Chapter 76: 76. Ruidar's Intelligence

Since sending off Rognar and Clami that day, Luoning had not paid any more attention to the matter of Weijinsi. Of course, even if he wanted to pay attention, he had no way to obtain information; Shanlin Town did not have Letter Birds to communicate with the outside world.

From that day on, Shanlin Town began its intensive autumn harvest campaign. The main crop harvested this time was barley, totaling over 9,300 mu.

With such a large area, even if Wilson called upon everyone in Shanlin Town over the age of fifteen, each person would still be responsible for an average of six mu of land; the workload was quite heavy.

Fortunately, there was enough time, and with the coordination of the various Village Chiefs and Group Leaders, the overall progress was well-controlled, so the wheat should not be left in the fields to go to waste.

The training of the Guards continued, especially after eighty militiamen were successively assigned; the training ground on the west side of the castle was quite lively every day, with the sound of shouting slogans rising one after another.

During this period, the various squads composed of those hundred or so Slaves also threw themselves into production.

On the hillside marked out next to the eastern farm, not only were two simple wooden huts built, but several Slaves had already moved into them.

Furthermore, the Ironwood Workshop, the Blacksmith Shop, and so on were all slowly getting on the right track; even after a few days of labor by the Manure Collection Squad, the amount of manure in the town had decreased significantly.

During this process, Wilson and several Village Chiefs reported instances of Slaves slacking off. For those who ate his food yet still wanted to slack off and not work, Luoning was merciless; a round of discipline plus skipping a meal or two made those people much more obedient.

They also came to understand that the Lord's kindness was conditional; if one did not work hard, one did not deserve to enjoy this kindness.

During this time, Luoning himself was busy studying Magic, crafting scrolls, and sparring with Maiken to improve his combat experience; besides that, he spent even more time on improving Iron Smelting technology.

To mass-produce farm tools, it was necessary to raise the temperature to smelt liquid iron.

Generally speaking, the melting point of iron is as high as over 1,500 degrees, and under existing conditions, it was a bit difficult to melt it.

But it was not impossible to obtain liquid iron.

In a high-temperature furnace, when iron is reduced, it absorbs carbon; the melting point of the resulting iron-carbon alloy decreases accordingly, and the more carbon it absorbs, the lower the melting point becomes.

When the absorbed carbon reaches about 4%, it only takes 1,200 degrees to melt the iron; with the combined assistance of bellows, high-grade charcoal, and a High Furnace, this temperature could be reached.

Therefore, Luoning mainly did three things during this time—designing a piston-style bellows, using primitive methods to make coke, and building an iron smelting High Furnace.

The piston-style bellows were more convenient to operate than the small leather bag bellows Kalesi used, and they could also save effort; the volume of air sent in was also significantly increased, which greatly improved the temperature inside the furnace.

Primitive coking was actually using wood materials to make high-quality coke, concentrating the energy of the wood.

As for the iron smelting High Furnace, it was actually a simple furnace made of yellow clay; it was not very tall and was only used for preliminary verification.

All along, Luoning had given the Servants in the castle the impression of being clean; they never expected that their master had not only been getting close to the Manure Collection Squad recently, but had even personally started playing with coke and mud!

Luoning did not care about this; after he finished making the coke and connected the bellows to the furnace, he began his attempts.

After several experiments, the temperature inside the furnace was indeed raised through the action of the bellows; after repeatedly adding charcoal to maintain the high temperature, it seemed possible to melt the iron.

But a problem arose: Luoning had no container to hold this scorching molten iron. He had wanted to use a pottery cup to directly hold the iron blocks for heating, but he found that the pottery cup could not withstand the temperature in the furnace and cracked directly.

Thus, the problem of iron smelting was transformed into the problem of making fire-resistant pottery cups.

Fortunately, Shanlin Town was not short of pottery clay; Luoning used several different types of pottery clay and finally fired pottery cups that could withstand high temperatures, which were crucibles in the modern sense.

When the Blacksmith Kalesi and Ba'er watched Luoning pour the molten iron from the pottery cup into a pre-made mold, which soon formed a small Dagger, both of their eyes went wide.

Kalesi did not expect that the Lord's words from that day about "being able to let ordinary people master the temperature to melt iron" were not a joke, but for real!

