You were made to farm, and now you're the emperor of an empire?

Chapter 57 Magic Ore
Roman's 55 days in Sig.

He pulled all the guards out of the livestock sheds and kicked Green and Aaron in front of them, so they could train them properly.

During this time, a small caravan arrived in Sig Town.

Roman is opportunistic.

He would value someone like Morey, who had seven merchant ships, dozens of men, and even a stable iron ingot purchasing channel, and might even receive him personally.

Someone like Daken, with three merchant ships and more than ten people, can handle quite a few things, and his attitude is also relatively good.

But those with only one merchant ship, or small merchant ships, which only sell goods such as linen, are not valued much.

They are all small-scale investors with no cash flow. They rely on bartering to make a living.

The merchants of Sig Town are like this; even their ships are discarded junk that others don't want, and they still have to go into debt to buy a ship.

Roman sent them off to do business with other merchants, exchanging salt for grain.

Upon learning that the town of Sige was selling refined salt at a low price and with low tariffs, the small merchant immediately left all the cargo on his ship in Sige, took two guards, and transported away a hundred or so pounds of salt. He also promised to send a large quantity of linen to Sige in the future.

Roman has been busy these days as well.

First, the slaves were assigned to different places. Some were assigned to do light handicrafts, such as making wood tools, twisting ropes, and making clothes—clothes for the slaves to wear.

When they arrived in Sigge Town, they didn't even have a broken bowl; to call them beggars would be an insult to beggars.

The remaining slaves went to quarry stone. Now the number of oxen in Sigge Town has exceeded one hundred. These large animals have to transport stone every day. Roman has a huge demand for lime, and there are no coal mines around Sigge Town, so for the time being, they have to burn wood.

Some of the labor force was also used for this purpose. Because there were not enough logging tools, they had to borrow the strength of several oxen. At most, they could uproot trees that were half a meter thick. Then they threw these trees with roots and mud into the river. The timber would float down the stream to the place where the stones were burned.

This is much faster than logging, and it also clears out the surrounding forests, making it easier for subsequent road construction and land reclamation.

It's okay if you're not used to it at first; you'll get the hang of it gradually.

After the topdressing, the 2,000 mu of farmland no longer requires special care, so the manpower there can be used for other purposes.

Roman had previously allocated dozens of oxen to 100 farmers there, instructing them to cultivate a 500-acre plot of land nearby for planting crops such as barley, oats, and peas.

In the future, hundreds or thousands of slaves will come to Sig Town. We need to ensure food reserves—it's not enough to just buy food to survive. If there's any turmoil, we'll all become Muggles. We still need to grow our own food.

Roman then sought out leatherworkers and carpenters from Sigir to create harnesses specifically for draft horses.

While draft horses are not as physically strong or enduring as oxen, and are also more expensive, this does not mean they have no advantages.

Horses are faster than oxen for plowing, and horse-drawn carts are faster and go farther than oxcarts.

Merchants valued this point highly; they often used faster carriages to travel between different places, saving time and increasing efficiency, thus increasing profits.

Knight armies also used packhorses and draft horses to transport supplies.

Roman bought the draft horses to increase transport capacity and labor power.

However, draft horses are not well-suited for plowing, and forcing them to plow can even cause them to die suddenly.

This left Roman speechless.

The fools of this era put yokes around the necks of horses, strangling their chests and tracheas, refusing to loosen them, and then complain that their plowing efficiency is poor.

His eyes twitched as he watched.

change!
Change it immediately!
Screw church regulations!

Roman designed a new harness, changing the point of force from the chest to the shoulders.

This thing quickly proved effective, making draft horses more efficient at plowing than oxen by about one-fifth.

Because of the lack of managers, everyone has to do everything themselves.

But Roman was full of fighting spirit every day, and he arranged all his affairs in an orderly manner. Every day at noon, he ate the same meal as the common slaves.

……

At 58 days.

People from the salt mine found Roman and said they had unearthed something. This piqued Roman's interest.

He immediately dropped everything, mounted his horse, and rushed to the salt mine.

The foreman in charge of the salt mine immediately handed Roman what they had mined with both hands.

This is an irregularly shaped crystal that weighs about five or six pounds.

Roman recognized it as a salt-sealed crystal sphere.

All mineral veins contain certain resources during geological evolution, which are considered associated minerals. Over a long period of time, these resources are encased in special crystalline layers formed by the solidification of minerals. Without breaking through these crystalline layers, it is impossible to know what specific resources are inside.

Roman smashed it open with a stone and found that the inside was a black ore that looked like charcoal but whose surface shimmered with fluorescence.

"Tsk, it's a magic ore..."

Some resources can be called extraordinary resources, all thanks to these special minerals.

Magic ore is widely found in many mineral veins, existing in the form of sealed crystal spheres. It can be found once a certain amount of mining is completed. It can enchant various metals, turning gold into fine gold, silver into mithril, and steel into magic steel.

If you're lucky, you might even dig up a magical ore while digging in the dirt.

The nobles knew how to use magical ores, and the blacksmiths in the great cities also knew this craft.

Enchanting the most common steel can also greatly improve its durability and sharpness.

In Roman's view, magic stones are equivalent to enhancement stones. Although the enhancement they provide to steel is significant, it does not exceed the scope of ironware unless one masters special forging techniques or adds other extraordinary resources.

Some rich mineral veins contain metal ore that possesses a shallow but extraordinary power. With just a little smelting, it can be transformed into a piece of magic-refining equipment.

Mining veins is very difficult, so production is limited.

Roman has no other way to obtain it except through mining.

Green, Aaron, the Greatbow of the Cracked Armor, the Ruby—those extraordinary resources were merely part of his dowry from home.

Salt mines are considered relatively pure among many mineral veins, and finding even a single dusty crystal sphere is considered extremely fortunate.

The magic ore comes from the sealed crystal sphere.

However, this does not mean that the Dust-Sealed Crystal Sphere can only yield magic ores; it also has a chance to produce various gems.

For example, rubies, sapphires, crystals, diamonds, agate, amber, and other such items.

It's similar to gambling on jade.

All the gemstones encased in the crystal sphere are of high quality and possess a rich, mysterious power.

Roman remained relatively calm.

If you didn't get a gem, then you didn't get one.

There is ample time.

One day, he will find rare gemstone mines, crystal mines, or even legendary magical veins.

You can have as many of these as you want.

Right now, this magic ore weighing a little over two pounds is of little use to him. It wasn't very big to begin with, and the magic stones obtained after calcining it would be even less.

Roman is now lacking iron, copper, silver, gold...

We're basically lacking everything, so there's no room for metal smelting right now.

This is a high-level project that only powerful nobles can afford to participate in.

The only option is to convert it into recruitment gems.

However, he will not be conducting a second recruitment for the time being.

Roman thought for a moment and then arranged for someone to do something.

(End of this chapter)