Alien Knights

The young man named Lynn took out an original "pendulum clock" made of wooden gears from the box, which completely overturned Todd's cognition.

In the history of the past life, the timing principle of the pendulum was first discovered by Galileo, but the real "pendulum clock" was invented by the Dutch physicist Christian Huygens in 1657.

Although the "pendulum clock" in front of me is rough in workmanship and its appearance is quite different from Todd's impression, the design of timing parts and swing parts is a unique invention of this era.

Todd looked at the slowly turning gears, and asked Ulysses, "How did you think of gravity from this machine?"

When Ulysses said this, he was a little excited: "When we found that the pendulum was falling, we wondered what force was pulling these heavy objects? Later, we experimented with various materials such as stone, iron, and wood, and found that no matter how the weight and material changed, the time for the pendulum to go back and forth was always fixed. We thought, there must be a force under our feet that is giving these objects speed, a constant speed!"

Todd listened and nodded, thinking to himself, although it is different from Newton's way of discovering gravity, but for the cognitive system of mechanics, it can be regarded as a new entry point.

Ulysses is a qualified scholar, but definitely not a qualified businessman. He pointed to the pendulum clock and continued: "Although we have discovered gravity, we can't think of any other uses other than using it to design the pendulum clock to calculate time. Moreover, this pendulum clock often has errors when calculating time, and the wooden parts often need to be replaced..."

The young man wanted to continue talking, but his companion couldn't stand it anymore, so he nudged Ulysses with his elbow, signaling him to shut up quickly.

Todd smiled: "Are you trying to use this invention to obtain investment from the Muxi Cooperative?"

Everyone nodded quickly.

Todd looked at the crowd in front of him, then glanced at the "pendulum clock", finally nodded and said, "I can help you..."

The faces of the people were first surprised, then surprised, and finally cheered loudly.

Todd put his hands down, signaling to the crowd to restrain their excitement for the time being. He didn't finish his sentence: "But I ask you to write a book, a book about explaining 'gravity'. Where does this force come from, how does it act on objects, what kind of energy characteristics it has, etc. The amount of money I give you will be increased or decreased depending on how good the book is."

After hearing this strange request, everyone looked at each other in blank dismay. They never thought that the head of the group would actually determine the amount of funding based on the premise of studying "gravity".

Seeing this group of students from Metropolitan College, monks who study ancient books, and residents who like to study walk out of the chief's office together, what Todd thinks of is the future technological innovation of Muxi Town. Because of his professional direction, he is more inclined to biology and chemistry, and he is not outstanding in physics, especially mechanics, electromagnetism and thermodynamics. If we want to carry out the industrial revolution in the future, we must rely on the continuous progress of the world's own scientific level.

Thinking of this, Todd picked up the unfinished paper again and started writing hard.

The next day, two notices were issued in front of the church in Muxi Town. The first one is to notify the relic holders of "Muxi Mutual Aid Society" to come to receive the dividends of the mutual aid company's one-year operation; the second one is to hold a celebration called "Story Contest" in the entire Muxi Town.

The residents of Muxi Town, except for the new word "dividend", can easily understand the first notice. The key to everyone's doubts is the second announcement about the story celebration.

Regarding the announcement of the celebration of the "Story Contest", Todd's personal announcement is as follows:

In order to enrich the entertainment life of residents and discover the literary talents of this town, this story contest is held here.

1. There are no restrictions on the identity, occupation, age and gender of the participants.

2. This competition only accepts text submissions, and there is no limit to the type of text, the length of the story, and the subject matter of the content.

3. The submission period is one month. The review team will judge the participating stories from various aspects such as plot, conception, and writing style, and select the top three, and give each person a reward of 100 silver months.

4. For the top three award-winning stories, Muxi Town will hire a theater troupe to adapt them into dramas and perform them in the whole town, and all ticket revenue will go to the authors.

As soon as such an announcement spread, at first the residents of Muxi Town were full of question marks. There is only one thought in people's minds, what is the Holy Son trying to do?

But after thinking about it, those lords in other places collected taxes randomly, chopped off people's heads, and exercised the "right of the first night" at every turn. In comparison, the actual controller of Muxi Town—Master Todd, just likes to read stories written by others, which is really commendable.

Therefore, the residents who are grateful for the kindness of the Holy Son plan to dedicate the best stories to Mr. Todd. But another problem came up. The story must be submitted in words, and in the huge Muxi Town, with a population of nearly 2,000, there are less than 200 people who can read.

This ratio looks embarrassing, but looking at the entire medieval world, the literacy rate in Muxi Town is already very high. You must know that the priests in the churches in some towns can't even recognize the characters of the "Bible". Every time they preach at mass, they are talking nonsense. This is absolutely nothing new.

In desperation, a new profession appeared in Muxi Town - "Book Recorder". Most of these people are monks and students, entrusted by the rich, to collect remuneration and turn the stories they orally tell into words and submit them to the church.

The one-month submission period passed quickly, and the church received a total of 132 submissions. In terms of writing, there are Latin, common Chinese and even a few copies in Northland. Todd sat at the table, looking at one after another, the more disappointed he looked.

Most of the stories submitted were stories about praising the Heavenly Father and singing about holy places, and some of them were actually Todd’s folk legends, such as wars against pirates, exorcism rituals, heresy trials, etc.

Todd was speechless, and just saw that at noon the next day, when he was close to losing hope for this "story contest", a submitted novel signed by Hans entered his sight.

Mr. Hans is a quasi-baron of the Silver Ring Kingdom. He originally served as an army clerk, followed the Southern Army to attack Muxi Town, and was later captured in a battle with the Cumberland army. Because the family is poor and cannot pay the ransom of the nobles, he can only become a prisoner, and is responsible for some text and digital work on the town reconstruction site.

In this "Story Contest", he submitted a short story titled "Mockingbird".

The story is narrated from the tone and perspective of a 7-year-old boy.

There was a boy who was weak and sick since he was a child. His mother died of dystocia, and his father barely supported the family by working from dawn to dusk and working several jobs.

Father and son depend on each other for life.

The war broke out, and the boy's father was forcibly recruited by the army and went to the battlefield.

The boy was lying alone in the damp and cold room, waiting for his father to come back, but the latter never heard from him and never returned home.

The boy with high fever dreamed that he became a bird, flew over the city wall, flew over the river, came to the battlefield where the two armies were fighting, and found his missing father.

At the end of the story, the comrades buried the bodies of the war dead, only to find that a robin also died in front of a tombstone.

With red eyes, Todd quietly drew a circle on the manuscript.