However, Luoning knew that this kind of cast Dagger could not be used for combat; it was too brittle. The method of casting with molten iron could at most be used to make farm tools by utilizing the hardness and wear resistance of pig iron, and it was best if it could undergo high-temperature decarburization treatment.

Of course, this crucible-holding method also had major drawbacks; if he could move the entire High Furnace Iron Smelting setup over, that would be even better.

But this would require him to spend more time researching.

Although this method was currently too crude, it was still a core secret. Luoning let Kalesi and Ba'er observe it, while also requiring them to keep this secret for him.

In this era, which was still in the stage of primitive iron smelting, whether it was the bellows or the future High Furnace Iron Smelting, they all belonged to core technologies.

Therefore, Luoning made Kalesi and Ba'er sign a confidentiality contract; if they leaked the secret, they would pay with their lives.

In the blink of an eye, the time reached September 15th, and Ruidar, who had been missing for nearly ten days, finally returned to Shanlin Town.

When he left, he was still a handsome young man, but when he returned, Ruidar had turned into a disheveled middle-aged uncle.

Luoning let him return to his room to bathe first before calling Maiken and the others to the fortress hall for a meeting.

"The woodlands to the north and east of the town are very large. At first, I was just searching aimlessly. It wasn't until I had traveled about ten miles north out of the town that I discovered traces of human activity."

In the fortress of Shanlin Castle, Ruidar recounted what he had seen and heard in a calm and unhurried manner.

After finding the traces of human activity, he searched for another day or two and finally discovered a village in a bamboo forest to the due north.

The dense bamboo forest concealed Ruidar's figure, and the rustling sound of the bamboo leaves masked his footsteps.

After detailed observation, Ruidar discovered that this village had no more than a hundred houses, and its scale was not very large. In the northern part of the village, there were cultivated fields; he did not know if the food grown there could be self-sufficient.

After Ruidar marked this village, he followed the small path to the northeast of the village and happened to run into three hunters while crossing the mountain.

There was nothing to say; Ruidar struck almost the moment he saw them, killing two on the spot and leaving one behind, and successfully learned the news of all the savage tribes in the woodland from this hunter.

According to the hunter's confession, there were once as many as eight tribes in this woodland, but after years of natural attrition and annexation, only four tribes remained: the Heiling Tribe, the Huitu Tribe, the Qingzhu Tribe, and the Ziguo Tribe.

Among them, the Heiling Tribe had developed very rapidly in recent years, launching many attacks on the other three tribes and absorbing quite a few people.

The remaining three savage tribes formed a Three-Party Alliance to prevent being annexed by the Heiling Tribe, presenting a stance of holding their own against each other.

Hearing this, Luoning could not help but be stunned for a moment.

No wonder these savage tribes were not invading Shanlin Town; it turned out they were also engaged in a civil war themselves.

"These three hunters were from the Ziguo Tribe. According to their confession, their tribe has the smallest population, with less than three hundred people left."

"In their Three-Party Alliance, the Huitu Tribe is the strongest, but their population is only over four hundred. As for Transcendental, there are very few, and the strongest is only an Advanced Knight."

After Ruidar finished speaking, he picked up the cup beside him and took a sip of water. "After I disposed of their bodies, I searched for two days according to the route they described. I have now clearly identified the locations of these three tribes."

"The Heiling Tribe they mentioned is located on a relatively flat plain. The houses and fields there are the most numerous and widely distributed among these few, and they are currently undergoing their autumn harvest."

Hearing Ruidar finish recounting the intelligence he had obtained, everyone sitting at the long table in the fortress revealed expressions of admiration.

Luoning was no exception; he admired Ruidar's courage, decisiveness, patience, and resilience.

Luoning could not help but praise loudly, "Ruidar, you are the bravest person I have ever met! This intelligence of yours is truly of immense help to our subsequent actions; it is worth me applauding you!"

Led by him, the others in the hall also followed suit and applauded, expressing their admiration for Ruidar's spirit and achievements.

Ruidar nodded to everyone with a beaming smile. After the applause died down, he looked at Luoning, "My Lord, the strength of the savage tribes is not strong. I think it is time for us to consider taking action against them!"

(End of chapter)