Farming in the Magical World

In the study, Lenny stood there with a dark expression, unsure of what to say for a long time.

Frank looked at Lenny and felt a pang of pity, so he comforted him, "Young Master, actually, it's not that much!"

"Hmm?" Lenny turned his head to look at Frank, somewhat puzzled. Wasn't this all there was to it? How could he, after transmigrating, be having trouble with even basic arithmetic?

Frank opened his mouth before continuing, "The castle has been quite unsettled lately. Of the eight knights who returned, most of them, except for Knight Tim, left on their own, which should save us a lot of money!"

"You're just a..."

Instead of offering comfort, Lenny nearly fainted from anger upon hearing such a terrible idea.

With her chest heaving a few times, suppressing her anger, Lanny gave him a disgruntled look and asked, "How much can you save?"

"I won't talk about what happened after that. Do you think I can just not pay the monthly salary I owed you before?"

"Does the Wells family still have any dignity?"

As Lenny's explanation became increasingly serious, Frank shrank back in embarrassment and said no more.

He wasn't unaware that what he was doing was wrong; he just wasn't fully aware of the consequences, and he was forced into this situation.

With various expenses becoming increasingly unavoidable, the castle's revenue was even declining.

After all, the lord led more than a hundred people to fight, which affected the territory's economy and made the already poor economy even worse.

When the master was still alive, he didn't care about the finances, and it wasn't something he was good at. Now that August is gone, and Lanny has been bedridden for almost two months, there's no one else to do these things.

Should we rely on Tim, the knight, or Candy, the maid?

Or perhaps it's Aunt Susan in the kitchen, holding a string of green beans?

It's fine to have Tim collect taxes, after all, his strong physique and the scar on his face are enough to terrify those lowly people, and that's exactly what he does, always taking Tim along when collecting taxes. But to have Tim in charge of this whole operation by himself... well, forget it.

As for Candy and Aunt Susan, they were even less likely to succeed. They were just maids, maids who didn't even know anything about the castle. Frank was even more worried that Candy wouldn't be able to find her way home after she went out!

He was forced into this situation.

"Alright, you can go ahead and get busy..." Lanny waved her hand, not even looking at him, took out a piece of parchment from the drawer, unfolded it, and picked up a quill pen!

Seeing the young master's worried expression, Frank felt a pang of pity and a deep sense of guilt for not being able to help him. After much hesitation, he shook his head and left the study.

Lanny paid no attention to the steward's thoughts, stroking the parchment in his hand while pondering what to do next.

This is the northern border of the kingdom, too close to the Grummans. These barbaric creatures come down from the mountains to raid almost every year, so it's not actually safe here.

As soon as he had money, he would recruit knights to protect the territory. He didn't want to be killed and sent back to the other side before he even understood this world.

If the pension payments are delayed for a long time, how can you still recruit knights in the future?

More importantly, there's the issue of credibility involved. If everyone thinks the Wells family is a bunch of scoundrels who refuse to pay their debts, who would dare to do business with them?

While it may seem like you've saved some gold coins, it could take decades or even centuries to repair and make up for the loss of credibility, making it a losing proposition!

Without a second thought, Frank's idea was a terrible one, and he would never consider it!

Therefore, of the more than 800 gold coins owed so far, the knight's pension must be dealt with first. On the other hand, we can try to find a way to get Tiffany to plead on our behalf for the 500 gold coins owed to Earl Enno.

After all, he was a subordinate nobleman of Earl Enno, and Tiffany was his own daughter. Surely he had some leeway with her?

However, he was unaware at this moment that it was destined to be in vain. If Angus were willing to consider family ties, he would be willing to marry his daughter to such a spendthrift as "Lanny".

Therefore, the next project must require minimal investment and yield quick results.

After all, even if you put all your assets into it, you'd only get about ten gold coins, not even enough to buy a suit of armor, let alone do anything significant.

Thinking of this, he lowered his head again to examine the parchment on the table more closely.

These are things he recorded in his spare time during his recovery period. They are the general methods of making some things, which he drew on the experience of some time-traveling predecessors, and combined with his own messy memories.

However, in his other world, he was just a computer science student, and he was really not up to the task in the industrial field.

For example, the sheet he's holding now shows how to make white sugar, but it only lists a few simple elements such as sugar, mud, and filtration. As for the specifics of how to make it, he can't remember at all and can only find someone to experiment with it later.

The sheet about refined salt extraction contained a lot of information. After all, distillation and filtration are not complicated processes, and the process only requires some simple equipment, so the description was much more complete.

However, he remembered reading some analyses before that suggested that salt was not scarce in ancient times, and the reason why people had difficulty obtaining salt was due to artificial control.

He didn't know if the world was like this, but if it was, then there was no hope for this path. He couldn't possibly try to steal the jobs of those great nobles as a mere baron; that would be suicide.

Therefore, he didn't have much confidence in this point either.

As for glass and ceramics, the technical barriers are not high, but it seems to have very high requirements for raw materials. One seems to have requirements for the composition of sand, and the other requires special clay.

He wasn't even confident he could find these things, let alone manufacture them.

Based on current information, soap is actually the most feasible option.

However, this product still requires market research. The unit price is low and the results are slow, which does not quite meet the current needs. But it would be good as a long-term business.

However, there is a problem. In an era when everyone was struggling to get enough to eat, animal fats were definitely a valuable commodity, and it was unlikely that there would be enough fat to make soap.

I wonder if there are any suitable materials in the territory. It seems I need to take some time to wander around the territory and see if there are any good things that everyone has overlooked.

Who knows, seeing the real thing might remind you of something?

In the study, Lanny spread out the parchment, writing down line by line, then crossing them out one by one, until only a stain remained on the parchment. He had no reliable solution at all!

Ugh, my head hurts!

He lay back in the high-backed chair and fell into deep thought.