added to their feed regularly and in fixed quantities, otherwise they will gradually lose their Magical Beast characteristics.

The purchase price of a female hippogryph is around 200 gold coins, but the annual feeding cost is more than 20 gold coins. 200 heads means the annual consumption is 4,000 gold coins, which is enough to bankrupt the finances of most barons.

It is true that hippogryph eggs are valuable, but sales are a big problem. Even for the Slater family themselves, most of the annual output is consumed internally.

Seeing that Raven didn't seem to be joking, Hyde thought for a moment and said, "I'll have to discuss this amount with my family."

Lei Wen said: "The price is not a problem, it can be deducted from the final payment."

Hearing this, Hyde looked much more relaxed, and he felt motivated to help Raven.

By lowering the price in front of my father and raising the price in front of Raven, I might be able to save myself tens of thousands of gold coins.

As for the Slater family’s losses—it doesn’t matter who makes the profit.
Wouldn't it be sad if the son sold his father's land?

After discussing some more details, Hyde left. Before leaving, he took a deep look at the monument outside Eagle Castle.

After seeing Hyde off, Raven called a meeting.

Old Gordon, Eric, Fiona, Kuman, Philip, Poirot, and almost all of Raven's core members were present.

With the recent income, the cash on the books has exceeded 200,000, so of course I have to spend it well.

However, there was no need for discussion. Raven had already made a plan and was just waiting for the funds to arrive to make the specific arrangements.

First, Xue Feng received the final payment for the two factories, and the remaining 40,000 gold coins were allocated to allow Kuman to speed up the construction.

The next thing is the construction of the brewery. Raven does not plan to look for another place, but to expand it directly with the riverside workshop as the center.

The construction cost of the brewery itself is not high. Even if it is divided into three brewing areas for red wine, beer and ale, the total budget is only 7,600 gold coins.

After it was completed, Raven planned to hand it over to Poirot to take charge. On the one hand, Poirot had achieved remarkable results in the management of the riverside workshop during this period and demonstrated quite good coordination and scheduling capabilities.

Secondly, in the Middles continent, a good chef is often also an experienced sommelier who can ensure the quality of the wine.

Poirot was flattered and couldn't stop smiling. Philip looked at him with envy and his eyes turned eagerly towards Raven.

As an important transit station in Xuefeng County, Raven did not forget the construction of Shanjin Town. He decided to invest 5,000 gold coins to build a farmer's market in the east of Shanjin Town, on the street leading to Xiongying Town, mainly engaged in the trading of agricultural products and livestock.

After all, Raven's standards for collecting grain are quite lenient, only collecting 40% of the harvest, and the people can enjoy complete control over the remaining land output.

On this basis, grain, vegetables and fruits among the people can be circulated to a certain extent.

The territory construction is on track, and the next thing to do is to recruit soldiers. Raven decided to start the first batch in Xuefeng Territory, planning to recruit 3,500 people and train them together with the new recruits previously recruited in Mon'en City to form a legion.

According to imperial regulations, a baron could have no more than two battalions of private soldiers, or about a thousand men.

But rules are dead and people are alive.

Raven could just declare to the public that he only had 500 combat soldiers, and the rest were civilians. As long as Raven did not raise the flag of rebellion, no one would care to investigate.

Eric expressed great enthusiasm for the expansion of the army, but also expressed his concerns.

The cost of conscription itself is not large. Even if one advances one year's salary, the total is less than four thousand gold coins.

The problem lies in the equipment of 5,000 people.

Even the two thousand new recruits from Mon'en City were barely equipped with leather armor, and most of their weapons were still wooden equipment.

If we expand the army at this time, not only will the armor rate be low, but the weapons equipment will be a huge problem.

You know, even a spear with only a cast iron spearhead on the market now costs as much as 63.7 silver coins. If it is made of steel, it is normal for the price to be three to five times higher.

With the current equipment prices, anyone who buys it will be sucked.

In response to this, Raven said there was no need to rush and that they should first build up the team. Wooden equipment could be used instead during the training process and as long as the forge workshop was built, everything would be fine.

"What I am going to talk about next is the focus of today's meeting, which can also be said to be the core of future territory construction."

