When the Saintess Arrives, No King Exist-Chapter 810 - 761: Flute-Type Ships and Industrial Syndicates

In the dark of night, the bulky cargo ship cut through the waves, heading towards Joan of Arc Castle.

Currently, the Saint Sun's Ship is still under repair, and Horn is eager to get to Joan of Arc Castle.

So he simply gathered a newly styled cargo ship from the dock, and set off with nearly a hundred guards.

The candlelight flickered with the ship's motion, and Horn sat by the window, letting the fishy river breeze wash over his face.

Even though they wouldn't reach Joan of Arc Castle until the latter half of the night, Horn still couldn't sleep.

The preparation time was originally a year and a half, then shortened to a year, and now it was only half a year.

Who could sleep in such a situation?

Currently, the Holy Alliance crisis was intensifying both internally and externally, and he had to stabilize the situation while hurriedly preparing for war.

Leaving Madlan to handle daily affairs, Horn gave him two instructions:

First, print three types of propaganda at full throttle: an investigation report on the Leia people's flood conspiracy, a compilation of bond dividend cases, and a secret dam-digging order from the Duke of Wing Nest.

They all share a common trait—being forged, or at least half-true, half-false.

Second, increase the number of Chekas—the Child Soldiers, who were only thirteen or fourteen years old in the Loyal Successor Academy four years ago, are now sixteen to eighteen years old.

These orphans witnessed firsthand the brutality of the Church and the nobility, having undergone four to five years of rigorous education in a closed and harsh environment, it is time to release them.

Entering a state of war, society is inevitably transitioning from openness and inclusion to introversion and isolation.

Especially when facing such a formidable enemy like the Leia and the dire domestic situation, extreme measures are inevitable.

Following this, the Imperial Cardinal Conference will draft a comprehensive plan based on information from all sides.

However, before it all begins, there's an urgent task that must be addressed at once.

That is recruitment and mobilization of manpower.

Currently, Moliat had lost a large number of troops, so Horn must recruit in advance to fill this gap.

However, mobilizing too many young men for military, flood response, and transport will inevitably impact local economies significantly.

Horn's army is a money devourer; finding a balance is a major challenge.

To distract from the chaotic thoughts, he forced himself to focus on the ship beneath him.

This ship, called a flute ship, is a newly developed vessel from the Xiaochi City shipyard over the past few years.

Owing to the removal of numerous tax cards and river checkpoints, and the flourishing various trades, the original single-deck barges no longer meet the shipping demands of the Thousand River Valley.

So, through the efforts of shipwrights, this new type of barge was developed.

It has an extremely narrow upper deck, a pear-shaped hull, and a ball-shaped stern.

Its length is about 25 meters, width around 6 meters, with 3 decks, and can carry about 250 tons, yet requires only 12 people to operate.

Moreover, with the establishment of Hundred Households Districts everywhere, the Village Magistrate's control over regions has greatly increased.

These demobilized troops or local gentry magistrates have dealt severe blows to river bandits, reducing the number of armed personnel needed on ships.

Such a ship can be acquired for just 260 gold pounds.

If transporting grain, each ton would cost about 5 Dinars in freight, meaning that a flute ship can earn 12.5 gold pounds per trip.

Since only 12 people are needed, a one-way 200-kilometer trip takes about a week, with crew members earning an average daily wage of around 4 Dinars.

Even so, after excluding other costs, the ship owner still gains at least 7 gold pounds.

If transporting sugar and spices, the profits would be even greater.

Essentially, the investment is recouped in two years, and everything afterward is profit.

Thanks to these newly styled cargo ships, Horn's Holy Alliance market managed to get established with difficulty.

The 23 shipyards in Xiaochi City and Rapids City launched nearly a hundred ships annually.

Starting this year, more than half are flute-type ships.

Of course, compared to the peak years of the Netherlands Republic in Horn's hometown, this is as insignificant as an ant.

They launched 500 ocean-going vessels annually, while Horn's are still coastal and inland vessels.

But compared to other contemporary shipbuilding areas, this was quite a remarkable efficiency.

It's not that the shipwrights of Lower Reif County and Kasha County excelled extraordinarily, but because of the widespread application of water power machinery and modularization.

