Chapter 181 Empire Workshop

The Empire Workshop at the hunter outpost primarily focused on three technical paths: processing exotic beast equipment, producing foreign blood potions, and creating hunter potions.

The internal management structure of the workshop had three chief administrators at the top, equivalent to one head and two deputy workshop masters. The two deputy positions were technical posts, promoted from artisans, while the head workshop master was an administrative post, a court minister responsible for the Empire's leadership of the workshop.

Each of the three technical paths had a director, followed by supervisors leading several development teams, then junior supervisors leading individual development teams. These development teams were further divided into different product styles, and finally, there were the artisans and apprentices in each team. The workshop naturally used different terms for each level of position, but Zhou Jing defined them according to his own understanding, which was more intuitive for him.

Sura was one of the senior supervisors of the hunter potion path. Under his arrangement, Zhou Jing briefly met his colleagues and was then assigned to a development team responsible for producing pain reduction potions, officially joining the Empire Workshop.

Many colleagues were curious about him, the famous "aphrodisiac maker," and would cast scrutinizing glances at him as he passed.

Sura instructed the junior supervisor of the development team to help Zhou Jing integrate and then left, leaving Zhou Jing staring blankly at the junior supervisor.

The junior supervisor's attitude was lukewarm, and it was clear that he disliked him somewhat. However, due to the workshop's decision, he couldn't object, so he had no choice but to accept the new team member, throw the quota tasks at Zhou Jing, casually introduce the work area and procedures, and then leave him to his own devices.

The alchemists in the same development team didn't welcome Zhou Jing's arrival. No one wanted to befriend him. After a brief greeting, they stopped talking, ignoring Zhou Jing and tacitly ostracizing the newcomer from their existing circle.

On the one hand, it was because "Bill" was young, and on the other hand, it was because his fame as an aphrodisiac maker made many people feel that having such a person as a colleague lowered their own standards, so the first impression was naturally not good.

Zhou Jing didn't care at all.

*This is nothing. Once I start working hard, these people will dislike me even more.*

Zhou Jing took out the list of his own quota tasks, read it carefully, and curled his lip: "Is that all?"

The annual quota was mainly based on production tasks, and the potions to be produced were determined by the development team's responsibilities. A development team could apply for more workload, which would be distributed to the artisans in the team, so the task quotas of each workshop member were different.

His task was to produce three hundred bottles of pain reduction potion and two hundred bottles of injury suppression potion this year... He hadn't learned the latter yet, and the workshop directly gave him the recipe.

"Only five hundred bottles of potion need to be produced a year... Is this a retirement home?"

Divided evenly, the workload was less than two bottles a day. What low efficiency.

Zhou Jing could make twenty or thirty bottles of potion a day, and that was even after deducting the time he spent looking after the shop. If he really made them full-time, he could complete the quota in ten days or so.

"It looks lively, but I didn't expect it to be so leisurely. When I came in, I saw those artisans working hard. Could it be that everyone is pretending to work hard and actually slacking off?"

Zhou Jing complained in his heart.

After pondering for a while, he roughly understood what was going on.

It wasn't that everyone was idle, but that their development team was idle. It was estimated that the junior supervisor never applied for workload and led the team members to slack off every year.

In addition, the various herbs and materials provided by the Terra Empire were not unlimitedly supplied but were supplied to each development team according to the task quota.

Moreover, hunter potions were consumables, but they were only used during hunting, so the consumption frequency wasn't high, and there was no need to stockpile too much. And there were many styles, and hunters had different choices when they set out, which reduced the demand for various potions. Finally, they were produced on demand, and the annual quota became like this.

Zhou Jing couldn't help but think of the situation when Jason took the foreign blood potion during his three enhancements and found a large pile of potions that no one cared about, and he understood the situation.

The production tasks of the Empire Workshop in the hunter outpost weren't heavy at all. The truly important thing should be the research and development of new recipes.

But developing new recipes wasn't easy, and it was estimated that such quota tasks wouldn't fall on ordinary artisans unless they applied for them themselves.

"So I, a newcomer who just entered the workshop, only need to be responsible for the most basic production quota... Hey, it seems like they didn't make things difficult for me."

Because artisans could apply for tasks on their own, it was difficult to make people sit on the bench. Even if the junior supervisor didn't like him, he wouldn't deliberately make things difficult by increasing or decreasing the amount of tasks. After all, the junior supervisor would also be responsible if something went wrong.

He really liked such a place!

As long as he applied for a quota, he could get materials, which was simply a treasure land for artisans to practice their skills.

No wonder those artisans were all so busy. They must have all actively applied for new quotas—taking public resources to improve their skills. Who wouldn't be happy to do that!

