A random medieval peasant discovers the second law of thermodynamics

[Short story]<br><br>'damn.'<br><br>For a moment, it stung more than any pain I had ever known. Of course it was a lie. Of course it had to be. The great wise woman of the forest was not what the legend claimed her to be. My son's life for meaningless tricks. My son's life wasted. <br><br>'mother, what's wrong?'<br><br>'nothing, girl. I'm alright.'<br><br>How could I tell her? Not here. Not now. She was still so young to understand. How could I explain the realities of the world to her? Better that she died believing in the goodness of mankind. I had seen it already with her brother. I would see it again with her. The day that all children stop believing in the world's goodness was the day they started to grow up.<br><br>'you know, mother,' she said, 'I sometimes think that you know more than you let on. That you know all the wizard's secrets, and you just won't tell me.'<br><br>'ssh,' I said. 'Don't say nonsense like that.'<br><br>'you do, don't you?'<br><br>I reached into my tunic and pulled out a silver coin.<br><br>'watch closely,' I said. 'And you must never repeat this.'<br><br>I flipped the coin high into the air. At the apogee of its arc, I roared in fire, spewing flames high into the air. The coin caught the flames, turning into molten metal, and fell to the ground, where it hissed against the wet mud.<br><br>'do you see, girl?' I asked. 'This is the world.'<br><br>I walked over to where the coin had fallen, lifted it up with a stick, and dangled it in the air.<br><br>'when we start, we are all molten and bright. Full of energy, and full of life. But inevitably, we fall. And we cannot stop ourselves from falling. We cannot stop ourselves from hissing away into nothing. And that is the world. That is the law by which all things live.'<br><br><br>---<br><br>[Context]<br><br>I'm a physics student with a boring lecture. You know what that means. A bored physics student is a creative physics student, and a creative physics student likes to dabble in fiction.<br><br>I've written a short story about a peasant woman who accidentally discovers the second law of thermodynamics while watching a street performer turn base metal into gold. Her discovery transforms her into an anti-hero who robs from the rich and gives to the poor, leaving a trail of destruction and molten metal in her wake.<br><br>It's mostly a work of fantasy, but I think it also counts as a work of alternate history, which is why I'm posting it here. In this world, a peasant discovers a law of thermodynamics centuries before Carnot and Clausius.<br><br>If you enjoyed it, I might write more in the same vein. A random medieval peasant discovers the laws of motion, a random medieval peasant discovers Kirchoff's laws. A random medieval peasant discovers Maxwell's laws.