Wrecking Fantasy with Technology

The Country of Eruchea:-

Harry could see the excitement on their faces.

He had chosen them at random since their house was only 10 minutes by carriage from the farmer’s place.

Harry could see from his surroundings that this family wasn’t that well-off.

But these guys were perfect candidates for starting a paper-making industry.

That’s because they mainly managed to collect smaller trees and branches that couldn’t be sold well in the market since their major use was only as firewood and most people already had more than enough firewood for the season.

So, they couldn’t sell much and seemed to have a large stock of wood kept right outside their house.

And this stock was perfect for making paper!

“So, what do you say?”

Harry said as he looked at their astonished faces.

“Y-y-your M-m-majesty, we would love to do something to earn more. But why choose us? Why not go to some bigger lumberjack family and work with them?”, said a middle-aged man who seemed to be the head of the family.

The family consisted of just an old couple along with their young son, his wife and one child.

Harry thought for a moment before answering.

He felt that he should at least try to make his random pick seem not so random.

“So, um, the thing is that I am going around the country trying to improve the living and working conditions of my citizens. Yeah, that’s it.

I was going for a better lumberjack family initially.

But then I noticed you guys! And I felt that it was better to help the poor citizens improve before making the rich people richer…

So, yeah, that’s why I’m here and not somewhere else.”

Harry’s quickly cobbled-together reasoning seemed to satisfy the man.

“All right, now back to the main topic! Do you guys agree or should I go to someone else?”

“O-of course your majesty! Why wouldn’t we?”

The young man excited replied before his father could open his mouth.

Harry could feel their eagerness to work.

“So, you guys remember the usual expensive parchments, right? The animal skin ones?”

“Yes, your majesty. We don’t have any on us, but we have seen them on the notice boards once in a while.”, answered the old man.

“Oh good! Anyways, I plan on replacing it with a new product that I thought up of!

I am calling it ‘Paper’!”

“Paper?”

“Yes, paper. It will be a cheaper and better-quality version of the parchments. But it will be made of plants and not animals.”

“Forgive me for asking, your majesty. But how can we make parchment from plants? The soft plants are very thin and the thick ones are very hard. How can those be converted into parchment, which is supposed to be soft and flexible?”

Harry looked at the young woman who said this.

‘I thought that women might be forced to be more submissive here. Turns out that I was wrong about this one!’

“Oh, no, no, no worries about that. Asking questions is a good thing. Don’t ever hesitate from asking questions, otherwise, you won’t be able to grow in life.

What’s your name?

Oh, it’s Brittney? What a wonderful name!

Okay, so Brittney, as for the answer to your question, you are somewhat correct in your thinking.

The softer plants are very thin and pretty unusable while the thicker ones are very hard.

Normally, we won’t be able to make anything like parchment from this stuff, unless you want to make a stiff wooden board.

Weaving can be a solution for this. You, know, just like how baskets are woven, you can weave a parchment from wood fibres.

But, honestly speaking, I find that to be too much of a hassle, no?

Anyways, what I plan on doing is melting the wood and then shaping it like parchments.”

“Melting wood, your majesty? I have heard of melting metal and melting candle wax, but how can we melt wood? Won’t it just burn up?”

This time it was Brittney’s husband who asked.

“Yeah, of course, it definitely would. Sorry about my wrong wording.

What I meant to say was, the small bits of wood will be boiled in water till it turns into a liquidy pulp.

Then, all you need to do is spread the syrup on a board, press on it to remove most of the water and leave it out in the sun to dry.

That’s it! I mean, some more steps can be added, but just doing this much would still give you a pretty satisfactory result.”

The entire family looked a bit confused.

When they thought about the time and energy it took for making the regular parchment, the steps for making this paper seemed unrealistically simple.

The process of making just one sheet of animal-skin parchment was so time-consuming, taking days to weeks just to make a single one, that their prices were something that people like them could not afford.

Even the ones on the notice board were rare.

The royalty rarely put notices on the notice board and usually made public announcements instead.

This saved a lot of money on the parchments and since most people in the country were completely illiterate, there was no use in putting up written notices when barely anyone could read them in the first place.

And compared to that ultra-expensive parchment, this “paper” thing felt like it could be made with a snap of their fingers and also could be sold for high prices.

“Really!? It’s that simple!?

Your majesty, you didn’t even have to ask us about this!

Even if it was an order, we would happily follow it! This new ‘paper’ feels like a blessing for a family like ours!”

The old man was getting very excited thinking about all the extra income they would get from this.

Harry stayed there for a total of an hour and also showed them how the initial wood-processing was to be done.

The family was a bit hesitant when they heard the king wanting to do such physical labour, but they eventually agreed to sit and watch after Harry spent some time convincing them.

And just as Harry was done showing how to spread the wood pulp on a board and extract water from it, his carriage driver came and asked him about leaving.

‘What, it’s 8 already!? I completely lost track of time!

I need to leave now to get back by dinner time! Otherwise, Qing will eat me for dinner!

And I’ve taken up a lot of the time of this family as well!’

Harry quickly rushed out of the house towards his carriage while continuously apologising to Brittney and her family.

If Harry ran at top speed, it wouldn’t take even a minute for him to return.

But since he was in the middle of a country right now and not in the wilderness, it wouldn’t look good.

Plus, it was pretty late and he didn’t want people to see their king running like that at such a time.

Finally, he reached the palace at 9 at night, only to find Qing waiting for him looking like a demon.

