Three months. In the stagnant flow of time in King's Landing, three months could have passed without leaving more trace than a ripple on the Blackwater Rush. But these three months had been different. It was as if an invisible dam had broken, releasing a new energy, a powerful current that was beginning to scour the capital's age-old filth. The epicenter of this change was on the riverbanks, where, every day, the improbable symphony of progress played out.
The rhythmic clicking of pedal cranks and the low rumble of the "Churners'" rotating drums had replaced the desperate slapping of washing bats. Twenty of these massive, functional machines were now lined up on stabilized wooden platforms, leased at a premium by the various washerwomen's guilds. Demand had exploded after the initial demonstration. Tony had struggled to keep up. The waiting list grew longer each week, fueled by rumors of doubled, even tripled profits, and by the tangible sight of women returning home earlier, less exhausted, their hands less damaged.
The production of the Churners ran at full capacity in the Gnats' HQ, transformed into a veritable assembly plant. Jem's team, the former "broken arms" and converted brutes, worked with newfound discipline, cutting, assembling, bolting frames and drums under Kael's rigorous supervision and Tony's constantly optimized plans. Theron, in his forge on the Street of Steel, was not idle either, producing axles, gears, and cranks with formidable efficiency. He had even had to hire two apprentices to help him keep pace.p
As Tony had anticipated, the domestic models became the real cash cow. In his previous life, he wouldn't have done it, but in this one, he had no scruples acting this way. Namely, charging based on the customer's appearance. Prices ranged from a hundred silver stags to a gold dragon for the wealthiest clients. Although smaller, it was more durable, and to prove its reliability, they came with a one-year warranty. Brand new, beautiful, efficient, clean, coupled with smart and aggressive marketing. He had already sold nearly two hundred machines and accumulated a hundred gold dragons in profit, which was wisely reinvested.
But for Tony, the Churners were just the first wave, the financial lever. His true objective, the one that would really change the game, was about to be launched. During these three months, as revenue from leases and sales began to flow in, he had meticulously built the foundations of his next empire: the Blackwater Soapworks. On Earth, this industry generated billions of dollars. In Westeros, he would generate thousands of gold dragons.
However, he had chosen to wait. Not out of lack of confidence, but strategy. He wanted to strike hard. He didn't want to launch an artisanal product, a few bars sold sporadically. He wanted to flood the market from day one, create immediate dependence, ensure that no one could challenge his nascent monopoly. For three months, he had stockpiled raw materials, built the infrastructure, trained the teams, and above all, allowed his first batch of soap time to "cure" – that crucial drying period for cold process soap, which made it harder, milder, and longer-lasting.
The HQ and several adjacent buildings, bought out or requisitioned, were now a labyrinth of dedicated workshops. The organization was relentlessly logical, almost military.
Outside, in a courtyard set aside due to the pestilential odor, stood the "Renderers'" cauldrons. Huge iron vats, forged by Theron, bubbled day and night. Men and women, their faces covered with damp cloths, threw in fish carcasses, animal fat collected from slaughterhouses, melting down and crudely purifying this nauseating raw material. It was hellish work, but vital. The fish oil and tallow thus obtained were stored in large barrels.
In another, cleaner section, the "Ashmen" and "Kelpers" brought their harvests. Wood ash was sifted and stored away from moisture. Dried seaweed was burned in dedicated pits to produce the precious soda ash.
The heart of the factory was the "Lye Makers'" room. It was off-limits to the uninitiated. Rows of large filtration barrels, designed by Tony, allowed the extraction of lye (potassium hydroxide from wood ash) and caustic soda (sodium hydroxide from seaweed ash) with precise and constant concentration. This was the most dangerous step, raw chemistry in the service of cleanliness. Tony had had to meticulously supervise this stage until they got used to it and didn't kill themselves by accident.
Next came the "Stirrers'" room. New cauldrons, smaller but more numerous, were lined up. There, under the direction of foremen trained by Tony, teams mixed the oils (mainly fish oil for the basic soap) and the lye in exact proportions. They stirred the mixture for hours with long wooden paddles until the "trace" appeared, signaling that saponification had begun. It was physical, repetitive, but crucial work.
Finally, the mixture was poured into molds. Hundreds of standardized wooden molds, each engraved with the gear seal. Tony had even added a touch of ingenuity: the molds were designed to be stackable, optimizing space. After 24 to 48 hours, the still-soft soap was unmolded and cut into perfect bars using a system of wires stretched on a frame, another simple but effective invention.
And then, the treasure was transported to the "Curing Room." A huge hangar, once a dilapidated fish warehouse, had been transformed. Thousands of wooden shelves rose to the ceiling, and on these shelves, tens of thousands of soap bars rested, slowly drying, hardening, refining during the necessary four to six weeks. The air inside was thick, heavy with a peculiar smell – a mixture of the gradually fading acridness of the lye and the scents Tony had decided to incorporate.
For he had no intention of selling soap that reeked of rancid fish. Even for the "Docker's Scour," his basic version intended for washerwomen and manual laborers, he had sought a solution. He had macerated pine needles and wild mint leaves, abundant in the nearby woods, in a portion of the purified fish oil. The scent wasn't luxurious, but it was clean, fresh, energizing. It effectively masked the remnants of the raw material and gave the product a distinct olfactory identity.
Today, the first batch was ready. Mountains of yellowish bars, hard as stone, stamped with the gear, giving off a sharp scent of pine and mint. They were stacked in the main courtyard of the HQ, ready for distribution.
Tony had gathered his council. The excitement was palpable.
"It's ready," he announced, his voice echoing in the courtyard. "Ten thousand bars. Enough to wash all the laundry in King's Landing for a week."
He picked up a bar, weighed it in his hand. "We sold them the machine, now we're going to sell them its most faithful ally. When this lathers up like sea foam, they'll never go back."
He turned to Lira. "Your team is ready? The strategy is clear?"
Lira nodded, her eyes shining with anticipation. "The first free deliveries go out tomorrow morning. For every washerwomen's guild leasing a Churner. A dozen bars of soap. Instructions: 'Use this. See the difference.' No sales. Just a gift."
"Exactly," Tony confirmed. "We're not selling them soap. We're selling them the result. When they see the lather it produces, how easily it removes stains, the relative mildness it leaves on their hands compared to ash... they won't be able to do without it. In a week, when the bars are gone, they'll come begging us to sell them more."
He turned to Jem. "Your men will handle logistics. Carts to deliver the crates. We need to show we're organized, professional. Not a bunch of thieves who stumbled onto a good idea."
Jem nodded, his chest puffed with pride. He had gone from a deposed gang leader to the operations manager of a real industry.
Tony looked at his lieutenants, then at the piles of soap, then at the expanding walls of his HQ. They had turned mud into gold, literally. It was mundane compared to what he had already achieved, what he would achieve in the future. But damn, it was satisfying. Now that the basic soap was done, he could start producing a more luxurious version.