Oil Pressing

The representative led us to the rapeseed oil production facility.

It was a short walk from his house, a large brick building situated just before the canola fields.

"It's bigger than your house."

"Indeed. A house only needs to keep the rain off and give us a place to sleep. We'd rather invest in the processing facility. Better work efficiency means better profits."

"Makes sense."

Princess Yupe nodded along, genuinely impressed.

He'd worried that a royal might find this boring, but she seemed to be enjoying herself well enough.

The representative opened the large door.

It was a sturdy stone door, yet he opened it by himself.

He had to be quite elderly, but perhaps farm work had built up the muscle.

A thick, oily smell wafted out from inside.

There was a slightly sweet quality to it, too.

Azu was sniffing the air curiously.

And it was hot. Extremely hot.

The temperature outside had been pleasant, but stepping inside was like walking into the middle of summer. Sweat began to bead immediately.

"Please, come on in. Just don't carelessly touch any of the equipment."

"Of course."

"It's partly a hygiene concern, but we heat the rapeseed and then crush it in a mortar. You could get hurt if you touch anything, and some of it gets hot enough to cause burns."

"We'll be careful. Burns leave marks on the skin, after all."

She murmured something about how much effort it took to maintain flawless skin.

The girls back home were particular about that too.

Women really did place a premium on the quality of their skin.

The representative called out to the workers, telling them to carry on and not mind the visitors.

A chorus of loud replies came back.

Every task here was heavy labor, so it was burly men drenched in sweat doing the work.

Princess Yupe didn't seem to mind.

Were they even tougher than adventurers?

Their biceps were unbelievably impressive.

"I apologize for bringing young ladies to such a rough place."

"Not at all. Everyone's working so hard, aren't they? How admirable."

"Ha ha ha! You hear that, everyone!? Being praised by a beautiful young lady like yourself seems to have fired them all up."

True to his words, the workers' movements did seem to pick up speed and vigor.

Princess Yupe's encouragement had given them a boost.

"Oh my, how manly."

She brought both fists up beside her face in a cute little pose.

A nearby worker got flustered, looked away, and threw himself back into his work.

"Oh, he's shy."

"Please don't tease them too much. They don't get many chances to see beautiful women from the city, so they have no immunity. Now then, this is where the rapeseed oil production process begins."

We were led to a corner of the building.

There sat several burlap sacks, each large enough to fit Azu inside. They were packed tight with seeds.

How heavy would those be?

If it were wheat, that amount would probably run about 40 kilograms per sack.

"You saw the canola fields on the way here. Peak harvest season is still ahead, so we don't have that much rapeseed yet. We've only just started operations, partly as a test run."

"Um, this looks like quite a lot to me, though…"

"Oh, this is nothing. Once we're going at full capacity, we'll fill the warehouse behind this building nearly to the brim."

"That much!?"

Princess Yupe's surprised reactions seemed to delight the representative; he was grinning the entire time.

He clearly took pride in his work, so having someone react like that must have made him happy.

"We plan to expand both the processing facility and the warehouse to match the increased rapeseed production. Thanks to Yohane-san's cooperation, we have a clear path to funding the hiring of craftsmen. We're truly grateful."

"Hmm, impressive. Not bad at all, you."

"Please stop, that hurts."

Princess Yupe was jabbing him with her elbow.

Back then, Luido hadn't even had proper ledgers, and inventory management was practically nonexistent. Everything was riddled with gaps.

Without knowing their stock, they couldn't calculate fair prices, so they'd been selling crops at rock-bottom rates.

That had originally been the lord's responsibility, but he'd abandoned it to focus on preparing his drug operation, so things had stayed that way for a long time.

If he'd wanted to make money, all the lord had needed to do was properly manage Luido's agriculture.

That alone would have turned the finances around dramatically.

Between that and the subsequent contracts for processed goods, this city was well on its way to becoming surprisingly wealthy despite its idyllic appearance.

… Though most of that money would likely be reinvested into further land clearing and processing.

At least that meant shady characters wouldn't come sniffing around.

"Now, please watch the moment we extract oil from the rapeseed. It's about to begin."

A worker hefted a burlap sack and poured its contents into an enormous pot.

Something was placed on top of the pot.

"Is that a sieve?"

"Yes. The larger seeds taste bad and tend to pop when heated, so we remove them. They also cause degradation, so it's a waste, but… well, they make good livestock feed, so nothing goes to waste."

So they were sorting the rapeseed at the same time.

They were paying attention to quality control, too.

After repeating this several times, the pot was full.

They set it over the fire and began heating it.

To ensure even warming, a worker stirred with a massive wooden spoon that looked like a ship's oar.

"It's like a soup kitchen. Very impressive."

"A soup kitchen? I suppose you could make quite a lot of soup with this."

Elza's observation was spot-on. The scale was huge, but it really did look like someone stir-frying.

The fire intensified and a wave of hot air rolled toward the group.

He could see sweat glistening on the napes of Princess Yupe's, Azu's, and the others' necks.

That alone was strangely alluring.

Before long, the heated seeds began to crackle and pop.

"Should be ready now."

The worker donned a pair of enormous pot holders on both hands, killed the fire, and moved the pot.

It took two of them.

"Hup!"

He'd thought it would be impossibly heavy, but it turned out the design allowed them to lift it slightly and then slide it along. All they had to do was brace the pot so the seeds didn't spill while it was moving.

Still, just lifting it was impressive.

"Elza could probably lift that by herself, couldn't she?"

"Master, what do you think I am? I am strong, yes, but in my case it's more about technique. I don't have the raw brute strength those men do."

Elza still had a smile on her face, but he'd been thoroughly put in his place.

That wasn't the kind of thing you said to a woman.

Princess Yupe gave him an exasperated "what are you doing" look.

The scorching rapeseed was poured from the pot through a sieve, then funneled into an enormous mortar.

Seeds popped and struck the men along the way, but they didn't flinch.

A closer look revealed their skin was covered in burn scars.

Working this job, that was inevitable, yet their faces remained utterly focused.

Before long, their intensity had drawn everyone in, and the group watched the process in silence.

"Heave-ho!"

"There we go!"

Once the seeds had been fully transferred from the pot, other workers moved the empty pot back to its original position.

The giant mortar closed around the seeds.

Two large men gripped the mortar's handles, calling out to synchronize their timing, and began to turn it.

At first the mortar rotated slowly, then found its rhythm and settled into a steady speed.

Another backbreaking task.

Yohane would have given up in no time.

He hadn't realized making rapeseed oil from canola was this grueling.

The sound of seeds being ground filled the room.

Powdered seed spilled over the mortar's edge, cascading down.

Workers immediately scooped it up and transferred it to the adjacent…

"Yohane, what's that? I've never seen one before."

"I don't know either. It looks like some kind of device for placing weights, but…"

Ground rapeseed was being packed into a massive tank.

The bottom of the tank had holes covered with yellow cloth.

Anything that came through the holes would flow directly into a large jar below.

On top of the tank was a mechanism designed to lower weights using leverage.

"Please don't go under that stone under any circumstances. It would be dangerous if it fell."

"Don't worry, I wouldn't dream of it."

Princess Yupe was right.

Even if someone told him to, he wouldn't want to go near it.