The Dawn Of Innovation

Before I start with the new chapter, I will give some basic information about Aqlasia and the currency.

There are 4 provinces in Aqlasia: Lumere, Parnesia, Armonia, and Velmyr.

Aqlasia had the biggest hubs in the entire empire of Archasia, and their main exports were food items and copper.

1 gold coin is worth 8 silver coins of the same weight. And 1 silver Coin is worth about 1000 copper coins of the same weight.

"Why do we have so much coal?" Arnold asked with his eyes widened.

Right under the castle, there was a whole basement filled with coal. Seeing this, Arnold was amazed. He knew something was stored in here, but he couldn't imagine why so much coal was stored in here.

"Do you know that coal can be used for more than just blacksmithing?" Luke asked with a smirk.

"Huh? Like?" Arnold asked in confusion.

"Follow me. I will take you to the storage room, there is something which will blow your mind," Luke replied with a huge smile.

"Alright," Arnold replied, following Luke through a few corridors.

"This is practically my secret lab. No one is allowed in here but me," Luke said, opening the door.

There were many small machine parts arranged neatly on many shelves. The bookshelves were all filled to the brim with multiple notes and textbooks.

"Whoa…" Arnold said in amazement.

"You know, when a teapot is super hot, the steam in the kettle will escape, pushing out the small lid, right?" Luke asked.

"Well, yes, King Luke," Arnold asked in confusion.

"Well, look at this," Luke said, sparking a small flame on his hands and placing it on a small pile of coal which was underneath a small tube made of copper connected to a beaker of water with a small flap lightly sealing it. Right above it was a small fan. In a few seconds, thanks to the water turning into steam and creating high enough pressure, it pushed away the lid and turned the fan around. The fan, which was connected to small gears, started to rotate them.

"And this is how I plan to change the world! Think about it, Arnold! With a bigger machine and more coal, we can power the machine enough to transport objects within the provinces in record time! Not to mention the ease of travel within multiple cities! This would revolutionize the world! This is THE ticket to make Aqlasia the richest nation in this world!" Luke shouted with a huge smile. 

Arnold's eyes widened at what Luke said.

"If you think this is all just a fantasy! I can prove you wrong again! This time, with the machines that are big enough to do the things I said before!" Luke said with excitement.

'Lord Luke is excited about this, but I can't stop speculating about this. I mean, how can water and coal do all that?' Arnold thought.

He followed Luke to another room in the basement.

There was the machine that Luke had ordered 2 years ago. As of right now, there are only 3 of them. It took a very long time for the blacksmiths to do since they not only had to create printing machines, but also armor, weapons, and farm tools. 

"I had it filled up with coal, just look how fast those wheels rotate! It's much faster than any carriages there are," Luke said with a smirk, smacking a small flame with his magic.

And within a few moments, a huge amount of smoke and steam started to come out, the wheels started to slowly accelerate, and in a few seconds, it was rotating very fast, signifying its speed.

Arnold's eyes widened at what he saw.

"If we create better versions of this, it can go faster and carry more load! But the only problem is that we have to create a huge network of tracks, which would require a lot of steel and wood to make. It would take about a year or so if we try to gather the resources ourselves," Luke said.

"But what about the huge reserve of steel you ordered to create?" Arnold asked.

"It's not close to being enough. We need more iron and other minerals. We must get more people into blacksmithing and mining. We should have only a few take care of farming, whilst others should do more economic activities such as manufacturing," Luke replied.

"TCH! Why didn't I think of this?" Luke shouted.

"Huh?" Arnold looked at Luke questioningly.

"Oh, I thought, how can we use steam to power printers. I can think of something which can beat the current printing machines by hundreds of times," Luke said.

"But the problem would be creating the dye. We can use coal and thinly made wheat paste to make the dye, but it would take a few tries to make the correct type of ink… I will think of the design for the machine first and try testing the different types of ink afterwards," Luke said to himself in deep thought.

"Alright, now let's get on with our work. I plan on selling some of the royal jewelry, which holds no historical value. This way we can secure some funding to get more people into blacksmithing," Luke said.

"Yes, that does sound like a good plan," Arnold replied.

"Also, what should we do about the land we confiscated?" Luke asked.

Not many buyers were there since Aqlasia didn't have many rich people, and people didn't know what buying land would entail.

"Why don't we give it to the people who join the mining and blacksmithing sectors? This way, we won't have to really dig into our cash reserves. We can give the land upfront so the worker's family can start working there and earn cash whilst the miner or blacksmith will be working for the allotted period," Arnold suggested.

"That's a good idea! We will also exempt them from any property tax for a small period! But we should also make sure that they don't sell off that land, since it is not completely theirs until they complete their contract." Luke replied, adding his inputs.

