Aside: Gasoline.
They all certainly looked real enough, is what Niven thought.
He gazed curiously at the two rows of test tubes. Each tube in one of the rows contained a specific material that had been fabricated through the use of utility magic, and its corresponding control in the other row.
He had cleared out an entire corner of the laboratory just for these tests. Personally, he thought the whole ordeal on whether or not the materials were 'real' was a bit nonsensical, but he had nothing if not trust in his master's intuition.
The first materials currently being testing were: cumin, salt, water, and soil.
First and foremost on his checklist of confirming the 'physical continuity' of the magically fabricated materials, he needed to determine their chemical compositions.
There were several methods to go about doing this for each of the materials and each method had its own degree of precision when it came to confirming the presence of trace elements. He had on hand several types of pH indicators, bacterial culture gardens, chemical indicators, and even an apparatus that utilized a flame and prism to view the spectral lines of elements.
Unfortunately for him, Stockwell had asked him to be as thorough as humanly possible, which meant that he would not be leaving the lab for quite some time.
"Oh boy…"
It was mostly just busy work. He would much rather help out Faber with the other project which seemed much more interesting in comparison. However, many of the tests that Stockwell called for were experimental observations made over long periods of time under a multitude of various conditions, and if Niven didn't get the chemical analysis done soon, he wouldn't be finished with the tests by the time Stockwell and Vera got back from the war.
"I guess this is what master called 'the grind'..."
Niven sighed. At least all the busy work was likely to increase his job class levels.
...
Niven went down his clipboard.
Not surprisingly, each magical material had acted exceedingly similarly to its non-magical control.
No major differences were found in the ground cumin seeds. Each sample tested showed a composition of 20.1 - 23.2% proteins, 30.3 - 32.0% carbohydrates, 37.9 - 38.8% fats, 8.1 - 9.2% fiber, 0.9 - 5.2% water, and around 5% inorganic materials.
As expected, the most abundant inorganic elements present in the cumin were phosphorus, potassium, sodium, and iron. All samples also showed trace amounts of manganese, copper, calcium, zinc, and magnesium.
The only notable chemical difference between the fabricated cumin and its non-magical control that he had obtained from a market on the way, was that the magical cumin had slightly lower levels of moisture.
And ultimately, they both tasted the same as far as Niven could tell.
Next was the salt.
The fabricated sample looked identical to a chunk of halite one would expect to find in a quarry, in other words, a nearly pure sodium chloride crystal. Merely nearly pure.
The control was a laboratory made crystal of sodium chloride so it was guaranteed to be pure to within a negligible margin of error. The fabricated sample however, whilst being nearly identical in appearance to the control, did show trace impurities and more variations in its crystal latus.
In Niven's words, the fabricated salt was much more akin to 'salt' than sodium chloride. Though admittedly their chemical compositions were basically identical.
It was much the same story with the water.
The control was a sample of distilled water, so Niven was reasonably confident that it was almost pure H2O and whatever atmospheric CO2 had dissolved into it. Its measured pH in all samples was consistently around 6.5.
The fabricated water on the other hand showed a plethora of other ions in it. He was easily able to confirm the presence of potassium, magnesium, calcium, sulfate, bicarbonate, and chloride. All were common ions one would expect to find in a natural body of water such as a well or river, and as a result, its pH hovered around 7.
Curiously though, he found no traces of living bacteria.
Indeed, it was also true for all of the other fabricated materials. He found microbial life in none of them, including the ground cumin which is by definition chock full of organic molecules
This fact was most clearly illustrated in the sample of soil.
Soil is by its very nature, chemically diverse. It serves as a porous medium for plants, animals, and bacteria to exchange nutrients and is constantly exposed to weather and erosion. So even though more than half of it is generally made from aluminates and silicates, the rest of its chemical composition is dependent on its local climate and ecosystem.
Naturally, being the diligent student he is, Niven had done the best he could to create a comprehensive analysis on the fabricated soil.
The soil had been created by a magic caster operating out of E-Rantel, and as a result, it closely mimicked the more fertile farmland soils of the region that he had taken the control sample from.
Like the control, it showed strikingly similar concentrations of clay, silt, sand, and water, and it even had all of the same organic nutrients one would expect of fertile farmland.
But of course, as with the other materials, absolutely no traces of bacterial or fungal life were present. Which was almost perplexing considering that many of the nutrients in the soil came about ecologically as a result of microbial action.
