ME: I should jot down a couple notes for this book later in the series while they’re clear in my head.

2800 words later, I have destabilized my world’s economy by having an artificer invent a desalinatior and purchased a book on the history of salt.

Right! So the salt trade in the White Rat’s world is largely controlled by a city-state akin to Evil Venice, who will graciously allow the coastal peasantry to sell them their sea salt harvest for the low low price of not burning your village down. https://twitter.com/rechanmole/status/1319726308717436931?s=21

This is then run through a shipping company which pays outrageous tariffs to use a particular coastal passage, and delivered all over the continent. If you don’t have a salt mine or a coastline capable of dehydrating brine, it is your best option.

And you need salt for EVERYTHING. Particularly preserving food, transporting it any distance, livestock feed, leather tanning, paper making, processing silver ore, etc. But then some clever bastard hauls off and invents a cheap handwavium magic desalination technique.

If this gets into use, Evil Venice is bankrupt, the shipping company goes bankrupt, the owners of the coastal passage lose half their shipping income, trade in everything that was being subsidized by salt cargoes goes to hell.

And also Bishop Beartongue saves about eight percent in operating costs annually.

Obviously the plot of this book that I cannot start until I’ve finished the other one revolves around trying to save the artificer from assassins sent by Evil Venice Shipping Inc, and maybe some canoodling between the spy and her former paladin bodyguard.