He stared at the smoke filled horizon that stretched as far as he could see, thick clouds of smog coming out of hundreds of factories filled the night sky and darkened to an even darker shade.
The world that he currently was living in was in a horrible state, probably beyond saving if his little informant had the right information.
Over a century ago this world was inhabited by only humans with a few monsters, as they were called back then, they lived in a state of stagnation, with the most advanced discovery being deep sea ships.
That all changed when a portal appeared in the sky, and from it came a multitude of different races seeking refuge. It was a time of confusion and fear, unknown races, with strange technology and powers that came from the sky and started reshaping the land.
Building great cities, reshaping mountains, and forever altering the way the world worked with their mere pretense.
It was only after humanity had gotten itself together and started to prepare for war that communications were established. They called themselves "The Great Union of Blessed.". He found the name unoriginally to tell the truth.
The thing from which they were fleeing?
The outer abominations.
Monsters to be sure, capable of breaking the space with their mere presence in the worst cases, with the most common ability to break the mind of a living being to be then devoured.
Created by outer gods with the sole propose of being used as a way of anchoring themselves in this reality to invade it and gain a true form.
He found that more original than some books from back home to be honest.
Even if their method was quite inefficient from his point of view, he would know.
Back to the point, after they open communications, humanity was taught about the truth of the war of the gods and those under their protection.
They had come to this world as their past bastion of defense had fallen under the pressure of an outer god direct attack, something that happened to almost every species member of the Union.
He pitied them, truly, to lose their home world and desperately try to defend themselves against an almost unstoppable enemy that wanted nothing more than to destroy their minds.
He was partially sure that he could recognize one of the so called outer gods if he was lucky enough, which was what he wanted to do to make sure of something.
And well another thing that he had in mind was seeing if he could maybe go back to earth to visit it or even die there as he originally wanted, to observe his home at least one more time.
For that he had a plan, one that he had started since he got a full grasp of the situation, its implications, and possibilities.
But to make it he had to take several steps in building a reputation to fully influence the Union to a certain extent, he was not planning on launching a full scall revolution, not yet at least.
While he felt a great of pity towards them, he certainly could not ignore how they treated humans, despite being the so called host of the union they were the weakest in all aspects, from technology, strength and even the new thing around, magic.
The last one was the only one that was bias in his opinion, the so called gods of this world originally had prohibited its usage deeming it a crutch that will hinder the growth of the world.
He certainly could get behind that, so good for them in his opinion.
To the main idea, every race had a thing that made them stronger than the others, having something that made them excel at that, humanity didn't have any of this, every race had beaten them in every aspect, which is why humanity was seen as the dumbest.
Despite the fact that humanity was the most numerous member in the union, in all the history of the union not a single member or race had more than a few hundred million at most/ humanity meanwhile had a little over two billion in population when the union came.
For that humanity become the workers and helpers of the other races.
Now every human city is filled with steam power factories working three shift daily every day to maintain the war effort. He saw right thru it the moment he heard how may normally went to combat in a great campaign.
That is one of the reasons he had made no real efforts to directly help the union, they were etheir incompetent, corrupt or not allowed to truly make a change.
He did not care either way, their system was exactly in which someone like a capitalist would make a monopoly without competition, a truly free way to make things.
Standing up from the roof floor, he took a last look around the smog all around. He stepped inside of the house he watched the structure, made of concrete, and filled with valves filled with gases to light the house.
The amount of advancement that was brought to the world was only upset by the amount of work and resources needed to maintain it.
As he reached the first floor, he turned towards the first door next to the stairs, opening it revealed a big room, previously the dining room and the living room, now combined in a single big room filled with what a person might see as strange machines and an alchemy set.
In actuality it was a workplace, one that contained all the necessary materials to elevate technology and even the war effort to the next level. Tools capable of piercing even the strongest materials with just a little push of a normal person.
Books detailing methods to increase the current industry output, blueprints of machines fully autonomous, and his magnus open.
A full industrial scale electric generator.
Even if the most intelligent races received divine advice, it would take them decades to even develop the means to build half of what was in this room. Just with the periodic table put in the wall of the room would be enough to push elemental works beyond the current understanding.
His notes of industrial automatization would make almost half of the factories in just this city obsolete. His notes of infrastructure could make cities into fortresses capable of withstanding even the most powerful natural disaster.
All of this was nothing in comparison to the possibilities that some of his other works could create. Electricity will open a myriad of doors, from lightbulbs, capable of illuminating a room without the need of a fire or a magic source, to machines that did not need help and could work all the time.
It was all great, and the possibilities were endless. Tragically he had hit a major roadblock.
A power source.
Sure, he could use coal to power steam engines that will work just fine, but that would not suffice in the long run. He had already checked all known coal deposits around the world, and they were not in good positions to supply a whole industry of the caliber needed.
His only other option was oil.
But that had one minor, but incredibly important defect.
He was not a chemist; he did not know how to refine crude into oil and certainly the members of the Union did not either.
That was why he left it to the side and concerned himself with other valid things, namely a rifle.
He had made the blueprint and a vague shape of it was on a table, but it was like that for a month already without progress.
And as before he was occupied with other important things.
He had invented the flare; sure, it was a complete mistake on his part while trying to make thermite, and was already preparing to sell it as a tool to give signal trough smoke and the light it made.
He needed the money quite badly, most of his research was stopped because he could not afford the materials or tools required.
It was somewhat funny how he could have run out of money while on earth he gave regularly blank checks to most of his problems.
Was it some kind of way for reality to make a joke out of him, a deity or even one of his friendly acquaintances?
He did not know but he was not going to curse at the heavens, hard work may kill one, but he was willing to do it again if it help him achieve his goal.
He grabbed his papers, and made his way towards the door, he had a business deal to close.
Grabbing his mask and gloves from next to the door, a cultural thing as he noted, and stepped outside. The road despite being night was pretty well illuminated, an effect made thanks to the magic illumination post that were found around the streets.
A view of a street covered in smog, with houses in a baroque style, something beautiful with the right angle. With a dark horizon marked by the sight of the moon.
"Ah young Alen, working so early and young, as expected of our little genius."
An old man, already in his late sixty's approached him, he was his legal guardian while his father was working in another part of the world, and his mother absence.
"It is a good day; I finally am going to make money by myself."
It was a lie, a lie by omission if one tough about it, he did make money before by selling his designs to his uncle and receiving a compensation for that, he probably was giving him less than he deserved, but didn't complain about it, it was the business world after all.
"Oh oh, so you finally decided to put that head of yours to work, I hope you don't let money control your mind, wouldn't like you to thing that money is everything."
"I wouldn't you know how little money means to me; besides I probably will put it in an account and forget about it, or use it for food only."
Another lie, he didn't actually like to lie, it was something that he found highly inefficient and prone to get him into trouble in the long run, but it will not cause him any problems if it never actually comes again.
"Really, with that head of yours you could easily run this entire city for the better, shame that you don't care about it."
"Its okay I plan to help the water plant so we can all get water."
"Really?! Then I'm sure we will finally get something to drink that doesn't taste like iron. HA HA, truly your head is weird but amazing as always."
"Isn't that an insult?"
He didn't truly understand what people thought about him, the nickname of weird head that everyone use to call him by was something that he could not get, it was used in a good way, but it sounded weird.
Making his way to trough the street he watched checked his papers to made sure they were in order.
They were simple papers stating who the solo producers of flares would be as well as how much he would be paid for, he did hope to not be robbed in his way as it will cause more troubles than necessary for him.
He didn't want to murder someone yet.