The shipwright’s complex was finally up and running. It housed 3 large Dry docks and 7 medium dry docks. Although even the smallest dry docks were considered too big for the current.
With the new resources of wood that is able to be harvested from the elven forest, they had plenty of material for ship Hulls.
Fred had commissioned a director for each Drydock and a managing director to oversee the complex, they were currently in a meeting in the complex headquarters looking over the designs Fred had brought them. In there was also the ten chief Craftsmen of each dry dock as well as Sir George and Baron Mendes.
What Fred had shown them was blueprints for a galleon heavy warship and an early frigate design for a lightship.
Fred had made copies for everyone to look at, however, Fred was getting unsure of himself, he knew too many details of a lot of things, and he could no longer boil it down to this being his favourite period of history. If given a design of an age-of-sail vessel he could probably tell you what the name of it was.
Fred could only think of the chip that was fused with his soul, he would need to find a way to access it fully, allowing for the greater utility of the chip. But right now, he felt it was giving him clearer information on anything he focused on.
“These ship designs, I’ve never seen anything like it.”
“Are you sure it will work?”
“What are all of these holes for in the sides of the ships?” one craftsman asked.
“Cannon ports,” Fred answered.
“Those bronze tubes that spit fire and smoke?” the craftsmen asked again
“Well, the housing units are in the process of being changed to fit on the ships.”
“You plan on fitting 40 on these big ships? That’s madness.” Another craftsman spoke up
“No, there is room for 60 guns.” Fred corrected.
“60? There are only 20 ports on either side.”
“So, 15 on the bottom row, 5 in the castle and another 7 on the open deck in line with the castle ports. Another 4 facing forward and two at the rear.” Fred confirmed all the gun placements.
“If we build these, they will be the strongest naval ships on the sea, with the Leary Frigate being a close contender for the second spot.”
“If we manage to build them, you have pages here detailing a few processes for wood treatment that is alien to me.”
“Relax, the infrastructure to build all these ships are in place, the shipwright complex has many workshops for different parts you will need.”
“You’ve been planning these ships from the start.” One of the Directors asked.
“Of course, the wood treating factories had been given orders to start working on the Keels, ribs, stem and body posts last year when they finished being built. We were just waiting for the drydocks to be finished.” Fred
“I remember now, you brought them to my desk last year.” The managing director said “6 months ago the rope factory was in operation, and we had orders for that as well.
“Yes, furthermore, a copper plant has already been built in the shipwright complex to make the copper plating for under the ship.”
“And what do these copper plating’s do?”
“It mitigates the problem of barnacles on the underbelly of the ship.”
“What? Are you sure, that would be big news if it’s true, and copper would skyrocket?”
“Well, I am no fool to think we can hide this fact, but I must implore you to keep it hidden, to give us enough time to get enough use out of it.”
“Sure, sure. We will just say it helps support the weight of the cannons.”
“Will people buy that?”
“Only shipwrights will question that, but they are not politically or administratively savvy enough to care.”
“That’s good.”
“Do we have enough cannons for this?” another Director asked.
“Certain advancements have made it easier to produce cannons and we have opened up another factory, even if we don’t equip all the cannons for launch the ships should still be potent.”
“Is that what is causing all that extra smoke next door.” The director was referring to the Steel mills.
“Yes, soon some of the factories this side will also be equipped with them.”
“I see.”
___
After the meeting, Sir George and Baron Mendes left for the castle.
“Is it wise to start shipbuilding now?” Mendes asked.
“They are needed for the war.”
“The war?”
“Our biggest issue is naval supremacy. Once the initial battle here is over, we can load most of the guns on the ships and use them as firing bases off the coast, also have you seen Ludnus?”
“Not since I was younger.”
“It’s not a city that can be taken immediately, Normandy took advantage of the chaos, and they have been stuck for 2 months already. They haven’t even come for Percy yet, the messenger they sent is just stalling.”
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“Yes, but the ships will only help us with 3 towns. Ludnus being one of them.”
“Do you think this Derek can claim Prince of Albion without support from the mainland?”
“No, they would need to support him fully as it will mitigate the blowback they will receive from angering the king.”
“So, they are willing to send reinforcements over?”
“Yes, I see, but it will be hard with just your ships to get naval supremacy,”
“And Aquitaine won’t help, the trader duchies are a big trading region, and we have the north Germania opening up as well.”
“The trader regions have the strongest navy, we cant beat them as well,”
“Not yet, but we will be able to in the future. Plus, once the king is back, even for the sake of dignity, he would have to resolve Burgundy, that’s why they are fighting in the south with all the rich lands, they need it to fund their war for independence.”
“Yes, I’ve even heard the emperor is focusing on settling it diplomatically, so Burgundy will be strong enough to fight.”
“And when that time comes, what is North of Ludnus?”
“The Trader Duchies colonies.”
“Precisely, the attacking force on Ludnus is rumoured to have come from there. We might be able to snag that for ourselves.”
“You talk as if we have already won the fight here.”
“What’s the point of talking as if we won’t. The point of this battle is to make it easier to conquer his lands.”
“How long will the ships usually take?”
“Well, 3-4 months.”
“3-4 months that’s quick. It usually takes a year or two for big ships to be commissioned.”
“Well normally that would be the case, but their most time-consuming parts have been in process since last year. Plus, we are using better techniques to speed up the process. altogether I reckon it would take about 3/4 of the time when compared to the construction time of current ships of this world."
“This world, you talk as if you are not from here.”
“Who knows? Maybe I found technology from a different world or era.”
Mendes felt like he won’t get any more information from this topic, at least not yet. “It’s the middle of summer, he might not attack this year.”
“He will, I doubt Ludnus could last any longer, after what we last saw of it. It will probably fall in mid-August. And then rush over here.”
