Miraculous Chemistry (1)
It wasn't just Archduke Karl. Archduke Otto was also deeply indebted to me. While Archduke Karl had expressed his gratitude for "saving my father," Archduke Otto's gratitude stemmed from "saving my own life."
What was more, Archduke Otto had become heavily dependent on Freud.
"Thank you for putting an end to my devilish life, Professor Freud," he had said.
Thanks to the Kaiser's consideration, Archduke Otto had been granted nominal military authority. And because of that, he was able to resolve the single greatest crisis looming over my head.
Go back to the military?! And of all places, the Austrian army, which is at least ten times more barbaric than the modern Korean military?!
The Austro-Hungarian Empire wasn't quite as warmongering as its neighbor, the German Empire. Perhaps because the Habsburgs held the reins, the nobility's martial spirit was relatively subdued, replaced instead by highly developed court intrigue and bureaucracy. Even so, the military was no less important.
After all, the Austro-Hungarian Empire was a melting pot of countless ethnicities. The imperial military was the only place where all these diverse peoples actually mingled.
"Aaaargh! My two years! No way!"
Austria-Hungary was a conscription-based state. Upon turning twenty-one, one was drafted to serve two years on active duty and seven years in the reserves. This damn military issue plagued me in the twentieth century just as much as it did in the twenty-first. I would turn twenty-one in 1904. That meant I would have to serve from the summer of 1904 to the summer of 1906. Let's see... what exactly happened between 1904 and 1906?
...I'm screwed.
The Russo-Japanese War of 1904 and the Russian Revolution of 1905. By the twentieth century, a revolution in one country never stayed contained within its borders. Demands for independence would pour in from Hungary and various other ethnic groups within the empire. Meanwhile, my allies, the Social Democratic Workers' Party, would surely launch a massive uprising to demand universal suffrage. And what would I be doing during all this?
"Whoa! Did you hear Marx Stahl joined the army?"
"But wait, isn't he using the military to crush the revolution?"
"I knew it! He crawled into bed with the imperial family, and now he's finally showing his true colors!"
Not only that. The mere thought of being stuck in the barracks, doing drill exercises and enduring military hazing while these world-altering historical events unfolded, made me dizzy.
To be fair, history had already changed. The Habsburgs had allied with the Social Democratic Workers' Party, meaning discussions on universal suffrage were already well underway. Unlike the original timeline, even I couldn't predict what would happen in Vienna in 1905. But regardless, the Russian Revolution would still break out, and I absolutely could not afford to be absent during such a critical juncture.
I have to get out of this! No matter what! Just as I was desperately plotting my escape, things resolved themselves quite easily thanks to Archduke Otto, whose life I had saved.
"Hmm. Director Stahl. Shall I pull some strings and slide you into the General Staff? I can get you a cozy desk job where you'll do little more than brew coffee for the senior officers."
"Is... is that really allowed?"
There was certainly no downside to this. However... Could I use this as an opportunity to expand my business?
Thanks to penicillin gaining recognition much earlier than in the original history, its production technology was advancing day by day. Of course, we were still a decade away from the true mass production seen in the original timeline. Even so, at the very least, demand will only continue to rise leading up to World War I. It will never decrease.
And it wasn't just penicillin. Soon, an astronomical technological innovation—one that would make penicillin look like child's play, and could easily rival Einstein's theory of relativity—lay waiting to be discovered.
The most important scientific discovery in human history, destined to be forged by the brilliant minds of Fritz Haber and Carl Bosch. With what I have now... it might finally be possible. That technology was none other than nitrogen fixation.
No military matter was more critical than food supply. In fact, agricultural scientists in various great powers often rose to incredibly high positions. In the Soviet Union, Trofim Lysenko—a self-proclaimed biologist who championed the absurd theory of inheritance of acquired characteristics—completely devastated Soviet agriculture, forcing the nation to import food from the United States until the very moment of its collapse. In China, Dr. Qian Xuesen, true to his background as a missile expert, successfully pioneered "close planting and deep plowing," an advanced agricultural method with the destructive power of a nuclear bomb that starved tens of millions of his own people to death.
Of course, I had absolutely no intention of shifting the paradigm toward starvation-inducing methods like Lysenko or Qian Xuesen.
Nitrogen is essential for plant growth. However, most of the Earth's nitrogen floats freely in the atmosphere as an extremely stable molecule, making it incredibly difficult to isolate. Consequently, nitrogen fertilizers in this era were still limited to human manure and guano. I, however, would synthesize nitrogen fertilizer and perform the miracle of shattering the Malthusian trap.
With this, my reputation as a scientist who saved hundreds of millions of lives will be set in stone. But the impact wouldn't stop there. The ammonia harvested from the air via nitrogen fixation wasn't just for fertilizer. It was also the key ingredient for gunpowder. By becoming the miraculous chemist who created bread and gunpowder out of thin air, I would seize control of military logistics and exert immense influence over the armed forces! I immediately launched a new project at the Stahl-Ferdinand Research Institute.
1903. The basic concept of nitrogen fixation was simple. Fill a container with nitrogen and hydrogen. Throw in a bunch of catalysts I remembered from my past life. Compress it under high pressure, and voila! But reality was far from accommodating.
"Director Stahl! Another fire has broken out!"
"Is everyone okay?! Damn it!"
There was a reason nitrogen fixation wasn't historically discovered until as late as 1909. No matter how well I knew the theory behind it, we simply lacked the equipment capable of withstanding the necessary pressure! Forget chemistry; I found myself studying mechanical engineering—a subject I had never intended to touch—just to design experimental apparatuses that could handle high temperatures and extreme pressures. During the penicillin project, biology had given me a massive headache, and now this.
