My Anime Shopping Tree & My Cold Prodigy Wife!
Episode-184

Chapter : 367

He turned to Lyra, the pragmatist. “Imagine, Lyra. A wall of soldiers, each armed with such a tube. They do not need the strength of a knight or the years of training of an archer. They simply need to point and pull a trigger. And a volley of metal projectiles, a storm of iron, is unleashed upon the enemy, capable of tearing through armor, of shattering shields, of breaking a cavalry charge before it even reaches our lines. Imagine siege cannons that do not hurl heavy stones with clumsy torsion, but fire dense, iron balls with such force that they can punch through the thickest fortress walls.”

Lyra’s face was pale, her mind reeling with the logistical and tactical implications. It wasn't just a new weapon; it was a new paradigm of war.

Then, he looked at Borin. The explosive enthusiast had been silent throughout his explanation, a rare and deeply unsettling occurrence. His usual boisterous grin was gone. His face was pale, his eyes wide, fixed on Lloyd with an expression of such profound, almost religious, awe, it was as if he were looking at the god of fire and destruction itself.

“Controlled… directional… explosions…” Borin whispered, the words a reverent, almost tearful, prayer. He began to tremble, not with fear, but with a pure, unadulterated, almost spiritual, excitement. He looked at Lloyd, his eyes shining with a manic, brilliant light. “My lord,” he breathed, his voice thick with emotion. “You are not just talking about a new weapon. You are talking about… the most beautiful, most elegant, most wonderfully, gloriously, destructive art form I have ever imagined.”

Lloyd had their attention. He had their awe. He had their fear. And most importantly, he had their absolute, unquestioning, and slightly unhinged, loyalty. The seeds of a new fire, a fire that would reshape the very foundations of their world, had just been planted in the fertile, brilliant, and slightly unstable, minds of his R&D team. The gunpowder plot had begun.

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The air in the manufactory study felt different now, charged with the weight of a secret that could shatter kingdoms. The initial, almost manic, excitement from Borin had subsided into a focused, intense silence. Lyra’s practical mind was clearly grappling with the immense engineering and safety challenges, her fingers drumming a silent, worried rhythm on the table. Alaric was already lost in a world of theoretical chemical reactions, his eyes distant, his lips moving silently as he mentally balanced equations for a reaction he did not yet fully understand. They were hooked. The concept, however terrifying, was too compelling for their brilliant, inquisitive minds to resist.

“This project,” Lloyd stated, his voice a low, firm command that brought them all back to the present, “is our highest priority, but also our deepest secret. It will be designated ‘Project Chimera’. You will not speak of it outside this room. You will not write down the full formulas or designs. All work will be theoretical, component-based, until I give the order to proceed with a practical test. Your research will be compartmentalized. Alaric, you will focus on the purification and properties of the three base reagents, in isolation. Borin, you will begin theoretical designs for a containment vessel—a reinforced metal tube capable of withstanding immense, instantaneous pressure. Lyra, you will research existing forging techniques and potential metallurgical weaknesses. Understood?”

The three of them nodded in unison, their faces grim, serious. The gravity of the task, the sheer, world-altering potential of what they were embarking on, had settled upon them.

“Good,” Lloyd said. “Now, I must acquire the components. And for that,” he added, a hint of his earlier enigmatic smile returning, “I require a different kind of expert.”

He dismissed them, and they filed out of the study, their minds buzzing with a thousand new, dangerous, and exhilarating ideas. Lloyd remained, waiting in the quiet solitude of his office, letting the echoes of his proposal settle. He had just set in motion a chain of events that could lead to either his house’s ultimate security or its absolute ruin. There was no turning back now.

He waited until the last sounds of the manufactory had faded, until the only sound was the gentle hiss of the oil lamp and the distant sigh of the wind outside. Then, he spoke to the empty, shadowed corner of the room.

“Ken.”

The shadow detached itself from the wall without a sound, resolving into the solid, impassive form of his bodyguard. Ken Park had been there the entire time, a silent, unseen witness to the entire secret meeting. Lloyd had known, had counted on it.

Chapter : 368

“Young Lord,” Ken acknowledged, his voice the usual flat, unwavering baritone. He stepped into the pool of lamplight, his face an unreadable mask, but his eyes, Lloyd noted, held a new, deeper intensity. He had heard everything.

