After waking up from my entirely dignified and not at all uncomfortable position, I found myself thankfully isolated in my lab, and without an audience. Turning around to dust myself off, I made a mental note to actually have a padded armchair or something put in place at this bench rather than the backless stool currently in place as a seat. There was no way that my most recent impromptu sleeping session was actually going to be my last. Still, the information that had flooded my head made the albeit unwitnessed humiliation worth it. So very, very worth it.

A lot of people believe that iron was a major game-changer from bronze when the art of ironworking was first discovered. The historical truth was that this was not exactly so much the case as the common perception would have one believe. It wasn’t until the discovery of steel that the advantage of iron over bronze was completely and unilaterally clinched. Before that, it was iron’s availability and comparative ease of production that won out. For the first few hundred years of the iron age, iron was generally speaking softer and slightly weaker than the best bronze. But bronze, requiring alloying and special techniques, was harder to produce. It was this reason alone that made iron weapons and armor a clincher in the history of Earth; when you had ironworking, it was easier and cheaper to equip more of your troops with it.

Steel, on the other hand -- steel was known for a very long time but only able to be produced in a very laborious manner. That's not to say that it wasn't made to extremely high levels of quality, however. Anyone familiar with so-called Damascus steel knows that. Similar techniques were used in producing the traditional swords for the feudal lords of Japan. But the simple truth is that the steel production techniques of contemporary industry produced a superior steel to all of that folding and refolding, and it did so at vastly greater quantities.

What I had now discovered was that not only could I utilize the frankly magical alchemical essences to produce steel in a manner far more like the modern model than in the ancient -- no true surprises there, I was anticipating that much -- but that this opened up a number of technical options that just weren't available to me before. There were a great number of niche discoveries the Romans made back in classical antiquity that were left to fester or rot in obscurity largely because they either had exactly the opposite problem from what I had -- too much manpower as opposed to too little, too little fuel as opposed to being surrounded by a continent-spanning virgin forest, etc., etc. -- or else because they felt it a good idea to conceal it in order to help preserve the awe of their mystery cults.

I could appreciate the drive to prevent other cultures from obtaining technological secrets as much as the next guy, but not even using them for anything more than impressing the yokels… I couldn't accept that. I wouldn't. A great example of what I was talking about was something called the aeolipile. This was a little toy that was created sometime between 250BCE and 100BCE. No one really knew exactly when. What was known was that no one would advance the basic concept of it for two thousand years.

What was the aeolipile? A proof of concept working steam turbine. An honest-to-god steam turbine. And in the history of Earth, it was never anything more than a basic curiosity; a toy for clever scholars. Oh, there were decent practical reasons why that was the case -- it couldn't produce any appreciable torque and they had no way of transferring its rotational momentum to something more practical -- but these were the same people who invented the undershot water wheel for use with lumber mills, who literally wrote the textbook on pneumatics and hydraulics, who invented the first water pumps and even used them for putting out fires, who invented indoor plumbing and sewer systems. It was a problem they absolutely could have solved if they had simply wanted to.

And the other major problem -- fuel efficiency -- was one I already had a major cheat for, in the form of my heat-transferring quartzite crystals. So, yes. I could already see a number of ways I could potentially make use of steam turbines, however profoundly primitive in design. The real issue that came along with attempting to use them, however, was the same one that I kept on butting my head against with all of my paths to progress: manpower.

Not just manual labor, mind, but mental labor. There was only so far I could get with the supervised rote execution that so much of my current model for operation was based on. Oh, having my homunculi act as task-masters for the hunting spiders and brain ants absolutely took great advantage of the fact that the minions being supervised had the necessary intelligence to operate basic tools and even communicate tasks with as many as a dozen steps -- and by having groups cooperate under diligent supervision by truly sapient beings such as my homunculi, huge amounts of work was getting done.

But there was an upper bound to the amount of supervision any one homunculus -- or I -- could do, and unfortunately that wasn't a problem my newfound comprehension of all the nifty tricks of the Classical Era actually helped me with. The reason being, the basic automatons and mechanical solutions offered by that era had no complex logic, and instead depended on thinking beings to know when to pull a given lever or push a certain button or whatever. These things, however simple, were still judgment calls and that required a degree of intellect that was simply beyond any of my minions except the homunculi.

