Chapter 1179: Tri-tank Magic Power Unit
Anna circled the prototype twice before she spoke.
“It’s pretty… small.”
“But it looks nice,” Celine said, her voice slow and meditative. “I like those tubes. They remind me of tentacles.”
Roland smiled. They had arrived at the same machine from entirely different directions and come away with entirely different conclusions — both of them correct.
Compared to the first cast-iron steam engine Anna had built years ago in Border Town, this prototype was a fraction of the size. Anna’s skills had improved considerably since then, but the real reduction came from the absence of a boiler. Every generation of Neverwinter’s steam engines — and they were on the fourth — had carried that same fundamental bulk: a large combustion chamber, a furnace, something to burn whether it was charcoal, wood, or heavy oil. None of that was here. In its place sat a rectangular steel box, one meter long, half a meter wide, less than twenty centimeters tall.
That box was the heart of everything.
Three magic cubes sat embedded inside it. Lead plating on the bottom blocked excess radiation. A dozen conduits ran from the top of the box, threading through a water tank and down into a condenser below. The entire heating-converting-cooling cycle was sealed, enclosed, hermetic — no contact with the external environment. In theory, as long as the device ran, the thermal conductive material never needed replacing.
Roland could have made it smaller still. He could have replaced water — cheap, accessible, familiar — with liquid alkali metal, and cut the size further while keeping the same output. He hadn’t. The point of a prototype was to learn whether the system worked at all. If evaporated alkali metal and water vapor found each other in this laboratory, the laboratory would not survive the introduction.
The condenser on each side was Celine’s favorite part. To maximize heat-transfer area, each tube wound around the box in long, unhurried loops.
The thing was almost beautiful: the dazzling silver box at center, the reflective copper conduits coiling away from it like something alive, the whole assembly precise and self-contained in a way the old coal-fed machines never were. Even someone who knew nothing about engineering could stand in front of both and understand which one belonged to the future.
“Shall we begin?” Roland said, turning to Anna and Celine.
Anna rested her hand on the operation rod. “Together.”
After a moment, Celine set her main tentacle across both their hands.
“Testing, prototype magic steam engine. Three. Two. One.”
Roland pulled the rod to the bottom. All three magic cubes switched on.
The laboratory was perfectly silent.
“Did we fail?” Celine asked, studying the motionless machine.
“It’s still heating,” Roland said.
Two minutes passed. The central steel box shivered — a faint tremor, barely perceptible. The indicator light on one of the conduit fittings glowed soft yellow: a pressure gauge fashioned from a tablet fragment recovered from the cave, reading changes in air pressure within the tubes.
Another five minutes. A hiss from the water tank. Then the piston moved.
As the temperature climbed, the flywheels spun faster, engaging the condensation pump, sending cooled thermal fluid back to the central box — the cycle closing on itself, self-sustaining, the machine doing now what it had been designed to do.
“It works,” Anna said, exhaling slowly. A smile crossed her face. “The only drawback is that it’s slow at the start.”
“All steam engines are,” Roland said. Heat transfer simply took time — no thermal conductor could match the near-instant ignition of an internal combustion engine. And this design required at least three water tanks, which meant it would always be larger than a combustion engine, whatever efficiency gains the magic cubes provided. The cubes themselves were another limitation: uranium-heavy, difficult to produce in quantity. As a practical machine, today’s prototype had almost no value. As a proof of concept, it changed everything.
Every industrial technology began this way — slow, expensive, impractical, and irreversible.
Once Celine worked out how to stabilize the system at scale, Roland believed this new engine would move through society the way steam itself once had: first in the factories, then on the roads, then everywhere at once. Small enough to mount on transportation. No fuel storage required. Space freed for cargo. The shape of industry quietly rearranged.
Half an hour later, the engine reached full speed and announced it: the whole machine shook, the bubbling of the water tank climbing into an angry shriek. Three cubes were too much for this hull. Roland cut two of them, and the prototype settled.
The next stage was a week-long reliability test — the phase that separated machines that worked from machines that could be trusted. Easy to build something that runs. Hard to build something that runs the same way every time.
