Fred and George met up with Director Jay, they discussed the guns factory, “They would need quite a lot of those lathes, Fred, that would speed up the barrels, right now those are the hardest pieces to produce and with the test firing that’s been done, they are the first part to suffer wear and tear.”

“I was thinking that, is there any problems with it?”

“Well apart from producing the devices, power as well, I assigned a team for Research and development as you asked, but there is only so much they can squeeze out of the water wheels.”

Fred thought for a minute, “Can I have some paper.” Fred was handed a piece of paper and drew a diagram. “you’ve seen the firebricks for the furnaces, right?”

“Yeah”

“Right, see this picture, there is a furnace at the bottom left, on top of that is a metal boiler with a piston on it,”

“Piston?”

“It works the same way as the guns, the outer tube is the barrel, but instead of a bullet, there is a stick, this stick is attached to one end of a crossbeam, which is connected to what is called a flywheel on the other end.”

“Right, what does this do?”

“As the piston goes up, the flywheel is spun, when the piston reaches the top, it opens up the exhaust, allowing the gas to escape, this creates a vacuum or a space with no air, this pulls the piston down again, allowing the flywheel to rotate once.” Fred was showing him the Watt steam engine.

“The boiler you fill with water, as the water heats it turns to steam, which expands, pushing the piston up,” Fred continued and went into more depth until Jay was satisfied. “Try and create one for the gun factory as soon as possible. I’ll draw you the schematics for each part.”

“How much power are we talking about here?”

“This design, about 30 times that of the water wheel.”

“30 Times!?”

“O but that’s running of the burning of coal, if we can get coal, that’s fine, but if its cheaper to use fire crystals do that.”

Fred took about two hours at the office drawing the schematics, and handed them over to Jay, “put all your effort into making two of these, even if it means halting other projects.”

“I will, Young Master.”

Fred walked out of the office with George, “Welcome to the industrial revolution.”

“Revolution, are we overthrowing someone?”

“Perhaps, but that hasn’t got anything to do with an industrial revolution.”

They got in the carriages.

“Although, it may end in a war with the crafters guild, like last time.”

“Bloody hell, could we win such a thing?”

“With an industrial revolution, absolutely. The industrial revolution was my favourite period to read about in the old world, so I should have an advantage as an ‘armchair general’.”

“Armchair general?”

“Simulate a historical battle in your mind, as if you were the general with the knowledge from post-war. Like what would you have done differently during the incursion to the metal mine, now you knew what would happen.”

“I see.”

“Plus, the industrial revolution didn’t need to fight back, its momentum was too strong. You only needed a few greedy craftsmen to fight a whole army of craftsmen.”

___

They got back to the castle.

“What do we do with Percy?”

“We ransom him,”

“Do we know why he tried to capture me?”

“Petty revenge, right?”

“Wouldn’t he want to just kill me; it would have been less risky.”

“Shall we go and ask?”

They went to find Percy, who was in the lounge, with Isabella. “Why isn’t he in the dungeon?” Fred asked walking in.

“Don’t you have any etiquette training? Such an uncouth bastard.”

“I can put you in my dungeon, I usually only imprison rats for experimentation, but it would improve my skills to try a human.”

Percy paled at this, what experiments, was this kid a mad man. “You experiment on humans.”

“Dumb ass did I not convey you would be my first? Also, is anyone going to answer my other question?”

“Silly, it’s noble etiquette to treat noble prisoners as guests,” Isabella answered him.

Fred looked at Percy for a really long time, “… damn it, I thought I might be able to have a human test subject for once.”

Percy squirmed at this; he couldn’t tell if Fred was joking.

“But to think you went to all that trouble just for petty revenge Percy, I used to think highly of you. Tsk, tsk, tsk” Fred finally sat down with George,

George was confused, wasn’t Fred the one who thought this wasn’t the reason.

“You… you, think I would go to so much trouble for petty revenge.”

“So, you didn’t attack the city just to give yourself a chance to exact your perry revenge, I’m not convinced.”

“We didn’t attack the city.”

“Sure.”

“We didn’t, we were escaping too. We just thought we could capture you in the confusion.”

“Capture me. Are you into experimenting on humans, Percy?”

