After moving the spiders into the hole I had prepared, I gathered Nikolaos, Ismea, Nifa, Aomei, Yulia, Tetra, and Alice.
　The purpose of this meeting was to discuss how to industrialize spider silk.

　In addition, this selection of people

　Nikolaos, who even though he had a lying scroll, still seemed to have knowledge of it.
　Ismea, who designed the hole that is the space where the spiders are kept.　
　Nifa, the oldest person I know, and Nifa, who seems to know something about it because she's an elf.
　Have you ever heard of anything in the East?　Qingming.
　Yulia, who seems to know a lot about bugs due to the fact that she deals with poison.
　Since I called Julia, she's going to sulk if I remove her, so Tetra.
　And since they're the same spider, Alice, who would be useful in some way.

　It was a moderately appropriate choice.
　You might think I should take the selection a little more seriously, but then, on the contrary, who should I gather?　That's what it means.

　Raimondo?　I don't understand spiders, let alone politics.
　Bartolo?　Bartolo, who doesn't command an army, is just a drunken father.
　Alexios?　As a matter of fact, that guy is no more useful outside of war than Bartolo is.
　Ial?　A spider does not understand human language.

　And, well, no matter who they chose, they were useless.
　Well, it would have been better to get people who had some interesting ideas.

　Well, at worst, the spider I caught this time would have to die.
　It's not like we only raise one spider at all.


　Qingming and Nifa, who were first told about the industrialization of spider silk, reacted in this way.

　''I see!　It might be interesting. Sure, it may be difficult, but our ancestors succeeded in domesticating the silkworm. Even spiders can be domesticated if they try hard enough.
　'Wow, that sounds interesting. They didn't raise spiders, but they did raise dragons and such. Where I was born, they raised dragons.

　It was an appropriate choice, but these two might actually be useful.

　'By the way, do you have any idea what you're going to do?
　It seems that the Suevi of Germanis once tried to raise them. I got the breeding files. We are in the process of preparing the breeding grounds for them.

　I answered Nikolaos' question.

　The queen spider seems to be eating meat in good health, so at least it doesn't seem to be dying of stress.
　The Adelunian peninsula is warmer than the Germanic region, and the environment is probably better here than I expected.

　'Your book was adequate, but it was pretty accurate about the structure of the nest. And the design of the Ismea was good. Thanks to you, it looks like we won't have to fix the hole.
　Haha that's good to hear.
　It's a pleasure, sir.

　Nikolaos chuckled, and Ismea proudly puffed out her chest.

　'How is the food?　I've heard of meat - isn't that pretty expensive?　Unlike the silkworms, they are quite large and...

　I answer Qingming's question.

　''According to this document, it's a pig every three days.

　A spider the size of a ten year old child eating a pig in three days is quite a glutton.
　But that much is easy to prepare.

　'According to this, it sounds like they used the three-day feeding to temporarily move them from the breeding room to the eating room, while they collected and cleaned the eggs.
　So you're saying it's easy to keep them?
　You will.

　Nikolaos quickly writes in his notepad.
　He's probably the most motivated of all of them.

　'Um, Your Majesty,'
　"What, pervert, that's not what I meant, Nifa El-Arb.
　''I certainly like to be naked, but it's not like I enjoy being abused... well, that's fine. Let's see, I told you earlier that in my village we raised dragons, didn't I?

　I was just a little bit surprised.
　This Elof is taking this seriously!
　Well, I'm certainly the one who called you, but

　In fact, the movement of a dragon depends on the type of meat you give it. As I recall, the queen spider has the same eggs as the soldier spider, but the difference is whether or not it grows by eating meat.　Then maybe the quality of the fiber will change depending on the meat.

　Oh!
　Constructive feedback from Elov!

　I knew this guy was pretty good at it, especially without the pervert.

　But it's quite a challenge.
　Recently I've been designing bras and pants. I thought it would be great if I could make underwear out of those spider fibers. Oh, and I've recently finished a pair of underwear that's made of silk. It's a great piece of silk. Ismea, will you come and see me sometime?　Oh, I don't care if it's Lady Julia or Lady Tetra!
　""Absolutely not!!!"

　Nifa was Nifa, after all.　
　Thank goodness, that's a relief.

　I'll get your underwear and whatnot later. If I ask, they'll wear them.

　"You said earlier that you were going to retrieve the eggs, but does that mean that the Swevi tried to collect the threads from the soldier spiders?
　'Yeah, yeah. That's the same way you and I thought of it.

　Me and Nikolaos were thinking of collecting the fiber, the thread, from the soldier spider, the baby spider, not the queen, but the soldier spider.
　It would be dangerous to collect from the queen spider, and it would be most efficient to collect from the child spiders, who would not be bothered to die.

　And that's what they thought.

　The Swevi seemed to think the same way.
　And then they hit the wall.

　The soldier spiders don't spit thread.

　When a soldier spider does spit out a thread, it is limited to two types.
　There are two kinds of times when a soldier spider lets out its thread: when the individual spits out its thread voluntarily, or when the queen spider commands it to do so.

　This is impossible, because there is no way the queen can order us to spit out the thread for us first.
　Then we'd have to let them out voluntarily, but the soldier spiders wouldn't bother to let them out for us either.

　Furthermore, there are many different types of threads that spiders spit out.
　It was extremely difficult to get them to spit out the most suitable thread for their fibers.

　The Swevi also tried many different ways, and the documents describe various measures that failed.

　In the end, though, due to lack of funds, the Swevi gave up on the idea.





　"It seems that the Swevi tried many things at random...

　Nikolaos muttered as he read the material.
　The Swevi tribe really did it at random.

　That's why Adalbero easily gave us the materials, stepping on the fact that we would never succeed.
　As long as there is no chance of success, this document is worth nothing more than trash.

