Chapter 35
There are roughly three ways to obtain fabric.
하나, Harvest it from wool while breathing in its awful stench.
둘, Grow flax and endure every hardship imaginable to make linen.
셋, Pick enough cotton to make even Bro shed tears of blood, then spin it into thread.
Of the three, cotton would be the most appealing for large-scale production, but….
“Cotton… I hear it’s grown only in a few estates in the southern part of the Empire.”
“It’s damn difficult to grow, yet they’ve somehow managed it.”
The problem was that cotton was unimaginably difficult even by medieval standards.
Around 200 frost-free days were essential.
Since cotton was a water-guzzler, its water supply had to be more than sufficient.
It was the ultimate soil nutrient drain, so nutrients had to be poured into the ground.
This absurd level of difficulty….
“Count Gossypium. It’s a pleasure to meet you. I hear you grow cotton?”
“Gasp?! Young Master Akion! A pleasure! And, if I may ask, are you interested in our cotton farming?!”
Apparently, the Gossypium family had managed to overcome it to some extent.
As luck would have it, he had come to the banquet, so Akion immediately went over to greet him.
“My territory has a mild climate all year round, and a clean, broad river runs beside the fields. It never frosts.”
“The south really is warm and comfortable.”
Growing it in Enersis would mean building greenhouses, but he had no intention of doing so, given how badly it depleted the soil….
Food had to be at least somewhat self-sufficient, after all. Anyway.
Thus, Count Gossypium operated the largest cotton farm in the Empire.
Even if it was small compared to modern mass plantations. Anyway.
When Akion asked how he dealt with that soil depletion,
“Hehe. In truth, I received tremendous help from your brother.”
“From my brother Juan?”
“Yes! He gave me invaluable advice on earth magic for maintaining fertile soil!”
“Goddamn it—!!”
It was all thanks to earth magic!!
Akion finally understood why people believed in magic omnipotence.
It guaranteed farmland as fertile as anything chemical fertilizer could produce, so of course people called magic omnipotent!!!
“Y-Young Master? Why are you cursing all of a sudden…?”
“What absurdly amazing magic! If we applied it to wheat fields too, the Empire’s people would never have to go hungry!”
“Ah! Hahaha! Just like Young Master Akion, who cares so deeply for the people of his domain!”
Understanding the principle behind it?
He gave up.
Mana acting like electricity whenever it felt like it was one thing, but this was something else.
‘I’ll have to ask if I ever meet him.’
He merely resolved that if he ever met the Lord who had transplanted the laws of physics from his previous life straight into this world,
he would demand to know why He had coded them so damn poorly.
Even if it meant going to hell, an engineer had to say what needed saying after being needled this many times.
“Then, Count, would you mind if I proposed a few magi-tools related to mass-producing cotton? A turbine pump to ensure a steady water supply, perhaps, or an easier cotton gin….”
“Let’s go to the terrace and discuss this in detail. Count Delphord, may I borrow your son for a moment?”
“Hoho, of course.”
Anyway, as far as Akion could tell, the raw-material supply itself was no problem.
Count Gossypium seemed eager to expand his cotton business, now that he had land to spare.
“Using this thing called a spindle—.”
“Aha! It pulls out only the cotton fiber! The cotton plant itself isn’t damaged at all!”
If so, all he had to do was streamline the process from harvesting and reprocessing all the way to winding the fibers into thread.
He was going to become the young master of a marquess’s house anyway.
Akion intended to handle this properly and see it through to the end.
*
In the middle of all this, Akion had somehow ended up on the Emperor’s side.
The day after the banquet, the chief chamberlain of the Imperial Palace handed him a badge engraved with a dragon emblem.
“It’s a pass allowing you to move freely throughout the Imperial Palace.”
“Why are you giving me this all of a sudden…?”
“It is His Majesty the Emperor’s gracious consideration.”
A gift sent with the clear intention of marking Akion as the Emperor’s man!
Holding it, Akion was too stunned for words—and slightly afraid that the Emperor’s blatantly one-sided favoritism might cause trouble later….
“Does this mean I can go to the Imperial Magic Research Institute with this?”
“Haha, indeed. Young Master Akion, your eagerness as a researcher is getting ahead of you. Before that, if you don’t mind, the Eternal Palace where Her Highness the Seventh Princess resides— Wait, Young Master! Please hear me out…!”
“Thank you!!”
Anyway, did this mean he could watch experiments at other research institutes now?
That made his mouth water.
Akion was already hurrying off. He had always wondered how magical research was conducted.
Neither his elder brother Juan nor his elder sister Hermione had done any proper magical research in his workshop, after all.
More precisely, the workload he had assigned them was so brutal that both Juan and Hermione collapsed the moment they got off work. Anyway.
- Tap, tap.
“Wow…….”
As he asked the palace attendants for directions here and there, a splendid facility opened up before him.
Opulent interiors that looked as though they had melted away an endless stream of tax money.
A garden as large as Akion’s mansion.
Even the flowers bloomed in profusion throughout it.
Akion entered the garden as if entranced.
“It’s autumn, so it should be chilly… but it’s warm here.”
