Seeing this, Viscount Helson smiled and patted him on the shoulder: "The intricacies of paper and pen are hard to explain in a short time. I'll explain it to you in detail later when we have time. Let's continue browsing. There are stalls selling farm tools and daily necessities ahead. If you're interested, we can take our time to look at them."
Balin suppressed his doubts and turned his gaze back to the dazzling array of metal products. He couldn't help but glance at the so-called banknotes in the customers' hands. His curiosity and apprehension towards Alda deepened. If there were so many things he couldn't understand in just one trading market, what must the workshops and systems that supported it all look like?
The next morning, as the sun had just dispelled the morning mist, Viscount Helson took Balin by boat to the north shore, their morning destination an ironworks.
Before even approaching the factory area, towering chimneys came into view in the distance, with black smoke slowly rising into the sky. The faint, scorching smell of burning coal wafted through the air, a completely different smell from the blacksmith's workshop in the Rocky Mountains dwarf clan. That smell was stronger and carried a more unsettling sense of scale.
Upon reaching the entrance of the ironworks, Balin was stunned by the sight before him: a vast expanse of massive wooden and stone workshops, many times larger than Iron Hammer Clan's largest forging workshop. In the open space outside the workshops, neatly piled mountains of iron ore and coal were stacked. Several workers were driving horse-drawn carts, continuously transporting ore into the workshops. Rails extended from the workshops, with several iron carriages loaded with iron blocks parked on them, the wheels gleaming with a cold, hard metallic luster where they touched the rails.
"Is this Alda's ironworks?" Balin muttered to himself unconsciously, a sense of dread creeping into his heart.
Viscount Helson smiled and nodded. At that moment, a middle-aged man with a face covered in soot came up to greet him. He was the manager of the ironworks.
"Viscount, you've arrived!" The factory manager bowed respectfully, his gaze lingering on Balin for a moment before he warmly led the way. "Please come in. We have a batch of iron coming out today, and you and this guest can take a look."
Following the factory manager into the workshop, a wave of heat instantly hit Balin, mixed with the pungent smell of molten metal. Balin's eyes widened as he stared at the scene before him, frozen in place: in the center of the workshop stood two towering iron-smelting furnaces, their openings glowing red-hot, like the gaping mouths of giant beasts, with sparks flying out from time to time; several workers were busy around the furnaces, holding long iron hooks and skillfully adjusting the furnace doors, while the steam turbines beside them were whirring, driving the blowers to pump air into the furnaces; not far away in the forging area, huge steam hammers fell heavily, smashing red-hot iron blocks into flat iron plates, producing a dull "clang" that made the ground tingle slightly.
"Our ironworks uses an improved hot blast stove, which can produce 15 tons of pig iron per day. After forging and refining, it can produce about 12 tons of wrought iron and steel."
The factory manager stood aside and introduced with a hint of pride, "Some of this iron is sent to machine tool factories to make parts, some is made into farm tools and implements, and some is sent to military factories to make barrels for cannons and rifles."
"Fifteen tons?" Balin's pupils contracted sharply upon hearing this number, and he instinctively retorted in his mind, "Impossible! They must be exaggerating!"
In the Iron Hammer Clan, even the clan's most skilled blacksmiths, working together, could only produce half a ton of pig iron a day, and even with overtime, they could only manage a maximum of one ton. This ironworks, however, claimed to produce fifteen tons a day—it was utterly absurd!
But as he looked at the constantly running steam machinery, the red-hot iron smelting furnace, and the endless stream of iron blocks being hauled out by the workers, his doubts began to waver again.
He couldn't resist walking over to a pile of freshly smelted iron, reaching out to touch it. The iron was still warm, smooth, and had very few impurities—higher quality than the smelted iron forged by the clan's best blacksmith. Thinking back to the small iron smelting furnaces in his clan, which could only accommodate one or two people, and comparing them to this colossal machine before him, Balin suddenly felt that the clan's iron-smelting workshops were nothing more than children playing house.
"So, Mr. Balin, how's the scale? Not bad, is it?" Viscount Helson walked up to him and asked with a smile.
Balin opened his mouth, wanting to say something, but found his throat tight and he couldn't utter a single word. Helson, seemingly oblivious to his embarrassment, continued, "Actually, this ironworks is only considered medium-sized in Alda. To the north, there are two ironworks twice the size of this one, dedicated to supplying military production; and near the port to the west, there's a newly built ironworks using more advanced technology, with even higher output than this one."
"Medium-sized? And even larger ones?" Balin was completely stunned, as if someone had poured cold water on him. He finally understood why he had seen so many cheap metal products in the market yesterday. Humanity had such a powerful iron-smelting capability that it could mass-produce large quantities of iron, naturally driving down the price.
He had previously thought that the cheapness of human-made metal products stemmed from their crude craftsmanship, but now he realized how short-sighted he had been. The factory manager was still explaining the iron-smelting process, but Balin was no longer listening. He looked at the constantly operating machinery and busy workers, his heart filled with shock and an indescribable sense of dread.
The amount of iron one can forge is the most direct indicator of strength, and he suddenly realized that Alda's strength might be far greater than any of the dwarven clans had imagined.
The foreman was still explaining the iron-making process at length, but Balin gradually recovered from his initial bewilderment. He took a deep breath, forced a relatively calm smile, and said to the foreman and Viscount Helson, "The scale here is indeed astonishing. Such an efficient iron-smelting method is something we dwarves have never seen before. It deserves praise."
These words were half sincere and half feigned. He was genuinely impressed by the scale of human iron smelting, but he didn't want to appear too out of line in front of humans, after all, he was an emissary of the Iron Hammer Clan and couldn't lose face for the dwarves.
Viscount Helson smiled and nodded: "It is an honor for this ironworks to gain Mr. Balin's approval. Advanced technologies should be shared and learned from each other. If you dwarves are interested, we can exchange ideas more often in the future."
Balin's heart stirred upon hearing the phrase "mutual learning." Looking at the metal-filled factory before him, and recalling the Iron Hammer Clan's proud forging skills, he suddenly felt he couldn't allow himself to be completely suppressed by human strength. His eyes darted around, and as if casually mentioning it, with a hint of unintentional boasting, he said to Viscount Helson, "Speaking of exchange, we dwarves do have something to offer. For example, our clan possesses a magical liquid; I wonder if Your Excellency has heard of it?"