Chapter 29: The Second Royal Examination (R&D)
A year had passed. The Prince's Highway was finishes, Lyra's District has become the most famous district in the entire realm. Even tourists from other kingdoms come to visit to admire and inspire the beauty of the district, The newly capital expansion district is being built and the progress is 80% finished, with the mastery of Master Borgin and his newly arrived comrades from far away dwarf kingdom who arrived 6 months ago with the intest of opportunity in the Principality, describe by Borgin's letter and sent with Cilia's help. The Third Legion has formed, and the fourth Legion is in underway with of rising population from demon flux southern island nations, and has now reach 800000 in total . The kingdom was stable, only a few demon incursions in the north.
The first Royal Examination had given him his administrators—Borgin, Elara, and Lyren. They were the brilliant managers and engineers turning his vision into reality. But now, he faced new, more complex bottlenecks. Borgin reported that while he could build anything, he needed new, stronger metal alloys to make the new forts truly impregnable. Master Helena, the Royal Physician, lamented that while sanitation had improved health, she lacked the tools to combat deep-seated illnesses. The secret "Thunder-Lance" project was stalled, handicapped by their primitive understanding of chemical propellants.
Alexius needed more than just managers. He needed innovators. He needed geniuses.
And so, the announcement for the Second Royal Examination was declared. This time, the announcement was more specific. While general administrative positions were still available, the Crown made a special call for specialists: masters of metallurgy, architecture, mathematics, medicine, and, most controversially, alchemy.
For the common people, it was another ray of impossible hope. But for one man, in a cramped, fume-stained apartment in Aethelburg's poorer quarters, it was a final, desperate lifeline.
(Albert's POV)
The ink on the Royal Decree seemed to mock him. Albert read the words for the tenth time, his heart a painful, fluttering drum against his ribs. 'Examinations for the Royal Service… specialists in alchemy and material sciences are encouraged to apply.'
It had to be a trick. A cruel joke.
He looked away from the notice tacked to the public board and back towards his small, two-room flat. He could hear the shallow, ragged coughs of his daughter, Elspeth, from the other room. Another fever. The local physician, a kind but limited man, had shaken his head, muttering about a weakness in the lungs and offering only palliative herbs that did nothing. Albert knew, with the certainty of a man who understood the very building blocks of the world, that her illness was a chemical imbalance, a flaw in the body's internal alchemy that a proper elixir could correct. But the reagents for such an elixir were impossibly expensive, and he was destitute.
He was, by any measure, a failure. A genius, perhaps, but a failure. At the Alchemist's Guild, his mind had soared past the dogmatic teachings of his masters. While they were content to endlessly replicate the thousand-year-old "classical formulas," Albert was asking why. He theorized about elemental particulates, about affinities and bonds, and about catalysts that could produce reactions the old masters deemed impossible. For his brilliance, he was branded a heretic and a troublemaker. Unable to afford the exorbitant fees required to buy his way into the Guild's upper echelons and unwilling to parrot their dogma, he had been cast out.
Now, he was a pariah, brewing simple headache powders and cleaning potions in his flat, the faint smell of sulfur and failure clinging to his clothes. He sold them for a few coppers, barely enough to buy bread and herbs for Elspeth.
"You should go, Albert," his wife, Anya, said softly from behind him, her hand on his shoulder. Her face was thin and worn with worry, but her eyes still held an unshakeable belief in him. "You are the most brilliant man I have ever known. Let the Grand Prince see what the Guild was too blind to."
"The Grand Prince?" Albert scoffed, the sound bitter. "He's a noble, Anya. They are all the same. They want alchemists who can transmute lead into gold, not ones who can explain the principles of molecular bonding. This is probably just a scheme to find a new court perfumer."
But then he heard Elspeth cough again, a weak, painful sound that tore at his soul. His cynicism was a luxury he could no longer afford. For her, he would endure any humiliation. For her, he would walk into the lion's den and offer his mind.
"Alright," he whispered. "I'll go."
The day of the exam, he sat in the magnificent, intimidating Great Hall. He felt small and out of place, his worn tunic a stark contrast to the finer clothes of the merchants' sons and minor nobles around him. He breezed through the general sections, his mind sharp and logical. Then came the specialized alchemy paper. He stared at the first question, and his breath caught in his throat.
'Problem 1: The standard process for smelting iron ore results in a 15% material loss and produces brittle pig iron. Propose a new, more efficient smelting method utilizing a flux agent to remove impurities and increase carbon content for a stronger final product. Detail the chemical principles behind your proposed agent.'