Raven looked around the venue, his voice steady and drawing everyone's attention.

"As the territory expands, Eagle Castle is no longer suitable as the center of the territory, and Snow Maple Castle is too remote. I decided to open up new land and build a new castle."

Raven's voice was calm, but the content of his words stirred up waves in the hearts of everyone present.

A new castle is not only Raven's residence, but also means the change of the overall economic, political and military structure of the Eagle Territory and the Snow Maple Territory. It is not an exaggeration to say that it is the "capital relocation" within the territory.

The redrawn map was opened, covering the entire Eagle Territory and Snow Maple Territory.

Under Raven's instruction, everyone began to discuss the location for building the new castle.

Eric's suggestion continued the current idea of ​​Eagle Castle construction, and was more radical, choosing the location in the northwest of Snow Maple Territory.

It is surrounded by mountains on three sides and faces a river on one side. There is abundant water resources and it is easy to defend but difficult to attack. As long as a stone bridge is built across the river, the new castle will become an indestructible fortress.

But this proposal met with fierce opposition from others, especially old Gordon.

In his opinion, the construction of a new castle should not be considered only for military purposes - if the castle is surrounded, then why did the Baron recruit so many soldiers? It is Eric's responsibility to protect the security of the territory!
The new castle will be a symbol of the Griffith family, so its economic and demographic development potential must be fully considered.

Therefore, Old Gordon chose to build the new castle on a plain in the central and western part of the Snow Maple Territory. This was just a piece of wasteland, and there was no need to spend extra gold coins to buy the land, so the negative impact on the people's livelihood in the territory was minimal.

There is also a mountain road in the southeast of this land. It only costs a certain amount of gold coins to widen it. Then both land and water transportation will be very convenient, which is a major benefit for castle construction and future development.

This proposal was supported by Fiona, but Kuman expressed his opposition tactfully.

The construction of a new castle requires a lot of manpower and a long time, which can take as short as half a year or as long as several years. The location chosen by Old Gordon was originally a vacant land. Under such circumstances, in order to facilitate construction, a large number of people need to be relocated from other places, which will undoubtedly cause the already developed and mature settlement area to become barren and dilapidated.

The effect is equivalent to sucking the blood of the entire territory, robbing Peter to pay Paul. Apart from being able to gain a new castle, it will be a huge blow to the economy of the entire territory, and it may take several years or even more than ten years to recover.

In fact, Kuman also has his own selfish motives. The reason why Xuefeng Town has reached its current scale is mostly because it is adjacent to Xuefeng Castle and can be regarded as the center of Xuefeng Territory.

With the establishment of the new castle, the focus of Xuefeng Territory will inevitably be relocated, and the decline of Xuefeng Town is bound to be inevitable.

Therefore, Kuman suggested that the new castle could be built outside Xuefeng Town, and the original Xuefeng Castle could be dismantled and used as building materials for the new castle, which would greatly save construction costs.

What the three parties said all made sense, but of course, Raven would have to make the final decision.

Raven had already made a decision about this. He walked to the edge of the map and used a charcoal pencil to draw two straight lines across the territory, one horizontally and one vertically, in a standard east-west and north-south direction. His hand fell on the intersection of the two lines!
The intersection of the central axis of the entire territory is the place he chose to build the castle!
Everyone looked stunned.

Eric blinked, Kuman frowned in thought, and old Gordon pushed his monocle: "But Baron, this is... the Flowing Crystal River!"

The location chosen by Raven's finger was exactly between the Eagle Territory and the Snow Maple Territory, where the Jinsha River and the Liujing River meet!

"It's right here." Raven said in an orderly manner, "The riverbed of the Flowing Crystal River is wide. We can fill the center with soil to create land. The castle can be built here, and the riverbed can be widened at the same time, which will not affect water transportation."

Eric suddenly realized, "And with the river as the moat, the defense capability will be excellent. There is no need to worry about the water source of the moat being cut off. It is extremely safe."

Raven nodded and continued, "That's right. Besides, the transportation here is convenient, which makes it easy for goods to be gathered and distributed, which means it is also conducive to the circulation of people."

