The dock

Jonas could slowly hear the loud river again, indicating that he indeed got closer and closer to his desired destination. He limped through the snow covered streets while his cheap jacket kept him warmer then he initially had thought it would. Speaking of the weather, it was probably early winter or late autumn. It was hard to judge with the amount of information available to him. The only thing which led him to believe that it could still be autumn were the gigantic mountains which were right behind him. It looked to be a mountain range or rather, it was the "Fontechien mountain range" as Mendo had called it once. Jonas stood still for a moment as his hands shaked furiously. He remembered the terror he felt when facing that beast. He already remembered it once today, but his attention back then was more on the captain of the towns guard then the event he had experienced the day before. But now, when he only saw one or two people crossing his way on the shabby gravel road he walked, he wasn't distracted by anything. He could clearly remember the beasts gaping mouth with it's razor sharp teeth.

He bit himself on the tongue so as to get himself out of the memory and remember something else. Though something else quickly caught his attention, that being Rife, Mendos sister, who walked infront of him as she came from another crossing that was covered by houses. She had her grey hair put together into a pony tail, almost like the one Jonas had with the only difference being that hers looked like she put some effort into it. She what looked to be a basket in her hand and walked in a rather hurried manner. Jonas decided to come up and talk to her as he was still wondering if they indeed sold the materials he needed at the dock.

While walking up to her, he loudly said "Hey! You are Rife right? can i ask you something?" Rife turned around with a surprised expression while Jonas catched a few stares from the four other people on the empty street. Rife waited for a second as Jonas limped towards her and quickly asked him "E-eh how can i help you?" she gulped her own saliva while tightening her grip on her basket.

Jonas quickly answered "Ah- Im trying to look for the dock, remember the conversation we had yesterday? I wanted to look if they actually had those over there". Rife looked to be relieved as her grip seemed to relax, she then cleared her throat, "The ships carrying saltpeter will probably only arrive tomorrow, but the sulfur should already be there. Didn't you see any wagons that smelled fowl and had yellow rocks on them pass by?" She looked a bit curious and tilted her head slightly.

Jonas shaked his head with a clueless face, surprising Rife who apparently wasn't expecting a no to be coming from her conversation partner. She then motioned towards Jonas that he should follow her towards the dock. Rife was sure that the sulfur had to already be at the dock as it was normal for the miners to send it over there a day before the merchants arrived.

As Jonas and Rife reached the dock, Jonas quickly surveyed the area, although there wasn't that much he could survey. The dock wasn't a big one, being built out of the same wood as everything else it seemed to be getting moldy under the constant stream of the cold gigantic river. The small dock could be compared to a nail in a plank with the plank representing the river. The on land part of the dock had a few people walking around and carrying crates into small warehouses so they were save from the weather. What instantly struck him in the next moment was the extremely fowl smell which encased the dock. He looked over to the source of the disgusting smell and saw a pile of yellow rocks on top of a care which was slowly being pulled in by about 6 people.

Rife looked over to the cart with a relieved face, it looked to be important to her that the sulfur wasn't hindered from getting to the docks, but Jonas was quite confused as to why she would be so worried about a stone she said was the most useless thing they sold. Jonas quickly asked Rife why she would be so worried even though she thought the rock was useless. She looked at him with an impressed face as she herself could barely remember her saying that the rock was useless. She then once again cleared her throat, which seemed to be a habit of hers, and then explained, "I still think that rock is useless, but it's also the main thing that keeps our town fed and supplied. The sulfur trade here is probably even more important then the iron, because sulfur is apparently pretty rare and our region is one of the only ones that has access to it, so the church pays a really good amount for just the sulfur. I once saw a merchant handing the overseer of the Sulfur mine three picanos! for just 60 kilos! if that was iron he would've maybe gotten one picano! For 3 you can buy so much food that you would be able to support 50 people for 1 month! that's basically the whole mine, and 60 kilos isn't even that much!"

Jonas could see a spark in the eyes of Rife, it looked like she was really intrigued by the dynamics of trade. It was a nice experience seeing her in her full element. People often become completely unrecognizable when they are completely absorbed in doing something they are extremely passionate about and seeing these people can inspire oneself to do the same. Jonas still wasn't really sure what the currency value here was, so he thought quickly asking Rife wasn't a big deal. He looked at her while she was still inspecting what the people from the mines brought in, but in that moment a different question popped into his head.

