Chapter 742: Affection Across the Distance
Adding these two together should allow the wireless communication to reach around a hundred kilometers, basically covering most of the residential areas in the Western Region and allowing Neverwinter City to receive real-time updates on the situation at the Impassable Mountain Range defense line.
To extend it further, signal amplifiers would be necessary.
The reason Roland chose to develop wired telephones, aside from Anna's words arousing his ambition, was that the telephone itself was indeed a highly versatile tool. Whether it was controlling the political situation, strengthening centralization, or aiding in war command, it was of great significance.
Another crucial point was that Neverwinter City's current industrial projects had reached saturation.
New immigrants needed to undergo primary education before they could be absorbed. The four behemoth industries of civil construction, mineral smelting, mechanical processing, and chemical production had already occupied ninety percent of the qualified workers, and based on their expected size and scale, they could easily absorb the six or seven thousand new residents joining the Western Region.
Since these industries were closely related to future wars, no one could suffer except the four giants. The most typical example was the bicycle factory, which Roland had enthusiastically built at first, but still didn't produce enough bicycles for the First Army. When there was a shortage of electricity, it was the first to be shut down. When there was a shortage of manpower, all the workers had to go to the steam engine factory to work overtime, which could be described as a troubled fate.
Even with the completion of Kingdom Avenue and Highway 67, the roads were mostly used by horse-drawn carriages—and they all came from Changge District or other cities, because the Border Region didn't raise horses or have stables and other supporting facilities. Seeing that the railway was starting to be laid, the scene of citizens happily riding bicycles back and forth between the two places had not yet appeared.
Of course, Roland would never admit in front of Barov that this was his decision-making error. However, when considering new facilities now, he would first consider Neverwinter City's production potential.
And the telephone was precisely a good tool that hardly required any production potential or manpower to maintain.
First of all, it wouldn't be introduced to the civilian market. Whether it was military communication or connecting the Border Region with Changge District, Roland only intended to lay cables in a one-to-one manner. This would save the wiring process and eliminate the need to erect complex lines.
Secondly, the small quantity meant that it could be made by Anna, Mystery Moon, and Soraya in their spare time, hardly requiring any diversion of city production.
It wouldn't be too late to vigorously develop civilian communication after the vacuum tube was developed.
Therefore, the wired telephone was the most suitable project to research and develop before joining the survivors of Taquila to explore the Snow Mountain.
……
The research and development of the telephone prototype went even smoother than Roland had expected. By the afternoon, two simple magneto telephones appeared in the backyard of North Slope Mountain.
It had no outer casing and looked like a mass of exposed coils and magnets, equipped with a hand-cranked generator and a magneto battery, "Dawn Mini". Since the power required was small, the finger-thick magneto battery could last for at least a month or so, and he didn't plan to tinker with dry batteries separately for the time being.
"How do you use this?" Mystery Moon asked curiously, "Does my ability really have such a magical effect?"
Roland automatically ignored the second half of her sentence. "It's very simple, watch carefully... This hand-cranked generator is responsible for sending the call signal. When the user quickly cranks it—" He grabbed the handle and rotated it forcefully, and the magnetic bell at the other end immediately rang with a "ding-a-ling" sound. "At this time, it means that a call is coming in."
Then he gave Anna a look, and the latter nodded, picked up the receiver and microphone.
"When the receiver is lifted from the base, the switch pops up, meaning the voice line is connected. At this time, you can talk. The current that transmits the electrical signal is provided by the Dawn Mini, so without Mystery Moon's copper rod, the telephone can only ring and cannot transmit sound."
"Um, um!" Mystery Moon puffed out her flat chest and nodded vigorously twice.
"Your Majesty, can I try using it to speak?" Soraya said eagerly.
"Me too," Ling raised her hand high.
"Of course, no problem… you are its creators, so naturally you have the
qualification to be the first to experience this epoch-making communication tool." Roland smiled. The significance of the telephone goes without saying. It completely changed human communication habits and closely connected the distant world. No amount of praise is too much. "It's just that the distance in the yard is so short that the signal hardly attenuates, so it's enough to connect it with ordinary copper wire."
Thus, in this silent place surrounded by a white forest, crisp ringing sounds kept ringing. Even though they could talk directly, everyone had to go through it again, starting with hand-cranked power generation.
"There's really sound!"
"It sounds like Lucia's!"
"Uh, what should I say?"
"Let her guess who you are!"
The witches shouted loudly into the microphone across the courtyard wall, and for a while, laughter echoed at both ends of the yard.
Roland also listened twice. Honestly, the effect of the prototype was not ideal. The sound fluctuated greatly and had a lot of noise, so it couldn't be considered a qualified finished product. However, he knew that the next step was to repeatedly adjust the reed size and electromagnet spacing to achieve the best call quality.
Before long, the microphone was passed to Roland again.
He shook his head with a smile, put the receiver to his ear, and habitually said, "Hello, hello?"
But besides the faint electrical interference, no one answered.
Almost instinctively, he guessed who was on the other end of the line.
"Anna...?" Roland said softly.
After a while, a slightly distorted response came from the other end.
"I like you... Roland."
*******************
After finishing a day of protection, Nightingale returned to her bedroom feeling somewhat depressed.
This feeling of not understanding anything wasn't the first time. Whenever this happened, only dried fish and ice cream bread could comfort her.
Well... now there was one more thing: Chaos Drink.
Seeing Roland and Anna's intimate appearance, she felt sincere envy and a faint but constant pang of sadness. She originally thought she would adapt sooner or later, but the process was more difficult than she had imagined.
The deeper the love, the longer the thorns.
She now understood what Wendy meant.
Walking to the desk, Nightingale opened the drawer, only to find the bottle empty.
Did she grab the wrong one?
She opened the other drawer again, and it was still an empty bottle.
"Wendy? My Chaos..." Nightingale had just turned around when her roommate hugged her tightly. Her proud chest almost suffocated her.
"Nightingale, how many years have we known each other? Since you left the Grantham family in Silverlight City, you've been with me."
"Yeah... it's been about four or five years, but my Chaos..."
"We've gone through so many dangers and hardships to get to where we are today. Nothing can destroy the friendship between us, right?"
"Of course, I've always treated you like a half-sister. But my Chaos..."
"I drank your drink, sorry!" Wendy hugged her even tighter. "I'll definitely give you the one I get next month!"
What? She drank it all?
Nightingale touched her empty dried fish bag.
"Only dried fish, ice cream bread, and Chaos Drink can comfort her."
Now, there were none.
She heard a cracking sound in her heart.
In an instant, her heart ached even more.