章 17: Chapter 5.2 Lobau Ironworks
POV David
June 4th 913 (2016)
I stared at the trio of towering smokestacks being constructed. Well, towering was being rather generous. I watched as women worked in conditions that would make an osha official die of fright, climbing up the stacks with a few bricks in a basket, some mortar, and a dream.
No scaffolding, no ropes, no safety at all. I'd already watched two people fall to their death in the short time I'd been standing here. I was in a sort of stupor, shock really. The corpses had been drug to the side, tossed in carts and carried off, almost like this was to be expected.
Irina watched the foundries construction like this was common and Shyora… well i guess i shouldn't be surprised the succubus was yawning like she was bored. I shook myself from my stupor and started walking into the foundry. Inside was a complete company of noise. Hammers, saws, shouts, and cries.
"Are you sure the smelters need to be this large, sir? We can easily make do with ones half the size." Irina asked, ducking under a swinging beam as we walked past the large smelters being set, fires already being lit as charcoal was being shoveled into the furnaces.
"Trust me on this mrs. Besser, you're under estimating the scale of everything I need." I replied as I dodged around a gaggle of workers pushing wheelbarrows of charcoal over from the docks.
"No sir, i think you don't realize just how much ore you've bought, or fuel. The smithing guild doesn't go through anything approaching this amount in a year!" Irina protested.
"Well that's the difference between a collection of private smithies and an industrial scale now isn't it?" I replied while gesturing at the large cauldrons being readied to collect the molten iron once the smelters were done turning the raw iron inside into a liquid.
"Then enlighten me sir." Irina said as we stopped before a large roller.
I sighed, then pointed at the iron rails already in the floor, each segment of the track was about six feet long, and one could easily shove a cart along it carrying up to a ton or so. "Remember how these make a circuit around the ironworks. They need to extend to the docks, and then we need something that can pull several, perhaps a dozen or more carts all at once full of ore from the docks to here."
"The dock is a mile away!" Irina protested.
"The mines are even further… about sixty three miles to the closest of them?" I asked Shyora.
"Indeed master, though I fail to see why that matters." the succubus replied, watching as a few smiths and a section of laborers started shouting near one of the smelters. I glanced over, seeing them carefully pouring the red hot iron into a cauldron.
The large crane picked up the cauldron, moving it across the short distance to the molds where another section of laborers and smiths poured the iron into. I watched as the still burning liquid raced through the molds, as did many within the ironworks. Long thin slabs of iron, about 3 inches wide, 3 inches tall, and almost 30 feet long. I smiled slightly to myself as another section of workers pushed a pair of carts close to the molds.
Once the slabs had cooled sufficiently they were carefully lifted by teams of workers and set on the carts. The carts were then pushed into a different section of the ironworks, specifically to the large rollers I stood near. I watched closely as smiths guided the laborers through the process of carefully lifting a rail and inserting it into the roller, the rail being shaped as it passed through the several rollers to something more familiar than a long slab of raw iron. Once rolled into shape the rails were taken to another set of machines and straightened, before being set to the side to be cooled. I turned to the former smithing guild master.
"Does seeing it in action help?" I asked, watching as another batch of molten iron was being poured into the molds. I gestured for Irina to follow me as I walked out of the ironworks and headed to a large brick shed under construction. Inside was a large contraption being worked on by some of the best smiths the former Lodi smithing guild had to offer. A few sets of flanged wheels were stacked in the corner as a pair of machines milled away at the circular blocks of steel.
I pointed at the half built contraption, its large round, pudgy smokebox glaring ahead with its unlit lamp. The door had been left open and several of the best smiths I could afford were busy installing small metal pipes into what would become the boiler. "Once this locomotive is complete it will need to run atop the rails. Look, it might not make complete sense to you now, but there is a plan behind all of this."
"I'll have to take you at your word sir, i;m afraid all I see at the moment is an expensive waste of money." she replied, staring at the locomotive. I chuckled and bid Irina farewell. Shyora followed me as I walked back to the manor.
The city was bustling with activity, people were everywhere, hard at work. Well, when you start spending thousands of silver, people tend to become more productive. I smiled slightly as I watched a guard help a family get their dog down from a roof. There was a hope, that promise of a better future in the air.
The first fires of industry were starting to smolder, it was up to the people to fan the flames now, to create that future and grasp it with their own two hands. I'd be there to help them do it.
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