In the End, It All Comes Down to Money!

Since intel about an invasion of Daehan had been intercepted in the year 4009, the restrictions on weapons development had been lifted.

The chemists immediately threw themselves back into the fray.

KWAANG!

"Kghk!"

Something had evidently exploded during an experiment at the chemical research complex, because a figure in thick protective armor went flying and slammed ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠into the wall.

"Holy Water, over here, quick!"

"Uuuugh... I'm not dead yet!"

Every bone in his body felt like it had shattered, but somehow he'd survived yet again.

"Ugh, making a living is brutal, seriously..."

"Well, at least the Holy Water keeps you alive, right?"

"Right, but at this rate I can literally see the end coming."

What they were working on was a way to handle a new detonator compound safely and reliably. Without it, the new propellant meant to replace the old gunpowder couldn't be put to use at all.

"Let's swap out the Holy Water purification canister first. Better safe than sorry."

"On it — I'll bring a fresh one. Get some rest."

It was a precious contraption that had saved the chemists' lives more than once: a canister packed with layer upon layer of cloth soaked in Holy Water. The toxic byproducts produced during chemical experiments passed through it and got filtered out.

If not for that thing, half of them would probably already be dead.

As chemistry advanced, tables cataloguing the properties and names of various substances had begun to be drawn up.

And one group profiting handsomely from all this was the Artisans' Bureau.

It could fairly be called the largest organization in Daehan — from iron smelting to precision machining, virtually every engineer in the empire was gathered under its roof.

"Alright, this time let's mix it at a ratio of eighty parts of number one, twelve of number two, three of number three, and five of number four."

The engineers spooned powders of what looked like various metals together and fed the mixture into a furnace. With so many new metallic materials available, they were experimenting with blend after blend.

"I wonder what we'll get this time?"

"Oh, we'll get something. The question is what kind of beast it'll be. Heh heh heh."

They'd always experimented freely, but this was the first time in their lives they'd ever run experiments with money being shoveled at them like this. Come to think of it, wasn't Daehan spending more right now than at any point in its history?

Lately even the Prime Minister and Mose had been quietly avoiding looking at the budget proposals.

"The guys over in turbine manufacturing really loved the stuff we made last time."

"They sure did. I still get dizzy thinking about how much free booze we drank off them."

Hadn't everyone been shocked when someone finally discovered that ingot languishing in the corner of the lab? Iron that doesn't rust? And now, riding the high of it, they were mixing everything together with wild ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠abandon.

Daehan's research labs were burning through money like it was water.

GRUMBLE-GROAN-GRIND

"Ooh! It's moving!"

"BWAAAHAHAHA!"

And the pièce de résistance among all these labs was right here.

SCREEEEEECH

A somewhat oversized Gulleongsoe was advancing across the floor, crushing the stone paving beneath its treads.

"Huh? Hey, it's tearing up the whole ground."

"Uh oh!"

CRACK-SPLINTER

The steam battle tank that Haneul had reviewed and rejected. They had finally dug the blueprints back out and were building the thing.

With armor plating that thick, they'd need a certain minimum range, so they'd even installed track assemblies. Which meant the surface area that had to be armored kept growing, and the weight kept piling up — until now the packed stone floor beneath it was literally cracking apart.

"Uh..."

"Is this thing... even usable?"

"This is bad..."

They'd been told point-blank that it was too heavy to ever work, and they'd gone ahead and built it anyway — and now the problem children were starting to feel a little nervous about the consequences.

"Should we try increasing the ground contact area first?"

"Yeah, let's do that..."

"But, um..."

"Hm?"

There was one rather large problem. They'd developed a tank, but all they'd built was the hull — and this was the state it was in.

"How exactly are we supposed to mount a turret on this?"

"Maybe just... ride on top and shoot a rifle or something?"

"If that's the plan, why not just carry a shield and fire a pistol?"

"Ugh..."

What they'd produced was genuinely hard to find a use ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠for. This was its performance on reinforced stone paving — what would it do on plain dirt? On wet, soggy marshland?

"What are we going to do?"

"No idea..."

But that's just how people are. Tell them not to do something, and they want to do it all the more — and somehow they get this feeling that it'll actually work out this time.

Well... someday down the road, when the internal combustion engine arrives and someone builds a real tank, all this hard-won experience will come in handy.