Now, in the most immediate sense I had two extremely bad solutions and one merely entirely unacceptable solution to this problem. Firstly: I could engineer a sapient minion race with human-equivalent intelligence. This was ethically indistinguishable from creating a slave species, and I was by no means ready to become a true slave master. The homunculi were bad enough and I was constantly checking on them for signs of desire for independent existence -- signs they had never yet exhibited. The next option was absolutely no better: use my biopunk knowledge to enslave elves with some sort of controlling parasite. But that's the same ethical dilemma just from a different angle, so again hell to the fuck to the no on that. Lastly, I could hire elven servants to do the work for me.

Now, on the surface that didn't seem so bad, but there was something in my gut that told me it would only end badly. I had already seen how much training would be required to prevent the elves from blowing up the place, and that was before my most recent tech upgrades. It would be a constant labor to keep them up to speed with each iteration of future developments and that rather defeated the purpose. I was already going to have to "child proof" my bases so that visitors couldn't screw anything up for me as it was, I did not want to have to deal with that as a 24/7 -- or however many hours there really were in a day on this rock -- issue in all areas rather than just the visitors' areas I would be creating.

No. If I was going to solve this problem it was going to be not by obtaining more-intelligent minions, but by obtaining more-intelligent methods of directing their behaviors. The only question now was -- how in the devil was I going to accomplish that? No obvious or immediate answers presented themselves to me, excepting that I wasn’t going to get there by following up on the techbase I had already acquired. I would have to go further afield from what was tried and true of the historical progress on Earth. Happily, however, I now had a potential means of learning about what was possible there so that I wouldn’t be stumbling blind and deaf in the dark quite so badly in that path.

~~------------~~

As I left the alchemical lab where I also collated my ‘research’, such as it was, I found that it was rather well into the night. This was not all that surprising, as I had probably been passed out on the floor of the lab for quite a while as my brain adjusted to the new volumes of information being dumped into it -- it seemed that the amount of knowledge each “General” tech level conveyed was getting broader and broader, which did make a good amount of sense after all -- but nevertheless it put a damper on my original intention of querying Annaka and her men about the possibility of how one might utilize mana to communicate intentions or directions, as it was so clear to me that she had been doing somehow to the trellisvine shoots the day before. That line of questioning would simply have to wait -- but in the meantime I could at least implement a few of the things that my most recent technological acquisitions made feasible.

I didn’t have a great deal of iron or steel to “play around” with, but I honestly wasn’t going to need all that much to do what I was planning. And since it was fairly far into the evening anyhow, it wasn’t like I would have a great deal in the way of interruptions or distractions in the way of my getting it done. The new information in my head included better clockwork mechanisms, ones that could depend upon the improved materials available to me now that I had access to true steel -- but also ones that allowed for a certain amount of logical operations. Adding power to a mechanism from more than one source depending on how much pressure was applied to an activation switch, for example, as opposed to simply having on/off as a strict boolean value. Why this mattered at all was that I could make significant improvements to the clockwork harnesses for my homunculi -- to the point where I could even contemplate beginning to make clockwork harnesses for my hunting spiders, as they would actually be meaningfully useful in combat conditions.

This was a degree of advancement I had been aiming towards for some time, and while it didn’t exactly solve any of the problems currently facing me, it was something to focus my mind on given that I would have to wait several hours until morning came. The redesign work for the homunculi’s clockwork harnesses themselves wasn’t all that laborious: largely a matter of replacing certain materials with others -- like replacing blackleather ‘tendons’ with proper steel cables -- or allowing for additional components and the complexity that represented, such as the variable-pressure switches that would allow for multiple movement paces, if not exactly outright leaps and jumping. It would also allow for finer motions with the manipulator arms, permitting them an easier time of performing more-sensitive work at higher effective speeds. Nothing incredibly revolutionary, really, but all put together it was a marked improvement over what their harnesses currently permitted.

I intentionally held off on attempting to follow up with any designs based on the aeolipile, however, as I knew that getting too far down into that rabbit hole would do me no good whatsoever right now. It would only frustrate me to get to barely scratch the surface and yet accomplish nothing from it. So, instead, I optimized the existing harnesses to use a small number of direct low-heat oil lamps -- burning from a shared reservoir -- to provide the kind of power needed to properly wind the increased number of clock springs that the new generation harnesses would require. A feat made possible thanks to the fibrous quartzite I could now make that allowed energy build up and discharge to happen at the same time.

