A group of thirteen men sat on the damp wooden floors of Baron Helm’s manor. Their faces were twisted with puzzlement and frustration as their hands held onto a feathered quill and scratched away at the paper before them.

The ages and appearances of these thirteen men greatly varied. A few looked old and wizened; others were young and inexperienced; there was even one middle-aged man who was extremely brawny and bulky.

Nonetheless, the one common aspect between all of them was their attire; coarse, filthy, and covered with the repulsive stink that filled the swamps outside.

“You have five minutes left,” Baron Georg Helm, who acted as the questioner/investigator for the ‘test’, reminded the participants.

His piggish face contained an imperceptible smile on it, while his egg-shaped eyes squinted with happiness.

‘Such an ingenious idea! The young prince truly is a genius!’

The man sang praise of our young protagonist within his mind.

The idea of conducting a standard written test to judge the education levels of these participants was an idea that sounded so alien yet brilliant to the large Baron. The idea was so sensible and easy that the Baron wondered why such a thing wasn’t popular around the realm already.

Perhaps, it was already the case beyond the Copper Hills. However, it certainly wasn’t the case within the three kingdoms.

“Five. Four. Three. Two. One. Time’s up, put your quills down,” the Baron barked.

At his instruction, these thirteen men who had already been informed of the general idea and concept of the test promptly rested their quills. Running their eyes over the test sheet one final time, they raised their sheets and handed it to the large Baron.

After collecting the test sheets from the thirteen participants, the Baron asked them to leave the office room and wait for the results in the manor’s hall. After closing the door to the office, the Baron turned around and called out.

“My liege, you can come out now.”

His words rung within the empty office room. A few seconds of silence answered, soon followed by complaining grumbles.

“God! The stink from their bodies almost killed me!”

Atlas appeared from inside a large cupboard that stood flush against the wall. His hand was holding onto a handkerchief which he used to cover his nose and mouth with.

“Here are their test papers, my liege,” The Baron quickly arrived before the young prince and handed him the parchments.

Receiving the papers with his free hand, Atlas walked toward the large office, one that he had recently claimed as his own, and sat down. Putting the papers in front of him, he removed a quill from an inkpot at the side and started marking them.

The standardized test that Atlas had given these thirteen men was exceedingly simple; from the standard of modern-day Earth that is.

It consisted mainly of simple math problems such as addition, multiplication, division, and the likes; a few questions to test their grasp of grammar and writing; and finally, a few questions regarding themselves, their expertise in whatever field they professed in, and basic information.

Going through the papers written in a language that he learned the basics of a few hours ago, Atlas got a grasp over the participants’ levels of education.

‘This is surprising. All thirteen of them do possess some form of education. Not a single one of them lied.’

‘Hmm… 2+2 = 4-1 = 3, that is correct… 9+10 is indeed 19 and not 21… not bad. Not bad at all! These people have performed better than I expected.’

“Not bad,” Atlas remarked out loud. Turning to face the expectant-looking Baron, he continued, “These men can be used. Especially this one…”

Atlas separated a single parchment and showed it to the Baron.

“Douglas Wootz. Aged 47. He’s a blacksmith and a metalworker.”

The young prince explained.

Baron Helm peered closer and read the man’s test sheet. His brows furrowed a little as he saw the middle-aged blacksmith’s answer.

“My liege, this person, his scores aren’t that good. Especially in the language part.”

“Does a blacksmith need to be a poet, Baron Helm?” Atlas snidely asked. “As far as I’m concerned, he has fair experience working the irons and can count decently enough. That is enough.” The young prince shrugged.

Putting down the sheet of parchments on the table before him, he ordered, “Tell them that they’ve passed the test. Send them home for today and ask them to report here tomorrow morning.”

“For what reason, my liege?”

“They’ll be informed of that tomorrow,” Atlas then waved the Baron away. Just as the large gentleman was about to exit the office, the young prince added, “Oh, and tell them that they don’t have to work in the stinking mud starting tomorrow. That should motivate them.”

He then ignored the Baron and returned his gaze to his desk. Putting away the test sheets, Atlas opened a drawer and brought out empty sheets to write on.

Spreading the sheets before him, Atlas reached for the feathered quill and carefully dipped it in the inkpot. Draining the excess against the side, he then started to write.

Symbols and characters belonging to a language that did not originate on Earth started to fill out the sheets. This was the language that he was writing with currently was native to the three kingdoms and was called, Krinis.

The Krinis Language consisted of a combination of dots and squiggly lines. There were a total of 42 characters in the language, with the shape and size of each character differing from the rest.

One particular fact that fascinated Atlas was that in this language, every word, no matter its origin, meaning, or nomenclature was only four characters long! To explain this concept in its Earth-ly equivalent; the words ‘air’ and ‘perception’ while having 3 and 10 English characters respectively, were both written with only four characters in the language of Krinis!

While the number of characters remained the same between the two words, the ‘size’ of the words differed. The first word occupied a two-line limit while the second word occupied nearly six! (AN: By line limit, I mean their heights. The first word occupied two lines of height while the second word occupied six.)

Facing this comical yet utterly fascinating language, Atlas was full of intrigue. The language of Krinis broadened this worldview on languages and how they could be written, structured, and interpreted. He was stricken with the desire to incorporate this system into those of his previous world and give birth to a brand new system.

The possibilities were endless!

‘There is also the matter of ‘my’ language. All these years, I had been unable to improve it, having hit a wall in its conception. However, with this new system of writing, I think I see a way forward to improve it.’

‘I might even be able to perfect ‘it’.”

An expression of true seriousness colored the young prince’s face while his eyes glinted with the light of genius.

For too long, he had been stuck at an impasse unable to improve his language. He had exhausted every available material regarding languages on Earth; old ones, now ones, extinct ones, etc. Yet, nothing came out of it.

His language had been polished to the limits of Earth’s standards, however, it was still far from perfection. Unable to find a way forward, he had given up.

That has now changed. Arriving in this new world filled with new cultures, new orders, new systems, the young prince saw hope to improve his language.

Maybe even complete it to perfection.

‘Ah, now I really want to see what it will look like once it reaches perfection. Will it live up to my mentor’s claims?’

He didn’t know, but he would find out. Until then, Atlas wouldn’t stop trying.

Having ordered the Baron to not disturb him for a few hours, or until the arrival of ‘that’ person, Atlas busily scribbled away at his papers. The ink atop the quill’s tip never dried for a single moment as the young prince kept at it.

Sheet after sheet of poorly made parchment was soon filled with characters and words of the Krinis language. He digested his learnings from the Baron’s lessons and improved in real-time.

A trace of Atlas’ true intellectual and computational power was slowly being revealed.