Moreover, it appeared they had deliberately adjusted the surrounding temperature for the flowers.
And above the garden, he could see something resembling a transparent membrane….
‘The greenhouse effect?’
When he noticed the clouds seen through it bend slightly, Akion realized that the unknown magic used here relied on the greenhouse effect.
Apparently, just as clouds and the atmosphere act like the walls of a greenhouse to maintain Earth’s temperature, this mysterious magic spread over the garden worked on the same principle.
‘They really are clever, when you see things like this.’
In a world with no clear formulation of principles, they were awakening to and applying scientific principles through instinct or whatever means they had.
Seeing things like this, it was clear that humanity here would someday advance as far as modern humanity.
They had magic too, so perhaps even further.
By then, wouldn’t everyone on the continent be living more comfortably than they did now?
“Oh my, who are you?”
Just as Akion stood there dazed, someone called out to him in a lively voice.
Akion turned his head toward the sound,
“You have an unfamiliar face… Hmm. Quite a handsome one, too. Are you perhaps from outside the Imperial Palace?”
It was a beautiful young lady standing by a terrace overlooking the capital.
Silky red hair and beautiful features.
Contrasting with them were pupils slit vertically like a predator’s.
Akion knew one person with eyes like that.
Tower Master Ridasid. A dragon.
And within the Imperial Palace, red hair was a symbol of the imperial family.
- Snap!
“I pay my respects to the pillar of the Empire.”
There was no way she could be anything but a dragon!
Akion did his best to hide the cold sweat trickling down him, immediately dropped to one knee, and paid his respects.
And the person receiving those respects,
“Pfft!”
burst out laughing at the visitor who had mistaken her for a dragon!
“Hahahaha! Did you really think I was a dragon?! Ahahaha!”
“Pardon…?”
Come to think of it, Akion remembered that the Emperor also had vertically slit pupils.
They were somewhat rounder than this woman’s… but that red-haired Emperor did have dragon-like vertical pupils.
“Haaah, honestly. I’ve seen plenty of people show me proper respect, but you’re the first to mistake me for my ancestor.”
Only then did Akion realize his mistake.
He bowed his head deeply to hide his face burning with embarrassment.
“You can get up. I’m just an insignificant young lady with a little dragon blood mixed in.”
“If it would not be rude, may I ask whether you are Her Highness the Seventh Princess?”
That narrowed the possibilities considerably.
There were three daughters among the current Emperor’s children.
One was on the battlefield, and another at the academy, so….
“That’s right. Flare Fandragon Asterion.”
“I pay my respects to Her Highness the Seventh Princess.”
The person before him was undoubtedly Princess Flare, the Seventh Princess.
The very person who had sent him not one but two orders stamped with the imperial seal…!
“I am—.”
“Wait, wait! Let me guess. Let’s see, silver hair, blue eyes, and quite a handsome face, so you must be….”
She proceeded to deduce Akion’s identity like she was solving a riddle.
Flare stared intently at the silver-haired, blue-eyed, handsome young man,
“I’ve got it! Juan Enersis!!”
“Your sister has gotten a tan, though.”
“S-Sister? What does that mean…? Anyway, I guess I’m wrong.”
She had guessed wrong.
Akion corrected her. He wasn’t some kind of eunuch.
“Then… since you said ‘older sister’… you must be family, and you’re an Enersis, right? Then….”
As the princess pieced together what she knew about Enersis, her eyes grew wider and wider.
Because that left only one Enersis young master.
“……Akion Enersis? The one who was known to be incompetent until just a few years ago, but—.”
“Yes, that’s me.”
“The alchemist who became a genius?! The one who made my hair dryer?!!”
“Yes. I was terrified when I saw the confidential commission Chief Maid Beatrice had passed along at the time.”
Flare, Beatrice, and even her father, Emperor Theodore Fandragon—
the benefactor who had driven away all their worries stood before her.
At that moment, Akion saw Flare’s face light up.
In a way, it resembled how overjoyed Goldie had been when she received a whole armful of cream puffs, but—
“You—you’re that Akion Enersis…!”
“Judging by the shine in Her Highness’s hair, it seems my magi-tool has helped ease your worries. I’m truly hono—.”
- Hug!
“Ghk.”
He hadn’t expected her to hug him, though.
Akion was flustered by Flare’s natural scent, carrying a faint orange fragrance.
He instinctively tried to push her away, but….
- Nod.
‘Why are you nodding? Are you saying it’s fine for me to hug her too?!’
But he couldn’t bring himself to do so with the chief maid and knight he had seen before nodding behind the princess.
“Thank you! Thank you so much! Thanks to you, I reconciled with my father, and you saved my life too!”
“I’m deeply honored that my magi-tool helped you so much, but aaaaaargh—?!”
“I’ll show you how I use it! Bai, have the maids prepare the washroom!”
“Hoho, as you command.”
Flare’s strength, bolstered by the enormous amount of dragon blood flowing through her veins, was several times Akion’s.
Akion, a hopeless weakling who had lost in a contest of strength, was dragged away by Flare just like that.