WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: Ceaseless

Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried

◈ The Medieval Heretic King is Too Good at Developing ◈

Chapter 54: The Hygiene Revolution (2)

──────

There was a scene that appeared in fantasy and alternate-history novels as though by prior agreement.

A modern protagonist traveled back to the Middle Ages, “invented” soap by mixing lye and fat, and astonished the locals. A tired old cliché.

Reality, however, was quite different. Medieval people already knew how to make soap.

The fact that mixing fat with lye created a cleansing agent had been common knowledge for thousands of years. There were even records of soap in the Old Testament.

So making soap itself was not the issue.

The real question was what quality of soap one could produce.

And for a chemist like me, that problem was as simple as reciting the multiplication table.

Prague Palace, Third Annex.

My private workshop, where the most radical and dangerous experiments in Bohemia were conducted.

None of the pleasant floral scents or savory smells of food that filled the palace could be found here.

Instead, the room was thick with the stinging stench of sulfur, the metallic smell of iron, and the harsh fumes of unidentifiable chemicals.

Three people had gathered in the center of that alien space at my summons.

János Hunyadi leaned against the wall like a shadow.

The maid Šárka nervously twisted the edge of her apron.

And there was also a guest I had specially summoned from Prague.

“Hmm...”

A middle-aged man wandered around the workshop, examining every corner. He wore a grease-stained leather apron, and burn scars marked his forearms like medals.

He was Josef, master of the Prague Soap Guild and a soapmaker with thirty years of experience.

“Everyone is here.”

I looked around the room.

“There is one reason I called you here. I intend to fill Prague, and beyond that, all of Bohemia, with a new kind of soap.”

My gaze turned to Josef.

“But I have no interest in expensive, precious goods used only by nobles. What I want is soap as common as stones on the roadside. Its quality, however, must surpass what the nobles use.”

Josef’s brow furrowed.

After clearing his throat, he spoke in a deliberately dignified tone.

“Your Majesty. Forgive me, but may I speak?”

“You may.”

“I have heard that Your Majesty is a god of war and deeply versed in alchemy. But...”

Josef looked toward the lard sitting in the corner of the workshop. Open contempt crossed his face.

“Just as one cannot pick grapes from thorn bushes, soapmaking is an honest craft. The most one can make from such... lowly pig fat is cheap lye soap for washerwomen.”

“Oh?”

I stroked my chin with interest.

“Is that so? I hear your soap is quite remarkable. They say the noblewomen of Prague refuse to wash with anything else.”

“You flatter me, Your Majesty.”

Josef bowed as though modest, but his raised shoulders showed no sign of coming down.

“My soap is not simply soap. It is art. Those who have used it once do not even look at anything else. Its softness against the skin, its delicate fragrance... no one can imitate such things.”

At that moment, Šárka, who had been standing in the corner, timidly raised her hand.

“Um... Your Majesty.”

“Yes?”

“Why did you call me here? I know nothing about soap. I’m only an ignorant maid who knows how to do laundry...”

Šárka hunched her shoulders and trailed off.

The unfamiliar atmosphere of the workshop made her too nervous even to breathe loudly.

“I know. That’s why I called you. I need someone to use the soap I make first and tell me whether it’s any good.”

I nodded, speaking with certainty.

“In that regard, your rough hands are the most honest measure. Šárka, your role is more important than anyone else’s in this experiment.”

“Ah...”

Šárka’s cheeks turned red.

Her roughened hands had always been something she wanted to hide. Yet I praised those calluses as proof of her hard work and a mark of trust.

Her eyes trembled at the unexpected recognition.

“Your Majesty! That is absurd!”

Josef, who had been watching, shouted indignantly.

“What could a mere maid possibly know to judge such a thing? Only noble people can recognize a soap’s true value. It is like throwing pearls before swine!”

János’s eyebrow twitched.

His hand looked ready to reach for his sword at any moment, but I raised a hand to stop him. Then I calmly asked, “Then let me ask you, Josef. How exactly do you make this finest soap of yours?”

Josef puffed out his chest as though he had been waiting for the question. The moment his area of expertise came up, his eyes gleamed.

“Your Majesty. Soap is an artwork born when materials granted by Heaven are infused with humanity’s noble patience. Therefore, there are three inviolable principles of soapmaking.”

With a solemn expression, he raised one finger.

“First, the ingredients. I would not use such lowly Bohemian lard even if it were given to me. Only olives grown in distant southern Castile of Spain, where the sun burns hot, or in Italy. Only the clearest and purest olive oil is worthy of becoming true soap.”

He raised another finger.

“Second, the lye. Ash from just any wood will not do. It must be precious soda made by burning seaweed raised in the sea breeze. Gold coins disappear simply to acquire it.”

The finest Spanish olive oil and soda made by burning coastal seaweed.

Neither was a material landlocked Bohemia could obtain. Naturally, they were ruinously expensive.

“And third. This is the most important.”

Josef raised his final finger with a solemn expression.

“Time.”

“Time?”

“Yes, exactly.”

Josef spoke gravely, like a priest reciting Scripture.

“When olive oil and soda are mixed and stirred over low heat for a long time, they become a paste as soft as cream. But that is only the beginning. The mixture must be poured into molds and dried in a shaded place with good airflow.”

He shook his head.

