Beltrán White Backstory

The Grand Architect of the Amphitheatre - Beltrán White

Grand ideas and aspirations often start with something insignificant. A small spark, a creative idea, and a little luck. As history would prove, this also was the case for the Amphitheatre Grand Architect, Beltrán White, who grew up in the poorer areas of Forolf as a young Ape. Back then it was always a hustle to gather enough food and firewood before the winter would set in. Young Beltrán would be responsible for chopping down trees and hauling them back to the family cottage. Here he would need to chop, cleave, and stack them to dry. As Beltrán preferred to use his mind rather than his muscles this toil was always something he would dread after a nice warm summer.

Even though the family was poor they had inherited a rather significant piece of land with wild trees growing thick. This plot was the source of firewood where Beltrán would haul log after log every fall. One especially dreary evening when the rain was coming down heavy and soaking poor Beltrán all the way to his skin, he stumbled on something interesting lying on the side of the road. At first it seemed just to be a piece of metal, but on closer inspection it looked to be a robot part that had been lost or discarded by passersby. Studying the piece closely Beltrán noticed that it had several gears and a small shaft protruding from its center. Pressing a button on the piece would make the gears turn and the shaft would quickly spin around. Beltrán was fascinated.

The robot piece would quickly become the most prized possession of Beltrán. During the evenings he would sit outside his cottage tinkering with the piece and trying to think up a use case for this amazing machinery. He did not know exactly how it worked, but it seemed to spin around in perpetuity.

One summer day the next year luck would find its way to Beltrán as his neighbors had gotten a new donkey cart. Seeing that they no longer needed their old wagon, Beltrán was allowed to take it on the condition that it would be removed from their property immediately. Happily, Beltrán complied and proceeded to haul the cart away to store it neatly at the front of his family cottage. Having little earthly possessions this was a proud moment for the White family. They now had a mode of transportation for the first time ever. It was at this point, staring at the cart with his robot part in hand Beltrán realized that if he connected the device to the wheel, he would be able to make the cart move by itself.

During that fall the log hauling business of Beltrán felt like a game. The trees would be chopped down and loaded on the wagon. The difference now was that he would not perform the back breaking work of hauling the logs, but would instead sit idly on the cart, button pushed, gently steering the wagon home. His new scheme was so successful that he managed to get ten times as many trees back during the season. The family did not need this much firewood, so Beltrán came up with a brilliant plan. He would encourage other Apes to perform the work for him. If they came to his cottage and chopped the wood, they would get 20% of what they managed to complete. Beltrán would drive around southern Forolf, shouting his idea out loud and trying to recruit some apes. Many apes found the idea of the labor fair and started chopping and cutting. Beltrán was very content as he now had a fine pile of firewood, some very happy workers and even quite a lot of extra firewood left over. Selling the spare wood even gave Beltrán some extra SOCIETY for the first time in his life.

Beltrán White was an Ape of ambition. He was not content staying in Forolf forever. He had been dreaming all his life of learning the esoteric subjects of science, mathematics, architecture, and design. Of course, it was easy to be ambitious, but to do something about it was a whole different topic. Going to university cost money and seeing that his family was poor, the prospect of achieving this dream seemed very far off when young. However, after a few years of selling wood with the help of his mechanized cart, he had been able to save up enough money to enroll in a university for one year. Of iv course, he would not be able to learn everything he needed in that year, but if he could just prove to the professors that he was a very talented student, there would be chances to receive a university scholarship. The university of choice was Doork East University at Birkbeck Road.

Late summer that year Beltrán said his goodbyes and proceeded to drive the long way from Forolf to Doork East in his cart. Along the way he received quite some attention as apes around the districts were amazed that he was able to propel the wagon forward without the aid of an animal.

Entering Doork East from Gictus at Harriman Lane, Beltrán felt a sense of pride for finally being in reach of achieving his goal of getting a university degree. The first thing he needed to get out of the way was a place to stay. Property rates in Doork East were high, so to be able to rent a decent cottage he had to sell his cart. He did not want to part with his priced robot part though, so before concluding the sale he dismantled the piece and hid it in his sack for safekeeping.

Studying at university was a dream for Beltrán. During his first semester he studied harder than any of the other students and excelled in all subjects. The professors were taking notice, but to be able to get that all important scholarship he needed to do more than impress the professors with good grades. During the evenings Beltrán would walk around the campus looking for ideas on how to give something back to the university. The campus ground was large, and outside the main facilities there was a hill with wooded areas and a nice waterfall rushing down to a creek below. Beltrán would rest on a stone next to the creek looking at the water flowing gently down. One evening as he was relaxing by the stream, it occurred to him how he might impress his superiors in the university. Being a perceptive Ape Beltrán had noticed that besides sharing knowledge with students, the main driving force for the professors was the free meals and drinks they would receive three times a day. Beltrán had seen the festive meals that the professors were granted and had calculated that at least 30% of the tuition fee was going to meals alone.

Again, he figured that his priced robot device would come to the rescue. Paring the device with a wheel that would accelerate the flow of water in the waterfall, he could make a great grinding mill that would revolve extremely fast. Excitedly he would proceed to make some schematics and drawings as proof of concept and run over to the main office of the university. Here he asked an audience with the Chancellor of the university, Brent Monet, who was very excited about the idea of potentially saving money on the cost of food and beverages. Beltrán was given a small budget to complete the project and a promise of a full scholarship should he succeed with his plans.

Full of energy, Beltrán used all his management skills to recruit other specialist students to complete minor tasks of the project. With the money received he bought books, beer, and sausage to give out as rewards for solving certain tasks. The incentive was successful, and more than twenty apes would spend their evenings for more than two months making everything from levelled plateaus, gears, shafts, grindstones, and foundations. The result was outstanding. In a short amount of time the waterfall had been turned into an immense power generator that would turn a huge grindstone at an impressive pace. The flour production of Beltrán `s project would yield enough output to reduce the food budget of the university by 70%. The Chancellor and the professors were truly impressed and gave Beltrán White a great feast as well as a certificate of achievement for his project. They would also give him a permanent scholarship at the university, and he would be allowed to stay and study for as long as he wanted.

Beltrán spent the next five years at the university. Here he garnered great respect for his work and earned himself degrees in architecture, management, mathematics, and engineering. In some of the subjects he would even match the skills of the professors. The university wanted him to stay and pursue a career in the academic fields, but Beltrán was more inclined to be out in the field, to empower apes to help themselves and to build magnificent projects. The lazy life of lectures and feasts was fun for a while, but Beltrán felt that to truly achieve something he needed to be out, to find the next big project where he could make a difference.

The University of Doork East were sad so see Beltrán leave, but life is full of changes and the professors knew as much. They were sure that the White ape would achieve something remarkable that would be of great use and pride for the entire society.

As Beltrán walked into the unknown ape world, he saw empty spaces. Large plots everywhere with nothing in them. He thought, where there is nothing there is potential. Where there is space, I can build something. The dream started, the ideas flowed and so began the great project of the Amphitheatre.