Watching a steam engine was not interesting. Talking with Anna was.
Roland felt it as a kind of peace — standing here in this laboratory that smelled of hot metal and condensation, the machine chugging steadily beside them, time somehow folded back on itself so that this felt like Border Town again, the two of them at the beginning of something.
At some point Celine slipped out, quiet as smoke, leaving the door shut behind her.
Anna rested her head against Roland’s shoulder. The machine’s noise went muffled, distant, as if the whole building had withdrawn to give them the moment.
“If this works,” she said, “I’ll be one step closer to your old world.”
“Closer than you might expect. Nothing quite like this exists there yet.”
Anna lifted her head. “Can we build those four-wheeled vehicles you described?”
“Yes. I can design a simple one if you want.”
Her face lit up the way it did when a problem resolved cleanly. “Do that.” Then: “What will you call this machine?”
“Does it need a name?”
“Of course it does,” she said, with the gravity of someone settling a matter of principle.
“All right. Black Technology No. 1, or Magic Cube Power Unit. Your choice.”
“It isn’t black at all.” She considered. “The second one. But how do we tell the models apart?”
“Simple. One Magic Ceremony Cube equals one tank. This prototype runs on three cubes, so — tri-tank magic power unit.”
Anna turned it over. “That’s a little strange.”
“It doesn’t have to be perfect.”
Their laughter and the roar of the engine rose together and hung in the air over the yard like a long note of music slowly fading.
Chapter 1179: Tri-tank Magic Power Unit
Translator: Transn Editor: Transn
Anna studied the prototype up and down before she expressed her thought on the machine.
“It’s pretty… small.”
“But it looks nice,” Celine said meditatively. “I like those tubes. They’re just like tentacles.”
Roland smiled. Anna and Celine viewed this new machine from a completely different perspective, and naturally, they reached different conclusions. Nevertheless, both of them pointed out the exact features of the machine.
Compared to the first cast-iron steam engine Anna had created, this prototype was much smaller. Needless to say, Anna’s skills had improved a great deal since then, but most importantly, the reduction of size was mainly ascribed to the absence of a boiler.
The steam engines currently used in Neverwinter was of its fourth generation. In spite of that, the boiler portion of the machine remained pretty much the same for each generation. The steam engine still required a large combustion chamber and a furnace to operate, no matter what kind of combustible materials were in use — whether it was charcoal, wood or heavy oil. Now, the boiler was replaced with a rectangular steel box one meter in length, half a meter in width and less than 20 centimeters in height.
This box was the core power unit of the whole mechanic system.
The cube and water were put in an enclosed container with a high pressure tolerance to power the machine. The system was technologically demanding, so Roland did not think they would have been able to create such an advanced steam engine back in the Border Town even if they had obtained this cube that had once belonged to the radiation race at that time.
The steel box, which was the power unit of the machine, was embedded with three magic cubes. Its bottom was plastered with lead to block excess radiation, the top of which was lined with a dozen conduits that passed through a water tank and a condenser around the bottom. The whole “heatingconverting-cooling” process was conducted in an enclosed system without any contact with the external environment. Theoretically, there would be no need to replace the thermal conductive material as long as the device was functioning properly.
Roland could have produced a smaller steam engine.
He could have replaced water, the most accessible and affordable thermal conductive material with more efficient one, such as liquid alkali metal, to further reduce the size while maintaining the same power.
However, the main purpose of building a prototype was to see if this system worked. Roland did not want to see any leak during the test. If the evaporated alkali metal and water vapor reacted, the entire laboratory would be probably blown away.
The thermal energy created by the cube would reach the water tank through the conduits to boil the water in it. After the water was heated up, everything would then be quite similar to ordinary steam engines that they were very familiar with.
Celine really liked the condensers on both sides of the machine. To maximize the heat-transfer area, each tube meandered around the box just like tentacles.
Compared to cumbersome traditional steam engines, this prototype was small and delicate with its dazzling silver box at the center and reflective copper conduits around it. Even a regular lay man who knew nothing about machinery would be able to tell which steam engine was more advanced.
