Hakai no Miko

Glass.

In modern Japan, it is a substance used as a variety of materials, not just dishes and windows. It is no longer an indispensable substance in modern life, and at the same time it is familiar to modern people.

But there was once a time when glass shined alongside gems and precious metals.

In modern times, high quality glass is manufactured directly by melting the raw materials, silica sand and alkali, at high temperatures. However, in ancient times, when science and technology were inferior, glass production was accompanied by a great deal of difficulty and effort.

As a result, glass has been used in ancient times as a substitute for jewellery and precious metals, which are of very high rare value.

And even in this continent of Cerdeas, the art of making glass is the secret art of the Dwarves. In addition to that, its scarcity was further increased by the subhuman exclusion caused by yesterday's ecclesiastical religion, which led to a decline in the number of Dwarves glassmakers and a shrinking of transactions with Dwarves and a drastic reduction in the number of glasses in circulation.

In addition to these rare values, and in conjunction with the beautiful decorations at the hands of the Dwarves, glass products were traded at high prices as the finest used only by the royal marquis nobility.

In such a situation, this Dwarf glass workshop was built as a result of the agreement between the Ethereal Horse, who wanted to entertain an eye-catching industry in the city of Bornis, and Dvarin, who wanted to rebuild the secret art of the race.

But its construction came with tremendous difficulty.

What was difficult, among other things, was the brick to make the kiln and the production of lutubos to melt the raw materials inside to make the glass. None of them only had to withstand high temperatures, but also the highly erosive properties of molten glass for Lutzbo.

Such refractories are not just something that can be done by baking clay. Not only do we use carefully selected natural rocks and clays, but we also need heat-resistant bricks and rutzvo shards crushed and powdered - shamots.

And fortunately, the Dwarves had shards of briquettes and lutuvos that became these chamots.

Kiln furnaces and ruzbos that can withstand high temperatures that cannot be indispensable for metallurgy or glass manufacturing are the lives of dwarves. In preparation for the accidental loss of its kilns and rutsubos, the dwarves of the continent of Cerdeas had a custom of having as amulets such as refractories and shards of glass, such as bricks and rutsubos, cooked at the beginning of the year.

Most dwarves had been taken away or lost when they were enslaved, but those who hid them only slightly came out with shards of bricks and lutuvos in each other's possession, and made chamots.

But it was also a bitter juice decision for Dwarf.

For Dwarves, bricks and glass are the crystals of the art of the clan, which has been handed down as cotton by distant fathers. It is infused with all the unique techniques of its clan, such as additives and their formulation rates, researched and developed by their fathers in blood, sweat and tears. It is nothing more than something that uniformizes and causes to be lost the qualities that have been inherited, such as mixing it with those of other clans, and it is never inherently acceptable.

But Doverine and the others broke it off with the following words:

"From this we shall be a new family"

Dwarves gathered in the city of Bornis after various destinies from all over the Serdeas continent. It was their decision to abandon their own clan and reborn them all as one new clan under the Ethereal Horse.

So, there was something approaching the chest for the completion of this glass workshop, too, Dvarin. But to mislead it, I dare to speak out of dissatisfaction.

"But not yet. Sand from raw materials is not satisfactory either. The truth is crystal scum or desert sand is good..."

The pot I gave to the Ethereal Horse is dark green because of the iron contained in the raw sand and so on. Other impurities, such as metals, cause the glass to come in a variety of colors. We have to look for ingredients that contain as little impurities as possible to make clear glass that is considered the finest.

"You're hitting your hand. As soon as the sand arrives, I'll have it brought here."

He asks Joash, who has taken the deal to see where he has been sniffing the glass from, to get sand from all over the place. In particular, the desert sands sought by Dvarin must be retrieved from the south of the continent, which separates the Benes Inland Sea. In that regard, we were fortunate to have the cooperation of Joash, who has great power in the maritime trade.

"By the way, Lord Soma. I'd like to introduce you to the greatest credit for this glass manufacturing."

Dvarin summons one of the Dwarves who was nearby.

"This guy's name is Nahl. My compatriots from the north of Holmeer."

The Ethereal Horse, who I thought was just one of the slaves sold from the same empire as Dvarin and others, asks Shemr in surprise.

"Hey, were there Dwarf people around here?

"You forgot, Soma. This guy is -" Shemru pounds his own hip mountain knife. - Our father asked Dwarf to hit us.

