I Pioneered Scientific Magic

Chapter 506: Perpetual Motion Machine and Photographic Optics

In September, the cool autumn breeze gently blows away the heat of summer.

After months of intense battles, the entire eastern, central, and southern regions of the empire have been occupied. According to the most optimistic estimates of the council, it should take no more than two months to completely end the war with the empire.

Meanwhile, the railways have been laid out segment by segment, forming a vast network that envelops every major city in the eastern region and will eventually extend throughout the entire empire, also facilitating the organization of this academic symposium.

A magic train, loaded with passengers, begins its journey from an unfinished platform with a loud whistle, heading towards the capital at high speed!

The rolling wheels continuously rumble over the tracks, and the carriage sways subtly, but the novelty of the experience is enough to overshadow these minor discomforts.

Sean, a middle-aged wizard who has just settled down with his apprentice, gazes out the window at the rapidly disappearing dense thicket of trees and can’t help but exclaim, "What an incredible alchemical creation..."

This train stretches over seventy meters in length and can carry nearly a thousand people, traveling at a speed of 100 kilometers per hour.

It is said that it only takes nine hours to travel from the central part of the empire to the capital of the magic kingdom!

This includes stops at other cities along the way, which is simply incredible.

"Teacher, is it true that the nights in the capital are as bright as day?" the young apprentice sitting beside Sean, no more than eleven or twelve years old, can’t help but ask.

They have always been within the empire but have heard a lot about the magic kingdom from passing traders.

In the stories of these traveling merchants, the capital is almost like a paradise on earth, where food is conjured by magic, even the common people wear exquisitely beautiful clothes, all sorts of new alchemical creations are everywhere, and the mode of transportation is not horse-drawn carriages, but rather a type of steel beast that emits smoke from the back...

By comparison, the imperial cities they had lived in seemed like cesspools, even the Holy City before its collapse was no exception, aside from its size.

"Of course," Sean answers with a smile, "I’ve heard that it's the masterpiece of the Star of Magic, Lynn, who trapped the mighty power of thunder in a bulb and uses electricity to create light..."

The young apprentice imagines such a scene, and suddenly, the sky darkens—the train enters a long, dark tunnel, and it takes more than ten seconds for the train to emerge back into daylight at this speed.

The intense change from light to dark surprises many wizards in the carriage, especially Sean, who is curious and sticks his head out the window to look behind him, seeing a massive mountain peak!

"It's the Peak of Despair, Despair!" Sean quickly recognizes it; it is the second tallest peak in the empire, named for its steep terrain.

This train actually goes straight through the mountain, no wonder it suddenly felt dark around.

Under Sean's watchful eye, a huge tunnel appears to run through the mountain from front to back, looking quite spectacular.

He recalls that the kingdom's musketeer corps reached here just three months ago; what kind of power could have hollowed out an entire mountain in such a short time! ????ἈŊꝊBЕŠ

In the carriage, over a hundred wizards discuss among themselves, and one proudly dressed witch says, "The tunnel was made with a Solar Cannon, one of the grandest alchemical creations of the council. It blasted through the mountain in one shot!"

Sean and others are visibly shocked—what kind of tremendous power could achieve such a feat?

Some wizards express skepticism, thinking it's an exaggeration or perhaps the work of grand wizards using magic bit by bit.

The witch shrugs and does not continue, saying a Peak of Despair is nothing; the entire Holy City was flattened in the battle between the council members and that false god.

The Solar Cannon was originally intended to be used against the remnants of the empire's armies, but the nobles were so incompetent that the weapon was never needed.

Instead, when constructing roads encountered difficulties, especially in the mountainous central region of the empire, taking a detour would have been both time-consuming and laborious.

So, Victorio, the council member, had the idea to use the idle Solar Cannon for road construction. One blast could clear a mountain or destroy a forest; it was incredibly efficient!

Sean has no doubts about the witch's words, as he has heard that the kingdom's legendary wizards created a sprawling area of death spanning several kilometers, obviously a more exaggerated feat.

After a nine-hour journey, which doesn't seem too long, the excitement of their first train ride gradually subsides, and the train slowly pulls into the platform of the capital.

His commanding voice instantly fills the entire hall, carrying an undeniable authority and pressure, and the hubbub and disputes abruptly cease.

In just a second, only echoes remain in the vast hall.

After all, Lynn has served as a judge before and is very familiar with the proceedings. He briefly utters some pleasantries, welcomes the many wizards who have come from afar, and officially announces the start of the magic conference!

An old wizard under the gaze of the audience, along with several apprentices, carries a transparent box onto the stage.

Inside the box is a very intricate device, the main body being a giant gear with a diameter of about three meters. Each tooth of the gear is sloped, and it contains forty movable short rods, each with a twenty-kilogram iron ball at one end, moving outward along the wheel's spokes.

"This is my research achievement, a vacuum perpetual motion machine!" the old wizard on stage proudly introduces his grand invention!

Nowadays, the magical world has many power devices, such as steam engines and improved internal combustion engines, but without exception, they all require energy consumption.

So, he has been pondering whether it’s possible to find a method that doesn’t require any fuel to continuously produce power!

Thus, this perpetual motion machine was born. It utilizes the planet's own gravity, employing an asymmetrical frame structure that creates a

gravitational imbalance between the heavy and light sides of the frame, pulling the lighter side and generating a continuous mechanical motion.

To minimize the influence of external forces, he even pleaded with a grand wizard to empty the elements inside the device, allowing the machine to operate continuously!

The wizards present are quite interested in this peculiar perpetual motion machine.

Although the power output of this device is limited, what if it were scaled up a hundred or even a thousand times?

The power generated could potentially supply an entire city!

Sitting in the judges' seats, Lynn rolls his eyes.

Well, a perpetual motion machine has emerged!

This is basically like his demonstration of the earth's rotation with Foucault's pendulum.

In a vacuum, unaffected by any interference and using the influence of gravity, Foucault's pendulum can theoretically achieve 'perpetual motion'.

However, this perpetual motion machine clearly falls short, and its biggest problem is that it simply cannot produce much power, and its efficiency is far inferior to that of using hydropower, wind power, and solar energy.

If this can be called a perpetual motion machine, then a water wheel powered by flowing water might as well be called one too!

Lynn quickly points out the flaws of this 'perpetual' device in a few words.

Sean and others notice that the speed of the perpetual motion machine is gradually slowing down, and the grand wizards roughly estimate that it will stop on its own in no more than two days, clearly far from being 'perpetual'.

Victorio tries to smooth things over, saying that using planetary gravity to provide continuous power is a novel idea, but this perpetual motion machine doesn’t have much practical value.

Under everyone's 'nitpicking', the confident old wizard blushes and repeatedly defends that his perpetual motion machine has great potential and just needs further improvement. He leaves the stage with a face full of indignation, clearly upset that his 'great invention' wasn't well-received.

Then it's Glenn's turn to come to the stage with his new camera, demonstrating it to everyone, and accompanied by a burst of flashing light, under the influence of magic, a black and white photo appears in front of everyone very quickly.

This alchemical device, capable of imprinting reality onto 'paper', immediately sparks the interest of many, having been amazed by the lifelike images published in the newspapers before. Now, under Glenn's explanation, they finally understand the principle behind it.

"Pinhole imaging, huh? That's a clever idea..." Aurora says with a smile.

Many know about this natural phenomenon, and wizards who advocate the particle theory of light consider it one of the most direct evidences of light traveling in straight lines, but Glenn is indeed the first to think of utilizing this phenomenon.

For this new invention, Lynn and the others unanimously give high praise and immediately decide to award him a Morning Star Medal to recognize his achievement...