Rebuilding Science in a Magic World

Getting all the metal machines made took some time.  Considering I needed a wood chipper, a pulper, a lime furnace, five hand turned presses, a steaming chamber, and a stirring vat, I'd say getting them all made and hooked up in thirty-five days was a pretty good accomplishment.  While Karsh worked on the machines, I was making frames for paper.  I have three sizes of paper that I want, and three frames in each size. 

The first size is pretty close to what would be standard A4 printer paper on earth, although it's slightly thicker to account for the fact that it isn't chemically processed so it will last longer.  The second size is the same printer paper size, a bit thinner, but not so thin as to tear while writing on it.  That paper is meant to be used as scratch, and thrown away when one is done using it.  The final size paper is quite a bit bigger.  In total, it's about the size of four A4 sheets arranged in a rectangle, and even thicker than the first sheet.  These sheets are meant to be used for blueprinting.  Basically, I wanted them large enough and rigid enough to be useful even when brought to a construction site.

The only thing left to do is a test run of the paper mill, however, I want to find about three goblins to man the mill, and teach them how to use it.

Thankfully, finding a few goblins interested in running this mill was fairly easy, partially thanks to the job board at the city hall.  By the second day, I had filled the three positions I wanted.  It seems that the goblins who were interested were ones that were interested in the first mill, and were excited to get an opportunity to work in a new one.  That said, the other mill and this mill have quite a few differences, so I hope that doesn't scare them away.

We've also gotten the first of the snowfall on the mountain, which means that we can probably expect the merchant to be returning within a few weeks.  I was hoping to get more paper made before that point, as its a bit more renewable than metal, so I'd like to use it as a trade commodity, but we probably won't have much if any made by that point.  Thankfully, outside of getting a few more bargas, and whatever Karsh and his family needs, I don't think this year we're going to be trading for much.  Though I'm more than willing to trade for some coin to keep the merchant happy.  If we don't keep the trade channel open, it can be much harder to reopen it in the future.

As always, when starting up something this complicated, there are going to be problems.  It took nine days to actually get the whole process working.  Most of the issues were easy enough fixes, but they required downtime for Karsh to make a new part to relieve the issue.  The biggest issue ended up being the steamer chamber, which I ended up having to rebuild as two chambers instead of one. 

I had just made a stone base with small holes to separate the wood and the water in a single chamber, but as it would turn out, that caused a lot of buildup of organic gunk in the water chamber, and by the fourth time we started to use it, it had become so caked that some of the gunk started smoking.  So ultimately, there is now a boiler which pipes the steam into the steaming chamber, rather than it being a single unit.  

In any matter, we got the paper mill running from start to finish, and I got to see the first pieces of paper go to start the drying process.  Ultimately, as long as the frame fits in the pulp tank, we shouldn't have any issues making other sizes of paper if the need arises, so I'm pretty content with the whole facility.  My only concern is that with more and more mechanical devices being used, we might end up having an issue as things break down.  Right now, we're nowhere near that limit, but with a single blacksmith in town, there is only so much metal that can be worked in a single day.

The paper mill finally gives us a much needed second output for all the excess wood that we get while expanding.  For the longest time, we've used it for charcoal, which has been nice, but we have more than we'll need for many years.  Now that all the dwarven crop fields are harvested, it's time to get to expanding those again while it's winter time.  With population expansion coming any day now, we'll need the extra food, plus I'd like to use the wood for paper making.

I've been cutting trees down behind some of the existing fields now for ten days, while keeping an eye out for the merchant's return.  Since I'm no longer in charge of construction, or for that matter, a lot of the management for the goblins, I've taken to keeping the levels to myself for cutting trees down.

If someone else needs levels, they can either cut down more trees for some other project, or they can take to working with the fishergoblins for a while.  While individually, most of the fish aren't worth much, the sheer numbers they've killed over time has really manifested itself in a bit of a power imbalance.  Most of the fishergoblins who have been at it since I taught them have evolved into hobgoblins. Even some of the newer ones have prestiged a few times.

At this point, the guard that we position at the artificial tide pools isn't really there for protection, just to collect tax.  Which means we'll need to consider a way to get the guards leveled up more.  I'd consider waiving the entrance fee in exchange for having the guards help with the fish catching, but that would take away from the monetary sink that is necessary to keep inflation low in the economy.

I suppose an option would be to reserve a portion of the tide pools where a few guards would be in charge of killing the fish inside, but the fishergoblins would still be allowed to take them for free.  The fishergoblins themselves have gotten quite good at precision strikes to kill the fish while keeping the meat as pristine as possible, so the quality of the fish probably won't quite be up to their standards, but its better than having weak guards.

<MYTHIC LESSER EARTH DEMON>
Level: 33
HP: 2069/2069
MP: 1209/1209
Traits: Mana Affinity, Earth Manipulation, Improved Dexterity, Heat Resistance
Magic: Improved Stone Shaping, Tectonic Sense, Improved Earth Spike, Thermal Hands

It took two days of convincing the fishergoblins and Zaka to get the change made to the guards regimen.  The fishergoblins were obviously the first to be concerned with the idea of suddenly losing access to some of the tide pools, but after some compromise they conceded the point.  What we agreed upon was that not all the fish in those sections would actually be killed by the guards.  The guards would have to learn which fishes were inexpensive and only kill those.  In exchange, we got a few extra tide pools to make up for the difference.

While I was overseeing some of the guards while they worked in the tide pools on the third day, I got word that the merchant had returned, along with Shasta, two other people whom no one recognized, and significantly more guards than have arrived previously.  I then promptly returned to sort out our trade while also going to see who these new people were.

When I arrived, I could tell two things before I actually got close enough to speak.  First, the extra guards weren't dwarves, and neither were the two individuals who weren't armed.  Second, whoever these people were, they were important.  They were dressed quite nicely, and held an air about them exuding authority.

When I finally got close enough to speak, I could tell that one was an elf, and the other was a human.  When I actually arrived at the group, the human started speaking first, in a language I couldn't understand, and hadn't heard before.  As he spoke, he maintained strict eye contact with me, and finished with a flourishing bow.  I bowed back briefly, and waited for someone to translate.

Unfortunately for Shasta, it seems like she ended up being the translator for this as well.

"I am the Baron of Compfur, servant to his majesty the King of Rathland, Besmond III."

After Shasta finished translating, the Baron continued.

"It seems that we have a bit of a legal conundrum on our hands.  You see, these islands are ours.  We have a document from a few hundred years ago detailing the actions of a fishing vessel that got lost during a storm, and eventually returned back to our kingdom.  As those men were the first to set foot on these islands, they're legally our territory."

As the Baron spoke, his speech was filled with hand gestures as flourishes.  I'm certain he's normally quite the speaker.  Something about his eye contact bothered me however.  It seemed that the conversation wasn't directed to me, so much as all the others who could hear him talking.  Once the translation finished, I responded.

"Then I suppose we do have a bit of a problem.  We can discuss it further this evening."