At this point, Raven's eyes fell on Kuman: "What you said before makes sense, but there is one thing you didn't think clearly."

Kuman frowned slightly: "I wonder if there is anything I haven't considered carefully enough?"

"You've considered that the new castle will affect the population distribution in the territory, which is very good." Raven praised, and then changed the tone: "But there is one thing you didn't consider, that is the purpose of my building a new castle."

“I just want to concentrate the population here!”

Originally, Old Gordon felt that something was floating in his mind, but he couldn't grasp the key point. Now he understood it immediately after hearing what Raven said. He pointed to the map and said, "The construction location of this new castle can completely radiate to Shining Gold Town, Eagle Town, and half of Snow Maple Territory!"

"Although you have granted land, Baron, a strong man can cultivate thirty acres of land, and nowadays a family only has about ten acres of land."

"When the Baron recruits people, he always pays them. As long as the income from working exceeds the income from farming, someone will be tempted to rent the land to others for farming. This is what the Baron said. Explanation..."

Seeing that Old Gordon couldn't remember for a moment, Raven smiled and said, "Liberate the labor force."

"Yes, liberate the labor force!" Old Gordon nodded heavily. "When these workers have money, they will definitely spend it. This will not only re-stimulate the economic vitality of Goldshire, but will also attract more people to spontaneously trade around the new castle."

Cuman also understood that the key lies in the word "spontaneous". In this way, building a castle is no longer a simple political act, but also an economic stimulus for the territory as a whole. Not only will it not cause the territory to bleed, but it will also greatly enhance the economic vitality of the territory!
I originally thought that Baron Raven had only made achievements in military and political fields, but I didn't expect that he also had such a far-sighted vision in economics.

New castles were built and the population gathered spontaneously on a large scale. This...

An idea came to Kuman's mind, and he blurted out, "You want to build a new city!?"

This sentence immediately awakened everyone present, especially Fiona. She glanced at the map and recalled the city outline map she had seen: "Whether it is Mon'en City or Hovi City, or even the capital, they are all built on the banks of the river."

"In this province, there is Hovi City in the southeast and Mon'en City in the middle, but the northwest lacks a real big city. Sir Baron, is this your ultimate goal!?"

Everyone present looked at Raven with eager eyes.

There is only one word difference between a city and a castle, but their meanings are completely different. The establishment of a real city is an event worthy of being recorded in history, enough for anyone involved in it to leave his or her name in the long river of history!

Raven smiled with relief: "Yes, I do have such a plan, but we have to eat one bite at a time and do things one step at a time. The current focus should still be on the construction of the castle!"

“Do you have any further questions about the site selection?”

Everyone shook their heads; they had all been convinced by Raven.

Now that the location has been determined, the next step is to work on the specific construction details.

In Raven's plan, the main body of the castle will have seven floors, cover an area of ​​12,000 square meters, be about 36 meters high, and be built with granite. The castle will have all kinds of structures inside, including dungeons, warehouses, armories, conference rooms, laboratories, study rooms, and even a small library.

Overall, the first batch of construction funds will amount to 120,000 gold coins, and all building materials used will be local materials as much as possible.

Everyone was excited to think that such a magnificent building would soon appear in the territory, and they all proposed their own ideas. Only Fiona expressed a little concern: "My Lord Baron, this castle is great, but it's a little too high. It will probably take two minutes to walk from the first floor to the seventh floor..."

This worry is not without reason. Although it is only 36 meters, before Raven crossed over, it would have been a 12 or 13-story residential building. It all depends on the conscience of the developer.

If the floor height is lower, it is not impossible to build fifteen or sixteen floors in a 36-meter building.

In particular, Raven's bedroom must be set up on the highest seventh floor.

Having people climb up and down dozens of floors every day is certainly not a pleasure.

As for Raven's castle repair, it certainly wasn't to bring trouble upon himself: "I have already considered this, and have contacted the Mages Guild in advance."

"Look at this."

Raven's finger landed on a hole in the center of the castle on the blueprint.

Old Gordon frowned: "Isn't this the pre-set patio?"

Raven shook his head and said with a smile, "No, I am going to install the latest invention of the Mage Guild here - the magic elevator."

