Why it never ends

Chapter 1243 Application
Two large, rotating discs were fixed together, with metal blades attached to them. The base connected to two Leyden jars. Two wires extended upwards from inside the jars, ending at two small discharge spheres.

As Nadi shook the handle, thin blue arcs of electricity were intermittently slashed out between the discharge orbs, accompanied by a continuous crackling sound, and a faint ozone smell rose in the air.

Hersta and Victoria both relaxed.

“What is this? Do you recognize it?” Hersta asked.

“Winhurst machine, I think,” Victoria replied. “It’s a small high-voltage power supply for early X-ray tubes, but it’s been phased out long ago. Now it’s mainly used as a teaching tool—like it is now.”

Several more children ran around the controller, and Gahodore wanted to try it out too, but she was too embarrassed to compete with these children who were barely up to her shoulder.

Gabrielle tried to distract herself, and then she saw Hersta and Victoria walking outside together. After thinking for a moment, she followed them.

“Many of our technologies are very advanced and are not shared with the United Government. Instead, they are directly authorized and supplied by the Mother City,” Victoria stopped at the entrance of the sphere. “It’s true that we don’t mass-produce solid-state batteries like those we just saw—we are the only ones in the world using them on a small scale. There shouldn’t be any factory in the Habitable Land that can produce them stably at present.”

Is it still the same now?

“Nothing should have changed,” Victoria replied. “Why do you ask?”

“I just suddenly remembered District 14…” Hester started to say, but then realized that Gahodore was nearby. She turned around and looked at the girl. “What’s wrong?”

“It’s just something for kids,” Gahodore glanced at the Windhurst machine. “It’s boring.”

“Really?” Victoria asked. “You’ve already understood the principle?”

Gahodorei shook her head.

"Go listen, be patient."

"Were you talking about batteries just now?" Gahodorei asked. "Was it related to the battery factory here?"

Victoria laughed and pointed to the ultra-thin solid-state battery booth not far away: "Yes, that's the booth over there. You can go and take a look. That thing is very interesting."

Gahodore glanced back with some skepticism, then turned and left.

Victoria watched her retreating figure, then leaned towards Hershta: "Are you asking if we transferred the technology along with the people?"

"Ah."

“I don’t know,” Victoria said. “I doubt many Mercury Needles know either, because we can’t really say we’ve mastered the technology. We just know what we need, and every request from the AHgAs receives a response from the mother city…”

Before she could finish speaking, Victoria immediately corrected herself: "That's a bit of an exaggeration, but it's 'most'."

Why does the mother city favor us so much?

“…favoritism,” Victoria had clearly never thought of it from this perspective, but after a moment’s thought, she reluctantly accepted the statement, “because we can always come up with reasonable reasons for our applications?”

"Is there a specific application process?"

"of course."

"You mentioned it?"

“I did mention it,” Victoria said. “Theoretically, it needs to be treated as a project, but in practice, a concise application is enough. The mother city doesn’t really care about formalities. Once they understand and approve of your purpose, they will respond quickly—most of my applications are related to combating chelates, and they have almost never been rejected.” “So there are a few cases where they have been rejected?”

Victoria smiled and said, "Yes, those are requirements for my personal research projects—but I don't reject many applications. Maybe one or two out of ten are rejected, and sometimes they get approved after some revisions."

"Then I can too—"

Another group of children ran past Hesta, and cheers erupted from the square. Hesta and Victoria glanced at each other and saw the group of young people rushing towards a semi-open venue—not far away, a screen about two people high and four meters long stood at the edge of the square, and a host was standing in front of the screen arranging cards and answering devices. In front of her, there were about thirty or forty small leather stools of various colors.

The children quickly went over and sat down. Since there weren't enough chairs, Stella and Thesis, who had been sitting on the edge, also stood up and gave their chairs to the young people.

Stella sensed Victoria's gaze and quickly waved to them.

"Shall we go over there?" Victoria pointed to the small meeting room over there.

“Let’s go,” Hester said. “I was just about to ask—”

“Okay,” Victoria said. “It’s actually quite strange to me that you haven’t established any direct contact with the mother city yet.”

"What exactly do I need to do?"

“Just write an email,” Victoria said. “Write to office number 2 or 4 according to your needs, and they will guide you through the first application—after that, it’s up to you… Everyone’s quota changes every quarter; for example, my available applications have been zero for the past two months.”

The two walked up to Stella and Thesis and greeted each other.

Tie Xi kept looking at Hesta with a provocative smile, but Hesta pretended not to see him and kept staring at the screen after greeting him.

"What are they doing here?" Victoria asked.

“A question-and-answer session,” Stella said. “Some scientific questions that Tex and I have been playing around with—three rounds now!”

Stella suddenly lowered her voice: "Iron Tin has always been number one."

"How do I participate?" Victoria asked curiously.

“Go to the front and get your answer device.” Stella pointed to the tray in front of the host. “They have numbers on them.”

Victoria glanced at Hershta: "Do you want to play? If you do, I'll get you one."

"it is good."

Four adults stood in the last row of the small hall, quickly preparing for the next round. Hesta familiarized himself with the answer device in his hand, following the host's instructions. The device had five buttons: A, B, C, and D, plus a confirmation button.

Hesta glanced around; Victoria was number 34, Tess was number 6, and she herself was number 22.

"You played three rounds, isn't that cheating?" Hersta suddenly asked.

“The questions are different each round,” Stella explained. “Don’t underestimate these questions.”

On the stage, the host led everyone through the first round of mock quizzes, and a question was displayed on the screen:
Tall trees in the forest often block out the sun, and short saplings usually cannot get enough sunlight. So, where does the carbon they need to grow come from?