Time to Become the God of Summer
???: Ahhh, so this is what they call an air conditioner. A machine that turns hot air into cool air. Heeeeee~~~~~~???
Power is like a living creature.
To survive, it constantly hunts prey to swell its own mass, then digests and excretes whatever it no longer needs.
In El Pandor Luntera, hundreds of families have been devoured by that very power.
A prime example is the Benthink family, which rose to sudden prominence during the great war seven years ago.
The Benthinks had long been known for their bountiful wheat harvests. In times of plenty they were nothing more than a baronial house, but when the war triggered a severe food shortage, their status skyrocketed.
The emperor promised massive rewards and bought their wheat at an exorbitant price.
On top of that, their longtime rivals, House Trosen, suffered a crushing defeat in battle and incurred the emperor’s wrath. The Benthinks absorbed the fallen house as an unexpected bonus.
A rural barony had transformed into a powerful county in the blink of an eye.
From that moment, the Benthinks became the hottest topic in high society.
Everyone scrambled to form marriage alliances, introducing their daughters to the family’s still-unmarried youngest son.
At the time, the Benthink family shone so brightly that even the great ducal houses took notice.
Behead the criminal Andersen Benthink.
Yet who could have predicted it?
That the brilliantly shining Benthink family would collapse in a single moment.
The root of the catastrophe was their youngest son.
Countless people had entertained the immature boy, offering their daughters, until he fell headfirst into luxury and hedonism.
In the end, he laid hands on a woman he should never have touched.
Convinced every woman in the world belonged to him, he got drunk on liquor and drugs, attended a social gathering, and committed the outrage of grabbing Isabella Graham from behind and groping her.
At that instant, Isabella felt unbearable humiliation. Her eyes turned pitch black.
She cast a high-grade curse on him.
The boy exploded into maniacal laughter, seized the steak knife in his hand, and went on a rampage, stabbing the daughter of a count family.
Right in her pregnant belly.
Fortunately, Isabella regained her senses in time and healed the woman. The mother survived, but the child was lost.
No matter how powerful the healing, anything short of Elena’s supreme-grade spells could not achieve a perfect cure.
After that, the Benthink family slid into ruin. The youngest son was beheaded, and the rest of the family surrendered their titles and fled into the mountains.
No one ever heard from them again.
They were digested.
But I, who knew even the game’s most obscure TMI, understood that the Benthinks had simply become another sacrifice to power.
Several houses that viewed them with jealousy had schemed to corrupt the youngest son and drag him into debauchery.
Of course, they never dreamed Andersen Benthink would actually molest Isabella.
They only wanted to tarnish the family’s honor a little; they had no idea they would hit such a massive jackpot.
Intentions aside, the jackpot had gone off. The Benthinks, reduced to prey for the nobility, were thoroughly consumed.
A rising star had become nothing but excrement.
In that sense, I now stood at the very center of power.
Irelia had already sought me out, and in a week the people from the archducal families would come to evaluate me under the pretext of an equipment demonstration.
On top of that, the faculty representing various noble houses would attend the same event to assess me—the one receiving sponsorship from both the princess and Elena.
Seven years ago it had been the Benthink family. This year, Edga Fix had caught the eye of power.
But I am no fool who will fall as easily as they did.
I have played this world for a long time. I know every last piece of the game’s hidden knowledge.
Therefore, the ones who will become prey are not me, but those who covet me.
For now I remain crouched, waiting for the right moment. But one day I will devour everyone who tries to harm me and climb to the top.
To do that, first…
“Air conditioner.”
I needed to build an air conditioner.
It was time to become the god of summer.
Thursday had come again.
It was time I could devote entirely to development.
I immediately shut myself inside the laboratory.
With the equipment demonstration set for Monday, I had to finish the air conditioner before then.
-Paat!
First, I decided to analyze its structure.
I activated the hologram, a sub-skill unlocked when my Engineering Thought reached Level 3.
