Progress and its characteristics

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281 A.D.

Valley of the Solar Flame, Osgiliath Castle

«Honey, are you sure? - I asked, watching Eilis, her silver hair swept back and forth as she gathered and checked the things she needed for the road.

«Yeah. I've never been to a tournament. Especially one this big. Fel, well don't be a drag, let me... - Looking at me with her beautiful violet eyes, the one who has been my wife for over two years now said.

"And how does she do it?" - I thought, raising my hands in a gesture of surrender.

It had been two and a half years since she and I had been married. Our married life had quietly moved on, pleasing us both. Eilis, who had escaped her father's firm grip on her family and the family that had bored her, had blossomed into the beautiful flower that almost every bard in Dorne praised. Sometimes when I listened to their songs, I even laughed heartily when these boozers, who would do anything for a mug of ale and a ham ham, came up with opuses that would make my wife's face blush and then twist so badly that the others would move away from her in horror. And how many idiot knights, who decided that it is possible to molest my wife in front of my eyes, I broke my arms and legs ....

"Only two things in this world are infinite - the universe and human stupidity, although I'm not sure about the universe" - I remembered the phrase of one great theoretical physicist, and, coming from behind to my wife, hugged her shoulders.

«Maybe you'll change your mind? In your position, it will be hard for you to cross half a continent. - After my words, Eilis instantly and incredibly tenderly stroked her already slightly rounded belly. My wife was pregnant for the third time. The baby Elaina had been born a year and a half ago and was an exact copy of her mother - straight snow-white hair, slightly darker eyes turning purple, and correct features of the child's face already promised to make her the first beauty of Dorne, if not for one thing. My daughter was an incredible brawler.

As soon as she'd learned to run and talk a month ago, she'd been howled at by almost all of her peers in the town where I sometimes let her go under guard. She fought everyone - girls, boys, even those a year older than her. And the amazing thing is, she always won. Seeing with what admiration she looks at the training of the Northerners, who became my temporary guard, and mine, it became clear to me that in the future I will have a very strong fighter in my family. It's all about training her properly.

«You're right. I don't know what came over me. - Eilis said apologetically, somehow deflating and sitting down in the spacious soft armchair she liked to sleep in when she was carrying Elaina under her heart.

"The mood swings have started. We'll get through this," I thought, and I came closer and took her warm palm in my hand and said. - Don't worry, my love. When your pregnancy is over, I will organize a tournament, on a scale not inferior to the royal.

«Promise?

«I promise. - Standing up from my knees and taking all the space left on the chair, I said. As I sat with Eilis, who was dozing on my shoulder, I became more and more absorbed in my thoughts about what was happening in the Seven Kingdoms and in my lands in particular.

The news of the deaths of Grand Lord Steffon Baratheon and his wife Cassana Estermont had shaken all of Westeros. Rumor has it that as they were returning to Storm's End and sailing through the Bay of Broken Ships, a storm appeared from nowhere, turning the bay into a veritable living hell. "The Proud," Lord Steffon's two-masted galleys, crashed in sight of his castle. His two eldest sons, Robert and Stannis, watched from the wall as the sea swallowed their father's ship. An incredible tragedy.

One that later led to a great deal of trouble.

According to Atrakes, who sent me a letter a few weeks after these events, Steffon sailed to Lys and Volantis to find a wife for Crown Prince Rhaegar. It didn't work out - everyone remembered well how the daughter of Clan Rhaegar ended up marrying Viserys II Targaryen. So an unspoken agreement was made between the Lys Magisters and the Triarchs of Volantis - "neither us nor you". And in the event of its violation, the traitor clan would pay the price very quickly.

As a result, Aerys, having failed to find a wife for the prince in the Free Cities and seeing Tywin insist on marrying the prince to his daughter, fourteen-year-old Cersei, made a new move. Barely a week after my wedding, a letter arrived in Osgiliath to Prince Doran, who had decided to visit, proposing an engagement between Elia and Rhaegar.

Such proposals are not to be refused, and the engagement was immediately arranged.

I was the only one at the time who wasn't happy to see Elia weeping with happiness at marrying the first handsome man of the Seven Kingdoms, and later in conversations with the Martell family I explained why.

This marriage was unequal.