Someday.

HISSSSSSSS

"Do this with meticulous care, you hear me? This is a trial build — we're making exactly one!"

"Got it! Quit worrying already!"

In Sinsi's shipyard, a single warship was under construction — one that looked larger and far sleeker than the existing Whale Shark class.

Word had come down that they might need an attack vessel capable of crossing the open ocean, and everyone had gotten so fired up that a prototype was already being built.

Sleek lines and an aggressive name — everyone agreed that was the way to go — so they'd christened her the Cheongsang-eo, the Blue Shark.

"She'd better perform, or there won't be any more like her. Heh heh heh."

"Oh, get out of here!"

And the dry dock next door wasn't seeing its lights go out either. With electric lamps now available, they worked in shifts straight through the night — the yard was packed with people all striving to build bigger ships and bigger guns.

KU-KWANG! KU-KWANG!

"Aigoo, they've started firing again."

"The report sounds completely different from the old guns, doesn't it?"

"I heard they're even more powerful now."

Along one side of the shipyard, they were conducting live-fire tests of naval cannon. Apparently a new-model turret — and its bore was actually smaller than the Whale Shark's guns.

"No, just make them bigger, will you!"

"They're plenty powerful as-is! Why would we?!"

"Big is better, I'm telling you! One shot, one kill! How do you not understand that?!"

"Shut it! Think about efficiency!"

A soldier and an engineer were at each other's throats.

The engineer insisted the current caliber already packed enough punch, so rather than enlarging it, he was hunting for ways to fire faster. But a naval officer kept dogging his heels, begging him nonstop to just make the gun bigger.

"AAAAARGH! BIGGER!"

"You insufferable little—! Fine, I'll make them even SMALLER!"

"Gah! My apologies! But still — bigger!"

"GET LOST!"

KU-KWANG! KU-KWANG!

The engineer's eyes were narrowing as he fired off round after round. The smoke from each discharge had noticeably thinned compared to the old guns — no question about it.

But after days of continuous firing, the turret had absorbed so much shock that the play in its mechanisms was growing wider and wider.

"What this thing needs is some kind of shock-absorbing mechanism."

For now, he cobbled together a recoil cushion out of springs, working from whatever came to mind.

And the experiments rolled on.

KU-KWANG! KU-KWANG! KU-KWANG!

"Oh? I can definitely see the shock is reduced."

But after days of continuous fire, the springs gradually compressed and lost their spring, and the effect kept fading.

"Ah... swapping springs out mid-operation is way too impractical."

Back in Moda, he'd been racking his brains with his colleagues — and now he was strolling the streets, getting some air.

ZEEEENG — PSSH ZEEEENG — PSSH

"Hmm?"

After days of agonizing, his eye caught a hydraulic rolling press stamping out armor plate.

"Hm... what if I sealed liquid — water, or oil — inside a chamber and used it in place of the springs?"

After several failed attempts, he managed to produce a remarkably serviceable recoil recuperator.

The only catch, after considerable trial and error, was that the fluid had to be adjusted depending on the temperature — a bit of a nuisance.

"Haa... inconvenient, but there's nothing to be done about it."

And then, during all that experimentation, he stumbled onto yet another problem.

SSSSSSSSS

"Haa... if we keep up rapid fire, the barrel gets dangerously hot. What do I do about this?"

With the muzzle smoke reduced and an ammunition hoist feeding the gun, the rate of fire had climbed dramatically — but the problem was the heat, accumulating little by little with every shot.

Keep firing without pause in the middle of a battle, and he genuinely worried the barrel might melt clean through.

"Cooling it with water would work... except then rust becomes the problem, doesn't it? Maybe I'll make just the water jacket out of something like bronze."

After mulling it over for a long while, he fitted a bronze jacket around the hottest section of the gun and put it back on the test bench.

BUBBLE-BUBBLE-BUBBLE

"Good grief... it gets THIS hot?"

Still, the turret was steadily approaching completion. Since the water circulation required a power connection anyway, he went ahead and made the whole turret rotate on its own while he was at it.

WHIRR-WHIRR

"Ooh? That's smoother than I expected. Still, I'd better leave a manual crank in case it breaks down."

"What IS that thing?!"