If you ask me that, I remember Zoog saying something like that when he first confronted Garam and the others with the dovalins he bought from the slave traders.

"Sure enough, the Dwarves who were near here disappeared after being chased by humans..."

When the Ethereal Horse muttered like a soliloquy as he remembered Shemr's words at that time, Nahl nodded loudly when he heard it.

"Yes, I am one of the Dwarf bloodlines who once lived in the mountains around here"

He offered me a secret medicine to make glass.

Dvarin insists strongly on Nahl's accomplishments.

"Secret medicine to make glass...... is it?

"Yes, Lord Soma. Without it, it would have taken more time to make glass"

A secret medicine to make glass is an alkali that is added to lower the melting point of silica sand when making molten glass. In many cases in the Continent of Cerdeas, plant-burning ashes and the like were used for this alkali. Doverlin also initially intended to use such ashes, but the presence of the secret drug brought about by Nahl changed that.

"There's a mineral deposit of trona stone."

Trona stones are minerals that are predominantly composed of carbonated soda produced from around the Great River and Salt Lakes. In ancient times it was a substance mined from the bottom of the lake of Salt Lake, which dried up in ancient Egypt.

Nahl glanced at Shemr before hesitating (for) to continue with the words.

"We were secretly mining trona stones from deposits found on the Sorbiant Plains and manufacturing glass between us trading mountain swords with Zoan"

Shemr wonders if such a thing slept in the plains where they were.

The Trona Stone deposits found by this clan of nar are the largest deposits of natural soda from which mining can continue in the modern continent of Cerdeas.

The deposit is one of the massive amounts of seawater once trapped on land in the course of the collision of continental plates that formed the Donus mountains surrounding the Sorbiant plains. In time, the northern ones became rock salt as they were, but the sea water trapped near the center of the plain became carbonated soda - trona stone - by the influence of volcanic and microbial gases, including many carbonated gases from the underground, in the process of enrichment. It was the Nahl clan that discovered what was bulging up near the surface due to crust fluctuations and was secretly mining it.

"So, what do you want from me?

Believe what Dwarf says, this Dwarf named Nahl is a tremendous feat. The Ethereal Horse was going to ask some impossibility.

In front of such a pale horse, Nahl suddenly kneels.

"Save our clan!

To the sudden offer, to the pale horse perplexed as to what it meant, Nahl told the current state of his clan.

"Our clan is imprisoned in Marben Copper Mountain by people from a country called Holmea."

Marben Copper Mountain is a copper mountain in the northern mountains of the Holmeer Country. Copper is one of the best copper mines in the western region, which is responsible for the bulk of the copper distributed not only in Holmea, but also in the western part of the continent.

But it originally belonged to the Naru and Dwarf clans. About five years ago, however, the Holmeer State attacked the Dwarves in the army with obfuscation that they had sold bad copper, and occupied every Dwarf settlement.

Nahl continues his words to the pale horse who is surprised to be told how to do so.

"Since then, we have been made to work in mines as slaves. The men are dug copper without rest every day and beaten with whips and sticks if they defy it at all. There is less food to be given and no medication. That's why so many of our countrymen are dying of bumps from injuries and illnesses. But still, we can't even rebel because we're holding women and children hostage."

Nar's voice was filled with thoughtlessness and anger that could not be hidden from him.

"In the midst of that, when I heard about this place from the human guards and was entrusted with the hope of a clan, only one, distracted by the carcasses of my fellow countrymen, escaped so far"

Nahl pleads with the Ethereal Horse.

"Please......! Please, help our clan!

There were countless scratches and cracks on the fingers of both hands, which were savvy and assembled to pray, and there were also marks of burns on the thick arms peeking from the sleeves, such as the wounds whipped with whips and the burning goth pressed against them.

To its painful appearance, the Ethereal Horse distorts his sight. But once his lips were firmly pulled and tied, he told Nahl, choosing words in a calm tone.

"We are so full now because we protect ourselves. We cannot go to war with Holmea to save you."

Bad for the Nahls, but that is the truth of the Ethereal Horses.

No matter how much we defeated General Darius, the Holmeer nation still has more than 20,000 troops. The Ethereal Horses don't have enough power to attack and fight there.

In that answer, the colour of disappointment floats all the way to the faces of the Nahls or the Dvarins.

But the Ethereal Horse made his grieving face smile.

"But the time will come to settle with Holmea on a day not so far away. I'm sure you'll do as you wish then."

