August is the autumn harvest season, and although there is war this year, Haaland's territory has not been affected by the war, and the spring and autumn harvests have not been affected.

This year is a normal year, and the grain yield per mu has reached a normal level.

This year, the Haaland Territory has been restored to cultivated land in the Barony of Dirham, and a large amount of wasteland has been reclaimed.

The summer and autumn grains combined with the grain put into storage, plus the tax grain paid by the free people, exceeded 80,000 tons.

Including the veterans of the territory, and the families of wounded and killed soldiers, there are now about 30,000 freemen in the Haaland territory.

A free man divides five acres of land, one acre of paddy field, and four acres of dry land, and needs to pay 270 catties of grain every year according to the tax rate of 30%.

Converting to silver coins is about the tax of three silver coins.

30,000 freemen, this year's field tax about 7,500 gold coins.

However, many freemen were short of money, so they had no choice but to pay public grain, which was about 3,000 tons.

These 30,000 freedmen no longer need to be supported by Richard, and the remaining indentured slaves are about 116,000.

Now Haaland's territory can already provide some meat and fruits, and the elderly and children in the indentured slaves will also dig wild vegetables during the slack time, and on average, they will be half full, and each person needs to consume 400 catties of food per year.

A few years ago, in order to buy more people, Richard left an average of only 350 catties of grain per person per year for indentured slaves.

With an average of 350 catties of grain and relatively little meat, indentured slaves could only be in a state of semi-starvation.

In autumn and summer, the elderly and children have to dig wild vegetables in the forest, collect fungus mushrooms and other mountain goods, and male indentured slaves have to hunt in their free time to keep themselves full.

In the past two years, the situation has been slightly better, with an average of 400 catties of grain per indentured slave, plus some fruits, wild vegetables, and a small amount of meat, coal mines have been discovered in the territory, a large amount of woolen cloth has been produced, and the standard of living has increased a lot, and it can barely be mixed with food and clothing.

About 33,000 tons of grain and rations will be set aside for next year. In addition, fifteen thousand tons of unforeseen grain reserves in the territory were to be left. Because the liquor market has lost a lot, the scale of liquor has been reduced a lot, and only 2,000 tons of grain are needed.

Of the 80,000 tons of grain, 30,000 tons can be sold this year.

Although there is a war this year, because there is no natural disaster, there are relatively few areas affected by the war, and more than 100,000 people have been plundered by the orcs in Gascoin Province, and the demand in the grain market has also decreased, and the price of grain is relatively stable, still two gold coins a meal.

The territory of Haaland is about 100 kilometers away from Heihe Fort, and if there is no river, it is very difficult to transport 30,000 tons of grain to Heihe Fort, which requires a lot of manpower and material resources. It is also necessary to build roads and establish grain storage points along the way, which with the transport capacity of Haaland's territory simply cannot afford.

With water transportation, although 30,000 tons of grain is a lot, it is not difficult to transport, and it adds up to more than 200 grain ships.

The grain ships sailed down the river from Fort William and arrived at Fort Black River in two days. The transport fleet in the Haaland Territory is not small, with more than thirty transport ships in itself, and six or seven transports can transport grain to Fort Heihe.

The grain transportation lasted for more than 20 days, and Richard transported 30,000 tons of grain to Heihebao, which this year had no big buyers in the Heihebao grain market, and these 30,000 tons of grain could only be sold to the citizens of Heihebao.

More than half of the inhabitants of Fort Black River are family members of the Legionnaires of the North, a population of about 100,000.

Legionnaires in the North were well paid and could afford a well-to-do life for their families, most of whom did not farm. The food consumed by this part of the population is about 20,000 tons per year.

In addition, there are a large number of craftsmen, merchants, and grassroots bureaucrats in Heihe Fort, and the grain digested by the local market exceeds 30,000 tons per year, and the market size is already considerable.

However, Heihe County has fertile land, relying on the irrigation of the Heihe River Basin, and is a relatively important grain-producing area in the three northern provinces, and its grain output is more than that of rich places such as the Labor Basin and Wright County.

Every year, Heihe County produces more than 40,000 tons of surplus grain, and the surplus grain of Rohmon County and Wright County must also be sold to Heihe Fort. There has always been an oversupply in the grain market.

Every year during the autumn grain harvest season, Duke Edward, Duke of Fox, Duke of Guise and other areas that lack food will buy grain from Heihe County, and sometimes the Grand Duchy of Starnik will also come to Heihe County to buy grain through the channel of the Church of Wealth.

