From Londoner To Lord-Chapter 196 - 193. New Ideas

Hudan interrupted, "I don't think there is any harm in checking, but I am pretty sure you aren't going to find a big iron deposit here. The frequent skirmishes and wars over Tolasi hills aren't just to control more land. It's because those hills contain the largest iron ore deposits that have ever been seen in Cilaria. If there was another big iron deposit in these forests, somebody would have noticed it by now and there probably wouldn't even be a war for those hills."

"Obviously, we can't expect to find another such huge iron ore deposit in these forests," Kivamus suggested, "but isn't it possible that we can find at least a decent size deposit here?"

Feroy shook his head. "It's unlikely, milord. The mercenary groups which I travelled with often moved through these forests, and while none of them were trained prospectors, some of them were still iron ore miners in the past, and they would have recognised if there was a big enough deposit, which extended across a big area." He added with a shrug, "That's not to say there can't still be a smaller deposit, since it's not like we checked every single place."

Kivamus sighed. That poured cold water over his enthusiasm. "Even so, it would be a good idea to hire a few prospectors just in case. Even a small iron deposit would be very helpful for us."

Duvas immediately protested, "But we just don't have the coin to hire those costly prospectors! We probably don't even have enough to pay taxes to the Count after the winter!"

Kivamus held up a hand. "Of course, we will do a search only when we have money to spare for it. I know we can't afford to do it right now. So maybe sometime next summer. But we will still need to hire them at one point, since none of you will be able to recognise ores easily. I believe I still would be able to recognise the ores, but it will take months to search over all the land in this barony, and it's just not feasible for me to spare the time to leave Tiranat for so long." He looked at the majordomo. "You said that there were prospectors in Cinran who could do this?"

Duvas nodded with reluctance. "There certainly should be. I will need to visit Cinran for this, but I think I might be able to entice a few of them to come here."

"I don't think that's a good idea," Gorsazo interrupted. "Any prospectors from Cinran would certainly be connected to Count Cinran, or maybe even to Baron Zoricus, and anything that prospector discovers here will be reported to them." He explained, "When the count finds out, then depending on the size of the discovery, he will either claim it for himself or at the very least demand hefty taxes. I think it would be a better idea to bring a prospector from somewhere else, who will not immediately blab about this to the count."

"I... can't deny that possibility," Duvas muttered with a sigh. "Count Cinran knows that we are already behind on taxes, so he wouldn't skip an opportunity to make up for it by bringing any newly discovered iron mine under his own control. That would easily defeat our purpose of getting any profit from those ores."

"Hmm..." Kivamus contemplated. "With the plans I have for the future, we are going to need and consume a lot more iron than we do currently, so I have no intention of selling the ore for coin in case we do find it here. But either way, you both are right. We can't take the risk of the Count claiming it for himself. That means we need to hire prospectors from Ulriga, or maybe somewhere even further away in case we want to keep such news away from my brothers as well."

"That should work," Duvas agreed. "But how will we even find prospectors in that case? I barely have any contacts outside Cinran. It's been nearly two decades since I moved to Tiranat, after all."

The majordomo looked at Gorsazo, who just shrugged. "Don't look at me. I was only a teacher in Ulriga. I don't know any prospectors there either, not that we are planning to hire them from the duchy's capital."

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Hudan and Feroy shook their heads as well.

"In that case, one of us will have to go on a recruiting mission to the north of the kingdom to search for them," Kivamus pondered, "but we still have some time until we need to finalise it. We will decide on it when we can afford them. For now, let's focus on our immediate concerns like you suggested earlier."

Duvas nodded. "I think that would be for the best."

"Alright then," Kivamus said. "It's already late today, and we all are hungry, so we'll skip any further discussion for tomorrow. Let's see what Madam Helga has cooked for us tonight!"

*******

The next day in the afternoon Kivamus was finishing up the sketch for a safety lamp for the coal mines, while waiting for lunch to arrive. Gorsazo was sitting close to the fireplace, while scribbling something on a piece of wooden board, probably planning for today's lesson in the first longhouse block. Hudan had gone to meet with the guards, while Duvas had been out for a while as well.

Thinking about last night, every guard on duty at the gaps in the village walls had heard howls of adzees all night. Some of those howls had also been audible inside the manor at one point, likely from those adzees who had wandered to the east of the village. The guard captain had told him earlier that an adzee was even sighted close to the northern gap, but thankfully there had been no attack so far. The howls had also stopped around morning, as expected, but every guard had still been ordered to remain on alert, even if adzees were known to hunt only in the nights.

Coming back to the present, he took a step back and looked at the parchment carefully. He had to think really hard about this design, since everything would have to be forged by Cedoron by hand, so he needed to keep the design simple but still effective. It had taken more than a few tries, but eventually he had settled on a design which only needed an iron gauze to surround the burning wick inside the lamp. This should keep the flames inside the surrounding gauze in case there were flammable gases inside the mine shafts, but it would still provide a decent amount of illumination for the miners while keeping them safe by preventing any explosion from happening. They certainly didn't have anything like petroleum or kerosene to burn inside the lamps here, but the vegetable or even animal sourced oils which they did have should be enough to do the task, even if at lower efficiency.

He nodded to himself. It still wasn't going to be easy to make, but he was confident Cedoron should be able to do it in a few tries. Rolling up the used parchment to show to the blacksmith later, he rolled out a new one so he could start working on the water wheel sketch for dewatering the mines. He glanced at the shelf at the edge of the hall, which was holding a steadily decreasing number of unused parchments. At the rate he was using them, he was quite sure they wouldn't even last all winter - despite paying a pretty penny to Pydaso to buy so many of them. So he needed a better solution to allow him to sketch more freely without worrying about the cost of these expensive parchments.

This world certainly had paper available here, with all the books in the library of Ulriga palace being made of them, but with the laborious manual process of manufacturing it, that paper was way too costly for them to buy. It wasn't like he had the Duke's treasury at his disposal to buy more paper, like for those books in that library, not that buying anything was even an option right now during the winter with the northern road blocked with snow. Hmm... He would have to think of some new ideas for this soon.

Before starting the new sketches, he walked near the fireplace where Gorsazo was already sitting and took a seat on one of the armchairs to get some rest and bring some warmth into his body.

Soon, the outer door of the manor hall opened and Duvas walked inside while looking like he was shivering. As the majordomo took a seat, Kivamus poured him a mug of water from the pitcher of hot water which Madam Helga had been so kind to refill and heat up regularly.

With a grateful nod, Duvas drank greedily from the wooden mug, and then took a minute to heat up his hands close to the fire. Before long, the majordomo looked at him again. "I just came from the northern part of the village, and I met Taniok there. He told me that the second long house will be completed by this evening."

"That's great to hear!" Kivamus grinned. "This will allow us to house nearly all of the villagers who need a better place to live."

"Certainly," Duvas agreed, "although many of them are already living there."

"How is that?" Gorsazo asked with confusion while looking up from the wooden board he had been scribbling on.