Aerys used the Martells and Elia as a shield against the Great Lion, who was later revealed to be furious at the king's antics. Yes, Elia's children, with Martell blood would rule the Seven Kingdoms in the future, but that was only in theory. Even without my knowledge of the future, I told Doran that after Aerys's antics, quarreling with everyone he could, the Western Lands, the Iron Islands, and the Northern Alliance, now being forged by the Grandlords of the North and the Vale, would not support the royal dynasty. Doran and Oberyn didn't listen to me.

And they regretted it later.

The prince and princess were married a year later, in the Great Sept of Baelor. Even I, a saiga running all over Westeros and Essos at the time, managed to get time to attend the wedding. The Valyrian steel ring I gave her, with a sun ruby, bought cheap in Valisar (only 1000 dragons) from one of the impoverished nobles, pleased Elia very much and became her favorite piece of jewelry. Rhaegar got away with a fine silver harp made in Tolos, a city famous for its musical instruments.

However, the king did not attend the wedding and even forbade his second son Viserys to go. This was rumored to be the cause of a huge quarrel between father and son, causing Rhaegar to move to Dragonstone after the wedding, leaving Red Castle behind.

It became the first sparks of a fire that was only growing. And when, a year ago, Elia gave birth to a daughter, Princess Reynis, things got even worse. If Queen Reila (holy woman, such a psycho to tolerate) warmly accepted the baby, the king at the sight of his granddaughter only wrinkled his nose, loudly saying that she "stinks of Dorn" in the throne room.

This, coupled with rumors that Viserys was to be the heir, made the Martells very angry. I still remember how much I had to calm Oberyn, who was staying with me at the time, drunk to death on the news. What happened to Doran, who loved his little sister much more, I can hardly imagine.

I didn't waste any time myself. After the wedding and a short honeymoon, I had to go away to take care of some business. I had not been anywhere during those two years... It was like being back in the days of trade.

First I visited Fowler, Dane and Vilas, controlling the transportation and quality of seedlings for my lands. After all, it is from them, in the future, will consist of my gardens and provide food and raw materials for the whole land.

Then I went to the North, where I had a meeting with Lord Bolton. Ruse Bolton, head of one of the strongest and most powerful houses in the North, made a strong impression on me. Having replaced his recently deceased father, this man, barely taller than my neck, with an unremarkable face, smooth skin, thin lips, and pale, almost colorless eyes like ice flakes, had instantly subdued his vassals, who were agitated by the young age of the head of the family, and now held them in a steel fist. What I needed from the Boltons was coal, furs, and barley, a very popular grain crop in the North. In return, I promised to provide Lord Bolton with food at prices far lower than those of the Riverlands and the Vale, which have profited from the winters of the North since the days of Aegon I. A mutually beneficial arrangement.

Of course the Boltons were not the first house I visited (they don't have the best reputation, after all), but the Mandrels charged prices so low that it was a loss to work with them, the Amber's sent me away, saying they didn't want to deal with some peddler, and the Karstarks simply didn't have the coal deposits I needed on their land in the first place.

The third destination was the Wall. Lord Darok Quargil greeted me with honor, feeding me well and giving me a little tour of Castle Black. Of course, he was doing this for a reason - his goal was the new donations and recruits for the Watch he hoped to get. I didn't disappoint him - by a hundred gold dragons, the 996th Lord Commander of the Night's Watch had received a very tempting offer from me.

The Night's Watch itself was divided into 3 branches - scouts, builders, and stewards. My offer was for the latter.

The builders themselves are a group of masons, carpenters, foresters. Their job is to keep the integrity of the Wall, its mechanisms, and the castles of the Night's Watch in good condition. They were involved in mending fortresses, building roads and villages for settlers, and finally, cutting down the Enchanted Forest. It was the latter that interested me. Usually builders only utilize a small portion of this woodland, leaving the larger one in place, to rot or gradually go into the ground.

My proposal was simple - I buy this "large" part of the forest for the price of 1 silver stag per ten trunks, thus giving a new source of income for the Night's Watch.

Quargil grumbled, of course, and said it wasn't customary, but in the end he agreed. Now, every month in the Eastern Watch-by-the-Sea, my ships were waiting for huge stacks of ship's timber, bought for next to nothing. In Braavos, they were willing to pay much more for timber that had grown in the cold and harsh conditions of Zastenya, and was characterized by its strength and texture. So my ships began to go to the North on a regular basis, carrying food supplies and small orders for the Night's Watch, and bringing back expensive ship's timber, furs, coal and amber.

