Our family is in decline

And Lance, who had no sense of presence just now, quickly followed.

"It seems that your meeting did not achieve anything."

This sentence was like turning on Margaret's switch, and the emotions that had just been accumulated were released with the words.

And Lance was able to get a glimpse of what happened between the two from a few words.

"They treat their children as personal belongings and then play with them as they please. If something doesn't go their way, they will feel that their dignity has been challenged. This is a very common psychological phenomenon of feudal parents, but I don't know if it is correct or not."

Lance's attitude was obviously in favor of Margaret, and he did not mention that Lawrence's warning as a father was reasonable.

Pertinence is not a compliment, nor is neutrality. In this case, telling Margaret that Lawrence's vigilance is reasonable is a sign of low emotional intelligence.

Because people at this time are irrational, Margaret will think that you are biased against the other party, and Lawrence will definitely not appreciate it, thinking that this is a cunning disguise, which will directly offend both of them.

What's more, Lance didn't bother to persuade the two of them. He was just a bastard and wanted you to fight.

We must sow discord. How dare Lawrence, the bastard, speak ill of him?

"He actually said, Lord, you will never let him go, and even used me as a threat." Margaret couldn't help but look at Lance and said, "Obviously, the Lord is a real knight, and it is absolutely impossible for him to do this." How could he say that to you?"

"I'm not a knight." Lance was very wary of this kind of argument that put him in a high position. He was just a loser, so don't kidnap him.

Lance's direct rejection caught Margaret off guard, and instead of probing further, she spoke directly.

"I guarantee that he will not return to Bastia after he comes out, let alone go against Hamlet."

"I need to emphasize that it was not me who started the war. It was Lawrence and Alvin who led the knights to invade Hamlet and killed hundreds of people along the way. We were forced to fight back and defeated them after paying huge casualties.

Then I asked you to be the lord. Now the enemy has invaded your territory, killed hundreds of innocent ordinary people, and then been caught by you. What will you do at this time? "

Are you kidding? Just let it go as you say?

Who will make up for my shortfall?

"He also has some money hidden. I can give it to you. There are at least several thousand gold coins in it."

Margaret's words also gave Lance a deeper understanding of her innocence, and he immediately understood that she was not delusional, but simply had not yet entered the adult world after losing the protection of the baron.

Margaret's innocence is not the reason why Lance needs to pay for her, but it also makes Lance give up the nonsense and directly throw out the conditions.

"This is not a matter of money. I need to consider those who have died as well as those who are alive.

Bastia needs someone with enough status to be responsible for the failure of the war, and I also need someone to be responsible for it. If I let him go so easily, what do you think other people think of me as a lord?

Unless Lawrence can prove his worth to Hamlet, that would give me reason to let him out. "

These words can be summed up in three words - you need to pay more.

Lance didn't like the thousands of gold coins at all, so he had to offer something valuable enough to make him relent.

Margaret is not the kind of woman who is messy, and she understands the current situation, but...

"As a daughter, I really can't do anything like watching my father suffer."

Margaret shook her head slowly. She had to rescue her father.

"I understand." Margaret's character was that even Lance didn't want to plot against her too much, so he pointed out a way for her, "In the future, you can bring him food and persuade him more, but sometimes it's not me. It makes things difficult for him, but he makes things difficult for himself.”

After all, Lawrence is still an experienced veteran. If he can use it, Lance will not waste it.

It depends on whether his loyalty to the earl is so firm.

"Thank you!" Margaret knew that the lord was not that heartless person, otherwise he would not have saved so many people.

Margaret can only be regarded as an unexpected blessing. Taking time out today is already the most benevolent thing. Lance can't waste more time on her, at least until she shows that she is more valuable.

A Lawrence is also not worth his attention, because now Hamlet is no longer a small place with only three or two people. The population is close to tens of thousands. It is not that there is no talent, and even if it is not there, it can be cultivated by itself.

Lance soon breaks away from her and gets back into Hamlet's affairs.

Until he appeared in a very interesting place in town - the brewery.

