our family is gone

Chapter 161 Workshop
Lance had seen the modern steel forest, but he wasn't too shocked by Totnes at the beginning. At most, he felt a little novelty about this alien-style city.

But soon his feeling was wiped out, replaced by another feeling - crowded.

Directly from the Embankment Wharf is the wharf commercial area. The business is extremely prosperous. You can’t see the kind of mud-walled thatched houses in rural towns here. They are all stone-brick buildings, at least two or three floors, and all the buildings are crowded together. Use up all the space.

The passages between the buildings are even more cramped, forming countless dark alleys, only the main road is slightly wider.

Restaurants and hotels can be seen everywhere on both sides of the main road, and some shops put up awnings to sell them. There are a variety of goods, not limited to the usual necessities, but many more with enjoyment attributes. The hawking of the merchants on the street made the street full of popularity.

Lance walked around all the way, stopping from time to time to ask prices, trying to understand the price level here.

The prices of the goods here show two extremes. Some handmade products are much cheaper than Owendo City, but things like food are much more expensive.

You don't need to think about it, you know that there are too many people gathered here, manpower is worthless, so the handicraft industry is very developed, and once the scale is formed, the cost will be suppressed.

On the contrary, the price of some items that need to be shipped from outside will be superimposed. Freight, rent, profit, etc., of course, will be much higher.

And this is the fundamental logic of the existence of merchants, to obtain profits by transshipment of goods.

But Lance didn't have much interest in these, but came to the place where the craftsmen gathered according to the location told by Barton in his memory.

There are a little less people here, but you can hear the sound of blacksmithing as soon as you get close, and there are not one or two. The whole street is covered with wooden signs with iron felts and stove signs, and blacksmith workshops are located in it.

【Workshop】

This place gathers most of the skilled craftsmen in Totnes City, and the current street in Lance is a foundry-related industrial cluster.

A workshop is usually a storefront with a working space behind it. It sells things in the front and builds them in the back. The weapons produced by some masters can sell hundreds of gold coins.

When Lance walked into a store, he could see that most of the customers here were in need of weapons and armor, as could be seen from the ratio of things hanging in the store.

But he didn't come here today for this, but for farm tools.

Why does he want refugees to go back?

It is to reclaim the land, and these need farm tools. In this era, most of them are still wooden farm tools. As for iron farm tools, it is not that there are no, but there are few.

The clerk here greets the customer when he sees the customer and wants to introduce him.

"I don't know what the customer wants? We only need a full set of knight armor..."

"Stop, stop!" Lance raised his hand to interrupt, and directly took out a blueprint, "See if you can do this, I need a lot."

Three hundred logging axes, one thousand sickles, one thousand hoes, one thousand shovels, and one hundred plowshares all don't need to be equipped with handles.

It was clear that this business was a big farmer at first glance, and the clerk knew that the amount could not be determined by himself, so he immediately ran to the back to ask for instructions.

The curtain was lifted, and Lance felt a gust of hot wind blowing out, and then came out a brawny shirtless man. His body was muscular, his arms were thick, and his knuckles were thick. It looked like he had worked hard all year round.

Maybe because he was still swinging the hammer just now, the leather apron on the waist and crotch was black, and a thin layer of sweat appeared all over his body, which was oily under the light, and his bald head, which had been bald early, looked very strong.

In other words, it is difficult for ordinary blacksmiths to survive here and maintain a workshop.

After some discussion, the factory owner is only willing to take part of the orders, because the quantity is too large and the time is too short.

Of course, the profit is relatively low, not as good as weapons and armor.

He was not in a hurry, there were too many factories here, and after finding a few, he quickly settled the order.

In other words, he just got a batch of money from the Ascension Sect, otherwise the order would only be half at most.

And when he has money, he directly doubles the order, because the price of farm tools here is at least [-]% cheaper than his own construction cost, and the more the quantity is, the cheaper the price will be when the price is shared, and the quality is more guaranteed.

The smithy in the territory spent most of their time maintaining weapons, and they had no time to make farm tools at all.

The major task of coming to Totnes has been completed, but Lance did not leave in a hurry, but continued to wander around the workshop area. He was looking for a workshop for making firearms.

The current gun loading problem makes it not strong in actual combat. Only a few people can see its potential for war. More attributes are a substitute for heavy swords for those gentlemen and rich merchants.

Therefore, most of these craftsmen who make firearms have not formed a scale, but take a boutique route, and you can see the gorgeous decorations on the finished gun bodies.

It's just that it is impossible for Lance to equip soldiers with these luxuries. He needs durable and cheap leather, and there is only one place that meets his requirements.

That is the affiliated workshop with the full name [Totnes Gun Academy]. The big shots have long seen the war potential of this thing and have been advancing it, even building an academy to cultivate talents.

There are military officers who specialize in the training of practical combat, and Patton is one of the best, but more are craftsmen and apprentices who make these. These are most of the teachers and students of the academy.

In order to maintain the operation of the academy, it is necessary to generate income, and this subsidiary workshop is one of them. It produces gunpowder and guns, undertakes most of the empire's firearms orders, and also represents the pinnacle of the empire's firearms technology.

Whether it is the guns seized from the artillery regiment or the munitions from Jean's warehouse, they are all produced by this workshop, the only difference is the logo printed on them.

The shop of the college workshop is on this street, and it even has a very large facade. When you go in, the finished products they display are basically practical, which is obviously different from those luxury goods that cost dozens or hundreds of gold coins.

Here, a basic short-barreled musket only costs twelve silver coins, while the basic long-barreled flintlock gun costs only one gold coin, which translates to twenty silver coins.

But there is one more thing to consider. Firearms are different from cold weapons that are directly picked up and cut. They need several things to activate.

Flint, gunpowder, and projectiles are all consumables, and this is the biggest subsequent consumption.

Lance estimated the cost of forming a musketeer team and the maintenance cost, and found that the general lord was really unable to maintain it.

But he couldn't bear the fact that children couldn't hold wolves. The training period of traditional arms was too long, and the threat of the ancestors was imminent. To protect and regain the territory, the presence of troops was needed. He had to quickly expand his strength in a shorter time.

(End of this chapter)