Civilization Chronicles: Rise of the Divine Creator

After breaking through to the Fifth Step Sea Establishment Realm, Lucas had managed to retrieve a bit more knowledge about baking soda, namely its proper chemical name, sodium bicarbonate.

Even before that breakthrough, Lucas knew what sodium was, and where to get it, but bicarbonate... well, it seemed his benefactor from the other universe didn’t consider remembering anything other than the most basic of basics about chemistry to be that important.

Forget about knowing what bicarbonate was, or how to produce it, to this day, Lucas still wasn’t able to recall what most of the elements on the periodic table were.

In other words, when it came to leavening cakes, he was still stuck using egg whites and, in certain circumstances, yeast.

For Christina’s birthday, Lucas naturally wanted sponge cake to be served, but with over 3,000 guests in attendance, whipping up that many egg whites by hand was going to be a nightmare not only because of how much work it would take, but also because it was something of a time-sensitive process.

Whip up an uncooked meringue then leave them for too long and it deflates, forcing you to whip it again. This is especially problematic in hot temperatures like, for instance, in the middle of summer in a giant kitchen with multiple ovens on.

Now, like back in Iron Rock, Lucas could have asked for a favour from some of the Initiate-Realm Cultivators he knew, but the steam engine mixer in Christina’s bread factory presented him with an alternative solution.

Able to whip 100 egg-whites at once, the steam engine mixer would make producing the enormous amount of sponge-cake necessary a breeze.

However, by now, everyone close to Lucas had already had quite a bit of sponge cake, and without flavouring ingredients like vanilla or chocolate, he was having trouble coming up with ways to keep the dessert interesting.

As such, for Christina’s birthday, Lucas decided that instead of just serving a regular sponge cake with whipped cream or buttercream, he would go a step further and make an ice cream cake!

Once again, the steam engine mixer came in handy with churning the massive amount of ice cream the boy needed to complete his plan, though he needed to bother Braxton and the forge to build a special set of thick-walled bowls that could be chilled in a freezer for a couple days before that.

None of this was easy, mind you, as Lucas did all of it without Christina knowing, saying he and Marco were performing ’maintenance’ on her steam engine mixer late at night, while actually bringing in a crew of chefs and baking the whole time.

Needless to say, when the massive slabs of frozen cake were brought out, featuring a variety of different fruit flavours for the actually ice cream, everyone except for the few people who had already had Lucas’ ice cream were quite curious.

Naturally, as the birthday girl, Christina got the first slice, which Lucas cut himself and served to her.

Tasting the rich, creamy ice cream made with plenty of sugar, as well as the light yet firm frozen sponge cake, Christina’s eyes narrowed in delight, which was more than enough endorsement for the dessert.

The maids moved in next and began carving up the cakes, which Lucas had originally estimated would be enough to satisfy 5,000 people.

Less than half-an-hour later, only a few slices remained, and not because people didn’t want those pieces; quite the opposite, in fact.

While Celestina didn’t get involved personally, as she knew she could just have Lucas make her more of this sweet dessert whenever she wanted, all the other top masters and high nobles were subtly fighting each other for these last few pieces.

Even Talia Darr, the Crown Princess from the enemy nation, was engaged in a vigorous debate with several Initiate-Realm masters from the Rockwell Kingdom over who would get one of the last few pieces of half-melted cake.

As for the younger generation?

Well... life wasn’t fair, was it?

In the end, using her astute political acumen, superb negation skills, and a little bit of diplomatic pressure, Talia managed to secure one of the last pieces of ice cream cake for herself.

She had originally wanted to savour this sweet treat a bit longer, but even with the sun having set more than an hour ago, the temperature outside was still quite hot, resulting in the ice cream quickly melting after it was removed from the cooling boxes.

As such, Talia had no choice but to gobble up the piece of cake in a rather unladylike display; not that she felt the slightest bit ashamed of her behaviour seeing how the Darr Kingdom banquets she was used to were generally far wilder and more rambunctious than tonight’s party had been.

.....

When the evening finally came to an end, and the thousands of invited guests began filing out of the Manor, Talia Darr and her entourage actually found themselves a bit reluctant to leave.

It had been... fun. Much more so than they had anticipated, at least.

Although, considering they had thought they would be shouted down then promptly thrown out, things going ’better than anticipated’ wasn’t a very high bar to clear.

Celestina had even offered them lodgings in the manor.

Lodgings!

Needless to say, while Talia and her group had mostly let their guards down at the party, figuring that Marquess Balfour wouldn’t publicly go back on her word and attack them, sleeping in enemy territory wasn’t something any of them was comfortable with.

And so, after some final farewells and a promise to meet again to further discuss the joint military operation Talia had proposed earlier in the evening, the Darr Kingdom group got back in their carriages and departed, planning on spending the night on their side of the Lorren.

After passing through the triple gates of Misty City, Talia’s smiling expression faded away and was replaced with a deep, solemn frown.

"Is something the matter, Mother?" Landon asked, taking the initiative that no one else in this carriage would dare to.

Talia didn’t respond, at least not right away, as she was seemingly consumed with her own thoughts.

Only after a good couple of minutes did Talia’s lips curl back into a wry smile as she muttered, "I guess I shouldn’t be too surprised."

Looking up to see a bunch of confused faces on the vast majority of the supposed leaders of the next generation, Talia felt the urge to sigh, lamenting the future prospect of her kingdom.

These youths were talented and brave, but when it came to politics, economics, and strategy, they were clearly quite lacking.

Fortunately, not everyone in the carriage was totally lost, so taking this as another teachable moment, Talia turned to Zara and asked, "What do you think of the Rockwell Kingdom, now that you’ve seen it and its people up close?"