This year's Duchess of Edward's harvest has lost a major buyer, and the oversupply of grain in the market has worsened. It's just that the people who sell the grain are hereditary nobles, and if they can bear it, they don't bargain, and the grain won't fall.

Anyway, the big nobles have granaries with good conditions, which can keep grain for several years.

The Haaland family has a large number of shops in Blackriver Fort, including two grain stores, a bakery, and a restaurant.

Normally, these businesses can digest more than 2,000 tons of grain a year. This year, 30,000 tons of grain are unsalable, and it is very difficult to rely on these stores to sell them.

The buying and selling of bulk grain takes a long time, and the time to collect the payment is also relatively long.

But the market is like this, the disaster of the Duke of Edward two years ago has increased the price of food by two percent, but it is a small probability.

Grain prices in Heihe County have been stable for decades.

Last year, when the grain merchants wanted to increase the price, the noble council immediately stepped forward to negotiate with the nobles of Heihe County.

The nobles of Heihe County couldn't withstand the pressure of Duke Edward, and even in disaster years, the price of food did not rise.

Just when Richard was worried about selling food, in September, it was his father William who helped him solve this problem.

William found Tarlac, the logistics chief of the Northern Legion, and sold 10,000 tons of grain to the Northern Legion as military rations, and the pressure on selling food was greatly reduced.

Because of the large amount of training, the soldiers in the army need to supply three catties of food every day, and they need to consume 1,100 catties of food in a year, which is equivalent to two men in the prime of life.

The 24,000 soldiers of the Northern Frontier Army consumed more than 13,000 tons of grain in a year.

William was able to win a purchase contract of 10,000 tons, and the Haaland family owed Tarlac a lot of favors.

After winning the Northern Legion food contract, William sought out Zachary of the Randem Legion.

Although the Haaland family and Zachary turned their faces last year, the most important relationship between the nobles is not face, but interests. Zachary was William's old chief, and they could talk to each other.

Richard was able to deliver grain to the Iron Lion Castle, the Pratos Castle, and also saved a fortune for the nobles behind the Randem Legion.

Became a supplier of military rations to two armies, selling 14,000 tons of grain in exchange for 28,000 gold coins. The remaining 16,000 tons of grain can only be sold to ordinary citizens and slowly exchanged for money.

In order to sell more grain, Richard converted some of Mrs. Ola's stores into grain stations and expanded into a chain of grain stores.

The price of grain has also dropped slightly, and ordinary citizens are very sensitive to prices. Richard cut the price by a tenth, which immediately caused the burghers to rush to the bridle, and before the other grain merchants could react, the Harland family's surplus grain was basically sold.

After negotiating the sale of the grain, Richard went straight to the Harland Mage Guild.

Recently, the Harland Territory Mage Guild is building a magical alchemy furnace.

Both Hiss and Butler are magicians from the Tower of Death, a large magical organization.

Despite being an evil organization of necromancers, the Tower of Death has a very comprehensive knowledge of magic.

Hiss has seen many magic furnaces and has specialized in alchemy runes for a while.

Butler is a low-level mage in charge of managing the alchemy furnace, and he knows the operation of the alchemy furnace very well, and he will even repair the magic alchemy furnace.

After driving away the necromancer and capturing the Mage Tower.

Richard focused on the necromancer's study of the bloodline and the soul.

Since last year, the hospitals in Haaland's territory have made great progress in mastering medical knowledge compared to before.

Despite the interruption of this year's magical research project by the Orc invasion, Sophia still has a new magical achievement, and she has improved and simplified the two-ring magic requiem to create a new zero-ring spell soul pacification.

Although the effect of soul pacification is not as good as that of requiem, the requirements for casting spells are much lower, and it is still a good spell for low-level magicians.

In particular, the Harland Mage Guild has quite a few magic apprentices who can learn this spell.

Soul pacification is a magic that soothes the soul and is considered a healing spell.

Because several magic apprentices learned the spell, Richard established a psychiatric department in the hospital, selected a few young doctors with a good foundation, and joined the young magicians who soothed the soul and began to use magic to treat mental illness.

The Haaland Territory now has a population of more than 100,000, and because of the harsh environment in northern Xinjiang, there are about 1,000 or 2,000 people with various mental illnesses.

These mentally ill patients are all in serious condition, and according to the conditions of Haaland's territory, mild mental patients do not come to the doctor.

Severe mental illness has made these people incapacitated. If these people can be cured, the territory can increase a lot of labor, which is very beneficial to development.

With the establishment of psychiatric departments in hospitals, these mentally ill patients have also been treated by doctors, although there are still few means of treating mental illness, and the main thing is to rely on soul comfort.

