Chapter 1308 - The Heavy Industry Central Laboratory

This created an endless burden for the Truth Office. Academic papers naturally required citations and evidence as a basic mode of argumentation, yet now everything had to be expressed obliquely. The transmigrators could barely keep track—they often covered the head but exposed the rear. After reviewing several papers, Dr. Zhong and his colleagues established a rule: henceforth, such papers would be sent to the Truth Office for wording review before publication.

"Although the electric motor has been built, and the metallurgy side says they're confident about producing silicon steel, when you think about it carefully, the gap in materials science remains quite large..." Faraday said, emboldened by the wine.

"What about the planned 100-kilowatt low-speed air-cooled permanent magnet generator?" Dr. Zhong asked with concern. "What will you use for the permanent magnet material?"

"Isn't that a materials science issue?" Faraday replied. "But based on my limited knowledge, ferrite permanent magnets are probably the most feasible. If I recall correctly, the raw materials are abundant and the process is simple—mainly ball milling and sintering. The downside is brittleness, but that shouldn't be a problem for generator applications. If it really doesn't work, we could also consider natural permanent magnets like magnetite—I believe that can be manufactured artificially too."

Dr. Zhong shook his head, sensing this wasn't so simple. Materials science had always been the soft underbelly of the Council's industrial system. Only after Ma'ao Steel Company was established and the Heavy Industry Central Laboratory organized as a supporting facility did industrial materials science make real progress. Ma'ao Steel Company's ability to smelt different grades of carbon steel—and even produce small quantities of manganese steel—was entirely thanks to elemental analysis provided by this laboratory.

"If silicon steel doesn't work out, are you planning to use carbon steel?" Dr. Zhong asked.

"Then we'd have no choice but to take the old road." Faraday looked worried. "It's not that low-carbon steel can't be used, but finding complete production blueprints and process manuals for 19th-century electric motors would be quite troublesome. We might have to have someone redesign the whole thing."

Qian Liushi chimed in: "Once we can mass-produce electric motors, the next step is tackling generators—and when that time comes, your manuscript fees had better be generous. I hear the Office is about to launch new transmigrator service facilities—special supply shops, 'Heaven on Earth,' and such. Our little monthly stipends probably won't be enough."

Dr. Zhong gave a dry laugh. "Right now, basically everyone who submits gets published, and the manuscript fees aren't low. Everyone writes up their entire research and production process—string together eight or ten thousand words and you're set. Someone even submitted a fifty-thousand-word paper with experimental logs and work diaries as appendices. I have to say, too much padding won't do. After all, our journal is archived, so academic standards must be maintained."

After the banquet, Dr. Zhong boarded his carriage. His home base, Taibai Observatory, was located at the Lingao-Chengmai border, quite a distance from the Bopu-Bairren core area, and the Lingao city rail currently only extended to the Ma'ao Peninsula. He therefore had a dedicated two-wheeled carriage assigned to him. Besides the driver, two armed guards accompanied the vehicle. As a result, in the eyes of Lingao's natives and naturalized citizens, Dr. Zhong had become a mysterious important figure. He rarely appeared, and when he did, he traveled by carriage with guards always in attendance—a grander entourage than even Chairman Wen or Secretary of State Ma.

However, on the way back to Taibai Observatory, he still had someone to see.

The carriage arrived at a remote corner of the Ma'ao Industrial Zone. Since Ma'ao had become the new heavy-industry district, newly built steel smelting and heavy chemical enterprises were all located here. Truss-frame factory buildings stood everywhere, chimneys rising like a forest. The steady rhythm of steam engines mixed with the shrill whistle of boiler exhaust.

This corner was somewhat removed from the production workshops, surrounded by tree belts that served as sound barriers and windbreaks against the sea breeze. It was consequently relatively quiet. The Lingao city rail had laid a dedicated branch line here with a platform whose sign read "Heavy Industry Central Laboratory Station."

Dr. Zhong alighted near the platform and showed his credentials to the Lingao Garrison Battalion sentry. He then walked alone along the path through the tree belt.

The path was paved with cinders, quite level, with rails laid parallel—evidently people frequently moved heavy objects between trains and the laboratory. The path stretched only fifty meters, but sentries stood at both ends. Dr. Zhong showed his credentials again at the guardhouse before entering the Heavy Industry Central Laboratory's gate.

The Heavy Industry Central Laboratory was a three-story building arranged around a courtyard, equipped with various laboratories and experimental equipment for handling experiments, analyses, and calibrations related to all aspects of heavy industrial production. Two other laboratories of equivalent grade existed: the Light Industry Central Laboratory and the Biology Central Laboratory, both located at Bairren.