I even had to go to the Isthmus to the Reeds and lure 9 werewolf families to my lands, who, for a carefree and secure future, gladly agreed to sail on my ships and be my "sonars" and negotiate with the Magnars. No matter how cheater the werewolves were in their powers to pick the right winds and avoid storms, the ships needed a quiet harbor where they could give their crews a chance to rest.

That harbor was the Magnars, probably the only adequate inhabitants of Skagos who didn't lunge at you to kill and eat you. So Conung's house soon became a small harbor where my ships could stop.

It was also where the little surprises given to Oberyn a year ago were found. The five and four year olds, Gin and Wolfe, the result of fun with one of Lord Magnar's daughters, had the classic Martellian looks and snake-like temperament of their father. The moment I introduced them to Oberyn in Sunspear, I thought that Grandfather Condratius had had enough. But the Dornish prince on the contrary only laughed happily and ran off in the direction of the Tower of the Sun. As I learned later, from Lady Mellario, he and Doran had long ago made a wager that the younger prince would never have a boy. The example of Obara, Nymeria, and Tiena was too telling. The ruler of Dorne lost, paying for his younger brother to go on a bender in the Summer Isles that resulted in the birth of another daughter, Sarella.

All my further travels were trips to the major cities of Westeros and Essos, where I found impoverished but talented (in a world where a noble "roof" is more important to an artisan than talent, not uncommon) craftsmen and apprentices of all possible trades - blacksmiths, carpenters, gardeners, masons, shipwrights, shoemakers, builders, and many others, and offered to work for me. All of them, after receiving a small cash advance, would go to the Valley of the Solar Flame, where there was plenty of work for them. Of course, there were those who simply took the money, not intending to go anywhere, but such, thank the Gods, were a minority.

At the same time, I visited Honey Grove, buying some beekeepers and a breed of bees specializing in fruit honey from Bisbury, Staromest, ordering nearly twenty shebaks to replace the merchant ships until Osgiliath's dry docks were up and running, and Arbor, buying some grapes from the Redwins.

Only recently have I been able to return home and see my family. I had only been to the castle once in two years of traveling, attending Elaina's birth and leaving for Lys almost immediately, and I missed my wife, son, and daughter very much. It was then that Eilis became pregnant for the third time.

Much had changed in those two years - the main facilities of the castle and the crafting district were completed, already up and running and beginning to produce the first goods. The foundations of the market, apiaries, orchards, crop fields and the villages that served them were laid. The region, whose population, thanks to my efforts, numbered almost fifteen thousand people and was not planning to stop in the coming years, was developing rapidly and began to bring the first dividends.

But I realized that there was still a long way to go before the end. The first part of the city, which was planned to house twenty thousand people, had to be completed and walled off (the second and third parts would probably be built by my descendants, since they were designed to fit the size of White Harbor and Staromest, respectively). I had to finish Minas-Itil, covering my lands from the sea, and start building the second fortress, closing the only entrance to the valley from the land. I needed to complete and start dry docks for the fleet, for the Ironwoods' "defense" was costing me a fortune. And finally, I had to complete the military camp where my future squad and guards of the city would be trained, because it was cheaper to grow loyal and professional fighters myself. Yes, it is a time-consuming and costly occupation, but the effect is corresponding.

And for all this needed money, which I had only 200 thousand gold pieces.

A large sum, but not enough for my plans in the long run. And to make up for it right now, dozens of workshops and manufactories were fuming on the northern edge of Osgiliath, producing things that had never been seen in this world.

Flashback

273 A.D.

Citadel Laboratories, Staromest.

The Maesters' Citadel has always been renowned as the world's largest library and one of the best (if you don't remember it's the only one) hospitals on the entire continent. But few people know that within these walls are dozens, if not hundreds of large rooms-laboratories. It was here that medicines, poisons, new alloys, mechanisms, and dozens of similar things were created in the days before the Targaryens. It was here that history was forged against the ancient order of Alchemists, who had lost many of their abilities over the past centuries and had fallen to creating mere wildfire, the one invention that the Maesters to this day cannot replicate.

And now, within these four walls, I was trying to bring to the world something that would push its development for centuries to come.

The first thing I decided to create was a simple black powder. Its recipe was well known to me from my university days on Earth, because it was the recipe that broke through the first tunnels.

Having taken the necessary ingredients, in proportions - 75% saltpeter, 15% burnt coal and 10% crystalline sulphur (how good it was that in the storerooms of the Citadel one could find anything) - I got the gunpowder and mixed it well. Such a simple and uncomplicated recipe.

