The next day after saying goodbye to Adel who was heading back to the castle, Sophie and I took a carriage to Thurul's place and were once again sitting in his meeting room. "Oh, so many orders already?"
Thurul sipped his tea and nodded his head. "Luckily, the process of making the pens is quite simple. But quality checking each pen will be hard without extra hands. After the quality check, they need to be recleaned before they can be sold, which requires more people."
"Yeah, I figured as much…." I was a bit lost on this as well. If we did get a batch of one hundred orders, then it would be hard to quality check all of them in a timely manner.
"Let's do this. There is an orphanage not too far from here that has quite a few kids there and very little money going in. If we have some of the older kids doing the quality checks, they can come here and make a few silver. It's not like it is hard labor, just filling them with a tiny bit of ink then testing them before washing them clean." I frowned slightly, hearing his plan, but when I thought about how my maids were also young, I nodded my head. The extra money could go to helping the orphanage, and the kids will also learn that they need to work to earn money.
"Let's do that. I will also hire them on after I get a small factory setup. This way, they can continue to make some money. By then, I can also increase their wages, and it should improve the lives of the children." Since I planned to hire them to work, I might as well keep them on afterward, with a fair wage, of course.
"Then I will talk to the head of the orphanage later today and send a message to you later on. Don't worry about paying them for now. I will keep a tab, and when the pens sell, you can just pay me back." Thurul was very business minded. I was truly impressed. On top of that, he was thinking about the long term on thighs as well. While I had money, I had no idea how long it would be before I would get a place to set up a factory or how long it would take to prepare the things needed to manufacture the pens. I was hoping to have it all done in the next month or so while keeping order limited to one hundred per month to not wear Thurul out.
"Then thank you. Ah! While I am here, what do you think about this…." Took out a blueprint that I drew up on my way over here. It was nothing special but just my thoughts and ideas on the design of the hover carriage.
Thurul took the design, and his eyes opened wide. "Are you serious!?"
"Yes, while I could go for a more simplistic design, I decided to not veer off too much on the carriage design as most people are used to it. With the coachman up front steering, it would be no different from before, except they would not need to worry about the horses and could even speed through groups of bandits or run away from them." I explained.
"This is really something. Yes, this would work…. The only problem is storing the magic to make it go for long distances. Are you sure you can come up with a better mana storage inscription?"
"It is only a matter of adjusting the one I saw inside the airship. The airship uses a total of six sets of runes. Five of which are for flying, while the last is to block the wind during storms. We can get rid of quite a few of those and only need to use four of the same runes for the lift and another for propulsion. We can even add one to the front so they can back up as well. The steering will be done with the casing that the hover runes are inscribed into. The diver can then determine the direction of the carriage by using a modified steering wheel." Airships also had steering wheels, but mine would not be the big round wheel as it will need to be used for both lift and landing. I do not plan to make these into flying cars or anything, but they should be able to float a few feet off the ground.
"I see. This is truly ingenious. If you were really able to modify the runic inscription and create a carriage that could be easily controlled with them, then you would advance the way people travel by quite a bit. Because you can make these go faster than a scaled horse, right?" Thurul asked. I could see the excitement in his eyes.
"Yes, with the right amount of mana, you could make them go as fast as you want. But the major issue is mana storage. To use an inscription, a sufficient amount of mana is needed, and to get this mana would be the hurdle I need to overcome." While the idea was feasible, the mana source was my only issue. Unless I created a mana inscription that slowly drew in mana….
I let out a sigh. I just answered my own question that I have been thinking about all morning. "I will also work on a runic inscription that will slowly take in the mana in the air. This way, it can be self charging."
"You are truly a little genius. To think you can come up with all these ideas. Faith, I will work with you hundred percent. When you are ready to make a mock up let me know I will work day and night on this!" Thurul was now all fired up. I am sure he will be bugging me to quickly come up with the proper blueprints. But mass production would still be hard. It was not easy doing inscriptions. I guess this would be one of those made to order type deals with a limited amount ordered per month.
With everything set, I said my goodbyes to Thurul and left his shop. Sophie and I planned to head to the sandwich shop we went to before to try out a different sandwich. But when we arrived, a young man who looked even younger than me yelled out to us. "Hey, you demi's, come here and clean this young master's shoes!"