These laboratories served their respective industries, providing services for production and R&D. Organizationally, however, they fell under the direct leadership of the Science and Technology Department.

Near the laboratory building stood a two-story dormitory with a cafeteria and simple recreational facilities. The transmigrators and naturalized staff who worked here normally lived on-site. To the north stood a wind turbine generator set that provided emergency power to the laboratory equipment—under normal conditions, power came from Ma'ao's 100-kilowatt mobile generator set.

The laboratory building was brightly lit—not with gas lamps, but real electric lights. Dr. Zhong entered and registered his visit at the reception desk. Even as the laboratory's highest leader, he couldn't be exempted from regulations. Under normal circumstances, visitors were not welcome here.

The receptionist asked him to wait in the reception area; she would immediately fetch someone. Unauthorized personnel were not permitted to enter the laboratory.

Dr. Zhong leaned back on the rattan sofa, drinking the cooled boiled water the receptionist had brought. Since the "Practice Strict Economy" notice had come down, all departments had eliminated tea for visitors and meetings, replacing it with plain boiled water. After a short wait, a young woman arrived—Ge Xinxin, who had spoken about refining silicon at the power work conference.

She wore a laboratory coat and work cap, with pressure marks from a mask and safety goggles still visible on her face. Her eyelids were slightly puffy—the look of overwork. This could be said to be the face most transmigrators currently wore.

"Dr. Zhong—" Ge Xinxin walked over quickly, extending her hand. Zhong Lishi hurriedly rose from the sofa and grasped it—soft yet slightly rough.

"Hello. Please don't keep calling me Dr. Zhong—there are at least a squad's worth of doctors in our Council," he said modestly.

"Oh no, you're an example for us to learn from," she replied with a half-joking smile.

The two sat down. A faint fragrance of perfume wafted to Dr. Zhong's nostrils. He knew that even if the female transmigrators had brought perfume originally, it would long since have been used up. From this simple fragrance with no distinction between top notes and middle notes, this was probably essential oil that Ge Xinxin had distilled herself.

Quite a sense of life's pleasures, Dr. Zhong thought. I should get myself a still one of these days and make some for Xiao Ying and Cletia too.

Ge Xinxin was a peculiar presence among the female transmigrators. When she registered, she had listed French as her specialty and "none" for other skills. As a result, she had been assigned to general labor, doing logistics and administrative work after D-Day. It wasn't until the Ma'ao Heavy Industry Central Laboratory was being organized that she unexpectedly volunteered. Originally, the transmigrators in the industrial sector had been unwilling to accept a girl who seemed to have nothing to do with chemicals or steel. But when Ge Xinxin demonstrated her burette technique, Ji Situi—conducting the interview—inhaled sharply. Her steady, standardized operations, especially the technique of touching off a quarter-drop at the end of titration, were absolutely professional-grade skills. And when she substituted atomic weights directly into formulas during final calculations without glancing at the periodic table—not a single error—he immediately recommended to the Organization Department that she be made director of the chemical laboratory. Later, her emergency treatment of casualties during a production accident at the chemical plant made Hospital Director Shi suspect her true identity—even the hospital's doctors might not have such accurate and decisive operations.

As a woman, her behavior wasn't particularly sociable. Her appearance was quite good among the female transmigrators, yet no male transmigrators pursued her—not from lack of desire, but because they often couldn't find her as she shuttled between dormitory and laboratory. Like Dr. Zhong, she was completely immersed in the laboratory, her own castle. Once the dormitory building at the Heavy Industry Central Laboratory was completed, she moved there and completely disappeared from public view, appearing almost never except at major events.

Even most female transmigrators rarely exchanged more than a few words with her. The only people who interacted with her regularly were Grand Library staff, and that was limited to book borrowing procedures. Living such a reclusive life, she had been nicknamed the "Chemical Plant Ghost."

Because of jurisdictional connections, this "Chemical Plant Ghost" had somewhat more contact with Dr. Zhong. This time it was she who had requested a meeting. He guessed it was most likely related to the power work conference. If she wanted to launch a new R&D project, it would inevitably require Science and Technology Department approval.

Sure enough, Ge Xinxin pulled a project proposal from her pocket. Dr. Zhong opened it and looked it over, then nodded: not bad. Her thinking on this issue went much deeper than many transmigrators who only dealt with immediate matters. Only by opening up this link could many long-stalled initiatives finally be resolved.

"Is this your project proposal?"

"That's right," Ge Xinxin nodded. "I've already done some preliminary research, but the next phase requires too many resources—more than I can solve here. So I want to formally apply for project approval."

(End of Chapter)