Struggle in the Steam Age

"By the way, what did you want to tell me just now?" Nora asked curiously after finishing her analysis report. She remembered that Lawrence seemed to want to say something to herself before she asked the question just now. "I remember you just studied those. Insect specimens, did you also find something?"

"Of course, there are some discoveries." Lawrence said, pointing to the dozen or so samples that he had put together, "I observed these insects carefully just now, and unexpectedly found that although these insects looked similar to Ordinary insects look alike, but are actually different."

As he spoke, he pointed to the two insect samples contained in a small box in Nora's hand and said, "For example, although the two samples you are holding now look like ordinary cotton pests, but I just now When I scraped some scales off their bodies with a knife and observed them under a microscope with a large magnification, I unexpectedly found that the powder was not fresh."

"The powder is not fresh, what does it mean?" The red and green eyes of the little puppet were full of confusion. She knew that many bugs had tiny scales or powder to protect themselves, These things are often poisonous. "Are you saying there's less toxicity on these scales?"

In Nora's opinion, this kind of thing should be regarded as a biological toxin. So if the powder produced by the bugs is not fresh as Lawrence said, then it means that the lethality of these bugs from certain angles should be much smaller than that of ordinary bugs. Sounds like it should be a good thing.

"Uh—the toxicity of this batch of bugs is indeed lower than that of normal species." Lawrence was stunned for a moment after hearing the answer from the little doll, and then replied. "But that's not what I want to say. What I want to say is that these bugs are alive, and only the powder on dead bugs will be stale."

"But now the issue has been clarified." Lawrence said with a slight shrug. "As I discovered just now, it's normal if there are gods or divine powers in it. After all, the power belonging to the gods has enough power to blur the line between life and death."

"But what's the point of doing this?" Nora asked puzzled. "What I want to say is, what is the point of these bugs being between life and death? It is impossible for these bugs to have the power of faith. It’s just an expense, and there’s no point in seeing it.”

When Lawrence and Nora confirmed that there was some kind of divine power that they didn't know was controlling all of this behind the scenes, they knew that it shouldn't be done by some rivals or enemies of Viscount Doropia. matter. After all, although Viscount Doropia can own nearly 1/10 of the textile market share of the entire empire, he would not use the power of the gods at all to deal with him, so the current situation always seems a bit unreasonable.

"I think it's because we haven't seen the meaning for the time being." Lawrence raised his right hand and shook his index finger gently at Nora. "We can't underestimate any god, even a fallen god. For example, I almost got caught in the adventure before you were born. Fortunately, because of my particularity, I added a little It was my luck that allowed me to escape from birth."

"Understood. I will remain vigilant at all times and will not slack off." Nora looked at Lawrence's serious expression and became serious. The little puppet knew that whenever Lawrence said something to him with this expression, it must be very important, and it must be firmly remembered, and it must not be taken seriously.

Although it only took them about half an hour to check out the problem, but in order to show their efforts, they didn't just go out, but took out various materials about magic and started to study until the sun began to rise. It was only when the sky was getting dark that he put away the materials, and walked out of the door with a tired look on his face.

"It's really hard for you." After watching Lawrence and the others walk out with tired faces, a servant who had been waiting not far from the door bowed to Lawrence and extended an invitation to them at the same time. . "Your Excellency the Viscount has already prepared dinner for you, and they hope to invite you to have dinner with them as a favor."

"Of course, I'm honored." Lawrence bowed slightly and motioned for the servant in front of him to lead the way. The inspection and study just now made him feel a little hungry. After all, although studying this matter is just sitting there reading and thinking, it does not consume a small amount of energy.

At noon, because the other party considered that Lawrence was researching in the room why it was not suitable to enter the door. So they just knocked on the door with two bowls of creamy soup and a big beef pie on a silver platter, and Nora moved in. However, since this is just a light meal, Lawrence feels that he has completely digested what he ate at noon at around 6:00 in the evening, and he is very hungry now.

Although there is no hunting action today, the dinner is still a standard hunting manor dinner. For example, the main course is roast grouse and roast venison. At the same time, everyone can chat easily while eating, without the need to follow a series of etiquette like a formal banquet.

Taking advantage of this time, Lawrence vaguely stated the results of his inspection today. The reason for the vagueness is to hide Nora's practice of using the power of faith. Fortunately, the mere fact that a live bug has the properties of a dead bug but is still alive and kicking is enough for Lawrence to come up with the theory that there may be divine power involved.

"But before that, we also asked the priests of the Agricultural Church to go to the farm to check these problems here, but they found nothing at that time. Why?" Aunt Mia asked. In fact, this kind of question is already very rude to the nobles, and it can also be seen how much damage the inexorable pests in the cotton fields have done to this family.

But no matter what, this kind of question should not be asked at the banquet of the nobles. Fortunately, Aunt Mia, as Lawrence's elder, raised such a question at this time is barely in line with etiquette. For Lawrence, it was just an opportunity to tell them some important points.

"Because the person you're looking for didn't expect the power of the gods to be involved, so those priests probably didn't carry out targeted investigations," Lawrence explained. "We only found that the situation on the specimens of those bugs was wrong, and then we assumed that there might be a divine influence and conducted a targeted inspection. Finally, after all the cotton plants and specimens were gathered together, we found that there was an extremely weak divine response."

"And I didn't discover this kind of power related to divine power in the end." Nora said, pointing to the little puppet next to him who was eating roasted venison and said, "If it wasn't for my companion who is very familiar with divine power If you are sensitive, I think even if there is cotton in a greenhouse, I may not be able to find the problem here. I think the range that the priests you invited before can detect with spells should not exceed the size of a greenhouse."

"Indeed not." After the Viscount's family looked at each other, Aunt Mia said to Lawrence, "Because we didn't find that these bugs had the power of extraordinary people before, so the people from the Agricultural Church we invited were all from the local The priests in the church and the professional team sent by the church here. There are indeed quite a few of them, but the extraordinary level is not high at all."

"So, I think you can go and inform the Agricultural Church about this." Lawrence finally concluded. "After all, our inspection is just a single example. It is better to find a professional to confirm."