"That can be done. I will draw up the contract and send it to the printing press." Arnold replied.

"Good," Luke said, leaving the room.

A few weeks passed, and there was a lot of progress made with the first-ever steam-powered printing machine. The first tracks for the railway system were laid out as well.

At the Cabinet meeting room,

"We need to increase our food production. I'd say we build an artificial water channel sourced from the River Prusso to various farmlands. This way, there would be a constant water supply to these regions, increasing the yield of the crops," Luke suggested.

"That can be done, but from what I hear, the Hindiria are building a dam on the river Samrao. This will cut the water coming to us by about 30%," The Duchess of Velmyr, Serena Erlyn, replied.

"Oh, then in that case, we will try using water sourced from here to help supply water to the farms. Also, I need you to start mining the iron on a huge scale, it doesn't matter if we deplete it. I need a lot of iron for a mega-scale project," Luke said.

"Also, I will be selling all of our printing machines to our neighbouring kingdoms. We have made a special type of printing machine which can print about 20000 pages per day each, and we have about 4 of them," Luke continued, smirking at his audience's faces.

"I will be giving you all 6 months to start building the dam and the canal. And as an incentive for the people who work there, they will be getting farmland on which their family can work. And after they complete their contract, they will receive ownership of the land," Luke announced.

"And about official posts, people who pass certain exams will be the ones receiving the post. This way, qualified people will be doing the job," Luke continued.

"That can be done, my lord," Andrew Painne, the duke of Lumere, replied. 

"My Lord, our current reserves of money are running a bit low; the reserve we saved up is not enough to keep up with our high spending," Arnold remarked.

"Hmm, that is quite the problem. How much do we have left?" Luke asked.

"We have 9 thousand pounds of gold and 30000 pounds of silver," Arnold replied.

'Paper money is a good idea, but it is simply too early to introduce it since people won't accept it… Oh, I know a way!' Luke thought.

"I'd say we issue out IOUs. They are papers saying that the state owes them this amount of copper or silver, or gold. This way, we give worthless paper some value without drying up our reserves," Luke said.

"But what if the people don't accept it?" Serena asked/retorted.

"It's easy, we create a demand for it. You know, we are the ones primarily selling food to the people, right? Instead of accepting only copper or silver, we will accept IOUs; this way, we create value for it, but of course, we can't go printing a lot of it since the public might lose trust in it," Luke replied.

"What will the protective measures be for counterfeit IOUs?" Andrew asked.

"We will make a special type of ink and paper so it can't be counterfeited," Luke replied.

"Yes, that is a good idea, but how long will it take to make it?" Serena asked.

"It will take a few weeks for the alchemists to create the ink," Luke replied.

"Are there any other issues with your provinces?" Arnold asked.

"Yes, there is a lot of petty theft going around, and not to mention the number of bandits there are! It's very unsafe in my region!" Serena replied.

"Hmm, how many knights do we have now?" Luke asked Arnold.

"We have around 12000 knights, my lord," Arnold replied.

"That's not enough, alright, I will be recruiting from all the provinces for a new subdivision of the government, policing. The police force will be tasked with protecting the innocent and arresting criminals. We will be transferring a few of the knights who are good instructors to that part of the government. They will teach the recruits to enforce the law. And on the topic of the law, I have amended it and printed it out, and made a book out of it. This way, there is a proper set of rules for people to follow and not break any rules they didn't even know existed," Luke replied.

"A whole book? Isn't that a bit too much?" Harland Kiper, the duke of Armonia, asked with a bit of hesitation.

"No, it isn't, I don't want any loopholes to exist which someone can exploit. I will also be creating a proper courtroom with a judge and lawyers, which people can hire or receive for free from the country, so people can get the representation they deserve." Luke replied.

"Well, we will try our best to implement it." Harland replied.

"Good, now, let's talk about our relation with the Ghoslian Empire," Luke said.

"They aren't our allies, but they are not our enemies as well. From our spies, they don't plan on attacking us anytime soon," Arnold replied.

"What resources do they have the most? And are they exporting it?" Luke asked.

"They are quite abundant in copper, iron, and coal," Harland replied.

"Hmm, how much does one tonne of coal cost there?" Luke asked.

"It's quite cheap there. Last time I checked, it was about 50 grams of copper for 1 tonne of coal," Harland replied.

Luke's eyes widened with greed.

"Alright, we have to make sure we get as much coal as possible. This way, we can ensure that we don't have to spend too much manpower in mining coal." Luke said.

"Yes, that is wise. The cost of iron there is more expensive than it is here. We are better off mining iron ourselves than importing it," Arnold replied.

"Good, we will try getting our railway system up and running as soon as possible. This way, we can ensure a constant supply of materials throughout the country," Luke announced.