Food has always been the most important thing to Lance. At the beginning, the situation was really critical. There were countless people killed and injured due to famine, but the warehouses were filled with food until it turned moldy.

So after taking control of the farm, he stopped brewing because brewing consumed too much grain.

But later, after the trade was restored, he spent money to expand the fleet regardless of the cost, and purchased unlimited grain and livestock. The continuous flow of grain transported into the warehouse was obtained by him in exchange for gold coins.

He is not the evil dragon in those heroic epics. Piling gold coins in a warehouse will not make him feel at ease, but a warehouse filled with food makes him very satisfied. Rats and rats are like this.

But the problem is that warehouses in this era are all built with civil engineering, and it is difficult to even prevent rats and insects, let alone maintain constant temperature and humidity.

The storage time of these grains has a limit, and the approaching autumn harvest means that a lot of grains are old grains that have been stored for almost a year.

As we prepare for the autumn harvest, new grain will need to be put into storage. Instead of letting this part of the grain mold, rot, and be eaten by rats and insects, it is better to use it and retain its value in another way through brewing.

So the closed brewery was reopened.

You don't even need to walk in, just get closer and you can see the smoke coming out of the distillery's chimney, and the faint smell of alcohol filling the surrounding air.

This is also the reason why the winery is moving here. Who can withstand it in a place where people gather?

When Lance walked into it, the smell was several times stronger, as if taking a few more puffs would make people feel drunk, and the workers here also had strange blushes on their faces, as if they had drunk.

There are no beautiful girls stepping on their feet, and the people here are basically men, because winemaking has always been a laborious job.

I am not very familiar with firearms manufacturing improvements such as guns, but I have actually studied the brewing process, and I can even say that I understand it very well.

It's not because he is a good drinker. Lance's understanding of these can be traced back to high school biology, and the legacy of his previous life once again affected him.

Winemaking is the process of converting sugar into alcohol using the principle of fermentation. Alcoholic fermentation is a process in which yeast or other microorganisms are used to decompose glucose or fructose under anaerobic conditions, producing metabolites such as alcohol and carbon dioxide, and releasing a small amount of energy. .

The raw materials for brewing are not only grains, but actually anything with high starch content, such as the roots of some plants, such as potatoes, sweet potatoes, cassava, and corn.

At the same time, there are also sugar-rich substances that are also raw materials for wine making, such as sugar cane, grapes and various fruits.

But now even grains are rare, let alone other alternative materials.

In fact, the wine-making process in this era was just like that. There were many popular alcoholic beverages in the empire, but fermented alcoholic beverages were mostly fermented alcoholic beverages. On the contrary, distilled alcoholic beverages had never been heard of.

Fermented wine refers to wine, beer and mead, which have a relatively low alcohol content.

And distilled wine is naturally spirits.

Currently, Hamlet doesn’t even have a vineyard, and no raw materials, let alone brewing.

Therefore, the most important thing is to brew beer that uses malt as the main raw material, adds hops, and is fermented by yeast.

Unlike wine, a high-end alcoholic beverage that can only be enjoyed by aristocrats, beer is a common alcoholic beverage among the general public.

Beer brewing can be roughly divided into main processes such as malt crushing → wort preparation → wort fermentation → beer filling.

If it is something that can be boasted about in modern times, there are various opinions on the selection of malt, water source, and production process, and then it is made into various flavors.

But these are not so sophisticated in Hamlet. Lance uses the most ordinary old grains to brew the most ordinary wine. After all, the current conditions of Hamlet do not support those fancy things.

What's more, the audience for beer is ordinary people. Their needs are very cheap. They just pursue the sweetness that can sweep away physical fatigue, and the tipsiness that allows them to temporarily escape the suffering of reality.

And that was never really why Reims restarted the winery.

Because the supply of food must be guaranteed at all times, this pastime must be placed behind survival.

In fact, his real core need is to deal with grains that have deteriorated and become moldy due to improper storage.