Surprised by the words, Nahl lowered his head as he wept and tried to rub his forehead on the floor again. The dwarves who watched it around also snort small.

"Check it out. We'll make the best glass and help Lord Soma!

It was a doverlin with its thick chest stretched and gahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

But there's a whine leaking out there like water.

"For that matter, how many woods do you crush..."

The Ethereal Horse was surprised by Eladia's poisonous words.

Eladia also seemed to have spoken, and even when asked what the Ethereal Horse meant, it only clouded the words at first. But when the Ethereal Horse asked overlapping, he answered, choosing the words.

"We use a large amount of wood to make something called this glass -" Eladia looked around at the workshop. "- Perhaps there are other workshops besides here? Besides, there's more wood-burning workshops than here."

Doverlyn, a little.

Indeed, Eladia is right, there were other workshops for the manufacture of glass besides here.

In an era where, as in modern times, high temperatures were not technically obtained simply by dissolving the raw materials directly to produce glass, it had to go through a three-step process to make glass.

First, the first step is to melt the raw silica sand and alkali at high temperatures and create a rapidly cooled and crushed glass grain - frit. Next, this frit and piece of waste glass - the second step of dissolving the carret at high temperatures to create the raw glass. And this is the third step of melting this raw glass, coloring and molding it to make the product.

Dvarin and the other Dwarves were in another workshop where the highest temperatures were required of these and the first and second processes requiring large quantities of wood as fuel were built at the foot of a mountain in the north with lots of trees. And the workshop I'm in is where I only do the third process, and I used the river to carry in the raw glass made in another workshop, and I manufactured the glassware with it.

The Ethereal Horse was surprised when asked about those things.

"You use so much wood to make glass..."

In modern times, oil and gas are used to obtain high temperatures that melt glass. But in ancient and medieval times, when there was no such thing, they said they needed twenty to fifty times as much wood as the glass to be made. There is even a theory that the rapid decline in primary forests in medieval Europe is due to the development of the glass industry.

But in this world, where there are still many untouched native forests, a sense of crisis about deforestation would have been about the elves living there. In addition, the elves themselves were more reluctant to Dwarves stepping into forests that they had made their own living areas, and there was less awareness that forests would disappear.

However, the Ethereal Horse, who has lived in modern Japan, where environmental damage caused by the logging of tropical forests is being screamed, considered this to be a major problem.

But that's not why we can suddenly stop deforestation. I came to this world and found out that wood is an essential part of people's lives as fuel. Demand for fuel will go up the eel if the town develops more and more from now on. No matter how much for nature conservation, if you suddenly restrict the use of wood and the very life of the city you are in is no longer made up, you have no ex or child.

So the Ethereal Horse presented Eladia with a compromise.

"Mr. Eladia. Can't you plant a tree?

When it comes to forest protection, the first thing the Ethereal Horse came up with was planting trees.

"Shizuku... what is it?

Eladia tilts her neck to a word she has never even heard.

"In the world I was in, after cutting trees, we're supposed to plant seedlings so that the forest doesn't disappear - tree children."

Eladia and Dvarin, who were supposed to be definitive elves and dwarves, accidentally looked at each other.

It is an idea that I would never have thought of in this world such as planting trees.

Unlike crops such as wheat, trees grow planted seedlings, and it takes twenty or thirty years before they can be used as fuel such as firewood. This could lead to life expectancy before that in people in this world who still have an average life expectancy of only about fifty years. Therefore, the idea of growing trees did not grow.

Trees are also natural for long-lived elves. It was even unimaginable, such as planting trees and growing them by their own hands.

To the bewildered Eladia, Aoima presents the knowledge heard in modern Japan.

"I hear that forests become overcrowded, trees become thinner and other plants cease to grow. They say if trees are harvested to an extent that is not overcrowded, trees will grow fat and splendid, as will other plants. Besides, logged trees can be used as wood."

That was the first ear for Eladia.

But Eladia is vague, but I could also understand what the Ethereal Horse said. In the old woods all the big trees grow, and not many plants grow at their roots. However, it is the knowledge of the forest that my father taught me at an early age that when trees fall due to occasional strong winds, lightning strikes, etc., a wide variety of plants thrive in an attempt to fill that gap. Eladia understands, so to speak, that it's about waking it up with their own hands.

"I don't think there's anything I can do about that..."

But understanding the principle and being able to accept it is yet another story. Eladia finds herself reluctant to rearrange the forest for their own ends.

