Europa Universalis 1867: Start by inheriting an armory

Richard stood up, walked over to Heinrich, and patted him lightly on the broad shoulder.

"I understand," he said. "Although it was your oversight, I don't blame you."

Heinrich looked up, his eyes full of doubt: "You...you're not planning to fire me?"

Richard withdrew his hand, smiling, and said, "How can I blame a man who carries two families on his shoulders?"

Heinrich's lips trembled slightly. He swallowed the breath that was stuck in his throat and straightened his back.

He then bowed to Siemens and Richard, and turned to walk towards the door.

Just as his hand touched the doorknob, Richard's voice came from behind him: "Oh, right, Heinrich."

He stopped in his tracks.

"Lucas didn't betray you."

Heinrich turned around, his brow furrowing slightly. "No?"

"No." Richard shook his head. "Ask Mr. Siemens if you don't believe me."

Heinrich looked at Siemens.

"No, not at all," Siemens added. "But he'd be better suited to writing novels than guarding the factory. He just spent over ten minutes in his office talking about Celtic mythology. I never knew an old man working the night shift at the factory could have so many stories in his head."

Heinrich paused for a moment, then gave a relieved smile.

He then opened the door and went out.

Richard turned around and looked at Siemens. The two stared at each other in silence for a few seconds before Siemens spoke up: "You know, I never imagined that one day I would be in my own office, dealing with factory matters like interrogating a criminal."

"There's a first time for everything," Richard shrugged. "Given what we're doing, this kind of scenario might happen again."

Siemens pursed his lips after hearing this: "When will this ever end?"

"You'll notice when it's over."

Richard walked back to the window, touched his chin, and seemed to be deep in thought.

Has the Siemens foreman been cleared of suspicion? It seems so now, but Richard isn't sure. Perhaps Eleanor's infiltration came later than he thought, or perhaps it was all a smokescreen.

Richard shook his head, abandoning this pointless game of rock-paper-scissors. He only needed to keep an eye on the three people in the target group, and if anything happened, Reginald's informants would be the first to notice.

So he didn't say anything more, gave Siemens a few brief instructions, and then left Swansea.

Richard soon returned to Dartford.

It was getting late, and the gaslights in the factory area were lit. He walked past the hydraulic press that was still being assembled. The columns were already in place, and the workers were playing a symphony of steel and iron, muscle and machinery on the scaffolding.

He watched for a while, then walked straight toward the explosives laboratory deep inside the workshop.

Richard arrived at the laboratory door, and as soon as his hand touched the doorknob, he felt a low-frequency vibration in the door panel.

The steam engine has been started.

He pushed open the door, stood on the threshold, and glanced inside.

The steam fan on the fume hood was running at full power, and a deep, powerful roar came from the duct.

The air was filled with a pungent, sweet, fruity aroma—the smell of acetone.

He had read about its smell in a book, but when he actually smelled it, the sticky, nauseating sensation gripped his stomach.

He stepped back and took the gas mask from the hook on the wall.

Rather than a gas mask, it was more like a charcoal respirator, a simple pad covering the mouth and nose invented by Scottish chemist John Stenhouse.

Shaped like a flat wallet, the inside is made of metal mesh holding powdered activated carbon, and the canvas straps are tightly tied around the ears to ensure that the edges are airtight.

He put it on his face, pulled the strap tight, the fabric pressing against the bridge of his nose, and the bitter smell of charcoal powder seeped out from the filter pad.

The equipment was so rudimentary that it reminded him of the bird-beak masks worn by doctors during the Black Death in the Middle Ages, but it was considered advanced for this era.

He sighed, thinking that he must take the opportunity to improve it.

He pushed open the door and went inside.

Thomas stood in front of the constant temperature mixer, watching intently as the brass mechanical claw stirred evenly in the lead-lined water tank.

His fingers hovered above the temperature control valve, his eyes fixed on the thermometer, ready to make fine adjustments at any moment, with his fingertips less than an inch away from the handle.

He was wearing the same black acid-resistant leather skirt as Abel, with the buckle at the waist fastened tightly, and there were several white marks on the surface of the leather skirt where it had been corroded by acid.

He wore the same charcoal respirator as Richard, with the canvas strap tied in a knot at the back of his head. A few strands of hair, soaked with sweat, peeked out from under the strap and stuck to his skin.

Richard had barely noticed Thomas's presence in the lab last time; he was so inconspicuous. But now that Thomas was standing next to the blender, Richard finally had a chance to take a closer look at the young man.

Thomas was about Richard’s age, twenty-five or twenty-six, maybe even younger, but spending most of his days in the library and laboratory had given his skin an unhealthy ivory white, like a thin sheet of paper stuck to his cheekbones.

His eyes were sunken, with two faint bluish-black patches hanging below his eyelids. His fingers were slender and without any calluses.

In the lead-lined water tank beneath the water bath, a whale oil lamp was burning quietly.

The blue inner flame and the orange outer flame intertwined, baking a ring of charred yellow marks onto the lead sheet at the bottom of the sink.

The water temperature was controlled at around 160 degrees Fahrenheit, just enough to soften and mix the gelatinous substances without causing them to explode and send the entire laboratory flying.

The brass mechanical claw rotated evenly in the water tank, the curved end of the agitator claw seeming to knead a ball of grayish-white dough, pushing it from the center to the edge and then rolling it back to the center.

The "dough" was a mixture of nitroglycerin, nitrocellulose, and jelly-like petroleum jelly, three potent and sensitive substances that were tamed by a constant-temperature mixer.

Large beads of sweat appeared on Thomas's forehead and trickled down his temples. He tilted his head slightly to let the sweat slide down his cheeks, his eyes never leaving the dough being stirred and the thermometer.

Richard didn't disturb him, but carefully walked around him from behind and headed towards the blast room.

Inside the explosion-proof room, Abel was bent over, his hands gripping the steel valve of a small steam hydraulic press, all his strength focused on the lever.

Richard didn't buy this hydraulic press; it wasn't on his purchase list.

Perhaps it was moved by Abel from the Woolch Arsenal, or perhaps it was transferred from the warehouse under some pretext.

Richard pinched the bridge of his nose. If Woolch knew that his equipment had appeared in the shipyard on the Dartford River, then the place was not far from being infiltrated.

He needs to explain this to Abel.