It was almost like artwork.
“So… let’s begin?” Roland suggested while turning to Celine and Anna.
Anna nodded as she rested her hand on the operation rod and said, “Together.”
Celine placed her main tentacle on both Roland’s and Anna’s hands after a moment of hesitation.
“Testing on the prototype of the magic steam engine. Three, two, one, go!”
As Roland counted to three, the rod was pulled down to the bottom, turning the three magic cubes on. The new steam engine, which marked the dawn of a new age of industrialization, started running for the first time.
Yet the laboratory was perfectly silent as though nothing had happened.
“Er… did we fail?” Celine asked hesitantly as she looked at the motionless machine.
“No, it’s still heating,” Roland replied confidently.
After around two minutes, the central steel box trembled slightly, and the indicator light on one of the tubes emanated a soft yellow glow. The indicator light, which was actually a pressure gage made of the tablet discovered in the cave, showed changes in the air pressure within the tubes.
It took a much longer time to transmit the heat. After around another five minutes, vapor finally escaped from the water tank, and the piston started to move.
As the temperature in the tubes steadily increased, the flywheels of the steam engine spinned faster and set the water pump of the condensation system in motion. The main purpose of this water pump was to expedite the circulation of the system and send the cooled thermal conductive material back to the central box, which thus completed the whole cycle.
“It seems the machine works pretty well,” Anna said while heaving a deep sigh smilingly. “The only drawback is that it’s a bit slow at the beginning.”
“All steam engines have that problem,” Roland assented while nodding. It took time to transfer heat. Even the most efficient thermal conductor would be slower than an internal combustion engine that could almost start working immediately. As this new steam engine required at least three water tanks in theory, it would be still a lot larger than an internal combustion engine. Another shortcoming was that the Magic Cube consumed a lot of uranium, which made this prototype almost had no practical value.
Nevertheless, every industrial undertaking was time-consuming.
Once Celine figured out how to sustain the system, Roland believed this new steam engine would soon benefit the whole society. Its relatively small size made it easier for mass production and also enabled people to attach it to most transportation tools. Meanwhile, the new power source would also save a lot of space for cargos, as fuels were no longer necessary for operation.
Half an hour later, the speed of the steam engine reached its height. The whole machine shook dangerously, and the bubbling sound of water vapor gradually dissolved into an angry shrill. Apparently, three magic cubes overloaded the system. Roland thus turned off two magic cubes and finally tranquilized the prototype.
The next step was a lengthy reliability test.
This test would take approximately a week, which was also a test that would expose many potential problems. It was easy to build the machine and make it work, but it was hard to ensure that it would function properly every time.
Watching a puffing and huffing steam engine was boring, but Roland liked to talk with Anna. He felt relaxed and calm as if he and Anna had suddenly traveled back through time to the moment they had first met.
Celine left the laboratory quietly, leaving the couple alone.
Anna rested her head on Roland’s shoulder. The noises produced by the machine suddenly became muffled and distant.
“If this thing works, I’ll then be one step closer to your previous world, right?”
“Yes, and probably you’ll be much closer than you think. There has not been any technologies like this in that world yet.”
“Can we also create those four-wheeled vehicles that you once talked about?”
“Yes, we can. I can design a simple one for you if you like.”
“Sounds great!” Anna said, her face lighting up. “By the way, what will you call this machine?”
“Does it have to have a name?” Roland asked, smiling.
“Of course,” Anna replied solemnly.
“Alright then. Black Technology No. 1 or Magic Cube Power Unit. Which one do you prefer?”
“It’s not black at all… Oh well, I choose the latter. But how do we distinguish its various models if we use this name?”
“That’s easy. One Magic Ceremony Cube represents one tank. So, this prototype can be called tri-tank magic power unit. How does that sound?”
“Sounds a little strange for some reason.”
“It doesn’t have to be perfect…”
Their laugh and the roar of the machine mingled together and lingered on in the air like a long murmur of music above the yard.