“You heard the proposal,” Lloyd stated, not a question.

“I did, my lord,” Ken confirmed. His expression did not change. He offered no judgment, no surprise, no opinion. He simply waited for his orders. His loyalty was not to the project, but to the man who commanded it.

“Then you understand the necessity for absolute, unparalleled discretion in the next phase,” Lloyd continued, his voice low, serious. “This is no longer about sourcing tallow or olive oil, Ken. This is about acquiring the very building blocks of a new kind of power. Any hint of what we are assembling could lead to… catastrophic consequences.”

He slid a single, folded sheet of vellum across the desk. It did not contain names or formulas. It contained descriptions. Three simple, seemingly innocuous, descriptions.

“I have a new procurement mission for you, Ken,” Lloyd said, his gaze locking with his bodyguard’s. “A shadow’s errand. You will use your network, your most trusted, most discreet assets. You will acquire three specific materials for me, in small but pure quantities. You will do so without raising any alarms, without linking the purchases together, without leaving any trace that connects these materials to me, to this factory, or to House Ferrum.”

Ken picked up the parchment, his eyes scanning the descriptions with swift, analytical precision.

“Item One: Cave-Wall Salt.” The parchment read. “A white, crystalline substance, often found as a powdery efflorescence on the walls of dry, deep caves—particularly those with large bat populations. Also found in the earth beneath old stables or barns, where animal waste has seeped into the ground for many years. It is sometimes used in small quantities by alchemists as a preservative or a minor reagent. I require a pure, refined sample. Free of excess dirt or moisture.”

Potassium Nitrate. Saltpeter. The oxidizer.

“Item Two: Yellow Brimstone.” Ken’s eyes moved to the next line. “A bright yellow, crystalline solid with a distinct, sharp smell, like rotten eggs when burned. Found in volcanic regions, near hot springs, or as a deposit in certain deep mineral mines. The Alchemist’s Guild uses it occasionally for creating acids or fumigants. I require a block of the purest, most vibrant yellow stone you can find.”

Sulfur. The fuel and stabilizer.

“Item Three: Heartwood Charcoal.” The final item. “Not the common charcoal used for forges or hearths. I require charcoal made exclusively from the heartwood of a slow-growing, dense hardwood, like willow or alder. It must be burned in a low-oxygen environment to ensure purity, then milled into a powder as fine as flour. The quality, the fineness of the milling, is paramount.”

Carbon. The primary fuel.

Ken finished reading, his expression still utterly, infuriatingly, impassive. He folded the parchment carefully and tucked it into his tunic. He did not ask what the materials were for. He did not ask why the heir to the Duchy was suddenly interested in bat guano scrapings and volcanic rock. The ‘why’ was not his domain. The ‘how’ was.

“Your instructions are clear, Young Lord,” Ken stated. He began to think aloud, his voice a low, clinical murmur, the master intelligence operative processing a new mission profile. “The Heartwood Charcoal is the simplest. The estate’s own charcoal burners can be tasked with a special, high-purity production run under the guise of creating a new pigment base for the Duchess’s art supplies. The discretion will be absolute.”

“The Yellow Brimstone is more challenging,” he continued, his gaze becoming distant, accessing his vast mental network. “The nearest significant volcanic deposits are in the Firepeak Mountains, a two-week journey. However, a small, independent mining consortium operating on the southern border of the Duchy extracts it as a byproduct. They are known to be… discreet… and amenable to transactions that are not officially recorded in any guild ledger. I have an asset in the region. The acquisition can be arranged.”

“And the Cave-Wall Salt…” he paused, a flicker of something—calculation? mild distaste?—in his eyes. “That is the most difficult. The largest known deposits are in the Echoing Caverns, a network controlled by a particularly unpleasant clan of cave-dwelling goblins. Negotiation is… unlikely to be fruitful.” He fell silent for a moment. “However,” he added, his voice dropping slightly, “there is an alternative. The old, abandoned levels of the Ducal stables. The ones that have not been used for over a century. The soil there will be rich. The extraction will be dirty, unpleasant work. But it can be done, at night, by a small, trusted team, without anyone knowing.”