“No, I’m not like you. Don’t throw me in the same boat, I have standards.”

“Then why?”

“Why?... look around you, this town, we don’t even need to plant spies in your town, the merchants are all yapping about the changes to this place. When we investigated, You were at the centre of everything. The steel… complex. The two types of wine and that vod… vod… voda.”

“Vodka.”

“Exactly, even the tax decrease has you at the centre, we aren’t dumb, and your textiles workshops are opening up. You wouldn’t do that if you didn’t believe you could make a profit from it.”

“Who knows, maybe I’m a philanthropist?”

“A what?”

“Never mind.”

“We know you have some sort of special or lost knowledge.”

“You wanted me to cough it up.”

“Your county is now the richest county on the island, we are already suffering financially from your tax cuts.”

“Ooo, nice” Fred turned to the others, “Look, look, and you all thought I was mad. It’s already working.”

George and Isabella just facepalmed.

“Wait, why don’t you just lower the taxes to compete with me.”

“There are too many problems with that. And it’s just easier to force you into increasing your taxes.”

“Ok, So, what now, I say we keep him indefinitely, as soon as his family gives up on him, I’ll be able to do my experiments,” Fred said while getting up to leave, followed by George.

“They will never give up on me, do you know who my dad is…”

“Yeah, yeah, you told me before… I got nothing, obviously, he wasn’t important.” Before he left, he turned to the two guards, “If he even looks at my mother funnily, bring him down to my dungeon.”

The two guards nodded.

When they were partway down the hall, George turned to Fred and asked, “Were you really going to experiment on him.”

“Of course not, it was just funny to mess with him. He didn’t even know what these experiments were, and yet he immediately went pale.” Fred had a good laugh when a scout came running over.

“Report,” George ordered.

“For private eyes only.”

Fred and George’s face turned grim; they quickly escorted the scout to a private room.

“Speak.”

“We discovered scouts in our area, Thomas’s area and Escroquer and signs of a build-up of forces in the towns of Normandy bordering us, although recently the forces seemed to have shrunk.

“How many days have they started to shrink their forces,” Fred asked.

“About 2-3 days ago.”

Fred turned to George “That coincides with their last chance to get Percy back. Delay negotiations with Normandy as much as possible, we need to prepare.”

“We can stall for about 3 months.”

“How’s the fort?”

“The fort and walls are complete.”

“Alright, how many men have we got?”

“At the moment 2000, here and 500 stationed in forts.”

“Alright brink 200 men from the forts,” He turned to the scout. “Inform Thomas and Escroquer of this, and tell them to relocate to this town, it’s easier to defend and our forces will be united.”

“Is it wise leaving those lands undefended?”

“If he plans on attacking us, then he will engage us, we can retake land after the battle.” He turned back to the scout “tell them to collapse the mines, we can dig them out afterwards,”

“it’s hard to reopen mines. Are you sure?” George asked.

“Yes, I have a method for that.”

The scout left to carry out his mission.

“Start recruiting archers and artillerymen. We need those cannons on the walls but leave 6 off, we can use them for our reconquest.”

___

3 weeks went by, and Fred got news of the first steam engine being installed. It was a lot faster than he thought, he believed it would take a good 6 months.

When he went back to the gun factory, they had created 12 more muskets, even just changing to Fred’s work layout showed significant results, last time the factory had a month to produce 7.

“So, this is it, huh?” Fred asked Jay,

“Yes, young master, we manage to install a few lathes as well that we had in storage.”

“Were they not in use, I thought they would be in demand?”

“They are, the water wheels just can’t cut it.”

“I see,” Fred rubbed his chin, “How high is the demand, or the demand for tools in general.”

“Extremely high, we are progressing too fast.”

“Alright, I need two more steam engines, also try and open up another musket factory, we need to double production. We are expecting conflict within two to four months.”

“I’ll get on that sire.”

“Also, when things calm down, open a workshop for just tools.”

___

When they got back to the castle one of the merchants from the merchant’s guild was waiting for them in the castle lounge.

“Good evening, young master Fred,”

“Good evening, have you come to discuss the proposals from last September or a new business proposal.”

The merchant looked confused at Fred’s question.

