Molecular Furnace

The Molecular Furnace is a modular factory that breaks up material to its constituent atoms and converts them to usable material for production and manufacture of goods.

From the Forges of Mercury: Declassified Data Archives for the Molecular Furnace
It is key to note that for the rest of the Imperium of Man there has always been just one purveyor of teconolgical and scientific expertise that is called the Adeptus Mechanicus. What is not much known except for upper classes is that there are two major factions within with the colors of red and blue being major indicators. Since the Schism within the Adeptus Mechanicus the Mercurian faction led by Senshi Mercury herself has had astronomical disadvantages when compared to the Martian faction. For one thing the number of forge worlds that joined the Mercurians amounts to but a handful of sectors compared to the Martians’ worlds numbering in the thousands. Even then those forge worlds have less than stellar rates of production and manufacturing that it took some millennia to make them reach the high levels of efficiency. Another disadvantage is that of the Fabricator of Mars and all those conservatives still maintaining its many key political and economic positions to hamper and block a majority of Mercurian movements.

What the Mercurians have though is the patronage of from some of the Imperial family such as Primarch Perturabo, Princess Serenity, and the Emperor. Still this is not enough as otherwise the Mercurians would be subsumed by Mars. As such they would have to do something to close the gap between them.

It is during the period of M35 that one random “Blue-skirt,” a common nickname among Mercurians, found some plans within the STC data copies as he was filing through them (1). What he found within those plans detailed a molecular furnace. Curiously he studied further on what it does and it surprises him. What the molecular furnace does is that it breaks down virtually any material into its constituent atoms and converts them to new material close in terms of atomic structure to be used in production and manufacturing of goods. The implications of this reached him before running to his superiors about the discovery.

It was not until 20 years later that a functioning prototype was built but needed to be tested and so a forge world with one of the lowest production rates was selected (2). Upon activation numerous low grade ore and scrap metal was fed and operators input the right atomic formula where what came out was pure materials of plasteel, ceramite, adamantium, and others. Disappointingly the amount of material produced seems to be less than before consumption. The Mercurians were confounded when they studied the results and so decided to do further testing. Since it is theoretically possible that any consumable material can be used by the molecular furnace there is no reason why rocks and dirt cannot be used as well. It was later stopped as the prototype malfunctioned and nearly consumed a small mountain collapsing a key production facility that set back the forge world for decades. Even worse the material converted was but a small ingot compared to early tests when using compatible material. The developers took note of these results and filed it for later use (3).

It was not until centuries later that the Mercurian adepts researching the data have been developing the molecular furnace further. It has done so by refining the consumption process that conversion into new material is nearly equal but there is still a visible discrepancy when in use. Later versions of the furnace were used on the same forge world that it actually reached production rates of 75%.

Since then Mercurian forge worlds have reached optimal production rates that only the Martians’ own maintains supremacy in sheer numbers. In theory though the molecular furnace used by a forge world should be able to outpace the Martian forge worlds quickly but what prevents the Mercurians from doing so is that: political maneuverings reducing the flow of resources to the Mercurians and the furnace to be kept completely secret but known to the few. It is thanks to the Martian faction diverting shipments that the resources needed for production have slowed to a trickle that led to the Mercurians to finding ways to bypass the resource shortage and that if the discovery of the molecular furnace is found out that escalation between the two factions is sure to erupt with relations strained as it is. With careful steps the Mercurian Blue-skirts are able to remedy this by making deals with other Imperial worlds for resources and research spaces in exchange of technical and scientific expertise.