Just like Fix, which came with Hand Skill Level 3, this hologram was one of the most broken abilities I possessed.
It let me see the inner workings of an air conditioner I hadn’t even built yet with perfect clarity.
“Hmm… Pretty much what I expected.”
Still, the hologram wasn’t omnipotent.
I needed to already understand the basic principles and structure of whatever I wanted to visualize.
Only then could I examine it in such detail.
Fortunately, I already knew exactly how air conditioners worked.
The system was split between an indoor unit that blew cool air and an outdoor unit that expelled hot air.
In essence, it stole heat from inside the room and dumped it outside.
So how did it steal that heat?
The answer was refrigerant.
The refrigerant flowed through an inverted-S-shaped pipe inside the indoor unit, absorbing the room’s heat and turning it into cool air.
Exactly like sweat in the human body.
When body temperature rises, we excrete sweat. That sweat absorbs heat from the skin and evaporates, cooling us down. The scientific term is latent heat of evaporation.
Our bodies exploit the phenomenon in which liquid absorbs heat and becomes gas.
It’s the same reason water sprayed on summer asphalt eventually disappears. It steals surrounding heat and evaporates into vapor.
That’s why the refrigerant flowing through the pipes is a liquid with exceptionally high latent heat of evaporation.
It robs the room of a ridiculous amount of heat.
The air deprived of that heat grows cold, and when a fan blows it back into the room, cool air pours from the air conditioner.
“All right. Let’s build it.”
Having grasped the indoor unit’s principle, I got straight to work.
I crafted the inverted-S pipe for the refrigerant and the propeller that would expel the cooled air.
“I’ll need the outdoor unit too.”
The outdoor unit compressed the refrigerant and gradually cooled it again so it could be reused.
I built the compressor and another propeller to cool the heated refrigerant.
That finished roughly seventy percent of the machine.
“Now I just need a temperature sensor.”
A temperature sensor was essential for controlling the room’s climate.
To lower the temperature, more refrigerant had to flow to the indoor unit. To raise it, less. I needed something that could measure the current temperature.
I solved it with mana stones.
I engraved the Heat Preservation spell formula onto the stones so they could remember specific temperatures.
I created fifteen mana stones that remembered every degree from 18 to 32 Celsius.
Then I designed the mechanical interface and aesthetics so that pressing a button on the air conditioner could adjust the temperature across that range, and integrated it into the unit.
Thus, I had built an air conditioner capable of precise temperature control.
“Whew! Fix, nice work!”
“Wee-oooong~!”
It was Saturday morning.
I had completed the air conditioner in just three days.
A cutting-edge device that fused fluid dynamics, mechanical engineering, thermodynamics, and mana dynamics(?)—finished in three days.
Now all that remained was to inject mana into the core magic stone and test whether it operated properly.
Without hesitation, I powered it on.
-Shaaaaaaaaaa…
It worked.
The previously muggy laboratory grew cool in moments.
Hell had transformed into heaven.
“This is what life is all about.”
You primitive medieval fools.
This is the greatness of Willis Haviland Carrier.
I leaned back in my chair and savored that greatness to the fullest.
Monday again.
Today was the day of the equipment evaluation meeting.
The day my skills would be tested as a special technical admissions student.
I had asked to move the equipment demonstration from 11 p.m. to 1 p.m.
To truly appreciate the air conditioner’s performance, the hottest part of the day was ideal. Plus, my next class started at 2 p.m., so 1 p.m. was the perfect slot.
Fortunately, under Elena’s leadership, the schedule change went through without a hitch.
The three examiners dispatched from the archducal house and the entire faculty had all agreed to attend at one o’clock.
“Shall we begin?”
All that remained was setup.
After finishing first period and grabbing a quick meal, I headed to the VIP room where the demonstration would be held and began installing the air conditioner.
I positioned the indoor unit against the outer wall and, with Fix’s help, moved the outdoor unit outside.
