Later, in order to avoid being jealous of the Soldiers Committee, Raos, a shrewd weapon merchant in Turiyi, took the initiative to join forces with the Legion Weapons Store and handed over the produced fine weapons to the Legion Weapons Store for sale, which made the Legion Weapons Store, which had already shown a downward trend in the competition in the Kingdom's weapons market, revived its vitality. He soon opened branches in various towns of the Kingdom within a few years. Half of his employees were disabled soldiers and their salaries were not low.

But Aristaglas made a difficult choice - to start a business. He chose the industry he had worked in - the stone mine. He asked his comrades to raise funds everywhere, and received strong support from the Soldiers Committee. He brought several disabled soldiers who were willing to work with him to the Ministry of Commerce, hoping to contract a stone mine.

After the establishment of Dionia, a resolution was passed: the minerals in the territory cannot be sold to merchants, and they are only allowed to contract. Important mines must not only be auctioned, but also after they are obtained, the Ministry of Commerce will also send people to supervise within the specified period of time, and neither allow their output to be too low nor excessive mining, so as to ensure that the share they pay to the kingdom every year is constant.

The Ministry of Commerce finally agreed to let Aristaglas contract a stone mine in Lucania, not because he was a disabled soldier who deserved care, but because the stone mine was located in the mountains, with inconvenient transportation and poor production. It was also a limestone mine. No businessman was willing to take over, so the Ministry of Commerce asked it to contract at a lower price and only gave it a one-year contract, just with a try-and-see attitude.

Unexpectedly, after Aristaglas took over, he overcame many difficulties. Not only did the production of stone minerals increase greatly, but he also sold it at a good price (at that time, the Lucania region had been owned by Dionia for several years. After vigorous cultural dissemination, local people had gradually accepted the lifestyle of Dernians, living in Greek-style houses, and building temples in Hades required a lot of limestone).

Aristaglas gained a lot of wealth and won the trust of the Ministry of Commerce. Based on this, he also used disabled soldiers as the backbone to make a fortune in the stone market in the kingdom and became a very famous stone merchant.

Four years ago, he did not participate in the Turiyi Chamber of Commerce organized by Raos and went to the Latinum War Zone because he had just contracted the Turiyishi Mine, which is of great significance to him and the kingdom. He needed to resolve all the affairs one by one, and he could not take the spare time to go to Latinum, not to mention that there is no stone mine in the Latinum area.

Now, he is a famous stone merchant in the Kingdom. He has a group of shrewd and capable subordinates. He no longer needs to go to the mine to supervise and command it personally. However, the project of rebuilding the main temple of Hades this time has a very important impact. The Kingdom Administrative Office issued an order that the marble mine required for the temple is mainly provided by the Turiyi stone mine (because the stone mine is close, the cost is low, and it is not easy to damage), and also provided all the Kingdom slaves of Turiyi to the stone mine for use to ensure that enough stone is provided for the construction of the temple in a short time. Because of this, Aristaglas felt that the responsibility was heavy and dared not ignore it. He came to the scene every day, for fear of making any mistakes.

Aristaglas first saluted the soldiers who were escorting the slaves and said seriously: "Thank you for your hard work, brothers!"

Then he asked the foremen: "Which team do you belong to? How many slaves do you bring?"

The foremen reported the number and number of their own formations. Aristaglas's men picked up the wooden board, checked it out, and said, "Come with me."

The foremen brought their slaves into the mine. Aristaglas stood at the entrance and chatted with the team officer while waiting for the subsequent slaves to enter the field. Until he confirmed that all the kingdom slaves had arrived and the number of people was in line, he said to his subordinates: "Go and bring our slaves and carts in."

The subordinate responded and did not leave immediately, but reminded: "Boss, according to the judgment of several old sailors, it is likely that there will be heavy rain in Tuliyi tomorrow. Just in case, we must transport all the stones in the mine today. Otherwise, if it really rains heavily, the ground of the mine will become slippery and muddy, and transporting stones will become very difficult and dangerous."

It is difficult to mine ore and transport even harder. Aristaglas has a deep understanding of it. He immediately made a decision: "I will discuss with Blos (the team officer who is responsible for escorting slaves today) to try to extend the time for the slaves to work and ensure that all the stones can be transported away today."

