Chapter 15: Woodblock Printing

After more than a year of contact, especially co-authoring the dictionary, Ace had confirmed that Peter was an honest person and held strong influence in the city-state’s cultural circles, making him the most suitable collaborator.

“Please, absolutely dont crack my skull. It is my honor to cooperate with you, Teacher.”

The study was filled with a pleasant atmosphere.

Ace had been planning for a long time. He had finally gained the status, fame, and impending Citizenship he wanted through the dictionary. Now he could do things he had wanted to do but hadn’t dared to.

He planned to use woodblock printing technology to gradually promote the popularization of books, become the largest printer and publisher in the city-state and even the entire Salia Peninsula , and provide strong financial support for his research into the secrets of the supernatural. He did not care who led the business, as long as he received enough of the profits.

He still did not have enough prestige or capital. Peter was the best collaborator. As for what would happen after the business grew larger and stronger, he had subsequent innovations like papermaking and movable type printing as leverage.

Furthermore, as his status increased, he could start leveraging other technologies from his past life to grow the industry, but industry was not the goal. His goal was not to become an otherworldly trust but to achieve the supernatural.

In this world, the absolute power of supernatural creatures suppressed all dissent. Everything in the mortal world was readily available, so most Heroes never cared about managing industries; if they wanted something, mortals would contribute everything. Industry was just a tool for pursuing the path to the supernatural, not the purpose.

Ace commissioned a familiar carpenter from his father to prepare blank woodblocks, prepared the ink he had formulated for printing, and borrowed a few disciples from Peter, including his literacy instructor, Morton.

Morton was also very emotional. In just over a year, Ace had gone from a young boy who could not read a word to the city-state’s youngest scholar , and was now organizing them to engage in woodblock printing.

“Mr. Morton, and fellow students, thank you for coming to help. We need to spend half a month writing the dictionary content onto parchment with thick ink and quickly gluing it to the blank woodblocks. This way, the carpenter can directly carve the reversed script for printing. This work is quite tedious, and it is a great inconvenience to you all. Here is a small compensation, 50 Silver Thales each. Please do not feel that it is too little.”

Those who were initially unhappy about being drawn in to do labor felt slightly better when they realized they could earn 50 Silver Thales in just half a month.

Studying under Teacher Peter was quite costly—50 Silver Thales a month, which was half a year’s expenses for a family of three. Any subsidy was welcome.

The woodblock carving progressed smoothly. After the carving was complete, Ace entrusted Romon to be specifically responsible for the printing.

He converted his old house in the Eighth District into a makeshift workshop, hiring seven or eight men and women at a price of 40 Copper Thales per day to print and bind the Universal Language Dictionary of Common Vocabulary.

Although the city-state has Slaves, one would cost 1-2 Gold Thales, which was too expensive.

Moreover, only Nobles and Citizens have the right to own slaves. The law stipulates that Nobles and Citizens have the right to own no more than 20 slaves within the city, and after purchasing land outside the city, they have the right to own no more than 3,000 slaves.

After 300 copies were successfully printed, Romon took the first batch of books to Joan, Peter’s steward. Joan was Peter’s head housekeeper and was responsible for the specific sales. The price was set at 50 Silver Thales per copy. Copying a book on the market costs the buyer half a Gold Thales to one Gold Thales for the original owner, so this price was not expensive.

However, after deducting costs, each book earned almost 10 times the cost. If the production volume increased greatly, the costs would continue to be spread out, making it indeed a very profitable venture.

As for the future, if the response was good, Ace and Peter also planned to woodblock print popular readings like Myths and Epic Tales, controlling the sales price and production volume. This was something Joan and Romon had to consider.

Ace was now completely immersed in developing his mental power and did not care about other matters. Through experimentation, he discovered several conditions that improved the effect of his mental power training:

Environment: A quiet, natural environment, the morning light, in places like mountain tops, forests, or near waterfalls, preferably rotating the locations, yields excellent results.

State of Mind: Calm the mind before and after training, reducing emotional fluctuations and distracting thoughts yields good results.

Objects: Training with lead objects is the most strenuous. Lead seems to have a strong inertness against mental power interference, making the training more effective.

Intensity: Training should make one feel extremely fatigued, but with just a little reserve energy left—this is just right.

Balance: After training once a day, sufficient rest is required, along with adequate nutritional intake.

He combined these five conditions and called it the Five-Step Meditation Method. He also bought a beautiful estate in Buku Town, the town nearest to the city-state. Buku Town is very close to the city-state, with convenient transportation. Although a small number of low-level Monsters appear, it is much better than the wilderness.

His mother, Marina, did not feel comfortable leaving him and came along. Romon also hired two veterans to protect their safety.

Ace would quietly meditate early every morning, then sleep until noon, eat a large meal, and then practice martial arts with the two veterans. In the evening, he would read miscellaneous books he had collected. His life was very regular.

After meditating with the Five-Step Meditation Method for nearly a month, Ace clearly felt that his martial arts skills were also progressing rapidly. Various techniques came naturally; his eyes, hands, and mind were all synchronized.

If he were older, he would be an outstanding warrior among mortals. This was the benefit brought by supernatural mental power.

One can imagine how much more superior the Nobles were, having awakened their bloodline potential , and Heroes with special authorities were even more unattainable existences for mortals.

Time quickly passed to the end of the year. Ace’s mental power was greatly enhanced. Where he was originally able to lift 1 kilogram of silver objects with his mental power, he could now lift silver objects weighing up to 5 kilograms. The maximum interference range expanded from 1 meter to 3 meters.

In addition, he slowly awakened a sense of perception, being able to sensitively perceive the mental power fluctuations of nearby creatures.

He tried controlling weapons like iron swords and daggers. Unfortunately, the flight speed was too slow to injure anyone, and his idea of controlling a sword through the air was directly shattered.

However, controlling needles made the speed much faster, but killing someone directly would require too high a level of manipulative skill.

He believed the fundamental reason was that his mental power was not strong enough and needed more training.

Life in Buku Town was not without incident. He encountered some minor troubles, but as soon as the veterans stepped in, the local ruffians were basically no match. As for incidents that reached the town council, Ace’s scholar status would let them know what despair was.

Romon had a servant bring him a letter. The letter read:

“Dear Ace, Mr. Peter wants you to visit his villa soon. He has discussed it with Telos and will introduce you to him to study medicine. You are so clever; you will surely become an excellent physician.

Our printing business is also getting better and better. We collaborated with Mr. Peter to print Myths and Epic Tales, which were very well received. The Dictionary has been reprinted, and the city-state library has commissioned us to print 300 copies of Medimus Founding Chronicle. It seems they are to be distributed to all Nobles for study.

I have also collected some fresh medical materials that you asked for. You can come back and check the quality of the materials.”

It seems his father managed to get some low-level Monsters with unique abilities. It was the perfect time to go back and study them thoroughly. Ace finished reading the letter, lit it with a candle, called his mother Marina and the two veterans, packed simply, and left Buku Town in a carriage.