“Won’t he stop at Swindon?”
“I bet he was planning to if it was defending, but since it would be a quick victory, he wouldn’t want to pay his men for such a victory. He would have to keep paying them wartime wages until next year. He couldn’t afford to reduce the garrison in case we attacked especially as there is no loot left there.”
“No loot?” Mendes was perplexed.
“I’ve had Baron Charlie send his troops back to the castle to clear out any scrap metal, as well as planting some stuff in there for easier reconquest.”
“What if they noticed what you placed.”
“Even if they did, they probably wouldn’t know what they are looking at. I’m also going there tomorrow to give it a final check.”
“Is that wise?”
“It’s a 3-day trip and there are Charlie’s troops there as well.”
___
They returned to the castle, Fred went off to find Rudy and Delphine. He had some plans to discuss with them.
___
The next day Fred, George, and Mendes Met Baron Charlie at Swindon.
“Good afternoon Young Master Fred, Baron Mendes, Sir George.”
“Good evening Baron Charlie.” They responded.
“Do you want a rest first?” Charlie offered.
“I think I’ll be alright, there is a lot to do.”
“Right, let’s go take a look then.” Charlie took Fred and Co to the walls to look at the handy work.
“The masons have managed to remove some of these blocks and placed those tubes you gave them, then replaced the stone. We have managed to get most of them wired through the ground to the west, where we will be setting up camp for the siege.”
“Great work Charlie,” Fred commented, He looked at the walls and couldn’t see any anomalies. “I cannot see any anomaly is it like that all around the castle?”
“Yes. We even managed to hide some on the bricks where the castle door hinges are attached to.”
They went over to the castle. And while the door was open, he went up to one of the hinges and pulled off the cap of one of the 3 nails embedded into the wall.
“What is that?” Mendes asked.
“Dynamite. It’s a stronger powder than what we use in the cannons.” Fred answered then turned to Charlie. “Won’t this affect the integrity of the door?”
“Over time, yes, but he would need to occupy it for a while.”
“And how do we trigger this.”
“We’ve added these metal panels between the hinges, so they won’t look odd. We then have a wire going underground towards the Dynamite in the walls.”
“That’s great, so we can just blow it up in one go.”
“Why are we destroying the walls, won’t we need the walls to defend this city?” Mendes asked, in essence, they were destroying their own land.
“We were going to replace them with the reinforced concrete, anyway, might as well get some use out of its demolition.”
“Have we checked everywhere for any sort of loot or metal; I want to give them as much of a wasted occupation as possible?”
“Yes, we have gone over the place 3 times,” Charlie replied.
“Excellent, we can withdraw then.”
They finished checking the last of the preparations before leaving that day.
___
3 weeks later, Fred got news of Ludnus’ fall, this had happened last week, and now the envoys were demanding the release of Percy, proper negotiations for his release were underway.
“How long should we drag this out?”
Daniel asked in the meeting room, it was just their side in the room at the moment.
“Mid to end of September, we need to get our harvest in, Thomas and Charlie have already sent labour force over to their fields to carry out the harvest we don’t want them interfering while we are at it,” George responded. “And the two duchies down south and West are also shipping most of their wears over here.”
“Are we leaving those counties abandoned as well?”
“No there will be a skeleton crew over there, and they will be able to retreat on the fishing boats at their port should they need to.” Fred corrected.
“What about most of our gold. If this city falls, they will get a lot?” Daniel continued
“Most of my gold isn’t in this city,” Fred responded.
“What, where is it?” Daniel shot to the edge of his seat.
“I’m not telling you, you’ll probably run off with it and leave the city gate open.”
“You…”
“Calm down,” Baron Henry interjected. “Have you made sure a secure way of transferring technology and the money should we fail to protect the city?”
“Yep.”
“And a plan of action to destroy all technologies here as well.”
“Of course.”
___
Fred Isabella and George left the room.
“I didn’t realise you moved most of the money,” George asked.
“That’s cause I wasn’t the one to move it, technically.”
“What, where is it?”
“The Skaven discovered an abandoned Dwarven village just under the nature mountain, it has an underground fishing port that connects to the river. The Skaven along with Rudy and Delphine have been moving the gold and technologies with some of Thomas' men.”
“Wait Skaven?”
“The rat’s I created; I can’t keep calling them rats now can I.”
“And they have all our money?”
“Most of it, the first thing they did was convert a prison ward into a vault, should we have to abandon, they can ferry the stuff to a ship waiting by the closet fortified port that side of the river.”
“I see. Can we trust them?”
“Who knows. Can we trust everyone from the family?”
“I can’t believe I didn’t notice.”
“Good, that was the plan, everybody is looking at me so Thomas’ side can move more frequently.”
___
They managed to stall Percy’s ransom until the last week of September. They got 50 large gold coins from him; this was equivalent to a year’s tax of the fiefdom he would be receiving next year.
Fred couldn’t understand the exchange rate properly, it was 100 small gold coins to a large, and 100 large silvers to small gold, and 10 small silvers to a large silver. His land had the cheapest bread for 150 coppers or 1.5 small silvers, but that was a good 3 hours work for the average serf.
It wasn’t that the serfs were underpaid, it was the production cost of a loaf of bread, it was a lot more labour intensive to produce. Technically speaking it took 25 times the man-hours compared to his previous world; however, 10 loaves of bread would only take 35 times the man-hours.
They managed to get most of the crops harvested, and then destroyed the rest, before abandoning Swindon and Summerset. All that was left there were a few scouts.
The remaining harvest for Bristol was also sped up with the extra manpower.
The miners from Swindon were moved to Coventry, the name Fred gave to the Mining outpost across the river.
That mine had started using Dynamite, which sped up output.