Valkyrie's Shadow

Chapter 5

“How does it look?”

“Mmh…one more?”

“How many bars are we going to go through?”

“As many as we need.”

Fried went back to his workbench and Liane gave her stool another spin. She was seated in what Florine would surely scold her for being an ‘unladylike posture’. Her skirts fluttered out as the Countess of Wagner went round and round.

Like the manors of the other nobles who chose to live in the city, House Wagner had theirs renovated to suit the tastes of its residents. Some nobles added more rooms to accommodate more family members and household staff. Others added libraries, gardens, gaming lounges and other spaces to pursue their hobbies. Alterations were made from generation to generation to fit the presiding lord’s fancy.

House Wagner, however, had built a workshop. It was as old as the manor itself. Here, members of the family tinkered and toyed around with various ideas, directing a small team of skilled artisans that were as much a part of the manor as the household staff. It was a prestigious assignment; each person working here was a master craftsman hand-picked out of the companies owned by her family.

There were two exceptions present, however. The first was one of Lady Shalltear’s Vampire Brides, whose outrageous mode of dress was quite the distraction for weeks. The men still hadn’t gotten entirely used to her being around.

She was adorned as her fellow handmaidens usually were, in those diaphanous alabaster silks without a single piece of protective equipment. At first, the workshop members fretted over this. Then they noticed that flying fragments from their work – that would surely cause injuries to Humans – mostly bounced off of her. Any injuries that she did sustain simply regenerated. Deep cuts vanished within seconds, leaving her ivory skin as smooth and unblemished as ever.

The second exception was an apprentice by the name of Friedrich. The veteran members made a semicircle around him, backs to Liane and the Vampire Bride. Comments, advice and all sorts of discussion rose from the group as the apprentice worked.

What are you, a bunch of old aunties?

The reason why the young man – he was even younger than she – had become a member of the workshop was due to some information that Momon had disclosed to her. Since she was considering industries that required new skillsets, he advised her that, rather than relying on the direct expertise of her company veterans, she should employ those of apprenticing age to develop those new skills from scratch.

In the time following the Battle of Katze Plains, there was no shortage of young people to hire on. Liane quite literally had her pick of the litter. Several thousand children in the duchy had been orphaned – either because their sole parent had been killed in the battle and the events of its aftermath, their widowed mothers felt that they could no longer support them, or they were abandoned by their parents who fled to Re-Estize.

Liane picked up over two thousand kids for her expanding merchant companies and the various industries that supported them. She ordered the workshops out in her demesne to send their most promising apprentices, and so Fried had ended up in Wagner Manor.

The apprentice finished his work and discussion rose as the master craftsmen examined the result. Liane leaned back and forth, but she couldn’t get a clear view. After several minutes, the men parted and Fried came up to display his work, freckled face awash in sudden uncertainty.

“W-what do you think, my lady?”

“Hm…I guess we’ll find out. Start cutting gears next and we’ll see how things work out once we put it all together.

Fried’s uncertainty melted away into a bright grin. The young man’s brown eyes sparkled.

“Yes my lady!” His excitement washed over her, “Right away!”

Cute…I should have teased him harder.

That probably wasn’t a good idea. They needed a new set of parts made by the evening so she didn’t want anything affecting his productivity. While her workers needed to sleep, she didn’t. With the extra hours that the Ring of Sustenance afforded her, Liane spent her nights testing the day’s work.

Fried moved over to a different workbench and started calibrating his tools. The rest of the workshop team moved over to stand around him again.

“Hey,” Liane said. “He doesn’t need all of you to help set things up. A couple of ya go and check the mill and make sure nothing’s falling apart between there and here.”

She smirked as the men looked to one another, as if trying to will each of the others to go in their stead. Liane shared in their excitement. What was being crafted would become upgrades for the workshop. It was something they all longed for but lacked the means to accomplish reasonably until now. Like her men, Liane could already envision the process in her mind.

It was an elegance that she only found in machinery: machines could be used to create parts for another machine, and one could repeat the process until they ended up with amazingly precise and predictable devices. Unfortunately, there was no need or demand for such devices in their far-flung corner of the continent, and nothing to make it worth its while…until now.

House Wagner was well-versed in their domestic craft – producing wagons, parts for mills and the mechanisms that many people took for granted in everyday life. They were well practised in methods of production that may as well have been magic to the vast majority. Their facilities, however, were tooled for the manufacture of wooden components, as was the manor workshop.