I barely managed to finish the first prototype, however, before daylight finally came around. And with it, the rousing of the princess and her guard. Well, most of them anyhow -- it came as no surprise to me whatsoever that her men were still sleeping in shifts while in the tent I'd set aside for them as a temporary barracks. Equipping one of my homunculi with the new design was relatively simple enough to do, even for another of my homunculi. Lighting the flames and checking the fuel level were things that, for now, needed to be done by someone/thing other than the one wearing the harness, at least not without great difficulty. This was a design flaw that I would need to work around when I had more time to think it through. In the meantime I had far more important things to worry about. Such as getting cleaned up and ready to be presentable to the elven guests in my home.

By the time I was finished making myself presentable, I found that the homunculus that had been preparing today's morning repast was also the one wearing the upgraded harness. I could already tell that the improved manual dexterity had made a meaningful contribution to its ability to get things done in a timely fashion, as I honestly hadn't expected it to have our meals completed by the time I was ready to come back downstairs -- yet it clearly was, as it was even setting places for everyone.

As I trundled on to the eating area in the temporary barracks, I found myself slightly less ill at ease with the presence of the elves. Having the basic foundation of a meaningful peace agreement between them and myself had allowed me to set aside a great many of my fears. I was still worried, mind you -- there were a couple hundred elves out beyond my walls -- but after the time they'd already delayed I didn't have to fear quite so much about being under prepared for them should they actually make a go at taking me and mine down. That and the albeit minimal explanations I had received made it clear that they were perhaps just as motivated as I was to have things work out. Though I did have quite a few questions.

Questions that I managed to pick up on the fact, yesterday, that they very much preferred not to discuss over the meal itself. Not knowing what the point of us all eating together was if we weren't actually going to discuss anything, I still did so simply because the places had already been set and because it just wasn't worth fighting over. The meal was as simple as any my homunculi had prepared for me thus far, though the addition of the trellisvine berries as a glaze for the crushed carrotatoes was quite welcome; in a lot of ways it reminded me of maple syrups from before I arrived here. I'd only be halfway joking if I said I'd be willing to kill for a decently caffeinated tea or something, though. Oh, I'd managed to work out some herbal teas that at least gave me water with flavor, but something that could properly put some hair on your chest? Nothing doing. Even the stamina tonics just weren't the same.

Once the meal was finished and my homunculus was directing ants to take care of the earthenware plates and chitinite cutlery, I began querying the princess and her entourage with some of the things that I was most curious about getting answers for.

“So, Annaka, Trisaldan -- I’m curious; how do your people actually navigate in this forest? It can’t be all that easy. Do you keep maps? Are there special paths you follow?” I kept my face as close to politely blank as I could manage.

The elves before me, however, smiled with a not entirely subtle pride. It was Trisaldan who answered me. "We have little use for such things. While those of the Wood do not all share in Rishuata's blessing, we have been in her grace for long enough that it has become something even the least of us is sensitive to. We know by the rhythm of the winds in the trees, by the light of the moons through the canopy of leaves, by the whispers of the great trees -- it is by these things that we know where we are and where we must go. I take it you are more like the plainsmen, then? Only following the routes you have come to know deeply, seeking landmarks that you find familiar?"

I shook my head ruefully. Of course the point ears all have a little of the druid in them. What else could I expect? "After a fashion… after a fashion. I have my means of making my way through the forests. It helps that my hunters are so capable of finding scents, for example."

Trisaldan nodded in understanding. "We use scent tracking beasts ourselves… though ours are far less cooperative than yours."

Interesting, but unsurprising. “Your methods of animal rearing are probably more ‘conventional’ than what I use, unless certain assumptions I’ve been making about your ishuata gifts are inaccurate.”

“Assumptions?” Annaka asked with her almost omnipresent curiosity, her eyes locked onto me in a manner reminiscent of a hawk eyeing a particularly plump rodent.

I repressed a grimace as what I was about to discuss was dangerous territory for me, still; I couldn’t know how they will react. “Well. I saw your … I suppose the best term for it would be ‘effort’ over the trellisvine, shaping the vines’ growth to more suitably match the trellis they were growing against. Tell me; is that a difficult art for your ishuata? Is it only plants that you can ‘direct’ in such a manner?”

Annaka shook her head. “No, simple acts like that do not require a true ishuata to accomplish. Anyone who trains enough with the innate sense of ishuar can learn such things. As to only plants… well. We ishuata have the talent to accomplish more complex things.”