Since the venue was on the first floor, setting up the outdoor unit was straightforward.
-Beep.
Once the installation was complete, I turned the unit on.
The stagnant, humid air inside the lecture room began to circulate.
A miracle unfolded as the temperature slowly dropped.
“Test complete. No issues.”
After confirming everything worked, I drew the curtains and adjusted the lighting.
Since I was putting on a demonstration, I wanted to set the proper mood.
People are easily captivated by atmosphere.
It’s why aesthetic cafés and aesthetic smartphones sell so well.
There were twenty minutes left until the examiners and faculty arrived.
Soon, an innovation on par with the smartphone would be unveiled.
The three examiners dispatched from the empire’s archducal house were all heavyweights who held important posts within their respective families.
The archdukes, having caught wind of Ed’s rumors early, had sent trusted retainers to evaluate his abilities.
“Hmm. For a mere commoner to rearrange the schedule however he pleases… I may need to reconsider my opinion of Edga Fix.”
“Indeed.”
They were openly displeased.
For a commoner to dictate terms to people of their stature—even with the backing of Professor Elena and Her Highness the Princess—changing the schedule the day before the demonstration was simply rude.
Besides, it was the middle of the day.
To gather respected academy professors and key ducal retainers in one room on such a sweltering afternoon—if he had any sense at all, such treatment was unthinkable.
Everyone knew that demonstrations and events on hot days were traditionally held at night.
Strange. According to the young lady, he shouldn’t be this foolish.
That was why Bilson, head butler of House Graham, felt a twinge of doubt.
Lady Isabella had described Edga Fix as a once-in-a-millennium genius.
Yet here that supposed genius was, making such a stupid decision. It made no sense.
If he invited examiners to view his invention on a muggy day like this, how could they possibly give favorable scores?
Even if the product itself was outstanding, good scores would be difficult.
What the examiners wanted to evaluate was Ed’s own qualities, not merely his creation.
My lady, I am sorry. Under these circumstances, a perfect score will be impossible.
Bilson shook his head and continued walking.
Although Isabella had begged him to give full marks, he had come as Archduke Graham’s representative. He had to remain strict and impartial.
There could be no exceptions.
“Ha, is this the thing?”
While walking in disappointment, one of the professors pointed at a strange object.
It was the outdoor unit of the air conditioner Ed had built.
“Ridiculous. You can clearly see hot air pouring out of it.”
“Heh heh, is he really planning to present something like this?”
“It’s quite different from what I heard. Doesn’t look like much.”
The outdoor unit was blasting air far hotter than the ambient temperature.
The examiners and faculty frowned and hurried past.
They were already dying from the heat; they had no desire to stand in more hot wind.
When they finally entered the building and stood before the VIP room door, their thoughts were unified.
I’ll just finish this quickly and leave.
There’s nothing more to see here.
I want a glass of cool ice water.
With the intention of wrapping things up as fast as possible, they opened the door to the VIP room.
If he had prepared nothing but a white hunk of scrap metal that spat hot air, they were ready to turn around immediately.
“……?”
But the moment the door opened,
heavenly air brushed against their skin.
The very quality of the air was completely different from outside.
Life itself existed in this room.
“Thank you for coming all this way. Imperial Academy S-Class, number 37—Edga Fix.”
On the dais in the VIP room, a handsome black-haired youth was introducing himself.
He greeted them with flawless noble etiquette, then gestured toward the table and comfortable armchairs before him.
“Before we begin the presentation, I’ve prepared cool beer and comfortable seats for everyone who must be tired from the journey. Please sit back, quench your thirst, and listen at your leisure.”
Air-conditioner breeze. Ice-cold beer. Sleep-inducing armchairs. Soft, pleasant lighting.
The examiners and faculty looked as though they had been utterly seduced.
Like a group under mass hypnosis, they each walked toward the cool beer.
Watching them, Ed lifted the corners of his mouth.
It’s a pass.