The Necro-Industrial Revolution

The massive wooden doors of the Great Hall swung open, and the lead guild merchants stepped inside.

Most of them had braced themselves for a drafty, miserable stone room. Castles in the deep north were notoriously. Instead, a wave of intense, deeply comforting heat washed over them the moment they crossed the threshold.

The massive stone fireplace at the far end of the hall was roaring. It was fueled by freshly mined coal, burning with a brilliant intensity that radiated warmth into every corner of the room. There was almost no smoke.

The merchants quickly unbuttoned their heavy traveling coats, sweating within minutes of entering.

“Please, gentlemen, find a seat,” Jack said.

He was sitting at the head table, resting his hands on his cane. He did not look like a starving, desperate boy-lord. He looked entirely in his element. Standing perfectly still in the shadows just behind Jack’s chair was Elias, wrapped in his dark cloak. The silent swordsman did not move a single muscle, but his mere presence cast a heavy, intimidating weight over the room.

The merchants hurried to the long wooden tables. Before they could even pull their ledgers from their satchels, Karen and the village women emerged from the kitchens.

They carried large, steaming wooden bowls and set them down in front of the traders.

A merchant with a thick, graying beard leaned forward and sniffed the bowl. His eyes widened. It was a thick, rich stew made with premium chunks of dire wolf meat, wild mountain tubers, and seasoned with a heavy dose of rendered fat. For men who had spent the last three weeks eating dry, salted travel rations on a freezing mountain road, it was a feast fit for an emperor.

“Eat first,” Jack commanded smoothly. “We will talk business when your bellies are full. In the Frost-Grip fief, we do not let our guests go hungry.”

Gary sat at the very end of the table, staring down at his bowl. He was supposed to be the savior of this valley. He was supposed to be the one feeding them scraps in exchange for their land deeds. Instead, he was eating their premium meat in a castle warmer than his own home. He ate the stew in bitter silence.

For twenty minutes, the only sounds in the Great Hall were the clinking of wooden spoons and the crackle of the fire.

When the bowls were finally empty, Karen quietly cleared the tables. The mood in the room had entirely shifted. The merchants were warm, fed, and completely disarmed by the unexpected hospitality.

Jack tapped his cane once against the stone floor. The sharp sound brought every eye to the head table.

“Let us begin,” Jack announced. “You have seen the goods in our square. We have massive quantities of dire wolf and mountain bear pelts. We have tons of perfectly smoked, travel-ready meat. And we have a functioning deep-vein stone-coal mine. I am willing to sell large portions of all three.”

A thin, sharply dressed merchant from the tailors’ guild immediately stood up.

“Lord Jack,” the tailor said smoothly. “The southern guilds are always willing to help a struggling northern territory. I will offer you a very generous price for all of your furs. I have Imperial Silver notes and two chests of copper coins.”

Jack’s expression did not change, but his eyes went completely cold.

“Sit down,” Jack said flatly.

The tailor blinked, completely taken aback. “My Lord, I assure you, standard Imperial copper is—”

“Worthless to me,” Jack interrupted, his voice carrying effortlessly across the quiet hall. “Imperial paper notes lose their value the second a new tax is declared, and copper is too heavy to transport in large amounts. Do not insult my intelligence. I am not a peasant selling cabbages on the roadside.”

Jack leaned forward, resting his chin on his hands.

“Here are the rules of this hall,” Jack declared, looking directly at the gathered men. “We will only accept pure Imperial Gold, or high-purity silver bars. However, I am much more interested in direct barter. I have things I need, and you have wagons full of supplies. We will trade value for value.”

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The merchants exchanged nervous glances. The boy was ruthless. He knew exactly what he held.

“I will open the bidding with the furs,” Jack said. “The tanned pelts will not rot, and they are as soft as velvet. Perfect for the noble courts in the capital. What am I offered?”

“Three crates of fine wine and a chest of silver ingots!” a merchant shouted from the middle of the table.

“Wine does not build walls,” Jack dismissed instantly.

“Two heavy wagons of treated lumber, nails, and a chest of gold pieces!” another merchant yelled, sensing the shift in demand.

“I have a forest outside my gate. I do not need your wood,” Jack countered.

He looked toward the back of the room, where Barnaby and Old Miller were standing quietly, watching the proceedings.

“I need iron,” Jack stated clearly. “Pure, refined iron ingots. Not rusted scrap. Not cheap tools. I need heavy blocks of iron.”

A merchant wearing a heavy leather apron stood up. He was a metals trader. “I have four wagons of refined iron ingots, Lord Jack. Intended for the mining towns to the west, but I will trade them here. I want the mountain bear pelts and exclusive rights to ten carts of your coal.”

