Rebirth in a Ruined Nation! The Life of a New Strategist Starting From Now - Chapter 33

The Eccentric Drew

The Genius, Drew.

Many people referred to her as such with some sarcasm.

She was the second daughter of a merchant family. Her family was very wealthy that even I had even heard their name.

She was supposed to be a sheltered lady, but instead of a guy from another wealthy family whom she had never seen before, her interest was in one of her family’s businesses, the shipbuilding industry.

She was particularly interested in making things, and she seems to have had incredible talent since childhood. Handcrafting a ship model from a single wooden board was a common thing she did in her childhood.

But, since she was indifferent of her duty as the second daughter of a wealthy family, she got into a fight with her father and eventually fled from her home and began to work as a court official.

She was first sent to the Navy due to her knowledge of trade and shipbuilding.

But she began to run wild in the Navy. She stopped caring about creating ships and began making weird items one after the other. Her interest, it turned out, was not in ‘making ship’ but in the process of ‘making’ itself.

Her superiors frequently told her to stop, but she never did. Finally, the navy’s higher official gave up on her and decided to return her to the capital.

Her career would normally stop there. However, when she returned to the capital, one individual became interested in her. That individual was Rays-sama.

As a result, she was sent to the weapons department.

By the way, she was the only member of the weapons department, and instead of making weapons, the weapons department made whatever Drew wanted. In other words, Rays-sama established the weapons department just for Drew.

Even though she was the sole member of the weapons department, she was still the department’s head, therefore she frequently attended meeting.

She would frequently come up with creative and effective ideas during those meetings. She was intelligent, and being the daughter of a merchant, she was brilliant with numbers. That was why people now regard her as ‘someone who was difficult to handle but occasionally useful’ and disregard her unusual antics.

In other words, her title of “genius” also referred to the fact that she was “a strange person that no one really understood.”

?

“Well? What is it? I’m very busy, you know.”

Despite the presence of Wickhalrt, the former commander of the 6th Division, and Rays-sama, she made no attempt to hide her displeasure.

Drew was like this with everyone.

“Don’t be like that, Drew. You will definitely be interested in what we brought today,” Rays-sama assured her.

Wickharlt, Drew, Rays-sama, Lapilia-sama, and members of the canning method research team, were now assembled in the royal palace’s spare kitchen, which served as the laboratory for the canning method research.

I wanted to tell Wickharlt and Drew about the canned food project today.

It took a few days for us to get His Majesty’s approval to tell them about the canned food project. Today was finally the long-awaited reveal day.

“I wanted to show you two something…”

When I gave the canned food to the two of them, Wickharlt held it carefully in his palm while curiously inspecting the jar, while Drew next to him looked at the bottom of the jar.

“This is…”

“…. Probably a preserved food? What is the liquid inside? How long is the food going to last?”

Drew figured it out before I began explaining.

“The liquid inside is water. We’re currently investigating to figure out how long it will last. Drew, this item in your palm is already two months old.”

“2 Month!? But the vegetables inside still look fresh.”

Wickharlt was taken aback as he looked at the jar.

“Let’s open one and taste it.” (Roa)

I took the jar from Wickharlt’s hand. Then I removed the wax and opened the jar. As air entered the jar, the jar made a ‘psshhh’ sound.

“Wait, I’ll give it a try first.”

I poured out the water and took one of the vegetables from the jar. It didn’t smell bad. I took a little bite. Hm…It tasted alright.

“It tastes better cooked, but you can eat it raw too. Try it.”

I place the contents on the plate and offer it to the two.

“Hoo, so it tastes pretty good even without cooking.”

Rays-sama commented, little surprised. Rays-sama tried canned food for the second time today. The canned food he tried the last time was 10 days old. It was two months old this time, but the taste should not have deteriorated too much.

Unlike Rays-sama, the two people who saw the canned food for the first time today remained silent.

Wickharlt’s eyes widened in amazement as he took the first bite, and he appeared to be frozen in shock.

Drew was chewing the veggies slowly, her brow furrowed and her eyes closed.

Drew didn’t take long to stop chewing. She seemed to have already swallowed all of the vegetables in her mouth.

“Isn’t the sound I heard when you opened the jar the sound of air entering the jar? By allowing air to enter the jar… No, you made this by getting the air out? So the food can be preserved by getting the air out of the jar? But why? No, how can you even get the air out of the jar?”

Drew asked a series of questions. It was incredible that she could figure out this much in such a short period of time.

“You put hot water inside, and then you boil it.”

“So you use heat to push the air out of the jar? If you can preserve food by forcing the air out of the jar, does it mean the less air inside the jar, the longer the food can be preserved?”

Her comprehension rate was amazing. Wickharlt was still frozen in place in comparison, though now his attention was fixed on Drew.

“I see…So that’s how it is…This is really… really interesting.”

After saying that, Drew suddenly grabbed my hands.

“You said your name is Roa? This thing is really interesting. It has the potential to revolutionize the logistics sector! You’ve brought me one incredible stuff!”

She stated this while enthusiastically shaking my two hands,

“Actually, when we tried to transport these things, Roa proposed widening the road. Since you’ve previously made a similar proposal, we’d like you to analyze the cost of reconstructing the road vs the profit that canned food will bring and determine if rebuilding the road to sell the canned food is profitable.”

Drew nodded to Rays-sama’s words.

“Without a doubt, it will bring us profit! First, sell canned food extensively, and then, once canned food consumption has expanded to a certain extent, sell the process used to create it! We can earn a fixed income if we hide the method carefully and only teach it to a few individuals, then rent those people out to other nations!”

“Let’s go and persuade the court to continue with this plan!” Drew said and attempted to run out of the kitchen.

It took us an hour to persuade her to stop by explaining to her that the canned food project was still top secret.

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