-Something you have to do?
'Yeah.'
-What is it?
'Preemption.'
-Preempting what?
'People.'
At my words Velkarion's replies trailed longer and longer.
A reaction that showed he didn't quite understand.
'This is why shut-in types are hopeless.'
-Really, why bring that up again.......
'Think about it.'
-About what?
'I regressed, didn't I?'
-And?
'So what's the most powerful advantage I have right now?'
-What could that....... Ah, preemption!
Velkarion's voice rose as he belatedly caught my meaning.
This is why shut-in types are hopeless.
They know theory tremendously well but haven't a speck of practicality.
For someone who knows the future, how great a gain would it be to claim the talents and technologies of that future first?
A skull-head who hadn't thought of it despite having regressed alongside me a good while ago.
After a moment's silence Velkarion asked.
-What, no, whom do you mean to claim first?
'Guess. The great invention that had the largest impact on the continent in the history before the regression.'
-The largest impact on the continent? Uh....... Huh? Ah!
Velkarion couldn't get the words out and only made exclamations.
Then, seeming to settle himself, he shouted.
-The steam, the steam engine!
'You've got enough head on you for that much, at least.'
-Are you insulting a great Seventh Circle Lich?
'Yeah.'
-N-no.......
What? Why?
The present is the year 1323 of the Derond Calendar.
Mana engineering and the Mana Engine drive the world's machinery.
Before the regression, the invention of the steam engine brought immense change to the whole continent.
No. It was a revolution.
Scholars named it the Second Industrial Revolution.
The First Industrial Revolution was when the Mana Engine was invented.
The Mana Engine was the foundation for the Mana Train, mana automobiles, and all the other automated machines and giant war weapons.
But it had a fatal drawback.
The Mana Stone Blocks used as fuel were far too expensive.
So it became the preserve of the wealthy, a luxury item.
That various goods were still invented and released anyway was proof of how great the potential of that discipline, engineering, was.
What threw a massive shock into such a world was the steam engine.
It used a cheap raw material, coal, to move enormous machines like trains.
Factories once run on horses and waterwheels achieved a frightening degree of automation through the steam engine.
Read the words strictly and it's fair to say the true Industrial Revolution began not with the Mana Engine but with the invention of the steam engine.
'And the inventor of that steam engine?'
-Ah! Of course. Hez Payden! A collateral branch of Facial, isn't he?
The surname 'Payden' is bestowed on those pushed out of House Facial's succession contest.
I shook my head.
'Wrong.'
-What? That's not right, is it? The author of the paper in the engineering journal was definitely Hez Payden, wasn't it?
I shook my head.
'The actual inventor of the steam engine is a man named Newcomen Watt.'
-Uh.......
Even at my confident words, Velkarion didn't answer at once.
And after long deliberation he spoke.
-No. It was definitely Hez Payden.
'That's how the world knows it, yes. But in fact Hez Payden stole Newcomen Watt's invention.'
-Ack!
'I heard it from the witch before the regression, so it's certain.'
Chloe Facial had been enormously angry that a loser named Hez Payden had seized someone else's achievement.
She actually tried to expose the truth and set it right.
But House Facial was attacked right afterward, and the matter fizzled out.
So.
'This time I'll set it right.'
-But how?
'I'll bring Newcomen Watt in before he properly invents the steam engine.'
And not only Newcomen Watt.
I know the scholars and inventors who will greatly influence the world in the future.
I also know the powerful figures who will greatly influence the world.
Among them, the ones worth winning over to my side in advance.
Those are the ones I'll claim first.
And the first of them to bring in was Newcomen Watt.
Because the steam engine brought that terrifying a change to the whole continent.
-So where is this Newcomen Watt?
'For now he's probably running a general store near some coal mine, I'd guess?'
-You don't know where?
'Only roughly. I'll start looking now.'
-And how will you manage that?
'Hey, who am I right now?'
-Aizel....... no, Kalian Facial.
'Everything in this world can be solved by throwing money and manpower at it. And House Facial overflows with both.'
***
It took three days to escape the hellish muscle pain.
And.
'It really is effective.'
Mother's family, my maternal house, has a remarkable secret cultivation method.
Then again, Mother Lucia herself is a Fifth Circle martial artist.
The first thing I did after recovering was have dinner with Mother.
"Hnnn......."
As I sat waiting, someone came shuffling limply to the table.
It was Chloe Facial, wearing the most exhausted face in the world.
Chloe had clearly done the training in question too.
My muscle pain was gone, but my strength hadn't come back either.
Finally Mother sat at the table, and the evening feast began.
And an enormous quantity of dishes came up onto the table.
Before the regression, or more precisely before the House fell, I too was a person of House Renhardt.
I'd experienced lavish banquets to the point of tiring of them.
But this was excessive.
Three people at the table, and food enough for at least twenty with plenty left over.
Whether to call it luxury or waste.
Mother spoke.
"Let's begin."