"Magic...what?" Eric didn't understand.

The so-called magic elevator is actually an automatic up and down device powered by magic crystals. It is similar to an elevator, but the working principle is completely different.

This invention is actually a "compromise" choice. Within the Magician's Guild, mages use short-distance portals to move between levels within the Mage Tower.

However, this mode of transportation is difficult to promote on the mainland.

The frequency of use of the portal in the Mage Tower is actually not very high, and many chores can be completed by magical creations; and when the Mage Tower is built, a magic well is usually built to provide energy for the Mage Tower at all times.

If it were a noble family, servants coming and going would be indispensable, and the cost of the portal would be extremely high; and the magic well was impossible to operate for most ordinary people and was too dangerous, which was equivalent to burying a time bomb under the castle.

So in order to make money, er, to "increase revenue", the Mages Guild developed this magic elevator which is easier to use and promote.

Of course, this kind of elevator is not cheap. The whole set, not counting maintenance costs, even with a discount, costs 17,300 gold coins.

Even after Raven's explanation, not everyone present could understand its principles, but at least they understood its functions and began to imagine what it would be like to work and live in the castle in the future.

A spacious and magnificent castle where you can move up and down without moving your feet is a life that everyone would yearn for.

After the budget was arranged, everyone dispersed and began to perform their respective tasks.

This is the benefit of a group being on the rise, everyone is full of energy and vigor.

After solving the financial problem, Raven's life returned to a leisurely pace. Anyway, the chores were handled by his subordinates, and he only needed to make the final decision, so he had plenty of free time.

In addition to practicing magic, Raven also did not forget to find Buggy to learn relevant knowledge about alchemy.

As a branch of magic, alchemy itself is also very profound, involving a variety of professional knowledge and professional vocabulary, such as "magical halogen blending", "blackening of raw materials", "fixation of products", "element rheology", "magic element neutralization" and so on.

This involved many concepts that Raven had never understood before, and he was used to understanding the concepts first and then remembering the nouns, so he wasted a lot of brain cells and also spent a lot of time studying.

This step allowed Buggy to find some balance - it seems that Raven is not a genius in everything!

However, when it came to the actual operation stage, the balance in Bucky's heart was completely unbalanced.

When a normal alchemist first enters the profession, even with a teacher's hands-on instruction, the success rate of alchemy is usually less than 30%, and it is normal to fail seven or eight times out of ten.

But Raven only failed a few times when he first prepared the "burn potion", and his success rate remained high after that.

Even the "Fire Glue" that is known as the "newcomer killer" and requires six raw materials to prepare, Buggy was stuck here for two months. Raven only failed twice, and the success rate has been maintained at more than 60% since then, and it has gradually increased with the passage of time.

Ordinary alchemists can only rely on the external manifestations of the refining process and empirically grasp the changes in the elemental magic in the bottle, but Raven has the Eyes of Truth.

The reason for the failure is mostly because the impurity content of different batches of raw materials is different, and some subtle changes are difficult to predict. If the quality of the raw materials can be guaranteed to be stable, Raven's success rate can be increased.

Bucky gradually discovered with some despair that in addition to being able to give Raven some experience and knowledge guidance, Raven could even serve as his teacher in practical operations!

But Buggy quickly adjusted his mindset - he could not compare to a monster like Raven, and if Raven achieved something in alchemy in the future, he could tell others that he was Raven's alchemy mentor, wouldn't that be very prestigious?
Time passed little by little, and Raven's life was plain but fulfilling. The construction of the new castle also started, along with the construction of Shining Gold Town, Riverside Workshop and Snow Maple Territory Factory. The whole territory was bustling with activity.

Raven could often hear complaints. Apart from Eric, old Gordon, Philip, and Kuman took turns to complain to Raven, and they all expressed one point - there were not enough people!
You know, in addition to the construction site, there are also large tracts of land that need to be reclaimed. This involves the foundation of the territory and cannot be stopped.

In response, Raven comforted them one by one and told them that the problem would be solved soon.

In early August, the 20,000 serfs promised by Viscount John finally arrived.

……

(End of this chapter)