Munitions Empire

"Cough..." Roger signaled that he had already come in and then glanced at Wes, saying, "All the children have memorized it, they are all very bright."

"The first three to memorize were your favorite apprentice Galsa, a little girl from the northern part of Brunas, Yulin, and Dino from Northern Ridge." Wes licked his dry lips and reported to Tang Mo.

Tang Mo nodded, jotting down the three names, then compared them with the roster he had organized to see if he could place these three children in the appropriate classes.

That these three children were able to memorize the school rules in the shortest amount of time at least proved that they were clever enough. Tang Mo planned to focus on observing them first and, if possible, provide targeted training for these three children.

First, to establish role models, and then to allocate resources preferentially, Tang Mo calculated in his mind and instantly made a decision.

He looked up at Wes and said, "Do you remember the task I assigned you? The children's physical education, follow my lesson plan, plus your swordsmanship class! I want to ensure every child has a strong physique."

"As you wish." Wes bowed slightly, agreeing to Tang Mo's request.

In the following days, Tang Mo was extremely occupied. He taught the children during the day, and when Mathews and Roger took over the handicraft classes, he would inspect the factory and return to his office to draw blueprints.

In the evening, after finishing his classes, he would go to the laboratory to conduct experiments and verify the preparation process according to the formulas in his mind.

He would go to bed on time around eleven o'clock, without any nightlife or social obligations, honestly climbing into bed to enjoy the most unadorned sleep under the clean starry sky.

He knew that in another half a year, it might not be easy to see such clean skies, as he watched the chimneys in the workshops grow more numerous and taller...

The workshop had already accumulated some gun parts, at least the production and speed of the barrels had essentially met Tang Mo's requirements.

These days, Tang Mo had been thinking about how to produce cement to accelerate his construction pace—unfortunately, whether Brunas or Northern Ridge, neither was a source of raw materials for cement. A large-scale preparation of cement remained an unrealistic dream for him.

Purchasing raw materials through sea transportation wasn't possible either, because no one would transport something as cheap as lime over such long distances. Therefore, for Tang Mo to produce cement, he would still have to wait some time.

Moreover, his current production focus was not on cement; part of it was on steam engines and gun parts, and another part on improving gunpowder.

After all, he needed to create products and find willing buyers to bring the workshop into a healthy operational state; obviously, the factory's internal infrastructure was not profitable.

...

"Here, we need to simplify! Yes, simplify the fractions... Come, I'm going to check your calculations!" Tang Mo was writing laboriously with a homemade chalk on a blackboard made with a simple coat of black paint.

His blackboard was pitted and not very smooth, and his chalk was not very user-friendly either, just a makeshift substitution.

Even the classroom didn't have electric lighting, only a few pitiful gas lamps emitted a dim light.

If judged by 21st-century standards, the lighting conditions here were terrible, even risking causing myopia in children. The classroom was filled with a faint kerosene smell, which wasn't great for their health either.

But it was within this rudimentary environment that 70 children were packed, in shabby clothes, with a third of them clad in garments dusted with coal ash.

There was no helping it. Among the students attending classes here, half were the children of workers who, being employed in the workshops, were among the first to hear the news.

These workers entrusted their children, or rather, young apprentices to Tang Mo, letting them receive a new style of modern education in the classroom.

Then, things got a bit out of Tang Mo's control—after his first class teaching the children literacy and mathematics and explaining simple mechanical principles with examples, more children arrived the next day for the evening class.

Tang Mo had ultimately underestimated the eagerness of people in this era to acquire knowledge. The workers were very aware of the significance of a complete set of knowledge in this age.

This wasn't an era of information overload; acquiring knowledge was a luxury. Tang Mo's willingness to share knowledge was an extremely unconventional act.

The production experience that these workers summed up over a lifetime, Wes managed to systematically theorize and teach it to the children, shocking the impoverished who had to labor every day just to have a meal.

Soon, news spread like wildfire in Brunas. People carefully shared with their friends that there was a school in Tang Mo Weapons Workshop that taught children to read and write for free.

Shortly thereafter, within just a dozen days or so, the simple school established by Wes far exceeded his expectations, gathering more than 180 children...

Yes, nearly 200 children! During the day, Wes didn't even have time to accumulate his smokeless gunpowder due to his craftsmenship. He had to teach more than one hundred and ten children during the daytime.

The same course content, in the morning one class of more than 50 children, in the afternoon another class of more than 50 children... and in the evening, he still had to teach the remaining 70 children again.

His throat was hoarse from talking so much, he grabbed the cup of water on the lectern and gulped down a big mouthful, which relieved him somewhat.

His mouth was parched and his tongue was dry, but he didn't stop talking ceaselessly. He needed to quickly impart some knowledge to these children, to help them grow up quickly.

In fact, age-wise, he wasn't much older than these children. The older ones among these children were fifteen or sixteen, the younger ones only seven or eight, all watching Wes at the lectern with wide eyes.

Seventeen-year-old Wes was actually very sturdy, standing at a height of one meter eighty, his presence behind the lectern was indeed commanding. However, his face still retained a youthful innocence, his voice not yet deep and powerful.

Yet standing there, in front of these children, Wes's figure seemed to grow taller. After he finished drinking water, he walked off the lectern with his hands behind his back, checking each child's homework book at their desks.

These homework books were also given out for free, and they actually didn't cost much. The son of the owner of Brunas' paper shop attended the morning classes. So, Wes bought the paper at cost price.

The children in the evening were generally older because they were old enough to help with chores at home, so they only had time to attend lectures at night.

Half of the students were apprentices in the workshop, some were children of workers, and the rest of the children's backgrounds were rather mixed.

Since these children were generally older, Wes would move faster through the lessons with them. Many of the apprentices already had a basic understanding of math, so Wes increased the difficulty and taught them more complex material.

"Hunter! Stop looking at Fanny's answers! You little rascal!" Wes shouted at a child in the distance, startling the kid into quickly tucking in his neck.

"If I catch you trying to take shortcuts again, I'll have you spend some time in the solitary room to reflect!" Wes scolded sternly, then began pacing along the desks.

"Correct... correct... yours is wrong, think about it... one-half! Four-eighths! Can these be simplified...

right! You're so smart, Balal!" Wes corrected each child's mistakes, then walked back to the blackboard and continued to explain the lesson.

Studying here was free, they could even receive notebooks and had to complete homework; Wes even prepared snacks for the children to stave off hunger during breaks.

And the children were more sensible than Wes had expected; they truly cherished this hard-earned opportunity to learn.

They paid close attention during class, diligently completing their homework after school, and there were study groups helping each other out, reviewing the previous day's material in their spare time.

Wes had even seen an apprentice who shoveled coal murmuring the multiplication table with each shovel, never stopping for a moment.

"You need to understand these fractions because they might appear in your future work, applying these numbers will make your job easier!" Wes said to all the students after returning to the blackboard: "Next, let's continue practicing! If you don't understand, raise your hand… twenty-four thirty-sixths, thirty-five forty-ninths…"

After going through a few example problems, Wes stepped down from the lectern, and as he walked towards the door, he instructed the smartest apprentice in the workshop, "Galsa! Keep the classroom in order! Wait for me for two minutes!"

By the time he finished saying this, he had reached the classroom door. This classroom was actually a large wooden shed that used to serve as a warehouse; all the items had been moved out and replaced with simple, long desks and chairs to convert it into a classroom.

Most of the goods originally stored here had been used up, and the rest had been moved to a makeshift wooden shed.

Next to this warehouse-turned-classroom was another room with even more interesting occupants.