American: Native Empire

Chapter 64: Steam Engine. 

Kim Kiwoo had countless followers in the empire.

And as time passed, this tendency became even stronger.

It was inevitable.

No one could escape the flow of time, but Kim Kiwoo’s appearance did not change at all.

Thanks to that, it was hard to find any imperial citizens who doubted the existence of spirits within the mainland.

And beyond following, there were quite a few imperial citizens who would unconditionally obey Kim Kiwoo’s words and actions.

Sharp Teeth was one of them.

The only special thing about him was that he was an intellectual who had enemies at the imperial college.

Then one day.

A piece of news reached his ears.

“A hydraulic spinning machine?”

“That’s right. You must have heard that many craftsmen are trying to make one.”

“They made it already?”

It was the news of the development of a hydraulic spinning machine.

“Aren’t you curious what it looks like? Let’s go see it together.”

Sharp Teeth nodded his head at his colleague’s suggestion.

He also wanted to see how the hydraulic spinning machine worked.

After that, the news of the development of the hydraulic spinning machine stirred up the empire.

Then, many people flocked to the textile factory to see the hydraulic spinning machine.

“Haha. If we’re not careful, we might get crushed by the crowd.”

“It’s amazing.”

Sharp Teeth exclaimed at the huge crowd.

Because there were so many people, it took longer to see the hydraulic spinning machine in action.

But Sharp Teeth waited patiently.

And his waiting was not in vain.

“Huh…”

“Is this really a machine in reality?”

“…”

Sharp Teeth stared blankly at the thread that kept coming out.

He heard the explanation of the textile factory staff and the admiration of the surrounding imperial citizens, but he couldn’t pay attention to any of those sounds.

The ability of the hydraulic spinning machine was that shocking.

‘It’s really going as His Majesty said.’

Sharp Teeth had engraved most of His Majesty’s words deep in his heart.

He looked at the rapidly spinning hydraulic spinning machine and recalled one of His Majesty’s sayings.

It was when His Majesty was in the Black Sky, and he spoke to Master Black Mud, who was then the head of industrial engineering.

We have learned to use water wheels to harness the power of flowing water, and over time, many more ways to use it will appear.

Because human curiosity is endless.

‘Has His Majesty’s words come true again?’

Look, just by putting in cotton, that thread comes out at a constant and fast speed!

The quality is better than the thread that went through human hands, and it doesn’t require much manpower either.

That meant that the textile factory didn’t need as many workers as it did now.

And…

‘This won’t be the end.’

What if other countless tasks start to be replaced by machines like this?

Then, cheap and high-quality industrial products will pour out without much labor cost.

He imagined a world where everything was run by machines in his head.

***

After seeing the hydraulic spinning machine.

Sharp Teeth returned to the imperial college.

And he immersed himself in his research again.

Finally, he saw tangible results in front of him.

He had been working on this research for over ten years now.

Sometimes people looked at Sharp Teeth’s research and said pessimistically,

“Do you really think that will work?”

“It seems like a too vague research topic.”

But Sharp Teeth never wavered for a moment.

He just quietly moved forward with his colleagues who shared his goal.

Because he had confidence.

Confidence in the outcome?

No.

The confidence that Sharp Teeth and his colleagues had was that His Majesty would never say anything wrong.

In the Black Sky, His Majesty said,

‘Not only water power, but we can also get power from many phenomena in nature.’

One of the examples he gave was turning heat into power.

His Majesty’s words were the truth.

That meant, just like water, heat could also be used as a source of power.

There must have been a reason why His Majesty specifically mentioned heat to the Black Mud Teacher.

He trusted him without doubt.

‘I will surely realize the truth that His Majesty bestowed upon me with these two hands.’

To achieve that, he devoted himself to studying how to convert heat into power after entering the university.

“I want to join you.”

Moreover, scholars who shared his vision joined him one after another.

But their research was stuck in a deadlock for a long time.

They had no clue how to turn heat into power.

To obtain power, there had to be a tangible flow of force like a waterwheel or a windmill, but heat did not show such a thing.

Time passed by mercilessly.

“…I will stop here. I can’t continue this hopeless research.”

“Thank you for your hard work.”

Some of his colleagues left.

He did not blame or stop them.

It was their choice.

Also, it was their responsibility to miss out on the glory that would follow when he realized the truth that His Majesty spoke of.

They would surely regret this moment in the future.

He believed so.