I had already published the fundamental concepts of nitrogen fixation in a paper. At the very least, I had successfully made a grand debut in the academic world with my first publication.
N₂ (Nitrogen) + 3H₂ (Hydrogen) ⇌ 2NH₃ (Ammonia)
• According to Le Chatelier's principle, applying external changes in temperature and pressure shifts the equilibrium, converting nitrogen and hydrogen into ammonia.
• Attempts to synthesize ammonia using electrical currents succeeded, but the astronomical power consumption renders the process economically unviable.
• Synthesis under high temperatures is possible, but similarly lacks economic viability.
• Catalysts have been introduced to accelerate the reaction rate; research is ongoing to identify a more efficient catalyst.
That was the extent of our research progress. Of course, as a former chemical engineering graduate student, I already knew the ultimate solution. The real headache was simply figuring out how to generate and sustain that extreme pressure.
And how did the academic community react?
"Is that even possible?"
"Completely unrealistic."
"I admit young Stahl is a genius. He keeps pulling off scientific achievements that should be forty years away."
"He's young, so he seems to be in a rush. Besides, isn't he Jewish?"
"He's already receiving massive funding from the Stahl-Ferdinand Research Institute. He probably wants to show results as quickly as possible."
Bastards. Of course, with the constant fires and explosions in the lab, even I was starting to feel a bit burnt out. Explosions from hydrogen leaks. Explosions from ruptured valves. Explosions simply because the pressure got too high. Creating high-pressure conditions with 1903 technology was incredibly difficult. But I couldn't give up now.
"I have to keep a low profile for a while anyway. Why would I let this slip away?"
While I had allied with the Kaiser, he was simultaneously monitoring every single move Archduke Franz Ferdinand and I made. I wouldn't have true freedom of movement until at least 1904. Because of this, Archduke Franz Ferdinand was currently stuck hunting in Bohemia, his favorite pastime. But what was the point of just idling around?
Once 1905 hits, I'll be far busier than when I first allied with the Social Democratic Workers' Party. Having stepped away from politics for a while, my influence had waned significantly. Naturally, those devilish nobles and the Christian Social Party were starting to creep out of the woodwork again!
"Marx Stahl is a fraud! At best, he is nothing more than a merchant who beautifully packaged a simple proposal to sweep the streets!"
"Look at his so-called ambitious creations! Penicillin? It has merely become a syphilis cure for decadent nobles! The Stahl-Ferdinand Model? Nothing but a passing fad!"
"Why is Stahl so quiet now? Because he is terrified that his failures will be exposed!"
The Christian Social Party, crawling back from the depths of hell, was spewing this utter nonsense.
"It seems that vulgar commoner has finally fallen out of His Majesty's favor."
"Indeed! It is a breath of fresh air not having to look at his face."
"His Majesty has grown old. I truly thought he had lost his mind when he decided to hold hands with those filthy commoners."
"Perhaps Archduke Karl is our true future after all."
To think that the great Marx Stahl had to listen to such drivel! Yet, given my current circumstances, I couldn't even refute them.
The decisive battle will likely be in 1905. I would use the revolutions erupting everywhere as an opportunity to strip power from the anti-Semites, the archaic nobility, the bureaucracy, and the Church. If the empire was on the verge of exploding, the established powers wouldn't be in any position to interfere with our reforms.
One way or another, I had to bide my time until 1905. While maintaining my influence until that day arrived, shouldn't I also secure a leash to control the military? And so, looking like a zombie myself, I conducted experiment after experiment, matching the haggard state of the penicillin researchers who worked daily alongside tuberculosis bacteria.
Consequently, the Stahl-Ferdinand Research Institute, which had started as a pharmaceutical lab, gradually transformed into a metallurgy and materials science lab starting in 1902. I poured in every bit of steelmaking knowledge I possessed as a former chemical engineer.
"Impressive. Even if it's only at a laboratory scale, this is strong enough to manufacture cannons."
"Then please give me more funding, Your Highness. The seal failed last time, and the whole thing blew up."
"I only funded you because you claimed you were performing alchemy..."
Fortunately, Franz Ferdinand was the second wealthiest man in the empire. Having nothing better to do—much like myself—he invested astronomical sums of money into my projects, acting as my personal ATM.
"Again! It blew up again! What was the pressure this time?"
"Director Stahl, it was one hundred atmospheres."
"...Fifty atmospheres isn't enough. This is driving me insane."
My assistant and I let out heavy sighs as we surveyed the ruined laboratory. Was this really impossible? At the end of the day, I was just a former chemical engineering student. While I could easily accelerate technology by several years in my own field, hitting a wall in metallurgy—a discipline I had no connection to—was incredibly frustrating.
"Honestly, achieving these high-pressure conditions isn't entirely impossible. Even a steam locomotive engine generates immense pressure."
"True. Those engines hold up just fine. Why won't ours?"
"Wait... Yeah. Why won't ours?"
In that instant, a spark of inspiration flashed in my mind. Even now, massive shipyards, engine manufacturers, and arms companies were producing colossal boilers and cannon barrels designed to withstand extreme temperatures and pressures.
"Why didn't I think of this sooner?! I was trying too hard to solve everything inside a laboratory!"
My scientific career had been confined to labs, not factories. My perspective had been too narrow. It was true that 1903-era materials science made this impossible on a delicate scale. I had to admit that. But what if?
"If it doesn't work, make it work! We just need to make it ridiculously big and thick!"
"W-wait, if we do that...?"
"Then the volume of hydrogen gas will increase, making it far more dangerous. Hydrogen gas explodes easily. But as long as we build it robustly enough to withstand even that, it won't be a problem!"
This might actually work. The moment the idea struck me, I dashed straight to my precious little personal ATM, Franz Ferdinand.