Barda was doing his rounds in the smithing rooms. Due to the influx of more people to work with, the adventurer team had been forced to rent more smith shops for its work. They now had 3 rooms each holding 5 smiths hard at work.
Kia was the finest blacksmith among the recruits, no question about that. He had joined in as a certified blacksmith, and he'd been doing his best to impress Barda with his skills. There were 3 other certified blacksmiths, tallying them to 5 if you include Barda.
Barda knew what they were after, the secret to his new invention, high carbon steel. He had had to tweak a few things, but the basic idea was still the same. He had formed the new procedure buy modifying a few things. No magic, no fanciness, just good math, and precision. In Barda's case, both were so overpowered they could be considered a cheat. He has also some experience with machinery as a spy.
The blacksmiths had thought they would have to go above and beyond to get it. In their minds, no one would willingly give out such a treasure easily. They were prepared to pay the price for it, knowing that the genius who came up with the new design was well within his right to demand much of them.
This thought was shattered when Barda had given them each a copy. He then instructed them to master it and learn to reproduce it. The good thing with dealing with these certified blacksmiths was that they could read the design and reproduce from it.
For one to be considered a certified blacksmith, they had to have come from a recognized training school. Naturally, the bigger the school and its status, the higher the value of the certificate. Gaining certification, however, was no easy task.
These blacksmiths and various other craftspeople had to go through arduous hours of training in the institute as well as pass various tests before they could gain recognition. The students would carry the name of the school with them, and they had to be stellar before the schools would allow them to.
The training forged ordinary people into splendid craftspeople, leagues above anyone who'd been an apprentice. They were the choice hires for kings and aristocrats, their status and recognition giving them access to the high and mighty in the society.
Such people wouldn't ordinarily join an adventurer team, but after seeing and hearing about the new weapons, they were impressed. Everyone wanted to move with the tide, and as it always is, development and technological advancement are always at their peak in times of war. With a genius emerging, it made sense that those that didn't have as much privilege and status as their peers would opt to ride on the coattails of innovative people.
They quickly learned the designs and could reproduce to 70% efficiency. That was good enough for Barda, if everyone could do as he did, then he wouldn't be the genius now, would he?
Barda was planning on changing the look of the Dark Flames team completely. Despite the obvious disadvantages of wearing a uniform, there was a reason several armies across worlds chose to wear them. It fostered a sense of unity and togetherness. This was what Barda wanted to achieve.
They had discussed this at length with the other vice commanders and Lady Ellen that day, and his request was granted. Many were excited by the possibilities this presented. There was also the fact that they now trusted Barda as an excellent blacksmith. To be outfitted by the best, who wouldn't want that. They were pumping all forms of income they could get into this project. This would make a name for their adventurer team.
For this reason, Barda had Kia and one other blacksmith focus on producing the steel solutions for the new weaponry. They had been the ones who produced the best. The work of molding the steel to weapons was given to one blacksmith and 4 other apprentice blacksmiths. Apprentice blacksmiths were the kind that had learned or was learning through apprenticeship. The guys he had trained fell in this category.
However, this time, Barda had them arranged into sections. He trained each section on how to do one particular thing and only that thing. In the first section, the steel was forged. The second section and subsequent sections reshaped a portion of it according to their needs.
The rest of the workers each had their part to play. As such, after working on one thing over and over again, it became muscle memory. They could achieve precision without effort, like a well-oiled machine. That was what it was. Yes, you guessed it, we are talking about an assembly line.
Pardon my plagiarism, hence I must confess I have airlifted this straight from Investopedia, but I like its definition: An assembly line is a production process that breaks the manufacture of a good into steps that are completed in a pre-defined sequence. Assembly lines are the most commonly used method in the mass production of products. They can reduce labor costs because unskilled workers could be easily trained to perform specific tasks.
Right off the bat, Barda had exposed 2 modern ideas in the society. Everyone present had to admit that they were impressed. The smooth flow of the steel and other materials such as leather and hide from start to finish was magnificent. No one could claim that they had worked on this batch of weapons, but they could claim they had worked on every weapon.
Everyone present had to admit they were stupefied by the utter brilliance of it all. Every step was choreographed since everyone knew their role to play. It seemed an obvious concept when you thought about it after the fact, but it would have taken a genius to come up with it. Hats off the genius that came up with it in the first place.
Due to the efficiency, time and production costs were cut by a large fraction, making what would have been a money hole bearable to the team's finances. That and the major resources flowing in made the team remain afloat and able to meet her obligations.
By the evening, the team had made enough to arm 50 men. With the new equipment, a vice-commander led his team to crash with the enemy at the front lines, one of the most paying jobs and simultaneously the least popular, for obvious reasons.
Due to the fuzz about the sword given to Lady Ellen, many people were curious about the performance of these weapons and whether they were as good as everyone said they were. After all, it could all be just hype, nothing more.
Lord Juma was one of the lead-certified smith and scholar from the Gazan school. He was renowned for his ideas in steel modeling. He was known for seeking methods of merging carbon from coal with wrought iron but had produced failures due to impurities inherent in both. To make such an alloy, one needed to be extremely precise in their handling, not to mention precise equipment.
When he first heard of a new genius coming up, he was not shocked. However, he was shocked to learn that the new genius was someone he had not heard before. He also did not follow the procedure one would take when they discovered a new weapon. It was as though they didn't know it, or to them, this was not a new invention. Either way, his curiosity had been piqued.
Not just him though, everyone wanted to find out what was so good about this new weaponry. The moment they heard that an entire team had been outfitted with the new armor, they had to find out.
What Barda didn't know was that his fame had extended to the palace, where even the king had heard of it. This was a classic case of fame preceding something. The team's attack would determine the validity of the rumors to everyone. It was not an exaggeration to say that the entire city was watching the battlefield, eager to see for themselves if the claims were true.
The Dark Flames Adventurer Team may not have known just how far the fame extended, but they knew that everyone was looking at them. It was more than just the weapons themselves that would be under scrutiny, but their skills as well. The weapons might be good but they needed skilled warriors to swing them. Talk about pressure.
Nada, one of the vice-commanders left behind by Lady Ellen, walked to where Barda was. They chatted for a while. Both being vice commanders, neither outranked the other. Both had mutual respect for each other. Before leaving, he placed his bear-like arm on Barda's shoulder in an act of comforting him and said, "Don't you worry, we will make you proud, before leaving for the gates."