The reason why they hadn’t been able to improve their facilities was threefold. Firstly, materials were simply lacking. While swords and suits of armour were not uncommon, upgrading a workshop required an exorbitantly and ultimately unjustifiable cost in steel. The newly established trade link with the Dwarf Kingdom now made acquiring the steel for their workshops affordable. This lowered cost in materials also meant that everything they created would be that much cheaper.

Secondly was the issue of power. Small watermills did exist, but the vast majority in the duchy were powered by horses, oxen, or just people. Her workshop was no exception. The workshop’s mill was designed for horses, but that also made them ideal for Soul Eaters.

Enchantment was the final issue, and the solution was also provided by the Sorcerous Kingdom. While they did not have conventional enchantment, they did have Runesmiths.

Runecrafting and machinery felt like they were made for each other. A single rune could maintain a cutting edge indefinitely. A rune could make shafts and axles immune to wear. She wondered if there was a Rune that could create frictionless surfaces as well, but Momon told her there wasn’t. Maybe they could figure something out one day?

The enchanting done by tier magic casters could also produce similar effects to those demonstrated by Runecrafting, but enchanting incurred hefty costs. Expertise, time, mana and material components were required to enchant an item. It only took expertise and time to carve and imbue runes. Simply put, one only needed to maintain a Runesmith’s cost of living. Due to the new methods of production in the Sorcerous Kingdom, the cost of living would inevitably plummet to a fraction of what it currently was.

Runecrafting was on the road to becoming competitive again, but she needed to get ahead of the game. Cost-effectiveness and efficiency were rarely what people thought about when it came to magic items. It was all about powerful combat equipment and wasteful displays of prestige. House Wagner needed to secure a portion of the Sorcerous Kingdom’s Runecrafting output before this wrongheaded thinking stole it all away.

What they needed to do now was create machines that could effectively harness the power of Undead Labour. Even when enchanted for durability and damage reduction, wooden machinery could not withstand what a pair of Soul Eaters was capable of. Over the days and weeks, Liane and the workshop team had planned and tested and planned some more until they came up with an improved scheme for the manor’s machinery. Now that their work was underway, progress felt inevitable.

The sound of Fried cutting new gears filled the air. Ordinarily, Liane would be wary of working someone so hard, but Momon also suggested that she push her artisans to the limit. A blank slate allowed singular focus. Long days of work would make greater gains than one who divided their attention between many unrelated tasks. That was what he claimed, at any rate.

It made sense in a way, but at the same time, it didn’t. Sure, a lot of practice added up, by why did they need to work so hard? A little bit at a time got most people to where they needed to be. The single-minded devotion to professional refinement that Momon described sounded like something Clara or Ludmila, who followed the tenets of The Six, would zealously encourage.

A knock sounded from the door. Everyone appeared intent on ignoring it. After another set of rapid knocks, Liane sighed and went over to the entrance of the room. She opened a small window in the door, finding her lady’s maid looking in from the other side.

“Rose? What is it?”

“There’s someone here to see you, my lady.”

“Tell that ‘someone’ that I’m busy.”

“I did, my lady,” Rose replied. “She insists that she needs to see you.”

“Who is it?”

“Dame Verilyn.”

A Knight? Knights were rare in Re-Estize. They had even less of a reason to exist in the Sorcerous Kingdom.

“I have no idea who that is,” Liane said. “Tell her to come back next year.”

“She had a letter from Baroness Zahradnik,” Rose told her. “Something about mentorship on imperial customs.”

“Geh…”

Why now, of all times? She did recall agreeing to help out with something to that effect, but the topic was broached over a month ago.

“Does it have to be right now? It’s not as if this Dame Verilyn only needs an hour to learn everything.”

“Probably not,” Rose said, “but you should still see her. She couldn’t have known what you were doing right at this moment.”

With one last glance back over her shoulder, Liane sighed and left the workshop.

“What’s she like?” Liane asked as they made their way back to the front of the manor.

“An Elf,” Rose replied. “She’s unlike any Elf that I’ve ever seen, though. She’s tall, with frost-white hair and silver eyes. Her overall look gives her a very ‘official’ image, but she doesn’t wear it well.”

Liane couldn’t think of any Elves like that. She wondered where Ludmila had picked her up from. Baroness Zahradnik had all but vanished since she departed for the Azerlisia Mountains over a month ago…maybe she was an Elf from a hidden tribe around there?

