85 – A Captain Offering His Services
The mission was an excellent opportunity.
There was no need to manage how many goods the fief"s residents traded, so he decided to just purchase three gold coins worth of goods for the castle.
Recently, seafood had started to be profitable, so the East Coast had become a continuous source of gold coins for the castle.
He succeeded in stopping the shriveling of his coin pouch and even managed to have it recover slightly. Currently, there were about five gold coins inside.
“Old Grandet, I called you over because I have something to tell you. Tomorrow, Northvalley City"s caravan will be coming to the Flower Town. Here are three gold coins, make sure to spend them, purchase anything that can be purchased.”
Old Grandet was quite sharp: “Sir Lord, you want to use the charm of gold coins to attract the caravan over again?”
“Exactly.”
“Understood, leave it to me.”
“Okay, you can go back.”
“Yes, Sir Lord, have a good night.”
Old Grandet turned and left. At the castle"s gate, he saw Burnell, so he greeted him: “Burnell, Sir Lord also called you over?”
“Oh, no, I made soap, so I came to deliver it.” Burnell jolted the pouch in his hand, “Has Sir Lord called you over because of the caravan that is coming tomorrow?”
Old Grandet said with some pride: “Of course. I am the leader of the castle"s caravan and Sir Lord trusts me.”
“I really envy you. Let"s stop here, I have to go inside.” Burnell bade Old Grandet farewell and then, under a servingman"s lead, entered the castle and came before Liszt.
After a deferential salute, he gave the soap to the servant.
“The soap has finally been made. From now on, I no longer need to purchase soap that has a production cost of one copper coin yet is sold for two silver coin.” Liszt picked up a piece of soap, thinking that Burnell"s handicraft was not bad. The soap was not much worse than what he purchased from the Coral City, “Thank you for your hard work, Burnell.”
“It is my fortune to be of use to Sir Lord.”
“I still have one more thing for you.”
“I am awaiting your instructions, Sir Lord.”
“I have heard of a recipe that uses a mixture of pig pancreas and plant ash to make a kind of soap that is even better at cleaning than honey locust soap.” Liszt didn"t call it pancreas soap as that wouldn"t sound nice. Anyway, it was a new product, so he could call it whatever he wanted.
“There is soap even better than the honey locust soap? Sir Lord, pig pancreas can also be used for cleaning?” Burnell was surprised.
“That is what it is. However, I can"t recall the specifics. Therefore, I will give you the task of making this soap. I want you to find out the way to make soap from pig pancreas and plant ash as soon as possible. I will generously reward you once you complete this task.”
Burnell hurriedly said in response: “It is my fortune to be of use to Sir Lord. Sir Lord, please rest a.s.sured, I will do my best.”
“Also, continue to make honey locust soap, the castle cannot do without it.”
“Please rest a.s.sured, Sir Lord.”
……
The smoke mission"s reward didn"t take long to appear.
Early the next morning, Liszt received a report stating that the oyster settlement"s fishermen found a huge sea monster stranded on the East Coast. Liszt immediately made the connection between the sea monster and the black pearls from the deep sea and immediately left for the East Coast.
On the beach, he saw the stranded sea monsters accompanied by a fishy stench.
“Sir, do you know what sea monster it is?” Gort and the others had arrived earlier, but they didn"t know what species the stranded sea monster was.
Liszt took a closer look. The sea monster was a kind of mollusk. It was very large, at least ten meters long. With its intertwined tentacles, it looked a bit like a squid. It already had signs of rot. Therefore, it was difficult to tell how it looked when it was alive.
He released Magic Eyes and found that there was no flow of magic power in the sea monster"s body.
Strictly speaking, it was just some kind of marine animal and not a sea monster.
“It is probably a large squid and not a sea monster.” Liszt fanned the air in front of him. The stench emitted from the rotting squid was very strong.
“Can it be eaten?” Asked Blair suddenly.
Gort made an expression of aversion: “I can"t stand the smell, let alone eat it! I don"t think it"s seafood, but a monster! It might be poisonous and might have even eaten people in the sea. I"ve heard of sea monsters that could wrap themselves around ships. With this squid"s ‘arms", it certainly could wrap itself around a ship.”
Even if it wasn"t poisonous and hadn"t eaten people, Liszt wouldn"t cla.s.sify it as seafood.
Rotten things should be just throw away.
However, as the black pearls from the deep sea rewards might be related to this large squid, he ordered: “Teacher Gort, find people to dissect this large squid to see whether there is anything of interest inside the carca.s.s. If there isn"t anything, then cut it to pieces and throw it into the sea so as to avoid the stench.”
Gort started to organize the fishermen to dissect the large squid.
Liszt went to where the sailboat was stranded on the beach not far away. This sailboat, which initially had a few holes, had been repaired by a carpenter. When the tide was low, it could be moved to the seabed and then when the tide was high, it could once again roam the sea… However, although there was a captain who could steer it, but there were no qualified sailors to man it.
“Sir Lord, I, Kosto, give you my regards.”
Just as Liszt was admiring the sailboat, his retainer knights, Philip and Xavier, stopped a fisherman. The fisherman hurriedly knelt on the ground and yelled out loud.
Kosto?
Liszt remembered this name. He turned around and said to Thomas standing behind him: “Let him through.”
Kosto was a tall middle-aged man, his suntanned face marked by weather and time: “Sir Lord, I, Kosto give you my regards.”
“You have already said that once.” Liszt sized him up, “Stand up and talk. If I remember correctly, you are the captain who steered this ship.”
“Sir Lord still remembers my humble name, I am greatly honored.” Kosto stood up and continued respectfully, “I used to work for Lord Smallkerchief as the captain of Soar, which was a barque sailboat that could reach the speed of three knots during tailwind. This sailboat, on the other hand, is better than Soar, it can reach a speed of five knots during tailwind.”
Knots was a unit of speed used in maritime navigation. Liszt wasn"t too familiar with this unit, so he couldn"t imagine how fast one knot really was.
However, he knew that the Tulip Family"s fastest ship could reach a speed of seven knots, and reportedly, the fastest sailboat of the court"s fleet could reach a speed of ten knots.
Kosto raised his head and, with an inscrutable glint in his eyes, looked at the sailboat: “Sir Lord, don"t you want to let it roam the sea again?”
“You want to steer this ship again?” Liszt looked at Kosto with interest. Apparently, the other wanted to offer his services, “However, there are no sailors in the Flower Town.”
“They can be groomed. I was originally a sailor, traveling the sea for years on end. I know how to groom qualified sailors. Sir Lord, if you put your trust in me… Give me twenty people. In three months" time, I can train them into sailors qualified to sail offsh.o.r.e, and in a year"s time, they should be capable to sail the open sea.
Liszt looked at him: “There is no place suitable for a harbor in the Flower Town, so how do you intend to train them?”
“But there is! Sir Lord, there is a place very suitable for building a harbor in the Flower Town! There, the terrain is flat and the water level is very deep! It is appropriate for med-sized ships to anchor!”