This wasn't a question about the mystical "four elements." It was a real, practical, chemical engineering problem. The next question was about creating a stable, high-energy propellant. The one after that was about synthesizing an antiseptic agent. Albert began to write, his hand flying across the page. The fear and cynicism that had haunted him for years melted away, replaced by the pure, unadulterated joy of a genius finally being asked the right questions. He filled the margins with diagrams, proposed new theories, and outlined entire research programs. He poured his life's work, his soul, onto the page.
(Alexius's POV)
Weeks later, Alexius sat in the throne room, a stack of reports before him. He had insisted on personally interviewing all five hundred of the top-scoring candidates. Chancellor Elias had nearly fainted at the suggestion.
"Your Majesty, that is an inefficient use of your time! We can appoint them based on their scores!"
"After examination we can tell me a man's aptitude, Elias," Alexius had replied calmly. "It cannot tell me his character. I am not hiring clerks. I am building the pillars of a better future. I need to look each of them in the eye."
The process was a grueling marathon, but it was bearing incredible fruit. He had found a young woman with a staggering gift for mathematics who could calculate siege trajectories in her head. He found a grizzled ex-hunter with an encyclopedic knowledge of the Sea of Forests. He found a dozen others, each a rough gem of talent. And then, he came to the report on a man named Albert.
The graders had flagged his paper with a note: "Either a complete madman or a genius on par with the ancients."
Albert was brought into the throne room. He was a thin man in his early thirties, with ink stains on his fingers and a nervous,depraved look in his eyes. He knelt, trembling, before the throne.
Alexius held up the man's examination paper, its pages a chaotic explosion of notes and diagrams. "Master Albert," he began, his voice quiet but intense. "Your paper is the most remarkable document I have ever read. You dismiss the classical formula for Greek Fire as 'a clumsy, inefficient incendiary' and instead propose a two-stage chemical reaction utilizing powdered aluminum and iron oxide to create what you call a 'thermic lance' capable of melting through steel. Explain."
Albert looked up, his fear warring with the sudden, shocking opportunity to speak his mind. "Y-Your Majesty… the old ways… they are based on superstition. They see magic. I see… process. I see elemental particulates and their affinities. The classic formulas waste so much energy. By using a catalyst, a transmutative agent, you don't just mix things… you force them to become something new, something more powerful. The energy released is an order of magnitude greater."
He began to speak, his initial timidity with passion. He spoke of theories so far advanced they sounded like a new form of magic. He didn't have all the answers—his knowledge was unpolished, cobbled together from stolen glances at rare books and his own obsessive experiments—but his understanding of the core principles was profound. Alexius listened, utterly captivated. He was not just listening to an alchemist. He was listening to a scientist. A man who, with the right resources, could change the world.
When Albert finally fell silent, breathing heavily, Alexius leaned forward. "The Alchemist's Guild threw you out for these ideas, did they not?"
Albert flinched and nodded, expecting the inevitable dismissal. "They called it heresy, Your Majesty."
"Good," Alexius said, a cold smile touching his lips. "Their dogma is a cage that has kept this kingdom in the dark for too long. I am not interested in their brand of alchemy." He paused, letting his next words land with their full weight. "Master Albert, I am creating a new institution. The Royal Research and Development Wing. It will not be a guild hall for reciting old formulas. It will be a laboratory for inventing the future. It will be the scientific and technological heart of this kingdom, and its only creed will be innovation. I need a man to lead it."
He stood, his presence filling the grand throne room. "I am offering you the position of Royal Director of Research. You will have a limitless budget. You will have a staff of the finest minds we can find. You will have access to the Royal Armory and its secret projects. Your only task will be to take these brilliant theories of yours and turn them into tangible reality. New medicines, new materials, new sources of power… new weapons. I am offering you the chance to finish your work."
Albert stared, his mind unable to process the scale of the offer. He thought of his damp, tiny flat. He thought of the guild masters who had called him a fool. He thought of his daughter's weak, wheezing cough. The chance to save her. The chance to prove them all wrong. The chance to unleash his mind without limit.
Tears streamed down his face, washing away years of bitterness and despair. He prostrated himself on the floor, his forehead touching the cold marble. "Your Majesty," he wept, his voice choked with a gratitude so profound it was a physical force. "My mind, my life, my soul… they are yours to command."
Alexius looked down at the kneeling genius. He had just found the man who would build his new world. The engines of state were in place. Now, the true research and development could finally begin.
[Key Personnel Acquired: [Albert] (Genius-tier Alchemist/Scientist).] [New Institution Founded: [Royal R&D Department].] [Principality Modifier Gained: [Era of Innovation]. Technology Development Rate: +50%.] (Continue…..)