In the second month of summer, in the middle of summer, Margaery arrived.

This time, the merchant groups brought in more ships than the dock could accommodate, and many sailboats had to dock at the river and wait for the previous ships to unload before they could connect to the pier.

This made Roland realize that the town's docks had to be expanded.

Ashburg Industries finally completed the task this month, reducing the parts scrap rate to 40% and successfully producing three steam engines before the delivery date. Although compared with the third-generation steam engine currently in use in the town, the foreign trade products produced by the factory are much worse in terms of power, air leakage, noise, vibration, etc., but compared with the first machine, it has made great progress.

The String Moon Bay caravan brought a team of 300 craftsmen under contract, and Roland placed them all in the industrial park on the south bank of the Chishui River - in addition to building a new wooden factory next to the existing factory, he also ordered Karl to build a staff dormitory near the bank of the river. In order to complete the facility within a month, the huge logs were delivered to the site, where Carl was responsible for the technical direction and Anna cut them. The longest woodworking session took only two days to complete, and Carl, Anna's former teacher, was stunned by her new abilities, and in just six months, the thin and quiet girl had become confident and radiant.

Roland hosted a sumptuous dinner at the castle to welcome the merchants.

At the same time, liquor also appeared in everyone's eyes for the first time.

"Every time I come to you, there's something new, and Margaery didn't lie to me," Hogg exclaimed, "and even the wine is so different, compared to this...... This ......"

"Liquor," Margaery reminded.

"Yes, liquor! Ale and wine are simply bland and tasteless compared to it," he grinned, and drank the wine from his glass, "Your Highness, you must sell me a few cases of this." ”

"I think it's too hot, or the wine suits me better," the businesswoman smiled and shook her head.

Roland smiled, "It's all about taste, not everyone can accept high concentration of distilled spirits. I didn't plan to promote it, but I just happened to make some for everyone to try. ”

In the era when liquor was still the mainstream, distilled spirits were clearly a new star with great development potential, such as liquor, rum, whiskey and vodka in later generations, which were all distilled spirits with higher alcohol content, and on top of these distilled spirits, a series of blending cultures were correspondingly extended. However, it is still too early for the current border town to develop this industry.

"Your Highness, I have sent someone to collect a lot of information about what you wrote to me last time," Margaery began, "After Eternal Winter was controlled by the Church, not much has changed, but the resistance of the Wolfheart Kingdom is much stronger, and it is said that the Church army has all gathered in the Broken Tooth Fortress, and it has not been able to move forward for more than two months. In addition, King Dawn sent a messenger to the Grey Keep, believing that the Church's move was not to destroy the witches at all, but to occupy the continental kingdom. He called for an alliance between the two countries to expel the Church and fight together against the holy city of Hermes. ”

"How did the king respond?" asked Roland.

The Marquess of Wick, the former Prime Minister, rejected the offer and rebuked him for nonsense. Garmor shrugged his shoulders and said, "This matter has caused a lot of trouble in the king's capital, and even the nobles have not reached a consensus. As far as I know, there are quite a few people who support the alliance, after all, the Church has no sign of returning its dominion to the Inheritors of Eternal Winter. ”

"Tifeco didn't show up?"

"The Prime Minister's reply must have been at the behest of Tifeko, and he himself has now rushed to the East with his army," said Marlan, with a solemn expression, "I heard that a large fleet had landed in Seabreeze County and plundered along the eastern coastline, not even sparing churches, and many fjord merchants had also suffered. ”

"There have been a great number of fugitives in the East, and Hogg and I have taken in quite a few," Margaery added, "and they say that these raiders not only robbed the money, but also the people, and burned everything they could not take with them, as if they were going to turn the whole East into a blank slate." This is definitely a heavy blow to Tifeko, who has just subdued the nobles of the Eastern Realm. ”

It should have been a happy thing for Tifeco to be hit, but hearing that the other party was robbing the population, Roland felt a pain in his heart, "Those fugitives ......"

"Are you interested?" said Margaery, smiling, "and I was supposing that you might want to buy a large number of slaves to supplement the labor force of your realm. However, compared to the exotic refugees of Eternal Winter and Wolfheart, these Grey Castle people may not be willing to sell themselves into slavery. ”

"I don't need to use them as slaves, as long as they are willing to come and settle in the border towns, they will have food and shelter, and they will be paid to work. Roland corrected that he also realized that this was a good opportunity to expand the number of people, although the news came a little later, "How many more do they have?"

"Most of the able-bodied refugees have been taken in by nobles and caravans, and there are still nearly 10,000 people gathered outside the royal capital, but there are more young people and women. ”

"It's okay, I'll send someone to screen and guide the way," the prince clapped, "Do you need to deal with the officials of the royal capital to take them away?"

"No," Margaery said, waving her hand, "they wish you could take these people with them, otherwise there would not be enough food to provide them, and if they continued to increase in number, they would probably cause a riot among the homeless." ”

......

After the dinner, Roland returned to his office and called his guard, Tasa.

This incident made him realize that his intelligence system was very backward, and if he could know about the fugitives in the first place, he could prepare early and bring more people to the border town. At present, all his knowledge of the outside world comes from caravans, and the speed of transmission once a month is simply not enough to meet the demand.

Even if the army is stationed in the fortress of Changge and the outpost is established, it can only monitor the western border. If you want to compete for the throne of the Grey Keep, you must expand your eyes to the whole country, or even the entire continent.

Roland didn't have that many loyal men to assemble a complete intelligence team, let alone spies and spies lurking in various places. Therefore, he planned to start from the basics and arrange for some people to go to the royal capital to collect information collected from all over the world. Not to mention detailed monitoring, at least you can quickly understand the changes in the overall situation, and you will not be as passive as today.

Tasa, who is very familiar with the power of the royal capital, is the best candidate for the prince.

"You asked me to follow the caravan back to the royal capital?" Tasa was stunned.

"That's right, you have two missions, the first is to take in refugees from the East for me. I will send a squad of about 100 soldiers to escort you, and I will tell you the detailed screening conditions before the caravan departs. ”

"Yes!"

"Second, after the refugee flow is over, you will stay in the royal capital and collect information from all over the country for me. You've dealt with underground rats before, so you know what to do, and Margaery's caravan will fully support you, and you will ask them directly for the cost of the mission. Unlike the last time I went to the area of Chishui City to spread the news of witches, there is no upper limit on the funds this time. He placed a revolver on the table, "Take care to protect yourself, and I hope to hear good news from you soon." ”

...... (To be continued.) )