Lance would not dare to eat the food contaminated by rats and insects. If there was any plague, the fragile Hamlet would collapse.

But these cannot be dealt with by brewing beer, but by using the process of making distilled liquor to prevent secondary harm.

At the same time, alcohol can be used as fuel, used to disinfect wounds, and finally to prepare alcoholic beverages.

The core of liquor brewing is to use the enzyme preparation contained in the distiller's yeast to saccharify and ferment the grain raw materials into liquor, and then distill and purify it.

The most critical one is this [Jiuqu]. In your previous life, you would have been embarrassed to mention anyone who didn’t have a thousand-year-old song.

This koji is made from moldy grains, which is actually some kind of fungal fermentation.

It was Grendel who conquered this technology. The method of controlling fungi can only be said to be that the witch's legacy is feeding back to Hamlet.

Another key step, the core technology of distillation, was solved by Lance. He stood on the shoulders of modern times and saw that the boiling point of alcohol, that is, ethanol, is 78.3°C, which means that the distillation temperature is between 78.3°C and 95°C.

There is also the need to remove the head and tail of the wine, which contain impurities such as methanol.

I can only say that reading is definitely useful. At least you can find sources for making salt, brewing wine, and soap through the three major magic weapons. It is a pity that there is no teaching on blacksmithing, firearms, and explosives.

According to this distillation process, the wine must be aged in cellars and then blended.

But Lance didn’t do this just to drink it, but to continuously improve the purity through repeated distillation, and finally turned it into high-purity alcohol.

The current process is limited by technical and tool issues. The current brewing process is somewhat extensive, and there is no concept of standardized production. Brewing completely depends on the experience and technology of the craftsmen.

The only way Lance can improve it is to standardize the production process as much as possible to ensure the stable quality of the wine produced.

It has to be said that these winemakers who have been working in this industry for so many years still have some skills. When Lance and Greendale teamed up to break down the key technology, they were able to complete the production after explaining the process to them, and even based on their own Experience improved some steps.

It can only be said that the wisdom of the working people and their acceptance of new technologies are not as stubborn as Lance thought, at least better than Lawrence.

The person in charge here is a middle-aged man who is in his forties but looks to be in his fifties or sixties. He is one of the refugees that Lance brought back from Totnes.

The reason why he was chosen at his age was naturally because of his wine-making skills. According to what he said, he had been making wine for local nobles in the winery for several generations.

It wasn't until drought came and chaos swept across that they were forced to flee.

After bringing it back, Lance began to allocate resources to him to rebuild the brewery. The first batch of beer brewed was indeed very popular, at least it was better than the previous one that was almost like urine.

For him, beer can only be regarded as a basic skill. His real strength lies in brewing wine, which can be regarded as a good card among the refugees.

The person in charge of the winery took Lance out of the winery's workshop and went to the assembly and storage area nearby. He took out a bottle of wine and handed it over.

"Sir, this is the sample we made."

Both beer and distilled spirits have been produced for a long time, but they are not the reason why Lance came here today.

that's.

Lance took the glass bottle from the craftsman's hand, and when he opened it, there was a "pop" sound, and the bottle-opening gas with the characteristics of fermented wine rushed out.

Lance's sense of smell didn't even need to get close to smell the familiar smell of alcohol, which also contained a complex fragrance.

When you take a cup and pour it out, the smell becomes even stronger. The bubbles are not very dense, just a light layer. The color of the wine is pink, and when you shake the cup, it feels like petals are fluttering in the wind.

Lance didn't take so many steps. He raised his glass and took a sip. There was a sting of beer in his mouth, but soon the sandy taste dissipated. He could feel the sweet smell of fruit reverberating in his mouth, and it came back with a sip as he swallowed. A little sweetness from honey, but no sourness from wine at all.

There are no grapes in Hamlet, but there are a lot of berries. Fresh berries are produced every day in large-scale development in various places. The shelf life of these berries is very short, and they basically go bad in two or three days, so it is the most reasonable to use them.

This mixed fruit wine is the next new product launched by Hamlet. (End of chapter)