The moment she finished, the maids serving the meal began portioning food out to us.
And then.
We ate.
We ate enormously.
We even ate with our noses buried in the table, ravenously.
Food went into our mouths without pause.
What is happening?
And it wasn't only me.
Mother, of course, and even Chloe, small in height and build, inhaled food at a tremendous rate.
-Wow, are you possessed by a hunger spirit? You're absolutely stuffing food into your mouth, huh?
'You've finally crossed the line. No talking for a month.'
-Ack! M-Master, that's so pett.......
'One more word and I'll make it two months.'
Having stopped Velkarion's mouth, I stopped my own with food.
If we ate at this rate, that enormous quantity was certainly not waste.
Nothing would be left over, so how could it be waste?
Checking the body's memories quickly, I understood.
This was part of the tempering process, an aftereffect of the secret cultivation method.
Brutally overworking the muscles, recovering with medicine and rest, and then this monstrous meal.
This was the final stage of the secret cultivation method.
Over-supplying nutrition to a body emptied out during rest.
The medicine that worked on the body during rest pushes that nutrition rapidly into the muscles.
"Hahaha, now that my youngest has raised his training intensity, nothing could be more delightful!"
Mother, Lucia, let out a hearty laugh and pushed a chunk of meat into her mouth.
Not a trace of a noble's elegant dining.
Of course, this is strictly limited to that particular training.
Normally she dines very elegantly.
Which, thought through in reverse, means Mother had done that secret training when I did.
Remarkable.
Mother's level is the Fifth Circle.
She might even reach the Sixth.
Before the regression I had no interest in other Houses' affairs, so I don't know the details.
I'll ask the skull-head later.
And so the meal ended.
Ah, so this is it.
Strange.
Overeat that much and normally your stomach is bloated and breathing is hard.
But not so.
Maybe it was my imagination, but my stomach felt light, and strength filled my whole body.
So in the end I had to save the talk I'd meant for dinner until teatime.
"Mother."
"Yes, my youngest."
Mother answered with not a trace of her ravenous state at dinner.
That doesn't mean she carried herself like a noblewoman.
In build and in character she was a born martial artist.
So she speaks with a knight's bold manner.
"Please take a look at this."
What I drew from my coat and handed over was none other than Neik's letter.
In House Facial, until a certain point the discipline and management of the children is entirely the mother's charge.
Right up until the Facial Succession Contest, or more precisely the 'Facial Heir Succession Contest,' begins.
So to go to Renhardt and be trained by Neik, I needed Mother's permission.
Mother tore open the envelope without hesitation and read the letter.
Then she looked at me with very calm eyes.
"Neik Renhardt."
Her voice was very hard.
Hoo!
I steadied my breath quickly.
I wanted that training badly, so I had to make my case properly.
"Yes, Mother. It's close to an alliance, but they are also a rival, so I wasn't sure how you would feel about my going there to train......."
"Is he only teaching you? Would he not consider teaching one more, even if they're a bit old?"
"Eh?"
What is this mother of mine saying?
"The strongest knight on the continent! The strongest man in all humanity, who may open the door of the Eighth Circle that they call humanity's limit. To be trained by such a man, honestly, your mother is dizzy with envy."
"Eh? Uh......."
Thoughts leapt about in my head and wouldn't sort themselves.
What did I just hear?
Come to think of it, weren't Mother's eyes different from the eyes I usually saw?
A powerful martial artist, a knight absorbed in extreme self-discipline, a strict mother.
Normally those were her eyes.
But now?
It was like looking at a teenage girl with honey dripping from her eyes at a handsome stage actor.
That was it.
Mother admired Neik Renhardt.
Which, thinking about it, is natural.
She herself was a powerful martial artist.
There's a certain qualifier that never attaches to Mother.
'For a woman.'
In a martial world made up almost entirely of men, a qualifier that follows women martial artists around like a tag.
But it doesn't attach to Mother.
Because she is treated, outside that category, as a complete martial artist in her own right.
So as a martial artist and a knight, admiring Neik Renhardt, said to be among humanity's strongest, is natural enough.
So I said firmly.
"I'll be the only one."
"Tch, stingy boy. Of course I permit it. The Three Great Houses exchange with one another and send their children to train often enough....... And above all, training under Neik Renhardt. But there is one condition."
"Please say it."
"You will keep up the secret cultivation method there as well."
A bleak feeling came over me.
Which means.......
"You mean I'm to put on that ravenous display of eating over there...... don't you?"
"That's your business."
Haa, my mother really is a strange person.
"In any case, you've given permission."
"Of course. So, when will you leave? Today, even?"
"N-no."
"Why delay? The sooner the training, the better."
"I'll go in half a year."
"Half a year?"
"Yes. There's something important I have to do first."
Mother tilted her head at my words.
"Something more important than Neik Renhardt's training. Your mother cannot believe it."
This was going to be hard to argue in a different way entirely.