But life is very fond of screwing people up, regardless of their wishes. When I put aside a few grams of the resulting mixture and put a long burning beam to it, nothing happened.

Nothing!!!

It just burned like a simple coal from a fire! It didn't explode like it should! Didn't puff like gunpowder created in the wrong proportions! It just burned...

I was shocked.

The next two weeks were spent trying to find a solution to the problem or mistakes in proportions or materials. What had I done wrong? Dozens of types of gunpowder were synthesized, in the most ridiculous proportions and quantities. But the result was the same - simple combustion, without a trace of explosive reaction.

In the end, being in a slight despair and under the influence of constant lamentations of our maester-warden, I had to give up.

"Fuck it, the gunpowder. I'll do something else," I thought then, embarking on another project.

My next target was the steam engine. Having an architectural and therefore primary engineering education, and a love for various historical books, I, with the help of Citadel forges and a few silversmiths, given to a few schoolboys-metallurgists, tried to make a simple steam engine Newcomen-Watt.

Bummer. Again.

Having checked all the latches, reassembled it screw by screw, I found not a trace of malfunction. I even wrote down the theoretical principle of operation on paper and checked everything according to it. It doesn't work, that's all!

The next six months in the Citadel were spent trying to create something new and, most importantly, working. A simple battery made from a magnet... Cartwright's loom... even a simple Chinese flashlight. None of it worked.

And the interesting thing is that most people who saw my ideas didn't believe in them. No, that's not how I put it. They had no doubt that my innovations wouldn't work. Not for a second. Even after theorizing about them, creating a precise blueprint and explaining the principle of operation to the barely mentally retarded. I would understand if they were unenlightened peasants from godforsaken villages or hardened lords who spent their lives collecting taxes from the first category. But these were Maesters. Maesters! Those people who, for the sake of learning new things and exploring the world, gave up everything else: women, status, wealth and power.

And these people didn't even doubt for a second that my inventions and innovations wouldn't work.....

I ended up going on a two-day brainstorming spree to figure out why this was happening. And I had a Theory! The theory of artificial limits to progress.

If you think about it, it's clear that this world should have broken through in its technological advancement a long time ago. The same wildfire, superior to Greek fire or napalm. I came across a small treatise stolen from the Alchemists' Guild, and it showed several stages of making this infernal mixture. There were already twenty different components used, with perfectly matched proportions and fractions. And these are just the initial stages, by which the Maesters couldn't even come close to creating this Westero analog of pyrogel. And I'm supposed to believe that the people who created it didn't think of mixing coal, saltpeter, and sulfur in four millennia?

Yes, there could be hundreds of other reasons and factors that could disprove my theory, but remembering how the mechanisms I created magically failed to work, I find only one answer.

This world is limited by someone. Limited in its progress, forever stuck in a strange state of magical Middle Ages, where the features of the 16th, 15th, and 14th centuries are intertwined. And if we remember about the two hundred meter ice wall, the skeletons of four-meter giants, indestructible statues in Omber, the Lorathian labyrinths, the famous and mysterious Asshai and the existence of a whole ancient state of dragon lords, there can be only one option.

Magic...

Or the gods restricting humans through magic...

Alas, but this I will never know, because against the background of the world a simple man, without supernatural powers or the necessary knowledge, just a grain of sand. I just don't have the strength and knowledge to change anything. So I had only one thing to do - to remember all kinds of inventions or ideas that do not go beyond the local "color" and suitable for my purposes.

That was what I did, in parallel with my studies, until the end of my stay in the Citadel.

The end flashback

Remembering how much work it cost me to pick out those technologies that don't make breakthroughs, fit Planethos, are very profitable, and can't be replicated without the right base, I'm starting to get phantom pains in the back of my head.

In the end I came up with just three things.

Waterproof and strong cement.

Porcelain.

A moonshine machine.

It was the former that allowed me to build the castle and the first part of the city in a measly 3-4 years. In the Seven Kingdoms, unlike medieval Europe, the Byzantine technology of hot mortar and proproeton (a mixture of slaked lime and special selicate powder) was used. Because of this, local lords could build such architectural marvels as the Eagle's Nest, the Old Town Lighthouse and, of course, the biggest and largest castle in all of Westeros - Harrenhal.

But I'm an architect by training, and a hard worker at that. For me, making good, hard, fast setting and water resistant cement was quite simple. Thanks to my mentors in practice, who crammed all this knowledge into my "one twist, and that - straight".