“Fred, this is Dominic, although he is part of the merchant’s guild, the merchant’s guild is split into many factions, each usually associated with a duchy or political faction.” Isabella introduced.

“I see.”

“And Dominic is on the Aquitaine faction, and he also acts as our informants for political news.”

“I see, I see.”

Dominic chuckled, “You’re entering into the big game now young master, let me warn you, the rewards you wish to play for, come with an equally dangerous risk.”

“Yes,” Fred needed time to sink in, he would be getting involved with big players now and school fights are a thing of the past.

“So, what have you got for us, Dominic?” George asked.

“Well two major news have come out from the Ludnus incident, news of Ludnus is starting to leak.”

“Go on,”

“Prince Arthur, Duke of Albion is dead.”

“What?”

“Eyewitnesses claim he was trying to protect an injured older lookalike while he fled.”

“Was it the king, it would make sense for him to hide with his brother.”

“The eyewitnesses couldn’t confirm, they hadn’t seen the king before. But the attacking troops fought in the style of north Germania. The lands that have recently been conquered by the empire and Burgundy.” Dominic recounted.

“So, either of them could have done it,” Isabella asked.

“Well, my bet is with Burgundy, but there is no proof.”

“Why burgundy?”

“Do you not know, its big news on the mainland, Burgundy declared its independence, with the Rhine colony and its union over the Lowland Duchies as well as savoy, they have formed their own kingdom, the kingdom of Lothringia.”

The room went silent with shock.

“Wait I thought they were supporting the 3rd prince,” Fred asked.

Dominic chuckled. “It looks like the young master has not heard much about the 3rd prince, he was a wastrel and probably had the lowest chances of becoming king.”

“Are we at war with Burgundy then.”

“Well, the crown is technically, but the king is absent, and the other duchies won’t get involved without a king.”

“Is Lothringia attacking the central lands?”

“No, they’ve gone south into North Graecia. They are fighting for control over piedmont, Lombardy Po valley and Valencia, while the duchies won’t try and bring them back under Franconia without the king, they won’t let Burgundy enter the central land.”

“They are fighting an entire empire.”

“No, the empire is a federation of loose duchies and counties, who elect one of the duchies to Emperor every generation. It is only the greater duchies of Austria and Bavaria that are fighting Lothringia.”

“I see,”

“And for the last piece of news, Derek, Percy’s cousin has claimed the title of Prince of Albion. He started besieging Ludnus two days ago, however, if he wants to keep the title when the king comes back, he will have to conquer the western side.”

“That would be us,” Fred responded.

“Yes, the mainland family is sending troops over to boost up your forces, however, they can only spare 500 men.”

“How are they doing with the dwarven mines in Iberia.”

“Conflict has started with the Aragonites last week, but the armour and your new crossbows and ballista are giving Castilian a huge advantage.”

“What about conflicts on the mainland?”

“None yet. Toulouse joined the scramble for north Graecia, they have troops in the Tuscany area, bordering the Eastern Heavenly Empire. This may drag them into the conflict as the north Graecia lands are inhabited by high elven republics.”

___

After the meeting with Dominic, Fred sent a letter to Director Jay, with a design for grapeshot rounds, for the cannons. There was not much he could do in the meantime.

Later that night Fred was having dinner with Isabella and George,

“I was thinking, if we are going to go into conflicts with eastern Albion, I should challenge this Derek for the title.”

“That’s quite risky, you would be angering the king, as it was his brother’s title,” Isabella said.

“I’m not claiming the title, I’m merely stating that I would be a better candidate than Derek for the title. It can cause instability for his claim.”

“I see, but we would have to do it now, if we waited too long it would lose its effect, however, we would be starting the war faster.”

“We don’t need to start the war; he just has to get rid of me to keep the title. If we conquer all of south Albion, we might be able to keep the title ourselves.”

And so, Fred shocked Franconia with the proclamation, it was doubly insulting for Derek as an 11-year-old was challenging him.

Thomas and Baran Charles from Escroquer entered the city a week after the meeting with Dominic. They had brought all of their people and Soldiers to Poilutonne. Furthermore, Earl Daniels had shown up, Isabella’s Brother, with 200 troops, and news of 300 more on the way.