Niven mulled it over and made a checkmark on the clipboard.
His master had a completely different scientific background than he did and was an alien to their world. Niven could only guess as to what kind of theories he'd make upon seeing the data.
At the very least though, Niven had his own set of ideas as to why there was no microbial life in the samples. He wasn't too sure since he knew little of the actual mechanics behind magic casting, but he had theories nonetheless.
He went about writing the report on his findings.
After he finished, he then began to set up for the next part of the grander experiment.
Because so far, regardless of their lack of microbial life, the magically fabricated materials reacted to his tests with complete chemical continuity.
That is, he had been able to deconstruct the materials down to their constituent parts and confirm that they were indeed made of atoms, such as turning the fabricated water into completely normal molecules of hydrogen and oxygen gas.
All that work thus far was simply preliminary work to what his master was really interested in.
E=mc^2
According to that rule, anything that has mass has an enormous amount of intrinsic energy.
It simply wouldn't make sense from a universal standpoint that someone like a first tier magic caster who couldn't cast the third tier spell 「Fireball」, which could only deliver around 10 megajoules of energy if one was estimating generously, could create a 5 kilogram bucket of water out of thin air which has in it an intrinsic energy of 449,377,589,368 megajoules.
The only two immediately satisfying explanations for this would be that the utility magic spells simply summon the material from some other place in the universe, or that the material they create is in some way not "real" matter.
The first hypothesis seemed unlikely, since similar utility spells are used to create objects which have been personally thought up of and designed by the caster at the moment of casting the spell. In other words, they couldn't have been stored in a different location or some kind of cosmic bank ahead of time.
So ultimately, the main part of Niven's assignment was in determining whether or not the strong and weak nuclear forces acted normally.
Obviously they didn't have a nuclear reactor in Moot Village, but they could still do some experiments with what they had on hand.
Niven went off into the storage room and returned with a small chunk of black ore. Its rarity was similar to that of tin. Since it had little use, miners generally considered it an obstacle to get around. It was called pitchblende.
Stockwell had correctly identified it as uraninite ahead of time. It was mildly radioactive, producing small amounts of beta particles, alpha particles, and very rarely depending on its exact composition, some free neutrons.
It didn't need to cause intense nuclear reactions with the nuclei of the fabricated materials, all it needed to do was mess with them a little. Just enough to remind them that the strong and weak nuclear forces exist.
Niven went ahead and placed the sample of fabricated cumin along with its control in an opaque black box with the chunk of uraninite.
He locked the box and brushed off his hands triumphantly.
He'd come back to check on the samples in a few days.
…
Niven stepped outside of the lab and felt the brisk morning fog coalesse on his skin. He looked up to see dark gray clouds forming on the horizon. The winter rains were returning to Re-Estize.
He smiled coolly as he strolled through the village towards Faber's workshop. The villagers were preparing for their final harvest before the cold came in.
He looked off in the direction across the lake. All of the potentially explosive materials being made were isolated over there, away from the village. That included the most recent structure he's helped to make: a steel construct for distilling petroleum.
It was actually a rather small structure, only really large enough to separate a quarter barrel of crude oil a day, but that was more than enough for what they currently needed.
His smile brightened when he heard a series of rough, uneven mechanical popping noises pierce crisply through the fog. The rate of the pops quickened to the point at which they blended into a low pitch.
It was the chilling roar of a remarkable piece of machinery.
The prototype "internal combustion engine."
Niven giggled lightly to himself. It was always the case that just when it seemed like Stockwell's ideas had peaked, he would turn around and pull something like that out.
A loud bang sounded and the mechanical roaring slowed and died. Faber's cursing quickly followed.
"-what is it now you piece of shit!?"
Niven rounded the corner and called out to the man. "Hello!"
Faber stood over the prototype engine. He was covered head to toe in grease and held in his hand a rag drenched in oil and unspent gasoline.
He turned his head away just enough to address the new arrival. "Hey there, how ya doin' kid?"
"Good, thank you. Just finished up a project for Mr. Stockwell. I see you're still having trouble."
Faber stepped back and rubbed his neck. "Everytime I fix one thing, two other things break."
"Have you tried turning it off and on again?"
"Excuse me?"
Niven laughed and shrugged. "It's just something that master says as a joke whenever I complain that something isn't working."
