As soon as Hu Po's voice fell, Gao Wen turned his head and stared at her straight away, looking at the half-elf thief with hairs all over his body: "You... what do you mean by that look..."
Gawain's eyes seemed to be looking at an alien creature: "Why do you know a druid?"
"Why can't I know a druid!" Amber put her hips on her hips and said confidently, "I'm more or less half an elf, okay—all the druid factions in the world originated from elves, haven't you heard of it?"
It’s fine for any other sharp ear to say this sentence, but it’s really not convincing to say this elf’s shame. Gawain looked up and down at the lady thief who still kept a straight face, and it took him a long time to hold back. One sentence: "Is it the kind of understanding that you stole things from others before, so you were hated, and people chased and killed all over the world?"
"You are insulting my personality, let me tell you!" Amber jumped up suddenly, "How could I be found out for stealing!"
Gao Wen: "..."
I always feel that there is something wrong with the angle of this guy's rebuttal.
However, despite her doubts, looking at Amber's confident expression, this guy seems to really know a druid, and she introduced it like a salesman: "Let me tell you, I know that druid." The guy is not only a druid, but also a scholar-type druid, the kind who knows everything. His druid faction is the 'heart of the forest', who is very good at dealing with animals and plants , absolutely reliable…”
Gawain finally believed what this guy said, but he didn't ask in detail how Amber met the mysterious druid, and the origin of the other party's name, etc. It's obviously not polite to ask these things now. After listening to Amber's sales pitch, he only asked two questions: "Can you still reach him now? If so, how soon will you be able to bring him?"
"It's easy to talk about. Although the world says that druids live in secluded places and are difficult to find, I know that guy's scope of activities is very fixed, just in the southern border area. As for how long it will take to bring it..."
As Amber spoke, she kept winking at Gao Wen: "When I went to find him, I was able to travel all the way in Shadow Speed, but when I came back, I'm afraid I can only go on my way. How fast the two of us can go depends on the means of transportation. Means of transportation, you understand?"
Gao Wen immediately understood what the other party meant, and with a wave of his big hand, he took out a few copper coins and stuffed them into her hand: "Go and buy a new pair of shoes."
Amber stared: "... I don't want to take you! And you have to give me some money as a deposit for others, right? Even if it's an introduction from an acquaintance, you have to pay the employment fee!"
"Didn't you just say that earlier?" Gao Wen was just joking with Amber. After all, it was interesting to see the girl jumping up and down, but after the joke was over, he still had to take it seriously. He took it out from another pocket. Thin bars of gold and silver pressed into uniform size, "Take it, and get this done—whatever is left is yours."
Amber immediately took those shiny babies with a smile on her face.
Since the work required for minting coins has not yet been prepared, "Cecil's coinage" is still only a concept, so Gawain temporarily asked craftsmen to make some gold and silver in the treasure house into this kind of broken gold and silver. trade with the outside world.
This kind of practice is not uncommon in this world—precious metals are used as trading chips for direct circulation, and the business system is still very primitive. In the Middle Ages, gold and silver with a certain degree of purity were themselves currencies. In many cases, gold and silver were made into coins just for convenience. Carrying, inspecting and counting, but merchants also accept direct gold and silver transactions—it’s just that there is an extra process of checking the quality and weighing calculations in this transaction, so when buying goods directly with gold and silver, the price will be lower. Raise it up a little.
Of course, this is also on the premise that the "currency reputation" of the nobles is still sufficient. If one day the nobles add impurities to the gold and silver coins to the extent that they can sting merchants, then the unofficial gold and silver bullion will in turn exceed The currency issued by the royal family and dukes has become a mainstream transaction item, and if you use gold and silver coins to buy things, the price will be higher.
This is why the emblem of the god of commerce is a scale, and a pair of iron scissors and an eye are placed at both ends of the balance—the iron scissors and the balance are both things carried by merchants, and the former is used to cut gold and silver. The latter is used for weighing, and the eyes are the eyesight that a good businessman must have to be able to see the fineness of gold and silver.
In fact, if it wasn't for Gao Wen's somewhat obsessive-compulsive disorder, if he insisted on casting exquisite and distinctive gold and silver coins, he could use a simpler and cruder way to "mint coins"—casting gold and silver into round rods, then cutting them into thin slices, and then Just stamp Cecil's emblem on it with a steel seal. In 536 Ansu, the Duke of the Western Territory used this method in order to save time and effort and reduce the cost of paying to craftsmen, and the gold and silver coins of the Western Territory in that year were also dubbed "the miser's money for buying roads" - because the Western Territory laws at that time It was stipulated that all merchants entering the Western Territory must exchange one-third of their currency for Western Territory gold and silver coins, and must use this low-quality gold and silver coins for settlement when passing through any checkpoints.