"Hey, when sulfur is of such worth, how come this town isn't a city by now? wouldn't a better economy guarantee a better life? From what I've seen this town seems not all that large, the size speaks for maybe 5000 people, but with something that brings so much money it easily could've expanded to maybe over 10.000 people, maybe even more". Rife turned around to him, but the spark she had in her eye had surprisingly vanished. She looked towards the river again with a gloomy face, indicating that there was something more behind this.

She answered with a brittle voice which was different to her normal clear voice and answered "Thank the mayor for that... He's the guy who is sucking up to the nobility of Galvie and the duke there. He is not only supported by Galvie in the elections but he also pay's way to much taxes to them. He is basically just a puppet for the duke over there. The only thing he is interested in is the sulfur and iron from here, so he forces us to sell it to him cheap so that he can resell it for a way higher price to the entire continent. Like i said, we have pretty much one of the only sources of sulfur". Jonas understood why Rife was sad, after all, they were forced to live in poverty due to being pressured to sell at a low market price.

On the other hand, he really couldn't condemn the "duke" for what he was doing, from the dukes perspective it probably was quite a smart move. He had an easy income for his domain AND he could control the output at his will, it was basically a money printer.

Of course, Jonas didn't agree with the duke, for what he was doing was still pretty inhumane, but if one looked at the duke's point of view, he probably doesn't really care what happens to the people that print his money. He possibly hasn't even seen one of them himself, so why should he feel any remorse for what he was doing? He was taking stuff away from some names on his documents and distributed it to where he could see it. It certainly was a dumb move if one would consider there WHOLE domain, but this country seemed to run on a feudal system, so the well being of the population wasn't the priority for him. And even then, from what Jonas saw up until now, the town looked to be doing okay. He didn't see anyone starving on the streets, maybe one or two that looked a bit to thin for their own good, but taking it as a whole it wasn't that bad.

Jonas didn't really have an answer which could lighten the mood, so he just asked if the saltpeter would also arrive tomorrow and if it was expensive. Rife seemed to instantly change her attitude as her face once again screamed enthusiasm. "Saltpeter is pretty cheap right now, it's winter after all, so you should be able to get a basket for about one trinovo-" Jonas interrupted her with his right hand as he finally needed to know what the value of the currency was. Just hearing random names didn't really help him in figuring out how much he needed of something to buy something different. Rife looked a bit annoyed at first for being interrupted so suddenly but quickly gave him the numbers. The Zalenano was the lowest set of currency, it was about as much worth as one loaf of bread. Comparing that with the value of the Kerks, which Jonas had already determined to be around 500€ meant that the Zalenano was probably 1€. She counted a few other names, a few to many as Jonas thought, as they were just the equivalents of the 50€,100€,200€ and 1000€ bills.

Jonas thanked Rife after she explained the values and made sure with her that the ship was guaranteed to come tomorrow. He was really thankful for Rifes explanation, as he could now make out the real price of the sulfur which probably was at around 4€ per kilo. He just hoped he could get it as fast as possible so that it wasn't already loaded onto the merchant ships.

As he would only get his payment for taking down the fullbear with Mendo tonight, he had to wait until tomorrow. Then he could buy the saltpeter and the sulfur at the same time and start making gunpowder. Mendo had already said to him that Pete had a good chance on becoming mayor only on the prospect that he was able to protect the town well. If Jonas could show of the gunpowder's power to the people, he probably already had a decent chance at becoming mayor.

If he was to run for mayor, he could probably ask Mendo to run together with him. If he had Mendo with him, he would have a familiar face on his team for the towns people, making it easier to convince them to vote for him. He had planned something together for quite a while when he walked towards the dock. His plan would not only involve him getting to be mayor, but bettering the life of the townsfolk that lived here. He knew very well that he couldn't do something like that in his old world, but now he had a chance to not only use his memory for the betterment of a few people, no, now he could lead a new era starting with the industrial revolution!

He knew that this was just a dream he had, but there wasn't anything he could lose at the moment. He had no family to get back to, be it the old world or this one. No place he could call home, not even one achievement he could be proud of. What use did his studying engineering bring him in his old world? He never even got a job anywhere! he just did a few tasks for a few acquaintances, and after his only family passed away, he completely cut contact with his social life. He felt his purpose was to bring about a new era for the people in this world. The way may be near impossible, but it being just near meant that it was still doable!

And even though Jonas felt motivated, something deep inside him didn't feel right.