"I must farm it like crazy!"

Zhou Jing's eyes lit up. Without saying a word, he went directly to the place where he applied for quotas to inquire and quickly found out the rules.

If one accepted a task and didn't understand the recipe for that type of product, the workshop would directly provide the recipe.

However, each person could only undertake three quotas at the same time. After completing them, they could take on others to prevent someone from taking on a large number of quotas at the same time and then not being able to complete them, getting the recipe for nothing.

If too many quotas weren't completed, the merit points would be deducted, and they would be kicked out of the workshop, so even with such favorable conditions, most artisans acted according to their ability and didn't dare to take on tasks casually.

Currently, the workshop's production quotas were basically all distributed, leaving only some recipe research and recipe improvement quotas. And the task of improving the foreign blood potion recipe was the most backlogged, with almost no one asking about it... Because it was too difficult.

Zhou Jing looked at it enviously and wanted to take on all these tasks.

But after thinking about it, he didn't immediately accept the foreign blood potion improvement task. Instead, he took on another hunter potion recipe improvement task and combined it with the previous two basic production tasks to make up three quotas.

He didn't blindly trust the [Item Analysis Function]. Out of caution, he decided to first complete a few simple quotas to accumulate merit points, which he would use to exchange for basic knowledge of foreign blood potions. He would first study the differences in foreign blood potion technology on his own.

This way, he could have a clear idea of the difficulty of improving the foreign blood recipe before he accepted the quota to obtain the relevant recipe... After all, only by having the ability to complete the quota could he sustainably get it for free.

Ordinary task quotas weren't difficult for him and didn't even require too much time.

The factor that prevented other artisans from taking on quotas and farming recipes was learning ability.

Knowing the recipe wasn't enough. They also had to be familiar with the production process. It would take a normal artisan one or two months to turn a new recipe from unfamiliar to familiar, so that the success rate of potion production was stable at a decent level. More complex recipes took longer.

This wasn't a problem for Apostle No. 3, Bill. He could turn on cultivation acceleration and become proficient in two or three days. With his talent and auxiliary functions, the success rate of production could be close to 100%, and the probability of producing potent potions was many times that of skilled artisans.

Zhou Jing blinked:

"Now there's only one problem to worry about... Will I be silenced if I learn too much?"

...

After entering the Empire Workshop, Apostle No. 3, Bill, finally got on the right track. In the following months, he farmed tasks in the workshop.

He hired someone to help take care of the potion shop in King's Landing and occasionally took some time to make energy potions to supply, which had earned him several thousand silver coins in total.

After farming tasks for several months, Zhou Jing completely showed Bill's potion-making talent, completing more than a dozen quotas and improving a large number of hunter potion recipes, becoming the most dazzling person in the workshop.

His other colleagues were shocked. They had never seen such an efficient alchemist. Improving recipes was as easy as improving recipes.

In just a few months, this newcomer's achievements were comparable to several years of work by a development team—where did this freak come from?!

Originally, many artisans looked down on an improper alchemist who made his fortune with aphrodisiacs and had a lot of criticism about the workshop's senior management inviting Zhou Jing to join. Now they were shocked to discover that the senior management really had vision, and he had completed them.

This unusual situation made many artisans feel that Zhou Jing must have done something. However, no matter how they investigated, they desperately found that... This was really his natural talent.

Even the few recognized workaholics in the workshop didn't dare to have the intention of competing in the face of this inhuman work efficiency.

They couldn't compete, they simply couldn't compete!

The workshop's backlog of quotas decreased every few days, and a sense of anxiety spread among the artisan group.

At this rate, wouldn't those quotas be completed by this newcomer? Then where would they take on new tasks? Would they really only be able to slack off and retire?

No, Brother Bill, please stop and leave us some tasks!

Most of the artisans were extremely anxious because of Zhou Jing's relentless work. They had been leisurely, but now they had to speed up the progress in their hands and try to grab the few remaining quotas.

However, the senior management of the workshop was overjoyed.

Inviting Zhou Jing to join was indeed because they were optimistic and valued him, but it wasn't that critical. It was just like the usual recruitment of talents from outside and incorporating them into the workshop system to contribute to the Empire.

But they didn't expect that they had won the jackpot this time!

A treasure, they really picked up a treasure this time!

The senior management of the workshop was amazed by Zhou Jing and urgently discussed whether to promote him directly to the expert level... It was extremely rare for an artisan who had only joined the workshop for a few months to receive this honor.

However, before the senior management of the workshop could finish discussing, Zhou Jing had learned a lot of foreign blood potion knowledge through the merit points he had accumulated. He felt that he had accumulated enough, and finally implemented the plan to attack the foreign blood potion.