Release That Witch

Looking at the shiny black stone on the desk, Nightingale asked, "What's this?"     

"Obsidian." Roland even did not raise his head, busy with painting his blueprint.     

"Ob... What?"     

"No, I was talking nonsense." He sighed. Just by looking at its shape and color, how could he know what it was? After all, he was not a geologic expert, and could not guarantee to distinguish even a pure metal, to say nothing of ores. The knowledge he had in his head only told him most ores were compounds with complicated compositions and their color varied with different impurities. For example, iron ores could be divided into hematite, pyrite, and siderite, which looked totally different from each other. Especially the pyrite, which would sometimes show a light yellow metallic sheen, was often wrongly identified as gold, giving it a nickname "Fool's gold".     

As for their thermostability, a compound did not have a fixed melting point, as it was related to the impurities and its composition, so it still was impossible to distinguish between all the different varieties by using different temperatures. In addition, metallic elements would exist in ion state, so melting the metal would be useless, as long as he did not know how to purify it.     

"So there are also things you don't know about?" Nightingale asked with surprises.     

"There are plenty." Roland put down his quill and poured himself a cup of black tea. "Would you like some?"     

"No." She waved her hand. "By the way, beef jerky isn't as delicious as dried fish. You'd better put some dried fish in your drawers in the future."     

Roland was silent for a while, pretending that he did not hear her. He decided to give the ore to Kyle Sichi, the Chief Alchemist. After all, minerals were more or less radioactive, so putting them in his office as decoration would not be a good choice.     

Since Soraya's ability evolved recently, he found that there were suddenly a lot of things he could create now.     

First of all would be a tap water system, which would greatly enhance the living level of the residents. Thinking of that, after a busy day, the residents came back home in a sweat and could not wait to have a shower, only to find the water tanks were empty and they had to walk to a well nearby to fetch some water. That feeling would be awful. What was more, Roland hated to use water from the tank to wash face or hands. He always felt there were parasites growing in the water after it had been stored in the tank for several days. To make things worse, tanks were rarely cleaned, not even once a month. When he took a closer look, he could see strips of sediments flowing at the bottom of the tank.     

If they used water tower for water supply, there were not many technical difficulties. They could pump water from Redwater River into a water tower by using a steam engine, and then the siphon principle would cause water to flow along pipelines into every house in the town. With this, they would have formed an automatic water supply system. The reason why Roland had not put it into practice so far was... the insufficient material.     

They had to use pipes made of iron or copper. The iron pipes without anti-rust treatment would be seriously damaged within several years. Copper pipes would be perfect, as they were non-corrosive, the inside walls would not scale, and they were non-toxic, and even the copper ion could kill bacteria in the water. But how could he use the raw material of coins to make pipes? The output of North Slope Mine was far from sufficient to afford such luxurious product. Even in modern time, copper pipelines were only affordable in high-grade mansions.     

Up to now, Border Town was not able to export ores; instead, it had to import metal ingot. Therefore, no matter iron or copper pipes, Roland was reluctant to use them just to create a water supply which was purely for his enjoyments rather than making any profit.     

But now it was different. With Soraya's Coating magic, he could make pipelines without metal. For example, he could take an iron pipe as a mold, wrapping it in paper and then covering it with Soraya's coating. Then he only had to take out the mold and got the pipe he needed. Even though these kinds of pipes were not pressure-resistant, they would be qualified as long as they were placed in covered ditches.     

The second thing he wanted to create would be a power supply system. He was afraid that it was impossible to spread it over the whole town within a short time. But Roland had dreamed for a long time to make the castle full of light. After all, reading in dim candlelight was too painful, and would do great harm to the eyes. Furthermore, summer was coming soon, so the evenings would be sweltering enough. If he had to stay in a room with burning torches and candles, how terrible it would be!     

Now he had got generators and electric wires, it was not an impossible dream for the castle to enter the electrical age ahead of its time. As for the filament of bulbs... he vaguely remembered that carbonized-bamboo filaments were commonly used for the incandescent lamps before the invention of tungsten filaments. Bamboos were not rare, as there were a lot to be found in the forest south of Redwater River.     

However, what Border Town needed most so far were smelting facilities. Their iron output was directly related to the scale of their mechanical production and weapons manufacturing, which was essential for the survival of the town.     

"You are drawing... a tower?" Nightingale sat at the desk and asked curiously.     

"Similar to it." Roland nodded. "But it's empty inside, so it can be filled with fuel and ores. It has similar functions as shaft furnaces and can be used to smelt iron ore into pig iron."     

This was a blast furnace, an updated version of the ancient shaft furnace.     

He had visited the construction site and had taken a look at the shaft furnace designed by Lesya. To be honest, its structure was very close to that of a blast furnace, except its capacity was smaller and the temperature it could achieve was lower. If Soraya's ability had not been evolved, giving the town the possibility to produce refractory bricks, he had originally intended to build a dozen of such shaft furnaces.     

But now with refractory bricks, he could consider building a blast furnace which could achieve a higher temperature and have a higher output.     

The height of the newly designed blast furnace was almost eight meters, about four times of that of the shaft furnace. The furnace was tower shaped, and its largest part was three meters wide. In order to prevent it from collapsing, carriages were installed at the bottom. The furnace wall was thinner at the top part and thicker at the bottom. The furnace bosh was up to half a meter thick, and its innermost layer was made out of refractory bricks with Soraya's coating. At the same time, it also had an air inlet hole through which a steam engine was able to continually send fresh air into the furnace bosh.     

In order to make full use of the power of the steam engine, Roland had also designed a set of automatic feeding equipment for the blast furnace, which included a climbing rail and a special loading cart with a movable door at its bottom. Driven by the steam engine, the cart would climb to the top of the furnace. Then the buckles at its bottom would be inserted by a hook, pulling open the loading door to pour fuel or ores into the furnace. This system could be regarded as the top technique in this era.     

Different from the shaft furnaces with wide openings and low furnace temperature, his new blast furnace would not stop working for a long time once it started. As long as fuel and ores were constantly delivered into it, it would have a much higher output than the shaft furnace. If five or six blast furnaces were built in the town, the output of pig iron would be multiplied.     

…     

After finishing all his drawing, Roland rubbed his sore wrists and then took out a box from a drawer of the desk and pushed it in front of Nightingale.     

Nightingale was surprised. "This is..."     

"Well, I had intended to give it to you earlier, but it cost me some time to engrave decorative patterns on it. After all, I'm not very familiar with the machines in the factory," Roland smiled and said, "Open it and take a look."     

She opened the box and could not help but give a cry of excitement.     

Inside the box were two revolvers. Different from the prototype used by her when she competed with Carter, the revolvers were made of shining silver and were so polished that she could even see her own reflection on it. Exquisite decorative patterns were engraved on its grip and body. On the barrel, he had engraved Nightingale's name "To Veronica".     

Roland had planned this for a long time. Compared with the flintlocks which were inconvenient to carry and load, the newly invented revolvers had been greatly improved. It had a high level of safety and firing rate. What power this powerful weapon would create in the hands of such an agile witch like Nightingale, he was looking forward to.     

"Thank you." She smiled to pick up the two revolvers, jumped off the desk, and struck a shooting pose. "Will you teach me how to use them?"     

"Of course." Roland nodded. Her white assassin outfit and sunny and dazzling smile made him immediately understand what was drop-dead gorgeous. "It's not difficult. You only need to sneak up on your target, pull the trigger, and shout 'It's time to die'".