"Can you go over and visit?" Xia Fan suddenly became interested. Having a factory means centralized labor and workers who are completely free from agriculture. Compared with small manual workshops, it is undoubtedly an advanced existence.
In fact, Jinxia City's new machine manufacturing bureau has evolved into a large-scale comprehensive manufacturing factory.
"Yes, but" Olina showed a hint of hesitation, "it's not a good place there."
"How to say?"
"In the Holy Wing Islands, desperate people usually have two choices, either joining the underworld organization or going to the factory to find work. So you won't like it there."
Even so, the dragon girl still took the two of them all the way. As she said, the market area and the factory are very close to each other, and the four-wheeled carriages between the two have become the absolute main transportation force on the street. This is a bit like the difference between bulk stores and wholesale stores. Generally, customers shop in the market area, while merchants who need to purchase large quantities of goods will go directly to the factory to pick up the goods.
There are no walls or guards around the factory, but there are many shacks built around it. They seem to be a transitional area connecting the two areas. Since the materials of the shed are extremely diverse, including felt and wooden boards, it looks like a sea of "mosaic".
The smell here is even worse. Garbage and black mud are piled up between the sheds. The smelly sewage flows freely on the stone floor and even seeps into some of the sheds.
"This is" Li raised his eyebrows slightly. She saw that there were people living in the shed, but most of the people staying there were old people and children. Especially children, ranging from two or three to seven or eight years old. One thing they have in common is that they are thin and dirty, and they are completely different from their peers in the market area outside.
In addition, in order to avoid direct contact with dirt, people put all kinds of things on the ground, ranging from bricks and stones to linen. However, this cannot essentially reverse the situation. On the contrary, a lot of sewage will accumulate and further ferment and rot.
The temperature in June is gradually rising, not to mention the strong smell of swill and fishy smell in the air.
"Families of factory workers." Olina replied, "It's empty now because most people are busy working, and everyone will come back to live here at night."
"Do you live in a place like this?" Li looked back and forth, "It's just like the refugees from Qi State."
"But at least they can have something to eat."
Xia Fan remained silent. Refugees are reduced to this situation because they are homeless. They clearly have a home, but they can barely survive. This speaks volumes in itself.
But this is the normal state of the world today.
Those who have enough to eat and drink are already an extremely lucky group.
Even Jinxia City has just managed to free the entire population from the plight of hunger. For these people, he could only watch from a distance.
Walking through the shantytown, the three of them approached a factory where production was taking place.
The carriages coming from the port dumped the goods on the ground, and the workers put them into baskets, climbed up a high platform, and threw them from top to bottom into a huge copper furnace.
"Those red fruits, could they be the drunken fruits I just ate?" Li said, pointing to the red fruits on the ground.
"It seems to be correct." Olina nodded, "But the main ingredient of the jam is its seeds. These are the original fruits shipped from the island plantations."
Xia Fan focuses on something completely different from the fox demon.
He saw a crude machine standing next to the stove. It is like an iron tripod, the main body is a cylindrical weight, and there are two movable flywheels and a cast iron cylinder at the bottom. You can see white gas coming out from the top of the cylinder from time to time, and the flywheel drives the heavy hammer to rise slowly. Whenever it reaches the top, the hammer head will suddenly fall down and smash into the copper furnace.
Accompanied by a rhythmic dull roar, tens of thousands of fruits were crushed repeatedly until they were completely broken, and the pulp and fine seeds inside flowed out.
Although crude in structure, it did make use of steam power.
"Good afternoon, gentlemen and ladies." At this time, a well-dressed middle-aged man came over. His eyes swept over the three of them in turn, and finally fell on Olina. "My name is Philip Law, Baiguoyuan Manager, is there anything I can do for you?"
He noticed the cyan scales on the dragon girl's wrist.
"I'm just accompanying you," Olina shrugged and pointed at Xia Fan, "If you have anything to say, you can tell this person directly."
"Is that so?" A trace of surprise flashed in the other person's eyes, and he looked at Xia Fan again, "Excuse me for being rude, but what do you call me?"
No matter how poor the Okan family is, it is still compared to the Dragonborn. As long as she inherits the blood of the flying dragon, she is inherently superior. Because of this, Philip was surprised that the Dragonborn would be willing to accompany a stranger.
"The steward in a place like this is, in a sense, the agent of the factory owner." Worried that Xia Fan wouldn't understand, Olina specially came over and explained in a low voice, "He is responsible for both production and marketing. goods."
Xia Fan blinked at her to show his understanding, "Good afternoon, just call me Xia Fan. What are those metal bumps that are beating up and down on the stage?"
he asked deliberately.
"Oh, you're talking about this." The manager smiled, "It's a recently popular product. It's similar to a hydraulic hammer, but it doesn't need to be built by the river. It's all driven by boiling water. Of course, the principle is more complicated. If you are interested, you can consult Frank Metalworking."
"Are there many factories using it in Azure Castle?"
"Haha, only small factories like ours can use it." Philip waved his hand, "Azure Castle is not short of water at all. Five miles away is the Ambergris River, and the real big factories are concentrated there. Water hammer It’s powerful, cheap, and not easy to break, unlike this thing, which often breaks down.”
As expected, it was similar to his own intuitive feeling. Xia Fan secretly thought that as a steam engine, it was still in its early stages, and its design and workmanship were rough enough to be seen with the naked eye. However, according to the other party, it had become a commodity and became popular among small factories far away from the river. Once its inventor had capital on hand, it was only a matter of time before the steam engine was further improved.
Frank Metalworking? He silently wrote down the name of this industry.
"By the way, do you want to try Pagoda's new jam?" Philip took the initiative to start the business. "We have recently developed two new flavors. They are not yet on the market, but they will definitely be well received. And it It has a high honey content and will not go bad even if it is sold back to the East.”
"I'm just browsing casually, I don't have any plans to buy anything yet."
"That's no problem. You are welcome to visit our factory." The steward's enthusiastic attitude did not diminish at all, "How about you let me take you all on a tour?"
This guy knows a lot about sales and relationship-building skills.
Xia Fan was about to agree when suddenly there was a fierce noise from behind the factory.