My eyes narrowed as I took in what she had just said. “Complex, how, exactly?”

“Those who enjoy Rishuata’s blessing are able to utilize the flow of ishuar itself to accomplish feats that we have been told by the plains-people are what they call ‘common miracles’. I do not know if you have the understanding for such things; we heal, we see what is unseen, we receive insight from Rishuata, and even imbue ishuar itself into objects that can no longer obtain its flow through more mundane means. We can smooth the balance of ishuar such that wildlings do not become enraged by a disturbance, or lay down barriers of ishuar’s flow that allow us to know of things crossing them. Truly powerful acts of the ishuata can even repel wildlings from crossing such barriers. Such are the arts of the ishuata.”

I sit in silent contemplation on that statement for a while. “You speak of an innate sense of the ishuar. You also say that it does not require someone to “actually be” an ishuata to work with that. I am curious -- is this something that can be taught? Or is that something that is proscribed?”

Annaka shook her head with a small smile. “It is long known that ishuata cannot teach non-ishuata to touch on or guide their inner sense of the ishuar. But Trisaldan here could tell you -- there are some arts that are common to all of those of the Alfar Wood. It is not … entirely forbidden for us to teach these arts to those not of the Wood; but first I would ask -- why do you wish to know of such things?”

I chuckled. “Real talk? To avoid pissing your people off in the future. You would never have come out here looking for me or mine in the first place if I’d known how to not upset whatever aspect of the ecology it is, exactly, that produces your ‘imbalance’ of the ishuar. I had believed I was already taking sufficient steps to avoid irrevocably harming the environment around me, but then you folks showed up and I learned that I couldn’t even notice a form of damage I was in fact doing. And that? It doesn’t sit well with me. The place I come from … it took my people far, far too long to realize that we needed to be more than mere stewards of the environment around us. We call forests like this one, back there, ‘old growth’. There are almost no ‘old growth’ forests anymore. They were gone before we understood what we were even doing. Now that I find myself in a new place, a new world? I see no reason to make the same mistakes as my forebears.”

Annaka and Trisaldan shared some silent glance with one another, expressing thoughts that I honestly could not even hope to glean the meaning of. Eventually, Trisaldan nodded -- more to himself than anything else, it seemed. “Very well. I believe Lady Annaka feels we have taken up enough of your hospitality in general, Sir Vincent. With your permission, as you seem interested in learning to sense the ishuar, I shall act as your tutor for a time, so that you and our people might have an easier time of knowing peace -- the better to avoid further bloodshed between us. Her Ladyship will return with the Wardens to the Alfar Wood, until such time as a better spokesman for our people can come and establish better relations between us and your creations.”

I raised an eyebrow. “I understand we’ve been hashing out a basic agreement, and I once again have to thank you for being willing despite everything to even entertain the idea of peaceful rather than bloody means of resolving our issues but -- I have to ask. Why is it that you are dealing with me so simply? You’re clearly bending over backwards to make things easy with me. Why?”

Annaka was the one who responded: “Voidborn almost always grow in strength along lines established very early in their time after their arrival. Your first actions were to convert the very wilderness itself into a tool for building wealth, prosperity, and civilization for yourself. If we were to go to war with you, you would turn to war. A Voidborn who can project force beyond himself and perhaps even turn the very Wood against us? That is the edge of the blade. But on the other hand -- A Voidborn that in a single season has created wonders that we had no access to before and is willing to trade them with us? Such beings have created empires out of kingdoms in the history of this world, Sir Vincent. Why should we waste such an opportunity?”

My shoulders slumped and my head nearly slammed against the table in frustration as I realized that this entire time, they were looking at me as a goddamned golden goose. I couldn’t help but groan under my breath, “Oh god. Politics. Of course it’s politics and ambition.” I turned my gaze back upwards, to speak through clenched teeth, “I will make this clear here and now: I will be no one’s pawn. When you go back and make your reports, you get that perfectly clear. I will be my own man, or none.”

She merely nodded with that mischievous grin and began to issue orders to her men to decamp. Trisaldan, in the meantime, slapped his hand across my shoulders and shook his head. “Be grateful, Sir Vincent, that you only dealt with one of the youngest of the ishuata caste. A true elder would’ve had you trimmed like a hedgerow in hours.”