The second idea came to me when I involuntarily started comparing the I-T Empire and ancient China. And I remembered that unlike earthly China, I-Ti does not have porcelain among its goods - a very expensive and status thing, along with silk, massively exported to the West, before the creation of its European analogs. So not to try to recreate it would be formidable foolishness.

And I did. I am certainly not a professional potter and geologist, knowing about all the properties of clay, but patience, books, casually asked advice, and remembered from the past life facts and here is the result. The white clay that turns into precious white porcelain after firing has been created. And judging by the admiring eyes of Eilis, when I showed her a small table service, they will sell very well.

The moonshine machine, on the other hand, was very funny. Remembering how most of my innovations didn't even want to start, I didn't even try to make one. Until one crucial moment. After making a successful deal with the Old Town Trade Guild, when Atraxes asked me to be his translator, I was invited to a celebratory banquet where I tried it.

Pear brandy.

A rare Tyroshian drink, characterized by high strength, up to 35 degrees. That's when I realized that it couldn't be made without standard distillation! In the end it resulted in the assembly of a simple moonshine cube, which (hallelujah!!!) worked. Thus, strong alcohol and spirits were added to the list of unique goods produced by my city. The only source of sugar in this world was I-Ti, who guarded the secret of its production like the apple of his eye. So until the gardens grew and produced their first fruits, the only kind of alcohol my distilleries would produce was whiskey. It is for this purpose that I have purchased barley from the Boltons, and for it alone I know the full recipe - one of my close friends, back on Earth, kept a small distillery and told me a great deal about its workings.

Naturally, I keep the secret of porcelain, perfume and alcohol production very secret. After all, if the recipes are found out, I will lose most of my profits as a monopolist. I even had to take an example from the Free Cities, whose artisan quarters, producing their "unique" products, are turned into separate strictly protected areas, where outsiders cannot enter, and the right to manufacture is concluded with several large clans, which can not leave their area and head responsible for the safety of the secret.

"After all, in case it leaks, they all forfeit their lives." - I thought, shifting my dozing wife onto the bed nearby. - "We must hurry. The ships leave in a couple hours."

The door creaked quietly and a small boy, with blond hair and red eyes, entered the room. He snuck in quietly, careful to step on the soft tufted carpet so as not to disturb the sleeping Eilis.

«Dad, are you ready yet? - Lion whispered in my ear, coming closer. Yes, my son, who had just turned four, was very thoughtful.

In fact, Lyon turned out to be a very smart and understanding child. He started to speak early enough, he ran after me, asking about everything. And his questions were sometimes such that I involuntarily wondered - "is this by any chance not another hitman in a child's body"? But after watching him for a while, I realized that he was a simple and naive child, though very clever for his age. Even now he often asked me to read him a book or tell him something new, and I did not refuse. You can not crush children's curiosity at a young age. Otherwise you risk raising inert amoebas.

«Of course, son. - I replied, stroking my patched head. - Go get ready. I hope you told Nanny to pack you some warm clothes. The Riverlands are not our warm Dorne, after all. Despite the spring, it's pretty cold there.

«Uh-huh. - He replied, nodding quickly.

"And this is the first time he's left the valley at a conscious age." - I thought as my son adjusted the small clasp on his chest. Dressed in a simple hemp vest and white-colored trousers with a long plume, he made a murderous impression on all the maids who worked in the castle. Still, his facial features were Eilis's, and he promised to grow into a heartbreaker in the future.

The only thing that made him stand out from the other boys in the town was a small gold medallion and small bracelets and wristbands made of the same metal. My son really liked the color of that metal and its contrast with his hair. And since it wasn't beyond the bounds of reason, and was one of his few childhood "wants", I didn't mind.

"After all, it's much better than Elaina's pugnacity" - I thought as I left the room grabbing my bag with some important documents.

An hour later, the three ships - Black Panther, White Tiger and Crimson Lion - passed through the gate separating the harbor from the rest of the sea and headed east. They had a long way to go - through the Dornian Sea and the Narrow Sea, through the Throat Strait and Blackwater Bay. And then, using rowing propulsion, and sailing past King's Harbor, passing against the current of the Blackwater and God's River, they would enter the continent's largest lake.

God's Eye.

Only after sailing through it and around the Isle of Leeks would the Tempers' ships, laden with porcelain, perfume, hemp, and iron, reach their destination. The cursed stronghold of Hoare.

Harrenhal. Where the largest Harrenhal tournament in recent years was to be held.

*** 

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