Dame Verilyn awaited in the foyer, looking just as Rose had described.

“Good afternoon, Lady Wagner,” the Elf curtseyed as Liane came up to her. “It’s been a while since we last spoke.”

“A while?” Liane frowned, “I don’t think I’ve ever seen you before…”

The Elf froze, mouth working silently.

“I uh…ah, whatever! You helped me bring in some students for Master Tian.”

“Master Tian…” Liane rubbed her chin in thought. “Oh. You’re her?”

“That’s right,” Dame Verilyn nodded. “Only a handful of people know, though. Please don’t tell anyone.”

The Frost Dragon in Elven form wrung her hands nervously.

“As if anyone would believe me,” Liane waved her worries away. “Wait – why are you Ludmila’s vassal now? I asked if I could have you first!”

“I-I’m not one of those women that people pass around!” Dame Verilyn cried, “Complain to Lady Shalltear if you have a problem with it.”

“Uh, no thanks.”

Liane couldn’t imagine anyone complaining to Lady Shalltear. She was pretty easy to get along with, but, like dealing with anyone from the Royal Court, Lady Shalltear was the one that decided how far you were allowed to take things. She was surprisingly tolerant when it came to some things, but brooked no nonsense when it came to others.

Fortunately, it was easy to tell what one shouldn’t be saying. The dignity of the Sorcerer King and his establishment, His Majesty’s order and the sanctity of duty were the three main points to avoid sullying. Lady Shalltear’s disposition towards women and men differed drastically, as well. She seemed to barely tolerate communicating with men, and violently disliked it if they attempted to become familiar with her. Women, on the other hand, were more than welcome to get close, as long as Lady Shalltear fancied them.

Unlike the powerful noblemen of the region, however, Lady Shalltear did not solely treat those women she gathered around her as ornaments, playthings and a production facility for heirs. The women associated with the Minister of Transportation did not only fit her lofty standards of beauty but were highly competent as well. Liane wondered what use Lady Shalltear had found for Dame Verilyn.

“So Ludmila sent you here,” Liane said. “She mentioned something about you learning Baharuth’s customs, but was there something specific you needed to know?”

“I need to know everything, I think?”

“I don’t think it’s possible to learn everything in a sane amount of time. What were you supposed to be doing?”

Dame Verilyn summarized what Lady Shalltear had tasked her with.

“I see…if you’re just collecting that sort of information, passing yourself off as part of a merchant company will be enough.”

“But what if they find out I’m not from around there?”

Liane gave Dame Verilyn a pointed look.

“With that appearance, everyone will know you’re not from around there. Why would you be worried about that, anyway?”

With that appearance, she could also probably get away with a lot. Beauty opened many doors and turned eyes blind to otherwise questionable actions. Liane wasn’t sure if she should let the Frost Dragon know that, however – there was no telling what sort of mischief she would get herself into.

“It’s someone else’s territory,” Dame Verilyn said. “People usually attack trespassers if they can. It happened to me a few decades ago too – I flew over the imperial border and they sent a whole flight of Hippogriffs after me!”

“Did they hurt you?”

“No, I flew away. Why would I stick around to find out what they would do?”

So much for Dragons being proud and fierce. Liane did not intend to turn Dame Verilyn away – on the contrary, she was very interested in seeing how she would do – but the timing was just horrible.

“To start,” Liane said, “how about we figure out some sort of schedule? I’m not made out of free time these days. When do you need to learn all this by?”

“I think Lady Shalltear wants me to be out in the Empire by mid-autumn,” Dame Verilyn replied. “As for my schedule…”

Assistant instructor at the Justice Dragon Dojo for two days of the week. She worked in a tavern…? Liane cocked her head.

“Why do you work in the Frosty Beard?”

“To make money?”

“Obviously.”

“T-the patrons are very generous,” Dame Verilyn told her. “I can also learn about the Dwarves at the same time. All I’ve ever known about them before now has come from their old books in Feoh Berkana.”

“Books aren’t enough?”

Throwing a bunch of texts at her was the first thing that crossed Liane’s mind.

“I learn much faster by experiencing things directly,” Dame Verilyn said. “As long as I understand what’s going on.”

“I see. In that case, why don’t we start by getting you accustomed to how merchants conduct their affairs. I’ll put you under one of the new guys – that way, you can learn together.”

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