“One month? Two months? Not nearly enough. It must mature for at least half a year, perhaps over a full year. Only then does the poison leave the soap, and only then is Castile soap born, white, hard, and fragrant as a noblewoman’s skin.”

Josef clenched his fist and spoke passionately.

“That year of waiting! That long period of endurance! That is why my soap is expensive. One is not simply buying something to wash with, but the time and care I have put into it.”

Once Josef’s long speech ended, a strange silence settled over the workshop.

Šárka did not understand it all, but she looked impressed. János let out a dry laugh and shook his head.

And I.

I had to bite my lip to keep from laughing.

It took a year to make a single bar of soap?

That was not something to boast about. It was practically a public confession of incompetence.

This so-called process of aging and drying was nothing more than a stopgap measure, using time to make up for an incomplete chemical reaction.

Unable to control the chemical reaction, they simply left it to nature and waited for time to pass.

Then they dressed up that endless waiting as devotion, added the cost of that inefficiency to the price, and fleeced the nobles.

I crossed my arms and looked at the arrogant craftsman.

“I have heard you well, Josef. I commend your noble craftsman’s spirit.”

Josef swelled at what sounded like praise.

My next words shattered his expectations.

“But I have no intention of wasting a full year to make one bar of soap.”

“Pardon...?”

“A year is out of the question. Even a month is too long. The soap I make will take one week. That includes production, drying, and actual use.”

“That is... impossible...”

I gestured to János.

“Bring the ingredients.”

János began placing the prepared materials on the worktable one by one.

Thump.

The first thing to take up space on the table was a white mass of fat in a jar.

“Lard.”

Josef snorted.

“Your Majesty, are you truly determined to use pig fat? Have I not told you repeatedly? No matter how hard you try, impure fat like that will produce nothing but a sticky lump of lye.”

Josef was not wrong.

Compared to olive oil, lard had a lower unsaturated-fatty-acid content and a higher melting point.

If simply mixed with lye without any treatment, the reaction would be slower, and the resulting texture rougher.

But that was only true if one simply mixed them together.

Thump.

The second ingredient was placed on the table.

“Lye.”

Šárka nodded as though familiar with it. She used it every day while doing laundry.

Josef showed no particular reaction yet. Lard and lye were the typical ingredients of cheap soap for commoners.

But the moment the third ingredient appeared, cracks formed in his arrogant expression.

János set down a basket.

It was filled with ripe, red fruit.

“Apples...?”

Josef blinked. Šárka tilted her head in confusion as well.

“Your Majesty, are those snacks?”

“No. They are an ingredient.”

“For soap? Apples?”

Josef frowned as though it made no sense.

“Your Majesty, if you add fruit juice, the soap will rot. If you wish to add fragrance, you should use expensive perfume oils. Add fresh ingredients like that, and mold will grow within days.”

He was not wrong.

At least, not with ordinary methods.

But I had not prepared apples to squeeze out their juice.

What I wanted was the natural wax and pectin in apple peels, along with that fresh fruit scent.

Then came the final ingredient.

The star of this experiment and the key that would overturn medieval common sense.

Thud.

János dropped a heavy sack onto the worktable. When its knot came loose, white crystals poured out like jewels.

“Salt...?”

Josef’s eyes widened.

Unable to believe it, he picked up a crystal and touched it to his tongue.

Salty.

It was unmistakably salt.

“Your Majesty! Salt? Surely you do not intend to use salt to make soap?”

He jumped in place.

“Salt is soap’s natural enemy! Have you ever washed clothes in seawater? It does not foam at all! The moment salt touches it, soap loses its strength and hardens! Yet you plan to pour salt into the pot used to make soap? That is like scattering ashes over finished soap!”

I smiled at Josef’s frantic outburst.

“Scattering ashes over finished soap... that is an amusing expression.”

Josef’s objection was accurate knowledge born of experience.

In saltwater, or hard water, soap did not dissolve well and clumped together.

But he knew only half the truth.

The very property that prevented soap from dissolving in saltwater.

Using that property in reverse was the essence of modern chemical engineering.

I took a handful of salt and let it run through my fingers like sand.

“As you said, salt repels soap. Just as water and oil do not mix, saltwater and soap do not mix either.”

“You know that, yet why...!”

“That is why I will use it.”

I pointed to the empty pot.

“Because they do not mix. Because they repel each other. I will use that property to extract only the soap. The impurities, residue, and foul-smelling glycerin will sink to the bottom, leaving only pure soap itself.”

Josef’s mouth opened and closed.

He clearly could not understand what I was saying.

Repel it? Extract it?

It was a mechanism beyond anything he could imagine from thirty years of experience.

I rolled up my sleeves.

“One demonstration is faster than a hundred explanations. Light the fire. Make the temperature as high as possible.”

János lit the brazier. The enormous iron pot began to heat up.

I tossed the prepared lumps of lard into it.

Sizzle!

As the fat melted, the heavy scent of grease mixed with a gamy odor spread through the room.

Šárka sniffed the air. It was probably a familiar kitchen smell to her. Josef, however, pinched his nose and frowned as though he had been insulted.

“Watch closely, Josef.”

As I poured lye into the pot of boiling fat, I declared, “I will show you how these rubbish ingredients you despised will surpass your year-long masterpiece.”

Footnotes:

Join our discord at https://dsc.gg/wetried