Take timber for example; in other parts of the Empire, shipyards would first receive orders, then purchase timber, dry it for six months, and slowly saw and manufacture.

Not just the hull, but everything like the boat's bow, rudder, masts, etc., they would have to build themselves for their own fit.

Even the quickest would take 8 to 9 months to build a flute-type ship.

In the Holy Alliance regions, although it hasn't developed to the point of using spring mechanisms, water power machinery was entirely feasible.

Under the redesign and transformation by the ry Court Barracks engineering team, the shipwrights used numerous pulleys, ropes, and water-powered saws to replace the laborious old machinery.

Horn was even generous enough to allow them to pay for the modifications in installments.

The shipwrights were now working at full throttle, looking forward to the day they would pay off their ship loans.

After standardizing weights and measures and breaking the traditional master-apprentice system across the Holy Alliance, Horn instructed Catherine to create a modular supply chain system.

Simply put, shipwrights only needed to design and craft the hull according to industry standards set by the national guild.

Components like masts and rudder boards were pre-made in dedicated workshops, ready for installation when needed.

As long as both the shipwrights and the workshop adhered strictly to the weights, measures, and industry standards, everything would fit perfectly once assembled.

Even the timber for the hull was already purchased and dried by specialized lumber merchants, and the shipyard only needed to buy it.

At various shipyards, a peculiar sight emerged where ships were pre-built and then sold.

Everywhere in the Holy Alliance, citizens and young people eager for profit frequently mortgaged their family lands to buy a ship for transport.

According to Catherine, they even attracted a batch of shipwrights from Leia, planning to expand to 27 shipyards by the end of the year, stimulating many other small workshops.

It wasn't just the shipbuilding industry; the cannon casting and gun industry in Gray Furnace Town also began to take shape.

Gun carriages, stock parts, gears, slings...small and large parts workshops surrounded Gray Furnace Town's central cannon factory like satellites.

There were even dedicated workshops for making tools used in part production, and machine shops for lathes making tools for producing parts.

Joan of Arc Castle is a conglomerate of the construction and publishing industries, while the ry Court Barracks is a consortium of the textile, alchemy, mechanical manufacturing, and academic industries.

Small workshops crafted parts manually, and the central large factory was only responsible for assembling, procuring supplies, and producing core parts.

Not only in Xiaochi City, but this trend was vaguely emerging across all regions of the Holy Alliance.

However, they couldn't develop as the shipbuilding industry did, mainly because of a lack of artisans, customers, and materials.

The building and printing industry in Joan of Arc Castle was somewhat better off.

The cannon and gun industry in Gray Furnace Town relied on market demand.

The textile industry at ry Court Barracks faced issues with raw material supply.

And universally, they lacked artisans.

Horn's manufacturing entities were about to exhaust all the skilled artisans in Thousand River Valley.

Yet it still couldn't satisfy the demand from Black Snake Bay and Falan Trading Company or even internal demands within Thousand River Valley.

As for the reason, Horn knew well—they simply had no confidence in the future of the Holy Alliance.

In their minds, the Holy Alliance was at best a faltering regime.

Under the Church's and lords' public opinions, the Empire's craftsmen viewed joining Thousand River Valley now as joining the Qin Army in '49.

This resulted in Horn's industrial system being stuck in a bottleneck, unable to progress or regress, and it was rapidly approaching its growth ceiling.

The solution to this problem is simple: just win a battle against the Leia.

Give the Empire a resounding showdown, and it won't ignore your presence.

So, does the Holy Alliance actually need this war?

For a moment, Horn didn't know what to think, and his thoughts once more turned to the war.

Fortunately, during this time, the ship had already passed the dark waters and docked at the port outside Joan of Arc Castle's city.

Walking from the gangway onto the dock, a carriage with thin iron plates embedded waited by the roadside.

Nearly a hundred officers from the Saint Danji Military Academy swung their torches, hammering their breastplates with clanging sounds.

They were temporarily reassigned to serve as Horn's guards, led by the short-haired Selomis.

Getting into the carriage, Horn didn't delay: "Where's Jeanne? All right, then head to the Holy Arrival Hall."