Then one day.

He had a brilliant idea.

It was an inevitable discovery.

He always paid attention to all the phenomena that changed due to heat.

So he was able to relate it to power when he saw the heavy lid of a boiling pot being lifted by the steam.

“It’s the pot!”

“…What?”

He ran excitedly towards his colleagues, unable to hide his excitement.

And he explained his hypothesis to them.

“Have you ever seen the lid of a pot moving?”

“Of course.”

“How do you think such a heavy lid moved? It’s because of the steam that evaporates with full of heat! What if we can use this power of steam as power?”

“…Indeed.”

“Hmm. It seems worth trying.”

That’s when the effort to use steam began.

Of course, it was not smooth.

The biggest problem was making a device that could use steam.

It had to be solid and not vulnerable to heat, so iron had to be used naturally.

But there could not be any gaps in this device.

Because it used steam.

That meant it required very sophisticated technology.

Otherwise…

Bang!

“Aaaah! Aaah!”

A huge accident could happen.

During the experiment, due to a moment of carelessness, one of his colleague’s legs was crushed halfway.

They realized how scary this device was.

The power of steam was much stronger than they thought.

But at the same time, he was sure.

If he could use this tremendous power properly…

‘I will get a much more powerful source of power than now.’

It would be far superior to a waterwheel.

More importantly, it could be used anywhere unlike a waterwheel.

It did not have to be near a river.

This would drastically change the current industrial situation.

By his own hands.

***

Kim Ki-woo stopped his work and hurriedly headed to the palace.

He heard that his grandson was born.

When he arrived at the palace,

One of the inner officials ran towards him.

“Your Majesty!”

“How is the condition?”

“It’s a healthy boy. Both the mother and the child are well.”

“Really? Phew…”

Kim Kiwoo finally breathed a sigh of relief.

The worst-case scenario he had anticipated did not happen.

When they arrived near the destination.

“You’re here.”

Deep Lake greeted Kim Kiwoo.

“You’ve worked really hard.”

Kim Kiwoo hugged Deep Lake tightly.

She had been very attentive and caring since the crown princess became pregnant.

“No, I just did what I had to do as a mother.”

“You’re still the same. Let’s go inside.”

Kim Kiwoo entered the delivery room with Deep Lake.

There, the crown prince and his wife welcomed Kim Kiwoo.

“Father!”

“Your Majesty.”

“Ah, don’t try to get up unnecessarily.”

“But…”

“Just rest comfortably.”

“…Yes.”

After stopping the crown princess from trying to rise forcibly, Kim Kiwoo approached his grandson.

He was very wrinkled, having just come out of the world.

He seemed to have cried himself to sleep, as he was sleeping soundly.

“Why don’t you hold him?”

“Thank you.”

Sanpa carefully picked up the baby wrapped in a blanket and handed him to Kim Kiwoo.

Kim Kiwoo felt the sensation of holding a newborn after a long time.

He had not had any more children after his fifth daughter, so this was his first grandson in eight years.

Of course, this time it was not his child, but his grandson.

‘The empress is also getting old.’

The empress was already forty-five years old.

She was already old when she gave birth to her youngest daughter eight years ago.

She was not in a condition to have any more children.

There were countless wrinkles on her beautiful face.

Kim Kiwoo felt a bitter taste in his mouth again when he saw her.

But today was the day his first grandson was born.

This was undoubtedly a great joy for not only his family, but also the empire.

Kim Kiwoo quickly shook off the bad feelings.

“Haha. He’s really handsome. Who does he look like?”

“Who does he look like? Of course he looks like me.”

“To my eyes, he seems to resemble our lovely crown princess.”

“As expected, father knows how beautiful my wife is.”

As he said that, he gently held his wife’s hand.

They looked at each other with deep love in their eyes.

They were a couple who married for love, not for political reasons, so their relationship was known to be good.

Kim Kiwoo never intended to force his children to marry someone they didn’t want to.

He had no reason to create powerful relatives, and he didn’t want to ask for more sacrifices from his children.

Of course, they enjoyed many benefits from being born as Kim Kiwoo’s children, but they also had many restrictions.

Kim Kiwoo stroked the face of the baby in his arms and wished in his heart.

‘You will have many difficulties in the future. I hope you can overcome them bravely like your father.’

He was born as the grandson of the empire, so he naturally had to bear a lot of weight.

That’s how Kim Kiwoo became a grandfather today.