Steel, Explosives, and Spellcasters

"Exactly," Sasha answered as if it were only natural. "Forging Village has water-powered hammers, which are most suitable for this task. Relying solely on manual forging, who knows until what year and month it would take to forge this huge lump of iron.

Although in recent years we've been using steel fortress iron, the skill of forging iron is a blacksmith's basic skill and shouldn't be lost so quickly. Worst case scenario, we could still ask my father-in-law's old brothers to come and give some guidance..."

Andre and Mason fiddled with the lump of iron curiously as the young blacksmith proudly explained to the two officers.

Only Winters and Sasha stood in the cold autumn breeze, discussing the matter of "forging" seriously.

"Forging... isn't free, is it?" Winters narrowed his eyes.

"Of course it's not free." Sasha introduced the internal rules of blacksmithing to Winters, "The simplest way—give all the iron ore to the master of the workshops in Forging Village, and you don't have to worry about anything else. Trade directly with them for forged iron, and you'll get about half the weight of the iron ore in forged iron."

"Half?" Winters exclaimed in disbelief, "We toil to refine the iron, and just by passing their hands over it they want to take half? Isn't this fucking daylight robbery?"

Sasha looked helplessly and whispered, "Getting half is only because of your face. What you've refined is not iron but raw iron. It contains a lot of poisonous slag; it's unusable without proper forging."

Winters laughed in anger, "Then I might as well build a few hydraulic forging hammers myself! What the hell with the renowned steel fortress's craftsman hydraulic hammers; I can construct another one after just one look, a hundred if I need to!"

"That's also possible," Sasha nodded, "But think about it carefully—apart from Mr. Soria, you don't have any other blacksmiths at your disposal. Even if I come to help, just Mr. Soria and myself won't be able to cope. You still should give the ore to the workshops in Forging Village, and focus on your iron smelting."

For the first time, Winters discovered that Sasha too had a way with words.

"I've set up an accounting school, I might as well establish a blacksmith school too!" Winters pointed at the laborers who were cleaning the furnace, "I'll train them all to become blacksmiths!"

Sasha became serious, he asked slowly, "What did you say?"

"I said, I want to train them all to become blacksmiths."

"I'm afraid that won't do. Those laborers are farmers with their own land, idle in winter. Even if you let them work in the blacksmith shops, they won't agree. Additionally, apprentices don't earn money during their apprenticeship."

"Whoever is willing, I will train. Apprentices don't get paid? Then I'll pay apprentices too!"

Sasha's expression grew even more solemn, and he earnestly warned the sheriff, "If you do this, I can assure you that all the blacksmiths in Iron Peak County will revolt immediately! Even if they don't revolt, they will definitely not stand by your side in the future."

Sasha's words sounded like a threat to Winters, and at first, Winters thought so too.

But he quickly realized it wasn't that; Sasha was cautioning him. In a sense, because Sasha already considered himself a member of his faction, he used a blunt warning to his face.

"Why?" Winters asked earnestly.

"Being able to forge doesn't make one a blacksmith," Sasha also answered honestly, "Only those who are recognized by the blacksmith guild are blacksmiths. The guild has a complete set of rules for apprentice promotion, and these rules are the foundation of the guild. If you set up a blacksmith school, you'll be undermining the very foundation of the guild."

Guild! Winters stroked his chin. Having lived in Paratu for too long, he had almost forgotten what life dominated by guilds in a city was like.

Sea Blue had hundreds of guild alliances, the guilds of the same industry merged into syndicates, and above the syndicates was the overarching Guild Alliance.

Before the Sovereignty War—when there was no Republic of Vineta, and the "Distinguished Sea Blue Republic" influence was limited to Sea Blue City and its surroundings—the position of president of the Sea Blue Guild Alliance was held by the chief executive.

To be more precise, one automatically became the chief executive upon being elected as the president of the Sea Blue Guild Alliance.

After the Sovereignty War, the small commercial city-states of Vineta and the inland noble lands unified to become the "Distinguished Republic of Vineta," and the president of the Sea Blue Guild Alliance continued to be held concurrently by the Republic's grand chief executive. The revered position of the guilds is evident from this.

It wasn't cities that gave birth to guilds, but guilds that built cities. Cities did not belong to the citizens; cities belonged to the guilds.

Who would have thought that in the impoverished and isolated Iron Peak County on the fringes of the Alliance, they would also play this guild game?

Winters shook his head, then broke into a smile, asking the middle-aged blacksmith, "How about you becoming my advisor, Mr. Sasha? An honorary one, so even if one day I'm defeated, it won't come back to you. There are many things I'd like to consult you about."

Sasha was a bit taken aback by the honor, and he nodded vigorously, "It would be my utmost pleasure."

Sasha further suggested, "Regarding the matter with the blacksmith guild... you'd better talk to my father-in-law. The iron blacksmith guild of Iron Peak County was founded by him."

"Right," Winters chuckled without objection.

Meanwhile, Mason excitedly pulled Carlos over.

"If we push a little harder, I see no problem even in manufacturing cast iron cannons," the elder classmate envisioned with boundless enthusiasm, "The Pretender Emperor's blacksmiths don't have more eyes or hands than we do!"

Carlos listened in stunned silence.

"How much ore has been produced?" Sasha asked Carlos.

"The furnace temperature wasn't high enough, I think what we got is forged iron, not pig iron. Estimating from the materials put in, there should be around four hundred kilograms of forged iron," Carlos added hurriedly, "But we shouldn't count on it being too precise, even two hundred and fifty kilograms would be good. We'll need to weigh it to get the exact amount."