"Oh! Sir, please, let me fire it just once!"

The navy men who'd gathered to gawk swarmed him again and started pestering him half to death.

"I'm busy. Just watch."

"Can't I at least take one shot?"

"No."

"Just one..."

"Aiish! Get lost and go do some work!"

Once again, curses flew out of his mouth today. Why on earth did even the top-ranking officers of this navy have so much free time to wander around slacking off?

Well — they weren't exactly free. They were simply the crews whose ships had sunk, stuck on standby.

As the surrounding nations and the countries of Europe kept building more powerful cannons and improving their warships, Daehan's wooden vessels had been sinking more and more often lately.

"*Sob*... I just want to serve on a ship too, sir..."

"When will our ship ever get built..."

The fleet was converting to steamships one hull at a time, so the sailors lingered around the dry docks, craning their necks and waiting for new ships to come off the ways.

"Then go learn welding or something! The faster the ships get built, the faster you get to sail, no?!"

"Ah! That's true!"

"That's right! If there aren't enough ships, we just build more!"

"Let's hurry!"

Simple-minded lot, the lot of them. It was hardly a skill you could pick up that quickly...

But watching the sailors stampede off in a herd to learn the trade, it looked like the number of dry docks was only going to keep growing. There were already ten of them along Sinsi's waterfront — how many more would there be?

"You slop through the job here, people DIE! Hey! You idiots! Get back here this instant! Just stay put where you are!"

At this rate, it wouldn't be long before some ship launched and promptly broke in half in the water. Who knew how well things would go with a navy full of men in such a headlong hurry...

While Daehan was pouring fortunes into armaments, Europe and the nations of the Middle East were all doing exactly the same.

"Oh? So we finally possess armored warships of our own?"

"Indeed, Your Majesty."

In Europe, they were building ships by bolting cast-iron plate onto wooden hulls.

"Ironclad" was perhaps too generous a term — armored wooden ships was more accurate.

Even plates that weren't especially thick proved remarkably effective against the solid iron shot used by European guns.

The problem was that the ships had simply become far too heavy.

"But with all this weight... can we even sail them properly?"

"Might we not build ships without sails, as Daehan does?"

"We understand the principle, sire, but we have yet to discover how the thing is actually constructed."

"Hmm..."

At first, when the scholars spoke of harnessing steam, the crowned heads of Europe had scoffed and paid them no mind. But through the scholars' tireless efforts, they finally managed a demonstration that ordinary people could see with their own eyes.

The most famous was a cannon fired by compressed steam.

Its power was nothing to write home about, but when the valve opened and the compressed steam sent a cannonball flying, it served admirably to prove the force of air itself.

"Haa... is it truly impossible, even to simply watch and learn?"

Countless nations shipped scholars off to Mudo and Pyeong-an Naru to observe Daehan firsthand.

"Yes, well... frankly, the scholars say that even if they were allowed to open the machines up and examine them, they doubt we could replicate what we'd see."

Yet every scholar came back with the same hopeless verdict.

"Why?"

"They say that ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠the outer shell of the machine called a 'train,' as seen in Mudo, does not appear to be cast iron."

"Even so. We must simply try it in cast iron first, no?"

"The cost would be absolutely staggering, sire..."

"Ah..."

In the end, it all came down to money. Technology only yields results in proportion to the investment poured into it.

But when you keep dumping money into something that produces nothing, people wear out — and many nations had already given up.

"Just how much money does Daehan HAVE?"

"They say the trade revenue flowing in through those harbor concessions of theirs is simply colossal..."

Looking at the prices of goods and the sheer volume of people passing through, one could roughly estimate how much money must be changing hands — and the answer was a truly staggering sum.

"Could we at least imitate their products?"

"That is..."

"Out with it!"

"We can produce them, sire, but the quality falls short and the price is higher..."

To put it plainly: even when they copied a luxury item, the result was worse quality at a higher price. And it was the same with cheap goods — matching the quality still left an enormous gulf in cost.

"The worst of all, Your Majesty, are cotton cloth and silk."

"*Sigh*..."

With hired hands picking the raw cotton and nearly everything else mechanized, that was one category that simply couldn't be compared at all.

And so, amid Europe's endless sighs, Daehan's research laboratories were lighting their lamps once again tonight.