Rebuilding Science in a Magic World

The first construction crew worked on extending the jetty for another twenty-eight days before they nearly caught up to where the float vines were cut to.  Their progress continued to slow due to both the distance that the rocks needed to be hauled now, and the added depth of the water requiring them to use more rocks for every foot of distance the jetty went out to the ocean.

The second construction crew also finished getting the road and second tunnel built, and has resumed building residences in the city, which means I'll be running classes at the academy again soon enough.  In the time while the construction crew was working, I took nine days to go manage things at the paper mill.  The desiccant was getting pretty close to needing to be recharged in their storage area so I did that.  Then I decided on making a standardized box size for each of the different paper sizes we have. 

I figured that it'll actually be easier for all parties if the stone boxes are mostly completed already and the mill workers can just load them up and put a lid on them.  Any boxes still in the storage area would then need to be sealed with stone shaping and could then be moved to a different warehouse, since they'll no longer need to be stored with desiccant as the boxes would be air tight after being sealed.

I made about a dozen boxes that hold about 100 sheets of paper each for the various paper sizes and filled most of them.  I then sealed and hauled them off to the village where they can later be opened to get access to the paper stored inside.  For good measure, I made another forty of each box size while leaving the lids off in the mill's storage area.  I then informed the workers as to how many sheets to store in each of the boxes before they put lid on them.

Once that was done, I was starting to clear some more forest areas to make room for more bargas herds when Boggs returned again from fishing somewhere on the island.  His condition was quite bad, however.  He had makeshift bandages wrapped around various parts of his body, which were soaked with dried blood.

When I asked him what happened, he said that he had a run in with a dangerous catch that had shot bone spines into him as he attempted to pull it up from the ocean.  Once the spines had gotten embedded into him, he noticed that the areas started to go numb, so he released his rod with the caught creature and immediately started removing the spines from his afflicted arm and leg.

He said that once he finally got them all out, the numbness had spread through a decent portion of his body, and he was worried that would be the end for him.  He laid there for hours, unable to feel almost anything and unable to move his limbs, worried his heart would stop at any minute, but it beat faintly the whole time, until he slowly started to regain feeling.

He didn't seem that upset by the injuries themselves though, instead he seemed more frustrated by the loss of his fishing rod that the beast had taken with it back into the ocean.  So I decided to take the time working with him to try to get our fishing rod designs finalized so that he could take one with him.  He'll be hanging around the village for a few weeks while he heals back up.  The jetty needed me for harvesting more float vines, so I left Boggs with the test rods and let him know who all would be helpful to him for getting things like fishing line made.

Karsh had been functioning as the translator between Boggs and I while we were in the village, so I paid him some coins for his help and then some more as advanced payment for helping Boggs work with other goblins in the village for his fishing equipment.  Karsh is also to make sure that Boggs tells me all the changes to our fishing rod designs before he leaves the village, so I can make sure that we can make more of them.

Having Boggs fishing like this has turned into quite the informational boon.  Knowing what things can be caught around our island, and knowing the dangerous ones means that we can more safely allow fishing off the jetty for large sea life, so I'll probably consider his debts paid once he gets the fishing rods figured out.

I got a few of the goblins to help me with harvesting float vines.  It didn't go that well.  They can't hold their breath nearly as long as I can.  They could at least harvest the very closest float vines, but even after I had them spend seven days practicing holding their breath and maneuvering underwater they didn't improve much.  I also tried having one of the hobgoblin fishergoblins that had water resistance try as well as one that didn't have water resistance.

The water resistant one did seem to be able spend a noticeably longer time underwater, but he was both higher level and higher prestige than the other hobgoblin, so I can't rule out that it could have been related to that instead.  I can't justify pulling more hobgoblins away from their jobs for now, especially as we've already harvested quite a bit of float vines, so the remaining float vines are getting a bit far for even the hobgoblins.  I myself could still go about twice the distance that the two groups had already harvested without running into oxygen issues.  I hadn't checked previously how long I could hold my own breath, but I knew it was quite long.  After a few tests, I determined it was about fifteen minutes.

If I get a chance, I'd like to have Zeb give it a try.  If and when a new lesser earth demon comes about, I'd like to have them also try just for informational purposes.  I suspect that different species of demon probably have different lung capacities, but I can't rule out that levels and prestige also play a role in the matter.  The next time that the jetty catches up to where I've cut float vine to, I'll have to be more picky about which goblins I have help me so that I can start to determine these differences. 

I could also just have them hold their breath underwater to test it outright, but with all this other work going on around me it doesn't seem like a good time to just be pulling individuals from their work to see how long they can hold their breath.  Once I actually do need to have others harvest float vine in my place, I'll go through the experiments because I'll have a good justification for it then.

After the seven days of work that I had the goblins do, then the two days of working with some hobgoblins, I myself worked for another nine days to get the rest of the float vines harvested that were in the way of the jetty.  At least as much of it as I could, as there is still some ahead of it. However, it looks like we're reaching the edge of where the float vine grows.  The depth of the water looks like it might be too deep for more to grow a little further out, as I think I can see open ocean about thirty feet from where I've harvested float vine so far.  The good news is that the deeper the water has gotten, the taller the individual float vines have been, which means much more biomass for converting to soda ash.

Even after all that time Boggs still wasn't fully recovered, although he was almost there.  Some of the spines ended up digging in pretty deep into his leg in some places and that was what was taking so long to heal.  He made a comment about how on the mainland he could have paid for a healer to help him recover much faster, but we don't have one here.

I noticed before when we first ran into the party that was traveling with Shasta that individuals could heal others with magic.  We haven't unlocked any healing powers that would be useable on others here on the island, but it seems like at least some people on the mainland have that ability.  He'll just have to heal the old fashioned way I suppose.  I did inform Boggs that once he gets the new fishing rods figured out, he can probably fish on the partially completed jetty while he's healing, since there should be individuals around to help him if there is an emergency.

He seemed to appreciate the gesture at least.  He's been working with the rope-making goblin to try to come up with a good substitute for his fishing line, and he thinks that they're at least getting close to a viable solution.  I certainly hope that they are, as they've spent a lot of time working on the problem.  Their issue seems to be that the plants available here on the island aren't quite the right durability, and that the lines tend to go bad sooner than Boggs would like.

I suggested that they could use copper wire, and Boggs gave me a weird look, but said he'd give it a try.  After a two days of making wire, Boggs gave it a try, and I see why he gave me the look.  The wire is too stiff to properly use.  I'd heard of people using wire fishing line on earth, but in retrospect it was probably used from a boat where you could just lower the wire into the water rather than needing to cast it out.

After that failure, I told Boggs he's welcome to have plenty of replacement line made of lower quality if he needs it, and that we'd look into getting whatever plant imported to grow for fiber materials in a few months when the merchant arrives.