William Williams
Stories
8
Chapters
3,046
Words
2.4 M
Comments
0
Reading
8 d, 4 h
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As Lord Janus was unable to accurately answer why Lady Miranda had chosen to ally herself with the Heeat family, Alexander could only make educated guesses. Perhaps her family had previous dealings with them. Perhaps they had reached some kind of deal with regard to the family's debt. Or perhaps they were the only ones willing to make a deal with the Margraves in the first place. Whichever the answers were, Alexander would have to wait till he met the lady of the house. For now, though, he…-
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Listening to Lord Janus explain Lady Miranda's situation, Alexander could finally see how things had gotten to where they were. The Margraves family faced stifling exports and a collapsing domestic market right when their expenses were peaking. This caused their treasuries to rapidly shrink, resulting in a want of change in the leadership. "Is the free trade agreement really unpopular with the people?" Hearing the gist of the thing, Alexander thus posed so to Lord Janus, pointing, "We also import…
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Edit- In the previous chapter- instead of tradesmen, it should be trade agreement. Alexander had up until now been listening to Lord Janus's story with mostly a detached interest. And yes, it was just a story to him. Sure, he was curious and even a bit concerned after learning about Lady Miranda's troubles, wishing she would be able to extract herself out of it as soon as possible. But that was really the extent of it. The reason for this apathy was because Alexander was still a tiny bit peeved…
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While Alexander was ready to depart for the capital Adhan, one inconspicuous morning he was suddenly informed that a small merchant fleet bearing the Margrave Family's sails had docked at the harbor. This news surprised him a bit when he got it first because he had gotten no prior letter to their arrival, which was the usual custom of the times. Thus, given this anomaly, Alexander quickly set up a meeting with the dignitaries that very afternoon, curious to know the reason. "Lord Janus! What a…
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With summer ending and autumn fast approaching, Alexander soon got busy tidying up his affairs in Zanzan. This was because he was scheduled to attend this year's annual pilgrimage, Jtaama at the capital Adhan at the invitation of Ptolomy. Given his great triumph over Tibias, it was a basic courtesy to meet the king and 'obtain his blessings'. As a matter of fact, Alexander was expected to have done this much sooner. And this time, Alexander too wanted to meet with the king. Because there were…
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Alexander spent the following five months after his conquest of Tibias at Zanzan, catching up with his family and getting up to speed on various administrative matters. His day would typically start a little after dawn, with one or more soft, often bare bodies spooned against him. While a warm, wet sensation would regularly tingle his lower half, delivered sometimes by his wives, and sometimes by the maids in the house. These maids were actually slaves and trained for especially this purpose. But…
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Alexander would state the required capabilities of his machine not using horsepower or percentages, but by the amount of work it should be able to do without a certain timeframe. So in his case, Alexander wanted the machine to be able to draw 250 tons of water from a depth of 10 meters every hour using just 10 kg of coal. Alexander would make the announcement throughout the city, with detailed diagrams of the machine freely available at the public library. And seeing this promise of an astounding…
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Looking at the huge machine slowly bob up and down, Alexander then began to ask Marvin some technical questions about it, such as its output and efficiency. "So much coal does it use every day? And how many ingots can you turn into sheet iron?" Alexander inquired. "Umm…. my lord we use close to 200 kg of coal during the day and can process a few hundred ingots." With the help of the supervisor there, Marvin was able to state the numbers. And using this Alexander was able to roughly work out the…
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The promise of just 1,050 men was enough to send Marvin over the moon, as he profusely thanked Alexander for his generosity. "Thank you, my lord. We will not fail you!" And with that said, the main 'workshop' portion of the tour had come to an end. But that did not mean Alexander was done. No, for there was one last thing that he had yet to see. And that could even be said to be the main attraction to the place. "Marvin! Has that machine I wanted been constructed? I want to see the…
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Alexander went to observe the lost wax casting method at the decorative section of the iron workshop, where things like statues and other showpieces were being created. In this casting method, first, a wax model of the product was created. Then it was coated with clay or in the case of Alexander, plaster of Paris, which was just powdered gypsum mixed with water, with only a few small holes at the sides and top. Once the coating set, the entire was heated in an oven to melt the wax and let it drain…
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