After saying that, he remembered another thing and said, "You take the time to go to the Institute of Engineering at Dionia Academy and contact the scholars there, and I have agreed to the matter they mentioned last time about building rails to transport ore. When we finish providing stones for the main temple of Hades, we will ask them to come here for... Well, as they say it is called an experiment."

"The person who manufactures the rails is coming to transport ore?" The subordinates were a little confused, obviously not aware of this.

"I don't know very well what the situation is. After you arrive at the school, you will know if you ask the scholars in detail." Aristaglas waved impatiently.

The Dionys Academy of Engineering was established shortly after the end of the Western Mediterranean War. Most scholars came from the original mathematics school, a discipline that puts theoretical science into practice, mainly responsible for the design of public buildings and various equipment. The construction of rails and mine cars came from the idea that Davers accidentally mentioned when he visited the newly established college and talked to scholars. However, scholars regarded it as one of the most important research topics for the new college to expand its influence.

The ownership of Corsica and Sardinia, as well as the entire Etruscan alliance with Dionia, gave the kingdom sufficient iron ore supply and solved the resource problem. Raos was also willing to produce such special and high-quality railway tracks, but it was difficult to find a mineral merchant who was willing to cooperate with, because the initial investment was large, mainly to spend huge amounts of money to buy enough railway tracks (iron in the kingdom price was not cheap, even though some new territory with rich iron ore resources were obtained a few years ago, mining difficulties and transportation were even more difficult to increase its cost).

The scholars of the Academy of Engineering have discussed with Aristaglas several times, and he has been hesitating, but after taking on the Kingdom task of providing stones for the main temple of Hades, due to the tight time and heavy tasks, the transportation of ore to the main temple of Turiine City had already lost seven or eight pack cattle and more than a dozen private slaves. He finally made up his mind to cooperate with the Academy of Engineering to improve the problem of transportation difficulties.

After making this important decision, he felt very stressed and was thinking: Can you borrow a huge sum of money from Cristoya Bank to alleviate the financial tension? After all, according to scholars from the Academy of Engineering, this is a very important research invention of the kingdom, and King Dionya also attaches great importance to it.

But before that, he had to do another thing first. He turned around and said to another subordinate: "You go to the port later and book a passenger ship for me first. If it really rains tomorrow, I will go to Syracuse and inspect the stone mines there. After all, they are also responsible for providing limestone for the main temple, so there is no mistake! (Syracuse has the richest open-pit limestone resources in the entire Western Mediterranean, and Aristaglas contracted the mining rights of one of the stone mines).

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Masims brought 50 slaves to the mining area they were in charge of before. He did not start construction immediately. Instead, he had to make a good judgment on where to start mining. This must be decided by the captain. If the initial position is selected well, the mining will be smoother and the casualties will be reduced. This requires the captain to have rich mining experience and eyesight.

The reason why Masims became the most trusted captain of the foreman is because he is very organized in his work and does not make temporary judgments, but has prepared for today's mining at the end of yesterday. This is a working habit he developed when he served as a Roman municipal magistrate for several times.

Several straight and vertical grooves had been poked out on the huge and flat rock in front of them, forming a contour of a rectangular stone.

At this time, Masims asked six slaves to climb up the rock on the wooden ladder. In groups of two, they knocked the dry wooden wedges into the groove with a wooden hammer. When all the grooves were embedded in dense wood chips, the rocks cracked slightly along the groove.

Masims immediately ordered the slave who had brought the water tank to water the wooden wedges. The water flowed into the groove and soaked the wooden wedges. The wooden wedges absorbed water and expanded, becoming larger and larger, and the rocks were under pressure, causing the cracks in the groove to become larger and larger. This process took some time.

At the same time, Masims did not waste all this time. After carefully observing the rock next to him, he began to measure with a tape ruler, and then used an ink pen to draw outlines on the rock. Then several slaves took a brush (an iron saw inlaid on the wooden board), brushing back and forth along the outlines, and finally chiseled a deeper groove.

At this time, the rock next to it became wider and deeper as the water-absorbing wood wedge continued to expand.

Masims felt that the temperature was almost the same, so he sent five slaves to the ground. They each held a slender and strong wooden crowbar in their hands, inserted it into the crack between the wooden wedges, and began to pry out the stones hard. This was an extremely laborious and difficult process. After changing to several waves of slaves, the stones finally separated from the rock body.
Chapter completed!