　I honestly can't think of any other way to do it than what's in here. We need a different approach. What do you guys have to say about it?

　I look around at them all.
　A look of difficulty appears on their faces and they stare at the failures in the document.

　After about five minutes, Tetra blurted out.

　''........How does the queen spider give orders in the first place?''
　Isn't that a pheromone?
　What?
　"A substance produced in the body of an organism and secreted out of the body that affects other individuals in their behavior and development.

　I see, said Tetra with a look of understanding.
　Julia and Nikolaos seem to have understood, too.

　Ismea, on the other hand, has been looking at the material with a look of total disinterest, and a question mark is floating on the heads of Aomei and Alice.

　And Nifa........

　Is it the sweat or the smell of sweat that turns me on?
　Well?

　I cowered my shoulders.

　Humans have pheromones too, so they get off on body odor.
　Actually, humans don't have pheromones, and getting off on body odor is just a matter of taste.

　I've heard multiple conflicting information, so I can't draw any conclusions about that.

　But we are not queen spiders.
　There is no way we can produce pheromones.

　There's no way we can talk to the queen spider and ask her to produce them, or ask her what kind of substance it is. I'm not going to listen to this.
　Yeah?
　Something important just popped into your head?

　Hey, Julia. Can't you fool a spider with your magic?





　Not a single method of witchcraft was mentioned in the materials.
　It's because witchcraft is underdeveloped in the Germanic region.

　In the first place, witchcraft is not used in life.
　It's natural.
　If you live a decent life, you won't encounter any curses.

　It's not necessary to be a sorcerer, although you have no choice but to turn to a sorcerer if you fall ill.
　There are even non-cursed medicine men who are non-cursed.

　The only ones who use witchcraft on a large scale are the Kingdom of Roselle and our Kingdom of Romalia.

　If witchcraft were used more globally, then the women and sorcerers of this world would have a strong political voice.
　However, as Ismea struggled with, the disdain for women is quite strong in Cilicia.
　According to Qingming, Persis and the Scarlet Empire seemed to be similar in that regard.

　Well, even in the Adelunian Peninsula, it doesn't have a very good image as long as it's called 'curse' art.

　Now, back to the story........

　Reproducing pheromones is impossible, no matter how many Yulia and Tetra.
　However, if you want to use pheromones to trick people into thinking they've received your orders, it's possible enough to do it with witchcraft.

　You could directly f*ck the spider's brain and make it move.

　And tricking the bugs....

　It's so easy!

　Mosquitoes whirled around Julia's fingers.
　That's right, the less-developed the animal's brain is, the easier it is to manipulate.

　Of course, its underdeveloped brain prevents it from performing sophisticated actions, but it is very easy to command it to do monotonous things.

　Adalbero called spiders smart, but that just means they are smart as insects.
　It's true that he seems to have the intelligence of a dog from that coordination but he can fool them at the dog level with no problem.

　Well, it might not be possible in areas where spellcasting is underdeveloped, like Germanis.
　Manipulating and tricking living creatures is a very advanced technology in spellcraft.

　Only Romalia or Roselle could prepare a large number of spellcasters who could easily manipulate living creatures, I would say.

　'Julia, is it possible?'
　'Well, I think I can do it. Still, I'd have to set up a special technique for that bug, so it'd take a lot of work.

　Boom!
　Julia said, crushing the mosquitoes that were flying around her fingers.

　'Then get to work on it!　
　Yes, Your Majesty.

　Julia gave a wink.




　Two months later, that is, in July.
　Just when the wheat was beginning to bear....

　Finally, it's done.
　Finally....I mean, it's only been two months.
　I didn't expect it to be completed so quickly...

　Yulia, Tetra and I smiled bitterly at the finished cloth made of spider silk.
　Columbus' egg, as they say.

　It was just a matter of imagination.
　However, the fact that Yulia was a very good spellcaster was also a major factor.

　But.........

　''The quality of this cloth is quite poor compared to the cloth made from Alice's threads. The cloth I made before was endorsed by Ains as being even better than silk but this is a bit inferior to silk.

　In case you're wondering, I used a traction thread that is said to be the strongest of all the spider threads...
　I'm still disappointed that my expectations were so high due to the fact that the Alice yarn was too good.

　''Oh, no, not really.''
　No, I didn't compliment you.

　For some reason, I poke a happy Alice's head.

　''If this is the case, I'll have to ask Alice to become a permanent thread-spitting machine...''
　'Well, that's not quite...'
　It's a joke.

　Then, for some reason, Alice looked down, her cheeks blushing with disappointment.
　Did she want to become a permanent thread-spitting machine?

　But I'm not sure this is going to yield a profit.

　After all, it costs more than silk to produce them, in terms of labor and feed.
　If this situation continues, the price will be a little cheaper than silk, or about the same.

　They would be competing with silk for customers, and sales would be in doubt.
　Besides, with the development of transportation technology, perhaps the cost of transporting silk would become cheaper, which in turn would make silk cheaper.

　But we've only just begun. If we continue to improve the breed, the quality of the silk will go up and up.　Still a wild species, right?
　And it's great that we can get the equivalent of silk without having to ship the gold and silver out of the country.
　Well, I don't know all the details, but I've heard it's cheaper if you mass produce it?

　Julia, Tetra and Alice spoke up.
　Indeed, the girls were right.

　It's just the beginning. It's just the beginning.
　Besides, if we can get the queen spider to spawn, we won't have to buy them from Germanis, and it will be cheaper for that.

　"Well, I guess we'll just have to wait and see...

　We have a long way to go.
　But we have a good prospect.

　Hopefully, it will be a major industry when Marx is old enough to take over the throne.