Faber smiled defeatedly. "Is that so… You wouldn't happen to know what he says when someone is complaining about a cylinder that keeps backfiring?"
Niven approached the engine. It was truly a remarkable piece of machinery.
It was a complex system of steel tubes and valves roughly 1.7 meters long and a meter high. Two parallel rows of six inline cylinders jutted upwards and outwards in a "V" shape, giving it an almost alien appearance that Niven could only describe as a metal insectoid carapace. It also weighed in excess of 350 kilograms so it was currently being supported above the rough turf on a pair of steel struts.
A shaft distended outwards from the engine and connected to a series of large gears, levers, and weights called a dynamometer. It had been used before to test their steam engine.
"How much power is it putting out now?" Niven asked.
The blacksmith's demeanor suddenly changed at the mention of power. A strange and childish laugher welled up deep inside the man's chest. "Double since I fine tuned the distributor timings and changed the firing order yesterday."
"Double? You mean…" Niven trailed off.
A wild glint appeared in the back of Faber's eyes. "Two, hundred, horses."
He placed his large hands on Niven's shoulders. "We were all so infatuated with steam, but this is where the true power is! At 1,800 rpm I can fit the power of two, hundred horses inside this little box!"
Niven couldn't help but resonate with the man's childishly gleeful tone.
"And that's only half the proposed power!" Faber continued. "Just imagine what kind creatures we could animate with a heart like this!"
He coughed into his fist and cleared his throat.
He chuckled and calmed himself. "That is of course, when it's all functioning properly. I've had no shortage of back firing in one of the cylinders all morning.
Niven smiled and crouched down to examine the engine. "I see… Are you sure it's just one of the cylinders that's backfiring?"
Faber scoffed. "Hell if I know. The cause could be any number of things. The carburetor not mixing in enough air, the piston rings failing to fully seal the cylinders, a faulty spark in the distributor… though, if I need to be honest, I suspect that the fuel is likely the offender right now."
Niven seemed offended. "Huh!? But why…the mixture is as energetic as I could possibly make it."
"I don't think that's the problem kid," Faber scratched his beard, "I think what's happening is that the fuel is igniting before the spark is able to set it off. And I don't think it's the timing that's the issue. I suspect that it's the compression. The fuel is too volatile and sometimes isn't able to be compressed to top-dead-center without igniting."
Niven paused and put his hand to his chin in contemplation. "Hmm… compression… couldn't the same problem be caused by the carburetor? Maybe it's pushing in too much or too little air?"
Faber shrugged and gestured behind him to a large piece of parchment splayed out on the back of his workshop's wall. On it were many detailed cross-sectional sections of the internal combustion engine that the blacksmith had done his best to replicate.
However, while Stockwell did have a generally good understanding about how most things worked, he was still only human and couldn't perfectly remember the exact shape and contour of every single piece in a machine that boasted so many moving parts.
He at least made sure to leave detailed captions as to the nature and design of each of the engine's mechanical systems. All written in English, of course. Stockwell hadn't nearly the amount of vocabulary necessary in Re-Estize script to do the engine justice otherwise.
Niven had done his best to translate what he could, but there were still a few sections that he needed to guess at.
Faber directed Niven's attention to the drawing of the device that mixed the fuel and the air together before sending it down the intake manifold. Its name in English was "Carburetor". Several sections were left blank.
Faber put his finger on a string of English letters that he assumed referred to the precise regulation and ideal ratios of air-fuel mixing.
"What's it say, kid?"
Niven sounded out the words on his tongue. English was a terribly hard language. Even after deciphering some of the way the spoken language seemed to auto translate between him and Stockwell, there was practically no phonetic overlap. Translating writing was always difficult. Luickly Gladur had begun to help out as well.
"This word here sort of means to 'discover' or 'figure', and it's followed by a phrase that means to 'do away with' or 'to be without'..."
Niven frowned, "... I think it's just saying 'Figure it out yourself'."
Faber exhaled and stretched his joints in a series of cracking noises. "I thought so."
"I'll see if I can create a fuel that's more compressible. I know octane is pretty good at being compressed, but pure octane probably won't do well in the engine… hmm, we'll need to do some experimenting to see which alkanes do the best and in what proportion. This will take a while…"
Faber laughed lightly. "I look forward to the challenge."