Soul pacification is effective in treating mental illness, and the power of magic far exceeds Richard's estimate in the treatment of mental illness.

After the invention of soul pacification, the establishment of psychiatry, the development of territorial hospitals accelerated by a small step.

After the end of the war this year, Butler handed in an application to apply for a magic core and build an experimental magic alchemy furnace.

From the Tower of Death, Haraland's territory obtained a part of the alchemy materials, which also involved the alchemy furnace.

The Magic Alchemy Furnace uses the magic core as an energy source and mobilizes the power of mysterious magical runes, which can provide higher temperatures and melt metals with a melting point of more than 3,000 degrees.

To build a magic alchemy furnace, the materials used are also extraordinary, requiring the use of graphite powder, mixed with Mithril powder, and the magic bricks are fired first.

On the magic brick, special magic runes are also inscribed.

If it weren't for Butler's provision of the magic brick recipe and refining technology, the magicians in Haaland's territory would not have understood the doorway inside.

Even if you want to build a magic alchemy furnace, you will have to get stuck in refining magic bricks for a long time.

Due to the use of Mithril powder, the Magic Bricks are very expensive to make.

Just by installing a magic alchemy furnace, the magic bricks alone cost four thousand gold coins.

In addition to the magic bricks, the alchemy furnace also consumes the energy of the magic crystal.

The price of magic crystals is high, and the cost of using an alchemy furnace is not low.

By September, under Butler's guidance, a magical alchemy furnace had been built in Haaland's domain.

The magic furnace looked very bulky, about two meters tall, with an ore feed port at the top and an outlet at the bottom.

In the middle of the magic alchemy furnace, there are also three rows of runes inscribed.

These runes need to be inscribed on the obsidian, which is then carefully polished and set on the furnace body.

Richard studied the newly built alchemy furnace and found that the three rows of runes were a fire elemental gathering circle, which provided energy through magic crystals, which could stimulate the power of the fire elemental gathering circle and increase the temperature of the magic alchemy furnace.

The working principle of the alchemy furnace is actually very simple, and the only difficulty is actually the manufacturing process technology of the magic bricks.

Magic bricks with Mithril and magic runes engraved with them are super refractory, and if it weren't for the extremely expensive price, Richard would have wanted to use these magic bricks for ordinary crafts.

After the magic alchemy furnace was successfully built, Richard tried to smelt a furnace of blood molten steel.

The melting point of blood steel is more than 100 degrees higher than that of ordinary steel, and it was very difficult to smelt blood steel in Haaland's territory in the past.

The production of alchemy bombs is very low, and the difficulty of smelting blood steel is also a factor.

Now using the magic alchemy furnace to smelt blood steel immediately becomes much easier, although using magic crystals as energy sources, the cost has increased a lot, but it has greatly increased the speed of blood steel smelting.

If it's an emergency, you can use the Magic Alchemy Furnace to speed up the production of alchemy bombs.

After successfully building the magic alchemy furnace, you can also explore and study the alloy process, if you can make some high-quality alloys, it will be very beneficial to the progress of the process.

"Butler, according to your experience, how many times a day can this magic alchemy furnace be opened?"

"Master Richard, the effect of the fire elemental gathering magic array is very good, it can refine a furnace of metal in an hour and a half, and each furnace can refine fifty kilograms of blood steel, but after three hours of continuous use, it will take ten hours to cool down and let the magic runes engraved on the obsidian cool down. Otherwise, if you use the alchemy furnace for a long time, the magic runes on the obsidian will burn. The fire elemental gathering circle inscribed on the obsidian is the heart of the magic alchemy furnace. Once damaged, you will need to buy a new obsidian and inscribe a magic rune to repair it. ”

Listening to Butler's narration, Richard secretly thought in his heart: "If you use the magic alchemy furnace to make steel, you can refine about four furnaces a day, which is about two hundred kilograms, and the magic alchemy furnace will consume a first-order magic core in three days, about twenty gold coins."

In this way, the cost of refining steel in the magic alchemy furnace is about twelve copper coins per kilogram. Coupled with the price of raw materials such as iron ore, it turns out that the price of steel remains high because of this, and the great nobles with magical inheritance estimate that they will use magic alchemy furnaces to refine steel. ”

Now the cost of steel refined in Haaland's territory has been reduced a lot, and Richard has calculated this year that the cost price of a pound of steel has been reduced to four copper coins. This also includes the wages of the workers in the steel mills, the cost of materials to build the steel mill, the fuel costs for the purchase of coal, and the transportation costs of coal, ore and steel.

It seems that using the magic alchemy furnace to make steel is not as competitive as the earth blast furnace in general.

(End of chapter)