The currency and economy of this world is so magical.
Amber left happily, and the half-elf lady almost floated away from everyone, which made Hetty deeply worried: "She won't run away with those gold and silver..."
"Absconding with money?" Gawain muttered, and then deeply thought that the elf's shame might really be able to do such a thing...
Forget it, let's trust her a little bit at this time - there is no other hope anyway.
Can the entire camp find a second person who claims to know the druid
After Amber left, Gao Wen turned his attention back to the reclamation project in front of him.
The old farmer named Norris kept his head down and waited quietly. He neither swayed and looked around like ordinary poor people in this situation, nor did he speak rashly, as if he had been waiting for Gawain to ask questions.
"Are there any problems with this land?" Gao Wen asked, "As long as there are possible problems, it's best to speak up as soon as possible."
"If I have to say it, the terrain is higher than the river beach, and it is difficult for the canal to divert water directly, and a canal or well must be dug from the upper reaches," Norris replied, "but it is also good, if something like a heavy rain causes the Whitewater River to rise. , but there is no need to worry about the farmland being submerged.”
Water diversion... If there is a pump or similar lifting machinery, it can be easily solved, or use the "special technology" of this world to find a mage who specializes in water elements to water the ground, but obviously the second way is unreliable— After the camp is on the right track, Hetty can only be busy with more and more things. It is impossible for her to have the opportunity to run over to be a human pump, and hire an official mage to come over to water the ground... This is not even the Violet Kingdom in the north or the south. The elves in the world can't do such a luxurious thing. Besides, even if the Cecil family's money fell from the sky, how many mages are willing to come to the fields to do this kind of "lower people will do it" What about "dirty work"
They would rather take double the reward and go to the castles of the king and the great nobles to set off fireworks for the banquet, so as to please those noble ladies and noble ladies with pale faces and ghosts who are addicted to magic drugs.
So Gao Wen immediately dismissed the idea of finding a mage to be a human flesh pump, and turned to consider the solution from a mechanical point of view—of course, if it is in accordance with the general rules of this world, the general thinking of nobles to solve such problems They are all looking for more serfs to work, but for Gao Wen, it is too extravagant to waste manpower on such things.
At this time, an ancient and effective mechanism came to Gawain's mind: "Have you ever heard of something called a waterwheel?"
Hetty, Norris, and Philip Cavaliers looked dumbfounded.
Sure enough, no one has heard of such a thing.
Gawain looked at Heidi: "Is there any paper and pen?"
After getting the pen and paper, Gao Wen began to draw a simple sketch. It was a tall wheel-shaped thing, supported by spokes, and on the outer edge of the "wheel" were fixed neatly arranged inclined cylinders and wooden board structures, and on one side of the "wheel", an extended out the sink.
Due to the limited time, he only drew a part of the structure of the waterwheel, and it was a sketch, but this simple and amazing mechanism has an amazingly concise principle, which can be explained a little: "This thing is a waterwheel, and the river flows from it. The water flows below, impacts these planks, and drives the water wheel to rotate, and then the water wheel will bring the water-filled cylinder to the top, and the water will be poured into this tank. This process continues to circulate, and the water is lifted to a higher place. How high it can be raised depends on how big the waterwheel is made, as long as the material can support it.”
Then, he added: "Of course, this is just a sketch, and the principle is very simple. There can be more models based on this..."
Hetty couldn't care less about talking at this moment—she was completely attracted by this simple and incredible thing.
With simple reasoning, she can see that this mechanism is absolutely useful, but before seeing this sketch, she really never thought that there would be such a thing in the world:
It does not require human power, nor does it require the participation of any supernatural power, it can work day and night, accomplishing the work that requires many serfs, and it is driven by the power of nature.
She suddenly felt "beauty" from this simple mechanism, a word that had nothing to do with the crude benzene structure.
However, Gao Wen still sighed: "It's a pity that there is no bamboo here, otherwise it would be much easier to build..."
Hetty didn't hear clearly for a while: "Ah? What did you just say?"
"No, nothing." Gawain waved his hand, "Do you have any other ideas about this machine?"
Hetty just wanted to say that this is a genius design, but saw Norris next to him picked up a pen and sketched it on a blank piece of paper. The old farmer said while sketching: "Just make it It will be very affected by the river water at the edge of the Baishui River, and it cannot be used during the dry season. If we can lead another canal next to it, during the dry season... "
Noticing the sudden silence around him, Norris reacted suddenly, then threw the pen away in panic, and retreated tremblingly: "Master, I just..."
However, what Gao Wen said was beyond his expectation: "Can you write?"