“You will have the bear pelts, but only five carts of coal,” Jack negotiated instantly. “And you will throw in all of your spare forging tools, heavy hammers, and a fresh anvil.”

The metal merchant calculated the profit in his head. The premium bear pelts alone would sell for a fortune to the other region lords. “Agreed!”

Barnaby let out a loud, triumphant laugh from the back of the room. He finally had the metal he needed.

Jack turned his attention to the rest of the room. “Next. The smoked meat. I have more than my village can eat in three years. It is perfectly cured.”

A provisioner stood up eagerly. “Lord Jack, I supply the Imperial army garrisons. I want all of it. I will offer you gold.”

“I will take some gold,” Jack nodded. “But I also need seeds. Specifically, frost-hardy tubers, iron-stalk wheat, and fast-growing root vegetables. And I heavy plow blades.”

Another merchant, dealing in agriculture, jumped into the fray. “I have the seeds! Three wagons full of winter-hardy stock. I will outbid him for the meat!”

Jack masterfully played the provisioner and the agricultural merchant against each other. Within ten minutes, he had secured enough high-yield seeds to plant the entire southern field Elias had cleared, plus a heavy chest of gold coins to make up the difference in value. Old Miller looked like he was about to weep with joy.

The bidding war continued for another hour. Jack sold off the excess coal and the smaller wolf pelts.

He was incredibly careful with his purchases. He didn’t buy luxury goods, fine clothes, or expensive spices. He bought canvas for making sturdy sacks, large quantities of salt for future meat preservation, and thick spools of treated hemp rope.

“There is one final item I require,” Jack said, his voice dropping slightly as the auction wound down. “It is a highly specific request. Does anyone carry capital-grade alchemical cement? The fast-drying resin used for sealing stone foundations?”

The room went quiet. It was a very strange request for a rural mountain lord.

A quiet merchant near the front slowly raised his hand. “I carry a few barrels of it, My Lord. It is expensive. It is usually only bought by the capital’s architects to waterproof the royal cellars.”

“I will take all of your barrels,” Jack said without hesitation. “Name your price in gold.”

Jack needed the alchemical cement desperately. The wooden tar-doors Giles had built for the coal mine were working well for now, but wood would eventually rot in the underground. Jack needed to send his skeleton Night Shift down into the mine to permanently seal off the toxic side-tunnels with solid, airtight stone and cement walls. It was the only way to make the mine completely safe for human workers forever.

With the final purchase made, Jack leaned back in his chair.

“The auction is concluded,” Jack announced. “My men will help you unload your wagons and load your new cargo in the morning. You are welcome to sleep in the Great Hall tonight by the fire.”

The merchants cheered, immediately breaking into smaller groups to excitedly discuss their massive profits. They were thrilled. They had paid high prices, but the quality of Jack’s goods meant they would all make a fortune when they returned to other cities.

Jack sat quietly at the head table, watching the room celebrate.

He had secured the iron, the seeds, and the building materials. The village was officially on the path to industrial self-sufficiency. But as he scanned the room, his eyes locked onto a single man sitting near the back wall.

The man was nursing a wooden cup of water. He had not bid on a single pelt. He had not shouted for the coal. He had simply watched the entire auction with sharp, calculating eyes.

Jack remembered looking at the caravan from his balcony earlier that morning. While most of the merchants drove standard, open-backed wooden wagons covered with canvas tarps, this quiet man’s wagons were completely different.

They were heavily reinforced with thick wood. The backs were completely enclosed, and Jack had distinctly seen iron bars fixed over small ventilation slits near the top of the carts. They were not wagons for carrying grain or cloth.

Jack knew exactly what that man sold. And it was exactly what the Frost-Grip fief desperately needed.

Jack had the resources of a growing town, but his total population was still only forty-four people. They were completely bottlenecked by a lack of human hands. His skeletons could dig and haul at night, but they couldn’t work the farms in the sunlight, and they couldn’t run Barnaby’s forge.

Jack slowly stood up, leaning on his cane. He walked past Karen, who was gathering the empty stew bowls.

“Karen,” Jack whispered quietly so the merchants wouldn’t hear.

“Yes, Lord Jack?” she replied softly.

“The man sitting against the back wall, in the dark gray coat,” Jack instructed, his eyes never leaving the quiet merchant. “His name is Vane. In one hour, when the rest of these men are asleep or drunk, I want you to discreetly invite him up to my private study. Tell him I have a very lucrative, private contract to discuss.”

Karen nodded quickly, understanding the need for secrecy. “It will be done, My Lord.”