“ELDER BROTHER HARRY!! Why in the world do you have to stay out so late!?

I have one brother who doesn’t seem to be too useful and the other seems to try and be so useful that he turns useless! What is my luck!?

Now get in here and have your dinner before I come over to you!!!!”

Gulp.

Harry could only follow what she said.

‘Even though I’m so much stronger than her, I’m still having this horrible feeling that if I don’t do as she said right now, I might end up dying…

Women are one heck of scary creatures! I better start running!’

This time, Harry ran inside at top speed and went straight to the dining hall before doing anything else.

Just as he entered, he noticed someone rush by too fast for even him to look at and saw a person already sitting on the opposite chair.

It was Qing. Sitting there with a big sweet smile on her face.

‘B-b-but she was just at the door, so how can she already be here!?

I don’t remember her being this strong!!

I feel like all laws of physics, science and even reality are being ripped to shreds right now!’

However, Harry decided not to let any of these thoughts leak out of his heart.

He couldn’t risk making the situation any worse than it already was.

So, he quickly ate his dinner silently at lightning speed and rushed over to his bedroom after declaring that he was going to bed.

The next morning, Harry woke up early and went to check on Qing and Shin.

Just as he stepped out of the room, he noticed Qing also coming out from hers.

It seemed that she had woken up and was going for her bath as well.

“Ah! Good morning elder brother Harry!”

“Morning! So, your brother still asleep?”

“Ah, yes. Elder brother does seem to like his sleep.”

“Say, Qing, did you have like some sort of breakthrough or anything like that recently?”, Harry asked with a lot of hesitation.

“No, elder brother Harry. I’m still at the peak of the mortal realm. I mean, there isn’t much qi in this place in the first place. It even takes hours just to refill any qi I use up, so cultivating further is pretty impossible right now.

Why do you ask?”

Qing seemed to be legitimately confused.

“U-uh, it’s nothing! Just thought I’ll check up on your progress once in a while.

That’s all!”, Harry said as he tried to hide his original thoughts.

“Oh, is that so? How thoughtful of you.

Anyways, I’ll be going for a bath now.

Ah, and if you were wondering about last night, that won’t happen again as long as you come home on time, okay?”

She made a very sweet looking smile as she said the last line.

But Harry couldn’t help but feel a shiver run down his spine.

‘I’ll have to be careful about it from now on…’

Harry thought as he went for his bath.

By the time he was done, he noticed Shin also coming into the bath.

“Hey Harry, please come home early from now on, okay?”

Shin said to Harry in the brief second they met at the door.

He looked pretty traumatised.

‘Uuhhh…

‘I guess I’ll really have to start paying attention to my schedule.

Otherwise, Qing might end up taking both our lives.’

As Harry made his way to his office, he kept greeting any servants and maids he met along the way.

Judging from their reactions, it seemed that being greeted by their king was not a normal occurrence for the palace’s servants.

Harry smiled as he walked into his office while thinking about this.

But his smile quickly turned upside down when he saw the huge stack of papers on his desk.

‘All those protagonists in isekai novels make it seem so easy!

And here I am slaving away signing papers!’

Harry felt like crying.

The only good thing that he could think up of was that he wouldn’t need to finish all of this in a day only.

He still had months left to solve many of the issues kept on his table.

Sitting down at his desk, Harry looked out of the window towards the military barracks.

He could see the soldiers running.

One guy seemed to be standing in the middle of the area.

Harry guessed that it might be George, his General. But since everyone looked like ants from this distance, he couldn’t be sure.

Harry kept looking outside for a little while before beginning his work.

“Let’s see here…

Domestic fighting… I can make Qing or Shin deal with this one…

Water problems… Ummm, I’ll probably need to contact the masonry group or whatever to dig a new well…

Next on the list is, wall repairs… hmm, I think I’ll need to look into cement for this one. Once they learn that, things should get better.

Next… can be postponed for now…

This one too…

Oh, a brawl? Let’s just keep the two involved in the dungeons for a month. That should be an appropriate punishment.

Wait, what’s with this letter?”

Harry looked at the somewhat fancy-looking letter in his hands.

It had been there since before Harry became king.

Curious, Harry decided to read its contents.

“Respected king… Uh-huh

Yeah… uh-huh… uh-huh… ore trade?

Okay… so, it’s a monthly thing…

What else is written…? We thank you for… yeah, that the standard stuff…

The sender’s called Ma Liang…

So, where’s this from…? The demon continent!? How!?”

The letter was about a monthly ore export done by the previous king.

This was pretty normal if you thought about it.

But the only thing very strange was that the letter was from the demon continent of all places!

That place was on the opposite side of the world from Harry’s current location!

It would have made sense if the letter was from some nearby kingdom or even from somewhere in Malonia or Wangxiu.

‘Okay, okay, no use freaking out about this.

We’re probably exporting some part of the little amounts of ores we manage to gather.

And since this seems to be a long ongoing thing, the demons probably wouldn’t harm anyone either.

The only thing that I have to do is to maintain that flow of cash from the demons.

Maybe once other industries start, I can even use the demons’ country as a potential market!

So, lemme just check when’s the meeting date...’

Harry thought to himself as he looked at the letter in his hands.

‘Today!? I gotta prepare quickly!’

“Hey Qing, Shin, prep up! We might be having guests today! And don’t worry, this time they won’t hurt us! Probably…”

Harry shouted out as he himself went to change into something a bit more presentable than his usual work clothes.