"I know it's hard, but can't you do something about it? Not just for glass, but for the life of the city, there has to be no wood."

That's how the Ethereal Horse asks you to do it, and Eladia can't say no without it.

In addition, the pale horse did Doverlin a favor.

"Can we not use coal (burning stone) instead of wood?

In modern Japan, fossil fuels such as oil and gas are used instead of wood. So far I haven't found anything that looks like oil, but I suggested using it because there seems to be coal in this world as well.

Then, Dvarin sinks.

"No, that's, uh... I don't really want to use it because it produces smelly smoke that rots glass and metal."

Smelly smoke is smoke containing sulphur oxides produced by the combustion of sulphur in coal. This sulfur oxide can corrode metals and glass to be smelted, and was distant in iron and glass manufacturing.

"Do something about it, please."

The Ethereal Horse asked him to worship Dvarin with his hands together. I don't know what that trick means. It was doverlin, but I know that the Ethereal Horse is pleading. If you have just been freed from slavery, or if you are begged by a pale horse who has taught you numerous skills and knowledge, Doverlin can't say no either.

"Okay. All right! - Not at all, Lord Soma."

Blurring with exaggeration, Eladia agreed with me all this time.

At this time, Ethereal Horse's conversion of fuel from wood to coal later led to the development of a coke that steamed coal to remove tar, sulfur, etc., but that is another story.

In the meantime, the Ethereal Horse, relieved with the two consents, once again looked around inside the glass workshop.

"But this is how you make glass in this world."

The Ethereal Horse, who had visited the glass workshop during his family vacation, uttered admiration for the condition of the workshop, which was completely different from what had been streamlined by modern science that he had seen at that time.

"Holy shit. Does Lord Soma know how to make glass?"

Doverlyn's tone sounded discouraging. The manufacture of glass is a prized secret for the Dwarves. As for Dvarin, who had so far been amazed by the numerous tools and techniques taught by the Ethereal Horse, I was just disappointed that I was going to pull out the Ethereal Horse's temperament with this glass manufacture.

Besides, the Ethereal Horse hastily waves his hands and denies it.

"Even though I know it, it's about the extent to which I visited the workshop where the glass is made. Besides, it's a lot different from how you make it there..."

"Different way to make it, then?

Doverlyn, who listened to the Ethereal Horse, frowned and asked.

"Yes. The way I know it, this is how -" the Ethereal Horse puts his fists of both hands together to hold something like a stick in his mouth. "- You breathe in and you make it."

Doverlyn made her face full of wrinkles look right.

"Don't breathe in?

"Yes. Wrap melted glass around the tip of a barrel of metal, so puffy"

Dvarin put on his arms with a difficult face.

I've never heard of breathing in and making glass vessels. To date, however, Ethereal Horse has been asked to produce a variety of tools, but it was easy to imagine that all of them were products of high technology that could not even be Dwarves. For this reason, Doverin thinks that the story of a pale horse breathing in this breath and making glass is not something he can laugh at and listen to at all.

"Hey! Anything like a barrel of affordable metal?

When Dvarin spoke to the craftsmen working in the workshop, one of them brought a single iron stick. It is an iron bar used to wrap molten glass. In order to lighten the weight and ensure good handling, and not to take heat away from the melted glass, the stick was hollow and cut off both ends to make a cylinder just the right length.

As the intrigued Dwarves crowd surrounded themselves as to what the hell to start, Dvarin wrapped dissolved glass around the tip of that cylinder, breathing in.

Then the orange glass swells like a balloon. Surprising voices rise from the surrounding dwarves watching over it.

But that voice turns into a sigh of disappointment when swollen glass is pulled by gravity and drooled to the ground.

"Eh, I think I did this while turning the stick in circles"

Doverlin blurs to a pale horse who hastily remembers and advises how craftsmen were doing in a modern Japanese glass workshop.

"Lord Soma. Say that first."

It is the second challenge. Next, breathe in several parts as you rotate the stick. Then they swelled it this time without drooling. Further how to disconnect it from the cylinder, it was found that it could be disconnected by scratching and gently tapping on the glass after it had cooled.

"... done"

What has been done is in the form of an undressed eggplant with a carrot or eggplant. But no doubt it was a glass vessel.

Doverlyn gathers the heads of craftsmen to match each process immediately.

"Look at that now and be honest with me about what you thought"

Yes. When Dvarin prompts him to speak, the oldest Dwarf first says.

"Shouldn't you first say what you actually tried and felt?

