Chapter 67: Electricity!
Michael immediately got up from his bed and looked at Kong, with excitement growing on his face by the second.
"It's working?" he asked Kong.
"It's working, Boss!" Kong replied.
The two of them didn't need any explanation. They both ran out of the house and ran through the half-finished houses in the village.
Kong had to go through the same obstacles as before, while Michael simply flew through the air and immediately headed towards a large square building in the distance.
The structure was made out of concrete, with white smoke coming out of the exhaust vents at the roof.
This was Michael and Kong's biggest project: the Steam Turbine!
They worked together to construct a working generator that allowed them to harvest heat energy and turn it into usable electrical energy!
They had to experiment and plan out the whole thing multiple times to make sure that everything had gone correctly. And yesterday, the last touches were finally constructed with the help of the other HobMankey engineers.
Early in the morning, Kong performed the last safety checks before finally informing Michael that the Steam Turbine was ready to turn on!
They both rushed inside the control room and saw a couple of other engineer HobMankeys pacing back and forth as they waited for Michael and Kong to arrive.
Finally, it was time for them to see the fruits of their hard labor.
"Boss, you have the honors!" Kong said as he presented the lever to Michael.
Michael nodded and lifted the lever, which required quite a bit of strength to push. Thankfully, he was already quite strong even as a ten-year-old child.
As he pushed it to the 'on' position, a satisfying CLICK resounded throughout the control room, letting them know that the flint had successfully lit up the fire that would start to burn the fuel inside the compartments.
Michael used his Supreme Skill: Mana Gathering to see through the layers and layers of metal in the contraption.
After igniting the fire, the water started to come to a boil.
And upon reaching 100 degrees Celsius or the water's boiling point, steam started to rise into one of the vents that directed everything into the turbine.
Since there was quite a large amount of steam flowing into this relatively small vent, the speed and pressure from this steam were enough to propel the turbine into rotating at an extremely fast speed!
This was where the magic happened.
Slowly, the generator attached to the turbine started to emanate Lightning mana, signaling the Steam Turbine's success in turning heat into electricity!
But that wasn't enough. For them to know that the Steam Turbine was working properly, they all looked at a single light bulb placed in the middle of the control room.
They all waited with bated breaths as the light bulb started flickering.
And finally, it turned on and emitted a glow that lit up the entire room.
"WE DID IT!" The entire room erupted in celebrations of joy and relief. There was hugging, jumping, and shouting spread throughout all of them.
"Boss! It's done! You were right!"
They couldn't believe that Michael's promise of being able to harness the power of electricity had come true. There was no magic required in this whole process, and only needed natural resources readily available in their surroundings.
With this Steam Turbine, they could have light bulbs powering the whole village even in the middle of the night!
Michael was a little emotional as well. It only took ten years, but he was finally able to have electricity in his life. He took a major leap in making life in this world a lot more comfortable than before.
There were a lot of inventions he had in store that could only work with electricity. He would only be able to start working on them after today.
"Thank you, guys. We all worked hard for this," he said to Kong and the rest of the Engineers. "But our job still isn't over."
Then, he pointed at the window to the side of the room, showing the entirety of the village in view.
"We need to start connecting each and every house with electricity. Kong, we have the electric lines ready, right?"
The Chief Engineer nodded his head. "Yes, Boss. I have already instructed other engineers to line up the houses with wires. We just need to connect them all to the power source."
Michael nodded. Now was the time to show everyone the power of electricity!
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In the afternoon, Michael had Lolo gather everyone in the village to start the presentation of electricity.
All the HobMankeys gathered at the plaza in the middle of the village. They all waited patiently in their places as the sun soon set in the distance and night covered the entire skyline.
Everyone was instructed to put out every candlelight in their houses, so the entire village was filled with darkness.
"What's happening?" asked one of the HobMankey children.
"Shush, child. Our boss says that he has something amazing to show us!" said his parents.
But even still, there were a lot of Mankeys who became a little bit restless as they waited in the darkness.
Just then, Michael's calming voice resounded through the plaza, making everyone excited.
"Sorry for making you all wait. But it's worth it, I promise. Without further ado, I will now give you the results of what we have all been working on. Kong, turn it on!"
With a single CLICK, a blinding light overcame the HobMankeys.
The child HobMankey winced and closed his eyes. He was a little bit afraid because he wasn't expecting such a bright light when the sun had already gone down a few hours ago.
But then, he started hearing gasps and awes of amazement.
"Wow…"
"I can't believe it…."
"It's beautiful…Nikola, look at this!"
The child, upon hearing the emotional voices of his parents, slowly opened his eyes.
And as his gaze adjusted to the light, he was met with the beautiful sight of their village lit up with stars everywhere.
He gasped, unable to catch his breath upon seeing this amazing scenery.
Michael instructed there to be miniature bulbs to be placed in wires and wrapped around the houses, just like Christmas lights back in his previous life.
This made it seem like their village was graced with the presence of stars in the night sky.