Presentation

The day after came quickly. Savine wanted to go to the Palace immediately, but the ceremonial nonsense with the Head Temple was already finished. Savine and the others were summoned post haste.

With that, they grabbed their inventions and headed towards the Head Temple.

Similarly to Fest duchy, the temple here was located at the edge between the nobles' area and the commoners' area. Savine could also see that many of the priests here were of noble birth and from all over the country, considering the large dormitory that stood on the nobles' area. Surely, if they were from the capital, they'd have their own houses to live in.

As for the temple itself, it was a taller and grander version of the one at Fest. Savine thought about it and remembered that in the Erst duchy, there was a rather grand temple as well. And from Eliseline, she learned that there were four cardinals in the Sovereignty. Like the Teleportation Circles, they should be spread across the Sovereign's City and the Three Great Duchies.

Savine expected that they were going to meet one of these cardinals today.

The group walked through the Temple's tall halls and arrived at the Grand Chamber. This Grand Chamber wasn't filled with various magic tools like Fest, but housed only one tool – a giant blue orb swirling with mana. It was the Link to the North, a teleporter of mana that supplied the Great Barrier.

Deeper in the Grand Chamber was an elevated wooden seat with no notable features. The only decoration it had was a wizened old man of 60 years wearing all white. He sat straight and proper, but his mind and body were relaxed and at ease. He felt like someone who was close to Savine's ideal of owning and accepting oneself completely.

'The cardinal here has a pretty good aura…'

Beside the old man, a middle aged man stood, wearing all black. Next to them stood a group of bishops. They were surprisingly young. They looked at Lucius and Eliseline with wistful sighs and occasionally furrowed their brows at Savine.

"Representatives of the Fest duchy's temple greet the Pope," Eliseline declared.

'Oh.'

"Our guests from afar, please be at ease. It's an honor for us to receive a duke and his blood. The young priest as well, I welcome you sincerely."

The pope's voice came from deep inside his diaphragm, giving it a domineering vibe. But its smooth timbre made his listeners feel calm and safe. Identically, his gaze was piercing yet calm, not betraying any emotions as he stared at the newcomers.

Savine smiled, feeling that the religious leader here wasn't so bad. He smelled nice too.

Eliseline started her presentation.

"As we've declared, we have produced new inventions and want to sell them under the Temple's name. I will not take your time with needless political speech and tell you all the truth.

"Though our duchy has talented geniuses, unfortunately, we don't have the power to defend their possessions. As a loser of the civil war, we know it would be hard to prevent the winners from trampling on us. It's a disgraceful matter and as members of the ducal family we are eternally ashamed, but we cannot allow ourselves to remain stagnant forever."

The other side remained still. The cardinal spoke.

"Naturally, we are willing to lend a helping hand to people in need. But despite our goodwill, we know we can't reach out our hands towards everyone. We all know that the common men are the backbones of our country. They grow our food and grant us mages to replenish our numbers. Our duty is to help these people as much as possible… I don't feel it's fair that we must lend a helping hand towards a ducal family, of all the people."

Savine struggled to keep the wry smile off her face, hearing the grand words. Has the cardinal ever walked out of the nobles district? How could he even know the circumstances of the people?

'I should be more hopeful,' she thought. 'Innocent until proven guilty…'

"We believe these inventions can help the people live a better and easier life."

Eliseline revealed their inventions. A table was brought in to place them all in row. In total, there were four finished products, one product that was yet to be assembled and a dozen mana motors of various sizes. The latter were made by Savine as they traveled. Eliseline picked the smallest one up and activated it with a bit of her mana.

"As you can see, these are Registrars, but its specialty is that a mage doesn't need to cast the spell for it again. It only needs mana to work."

At that point, the mana motor whizzed into action. Its square key spun rapidly, making a whirring noise.

The cardinals and the bishops were impressed by the registrar, but seeing the mana motor in action, they looked underwhelmed.

"So it just spins? What's the point then?" one of the bishops, a stout, loud voiced man asked.

"Allow me to demonstrate," Eliseline said.

She deactivated the mana motor, and started assembling the one unfinished product, the core of it being the mana motor. The others looked at her hands with interest, awed by the tool's tightly knit parts. Two minutes later, Eliseline was finished and on the table stood a small drill.

She turned the tool on and it spun at high speed. Eliseline then picked two pieces of wood and drilled a hole in both.

Afterwards she picked up another tool. This one was a screwdriver. Since there was a screwdriver, naturally, there was a screw. She placed it on the hole and the two screws spun inside, binding the two pieces of wood together.

All these tools were made by Savine. She made the drill's head and the screws for the screwdriver. The craftsmen were yet to create screws themselves as they were still working on the screw-cutting lathe blueprint that Savine provided them.

These things, Eliseline explained all.

Next Eliseline demonstrated the electric saw. Seeing its circular shape and the speed at which the previous two tools spun, the observers moved back a bit even before the tool was activated. A couple seconds later, the saw spun at incredible speeds and cut the pieces of wood cleanly in half.

Naturally, this demonstration was much more impactful than the previous two.

"As you can see, the process is fast and easy. Even I can be a decent woodworker with these tools, imagine what the real masters of the craft can do?" Eliseline said. "We'll be able to make products and goods nowhere else seen in the world, pushing the Sovereignty's image to the peak.

"For now, we've only created tools to help the craftsmen, but I'm positive we'll be able to create tools and machinery able to help the farmers and the shepherds. In fact, our craftsmen are already working on a larger construct that can plow the lands quicker."

The observers' eyes went towards the last tool. It was the wooden fan.

"What is that? Some sort of weapon?" one asked.

"We felt it would be too shallow-minded to focus only on craftsmen's tools. This is a simple house appliance," Eliseline said and turned the fan on. It spun without making much noise, blowing air towards the observers. "It's to help during hot sunny days. It's a luxury item for the nobility."

The bishops went silent. Before they could ask about the final product on the table, Eliseline spoke.

"We expect to find many more uses of the mana motor," Eliseline said. "These little things seem unimpressive at first, but keen minds can always find uses for them. We've made many things, but I'm confident we haven't even found 1% of all the things we could do with them."

With that, Eliseline's presentation of the products concluded. Without giving the pope's side to think further, she continued on to negotiations.

"The Fest duchy is willing to give the Head Temple 70% of all profits made by with the mana motor. We will take care of all production fees and also sales fees. We only ask the Temple to provide us with the raw materials and also grant us protection from overbearing hands."

Surprised gasps could be heard. It was unprecedented that someone would be willing to offer so much of their new business to another party. But when they remembered that it was the Fest duchy, they could see why.

"Thank you for your speech," the cardinal was the first to speak. "We will discuss this among ourselves and grant you a reply."

Servants opened the door, inviting the group out. Before the door closed, Savine activated the last invention on the table, the one they hadn't demonstrated yet. They were directed to one of the temple's rooms to wait for the Head Temple's decision.