Building the First Industrial Empire in Another World

They returned home after buying from the market. And at this point, Ernest hadn’t seen his father yet.

That’s because his father always left before sunrise.

According to the original Ernest’s memories, Victor would wake up while the sky was still dark, quietly prepare himself for work, then leave the house without making much noise.

By the time Ernest usually woke up back then, Victor was already gone.

Then at night, he would only return once the sun had already set.

Exhausted.

Covered in soot and sweat.

Sometimes mud too depending on the weather.

There were even nights where Victor would arrive home so late that Anna already prepared dinner separately for him.

The man would simply sit alone at the table in silence while eating cold stew beside a candle before immediately heading to bed afterward.

At first, Ernest thought it was because Victor disliked his own family.

But after spending more time observing things carefully, he realized that was not entirely true.

The man was simply tired.

Not ordinary tired either.

The kind of exhaustion that built up over years of poverty, debt, physical labor, and grief.

And strangely enough, Anna already seemed completely used to it.

The moment they returned home, she immediately began unpacking the vegetables and bread from the basket before instinctively setting aside a separate portion near the stove.

"For father?" Ernest asked.

Anna nodded lightly while organizing the ingredients.

"He’ll probably come home late again."

Probably.

The way she said it made it sound normal.

Routine even.

Honestly, it felt depressing.

Back on Earth, Ernest used to think working long hours was exhausting.

But at least modern workers had machines helping them. Such as forklifts, power tools, vehicles, factory equipment.

Meanwhile here?

Everything depended on pure physical labor.

A blacksmith assistant in this world probably spent the entire day lifting metal, pumping bellows, carrying coal, and enduring furnace heat manually.

And the reward for all that suffering?

Barely enough money to survive.

Ernest quietly sat near the small table while watching Anna prepare dinner.

The kitchen itself was primitive.

A stone stove connected to a chimney.

Firewood stacked nearby.

Several iron pots hanging from hooks.

Even preparing one meal required gathering wood, starting a fire manually, carrying water, and cleaning everything by hand afterward.

Modern convenience truly spoiled people back on Earth.

And honestly?

Ernest missed it badly.

Especially showers. Oh god, he missed showers.

Anna suddenly glanced at him while peeling potatoes.

"You’re staring again."

Ernest blinked.

"Sorry."

"You’ve been thinking nonstop ever since your fever ended."

Well, that fever technically killed your son and replaced him with a reincarnated engineer, Ernest thought internally.

But obviously, he could not say that.

Instead, he leaned slightly against the table.

"I’m just thinking about how hard life is here."

Anna paused briefly, then smiled faintly.

"That’s normal."

Normal? That word honestly bothered Ernest a little.

Because suffering here truly became normalized.

Poor hygiene, malnutrition, child deaths, debt, overwork.

People simply accepted them as unavoidable parts of life.

Back on Earth, humanity spent centuries developing systems and technology specifically to reduce those problems.

Medicine, industrial machinery, sanitation, mass production, and transportation.

Yet this world still had none of it.

Which meant civilization here remained trapped in the same exhausting cycle humanity already escaped long ago on Earth.

Now there’s a lot of time before dinner and honestly, he already felt bored. He had discovered the city market so that satiated his curiosity. It’s so hard to not do anything. In his previous life, to pass the time, especially after his work, he’d just scroll through his phone for hours. Especially reading engineering journals or watching documentaries.

Well, he couldn’t do that here as there is no internet, no smartphone, there’s not even a book to read. Wait, is there a book?

"Mother, do we have a book?"

Anna paused midway while cutting potatoes.

"A book?" she repeated.

Ernest nodded.

"Yeah. Like... stories or something to read."

Anna looked at him strangely for a moment before softly chuckling.

"My dear, books are expensive."

Ernest blinked slightly.

"How expensive?"

Anna placed the knife down briefly while thinking.

"A normal commoner family like ours would probably need to save for months just to buy one proper book."

Ernest’s eyes widened slightly.

Months?

For one book?

Back on Earth, he could literally download thousands of engineering books in seconds from the internet.

Here, a single physical book was considered a luxury.

Actually...

That made sense.

This world lacked industrial printing.

Which meant books were probably copied manually or produced through extremely labor-intensive methods.

Paper itself was likely expensive too.

"No wonder there aren’t any around the house," Ernest muttered quietly.

Anna resumed peeling potatoes.

"Only nobles, wealthy merchants, scholars, and churches usually own books."

There it was again.

Another thing limited only to the upper class.

Knowledge itself.

Honestly, that realization bothered Ernest more than he expected.

Because without widespread access to knowledge, technological progress slowed dramatically.

Back on Earth, industrialization accelerated partly because information became easier to spread.

Books.

Schools.

Newspapers.

Eventually the internet.

Ideas traveled rapidly.

Meanwhile here?

If books were luxuries, then most commoners probably remained uneducated for life.

"Can father read?" Ernest suddenly asked.

"No..."

"But how about you mother?"

Anna shook her head lightly.

"No."

Then after a brief pause, she added something that made Ernest freeze slightly.

"You can’t either."

Ernest blinked.

"...What?"

Anna looked at him strangely.

"You never learned how to read or write properly."

For a moment, Ernest genuinely did not know how to react.

He... couldn’t read?

Well, technically, the original Ernest couldn’t.

Obviously, modern Ernest still remembered how to read and write from Earth. And their writing system is kind of similar to English so there’s that.

"Right," Ernest muttered awkwardly.

Anna gave him a strange look.

"You forgot that too?"

"The fever messed up a lot of things," Ernest quickly answered.

Honestly, that fever had become the perfect excuse for everything.

Act strange?

Fever.

Forget memories?

Fever.

Suddenly ask about economics, books, soap, and sanitation?

Apparently fever too.

Anna sighed softly before returning to the potatoes.

"You stopped learning years ago anyway."

"Learning from who?" Ernest asked.

"There was an old church reader near the southern district."

Church again.

Interesting.

From everything he had gathered so far, churches in this world seemed to control a large portion of education and literacy among commoners.

Historically accurate honestly.

Before widespread public education existed on Earth, religious institutions often monopolized written knowledge.

Ernest leaned slightly forward.

"Why did I stop?"

Anna paused briefly.

"We couldn’t afford the lessons anymore."

There it was again.

Money.

Everything always came back to money.

Even basic literacy required resources.

Ernest quietly stared at the wooden table.

Back on Earth, he complained about university tuition and engineering workloads all the time.

Yet compared to this world, he had been unbelievably privileged.

Public schools.

Libraries.

Internet access.

Cheap printed books.

Knowledge surrounded modern society everywhere.

Meanwhile here, a poor child losing literacy lessons because the family needed money for food was considered normal.

Honestly, the gap between civilizations felt absurd.

Anna suddenly smiled faintly while looking at him.

"You did like learning though."

Ernest blinked slightly.

"I did?"

"Mhm."

Anna nodded.

"You used to ask many questions when you were younger."

That actually surprised him.

The original Ernest apparently had curiosity too.

Interesting.

Though unfortunately, poverty likely crushed most opportunities for him long ago.

"You always asked how things worked," Anna continued while preparing the stew. "Your father used to joke that you talked more than the village scholars."

For some reason, hearing that made Ernest smile slightly.

Maybe curiosity itself carried over between souls.

Or maybe growing up surrounded by hardship naturally made people question things.