The grain boats of Qingjiangpu in Huai'an Prefecture were steeped in the scent of rice as Xiao Heng’s saber tip pried open the reed matting of a grain vessel. Rainwater blurred the ink of a "Seventh Year of Tianqi" seal, revealing, written in microscopic Polish, the "Krakow iron-smelting blast furnace method." To his surprise, eighteen of the grain bags were lined with coded diagrams for blasting the Vistula River mine veins.
"Look at the cold-forged ripples on these windmill gears!" She scraped her armor against the spiral marks on the cast-iron gears. "This 'Seven-Star Milling' technique was specially created by Song Li during the reopening of the Grand Canal in the Yongle era. How could it be stamped with the quenching mark of the Jagiellonian dynasty knights?"
A whistle sounded at the lock. Seven official vessels flying the "Pan" banner emerged from the mist. Once doused in rice slurry, the figureheads of Zhu Di revealed the keel riveting patterns of a Gdansk shipyard. Shen Xitang’s Crossbow Bolt tore through a bag of japonica rice, causing a fragment of the "Danzig Port Secret Treaty" to fall out. Next to an official document stipulating an "annual loan of two hundred grain boats," a note in Lithuanian read: "Converted to waterproof holds for Baltic Sea iron-transporting warships."
Chapter 205