That statement was the best, so Dvarin often contemplates it and then makes his point as he indulges himself.

"Perhaps...... no, I can certainly do glass vessels the way I am now"

To that answer, the craftsmen heads said small, "Whoa!," he exclaims.

"But a way like that is out of the way!

It was the craftsman's head, who had the process of creating the mould of clay wrapped around glass, who so disagreed.

"I know a hundred ways to go. But I think there's a terrible possibility in that way. - Even if you think about it, look. How long has it taken to build one vessel so far?

In that word, the heads of craftsmen are united.

First, on the tip of the metal rod, make the core of the vessel with clay. Let it dry, then dip it directly in melted glass, or roll the stringed glass and heat it up again to integrate the glass. After slowly cooling and solidifying it, he scratches out the clay of his core, and finally he can have one vessel.

But the only way the Ethereal Horse presented it would be to put melted glass on the stick and breathe in.

"Perhaps ten times as efficient as ever - no, it would be hundreds of times more efficient to work. That's not all. Look closely at this."

Dvarin shows the glass that was blown earlier.

"How about this thinness. Have you ever been able to make something so thin?

Dvarin is right, the glass he has been making was to such an extent that he managed to see the light on the other side if he looked watermarked, whereas the containers of glass blown and made are so thin that the other side seemed transparent as they were.

"Less effort than ever before. And this thinness. - I think this is incredible technology."

What the Dwarves have been doing so far is called Core Techniques, a method of making glass that was carried out in ancient Egypt and elsewhere.

In contrast, many people would think of a glass craft in modern Japan, the technique of breathing into an iron pipe and inflating the melted glass on the tip, supposedly invented during the Roman Empire, is a "glass blowing technique".

This "glass-blowing technique" is the basic technique used in glass crafts even after thousands of years, or in the manufacture of glass containers, even in state-of-the-art factories, although they have changed from human hands to mechanical. The "glass-blowing technique" that modern Japanese take for granted was a groundbreaking technique called a major technological innovation in glassmaking.

The craftsmen other than Dvarin intuitively realized that this was a hell of a technology.

"I'm not asking you to throw away your previous technique right now. But I think I should learn and drill this technology, but what should I do?

There was no denial from anyone this time to Dvarin's suggestion.

Behind the Dwarves poking their difficult faces, the Ethereal Horse was thinking it was time to return to the city. I saw one glass workshop I wanted to see, and in all probability, I would accumulate the administration I had to do if I didn't go back to the city.

"I have work to do, so I'll be back."

Doverlin grabs disappointingly on the shoulder of a pale horse who tried to return to the city with that said.

"Well, Lord Soma. There is no panic. Why don't you talk to us for a while?"

Suddenly the Ethereal Horse grabbed his shoulder and said, "Huh?" and it solidifies with its mouth open. Plus, another dwarf grabs that right hand.

"Well, well. Let me talk very carefully about glass in particular."

"Do you know anything else?," he grabbed his left hand.

"Something trivial. Yeah. What else do you know?," he grabbed the hem of his clothes.

"Anyway, spit it out - no, let me tell you something," he said, hipster.

And then, sloppily, they pulled it to the back of the workshop.

Shemr watched it blindly for a while, but returns it to me.

"You guys, take the soma!

◆ ◇ ◆ ◇ ◆

"... what are you doing, those guys?

It was Garam who wanted to talk to Ethereal Horse about preparing for the war, but no matter how long he waited, Ethereal Horse would not return to the Lordship's residence. Besides, I finally cut the numbness and even came all the way to the glass workshop, where Gallum shrugs back.

"You guys, give me back my soma!

"Yes! Return Master Soma!

"Shut up! Lord Soma, talk to us slowly!

In the workshop were the dwarves surrounding the Ethereal Horse, and Shemr and Eladiah, who ate it with a great sword screen.

Surrounded by the Dwarves, the pale horse, when he meets Gallum, smiles bitterly and waves small to him.

To this incomprehensible situation, the troubled Gallum turns his gaze to ask Zoog, who was coming with him. Then Zoog also said, perplexed again, scratching his cheek with his fingers polypoly.

"It just seems to me that the kids are toying..."

Gallum could only sigh at that overly accurate expression.

But behind this commotion, no one noticed then that one old man was sneaking into the workshop with Kosokoso.

"Hmm. Is this the drug that makes the famous glass for rumors? Interesting…"

Solon held the powder of Trona stone and smiled hazy.