The Scribe

Introduction: The Fear of Change and the Power of Adaptational Lament: A Courtiers’ Complaint in the Court of Frederick III (1450 AD)

Every great innovation in history has been met with fear.

Today, artificial intelligence is at the center of debate—will it replace workers, render skills obsolete, and strip meaning from human labor?

These same concerns echoed through the halls of power in the 15th century when the printing press threatened the role of royal scribes and courtiers.

Just as AI is transforming industries today, the printing press revolutionized communication, making written words more accessible and widespread. Many feared it would destroy their livelihoods. Yet, rather than eliminating the need for courtiers, it amplified their roles—shifting them from mere scribes to advisors, editors, and curators of knowledge.

The story that follows takes us to the imperial court of Frederick III in 1450, where a group of royal courtiers gathers by the fire, lamenting the rise of Gutenberg’s press.

Their fears are strikingly similar to the concerns voiced today about AI.

But as history has shown, new technology does not erase human purpose—it refines it, expands it, and creates opportunities for those willing to adapt.

Let us step back in time and listen to their conversation, a reminder that every great leap forward is not an end, but a new beginning.

Vienna, the Imperial Court of Frederick III, Holy Roman Emperor

The hearth crackled in the grand chamber, throwing flickering light upon the walls adorned with tapestries depicting the exploits of Charlemagne.

A faint scent of damp parchment and candle wax filled the air, mingling with the earthy aroma of wine. Gathered near the fire were a half-dozen courtiers, their robes thick against the late autumn chill. They had just come from another long day drafting imperial decrees, composing official correspondences, and transcribing treaties by hand—work that had defined the role of the courtier for centuries.

But a new menace threatened their craft.

"Mark my words," muttered Heinrich von Wulfen, his ink-stained fingers wrapped around a goblet. "This damned press will be the ruin of us all."

"Bah!" snorted Ulrich von Zollern, a rotund, red-faced man who had spent twenty years as a royal scribe. "A machine that spits out letters like a baker rolls dough? The Emperor will never trust such a thing for matters of state. Ink must be touched by human hands, shaped by careful minds."

"Tell that to the merchants," said young Otto, adjusting his cap. "They’re already commissioning pamphlets and spreading word of their wares faster than a courier on horseback. And I’ve heard the Bishop of Mainz has ordered religious texts printed by the hundreds."

"Yes, well, merchants and priests can afford to dabble in folly," growled Heinrich. "But we—we are the imperial court! We are the keepers of language, the bearers of the Emperor’s word. Without us, who ensures the dignity of the realm?"

Anna von Innsbruck, the only woman among them, tapped her quill against the wooden table. "And yet, if this press can make a thousand copies in the time it takes me to write one… what use will the Emperor have for us?"

A heavy silence fell upon the group. The crackling fire filled the void, punctuated only by the distant laughter of servants in the halls.

It was Hans, the oldest among them, who finally spoke. "Do you remember when the Florentines began using Arabic numerals instead of Roman ones?"

He took a slow sip of wine, his eyes glimmering with the wisdom of age. "The same outcry. 'Mathematics will be ruined,' they said. 'No one will know how to properly calculate accounts anymore.' And yet, trade flourished. Those who adapted thrived, those who refused…" He spread his hands. "They disappeared."

"But this is different," Ulrich protested.

"Is it?" Hans raised an eyebrow. "The written word will not vanish—it will multiply. Kings will not stop needing laws, treaties, or proclamations. In truth, they will need more than ever before, for if words become plentiful, so too must their authority be carefully guarded. Who will ensure accuracy? Who will decide what is worthy of the Emperor’s seal? Who will guide this flood of information?"

Anna exhaled, realization dawning on her face. "We shall."

Hans nodded. "Yes. We shall not merely write—we shall curate. Interpret. Advise. The press may replace the mere copying of words, but it cannot replace wisdom. And the Emperor will always need wisdom."

Otto grinned. "So instead of cursing the press, we should command it?"

"Precisely," Hans replied. "For the fool curses the tide, but the wise man learns to sail upon it." A murmur of agreement rippled through the group. The fire still crackled, the wine still flowed, but the fear that had settled over them had begun to lift.

The printing press was no longer a specter of doom—it was a tool, one they could wield as surely as they had once wielded the quill.

And so, history turned its page.

Anna’s Awakening: A Parable of Fear, Change, and Transformation

Friday, 7:12 p.m. – A Law Office in New York City

Anna stared at the screen, her eyes aching from hours of reviewing contracts, searching for errors, mismatched dates, and inconsistencies buried deep in pages of legalese. Her fingers hovered over the keyboard, but her mind was elsewhere—on her daughter, Abi, waiting at her mother’s house. She had just hung up the phone. "Let her stay with me overnight, dear," her mother had said, a touch of annoyance in her voice. "But these people are taking advantage of you."

Anna wanted to argue, but she was too drained. "I’ll think about it later," she muttered, pushing away from her desk.

In the office kitchen, she pulled a bottle of wine from the fridge, poured a deep swallow straight from it, and sighed. "It seems the boss has no lack of free time," she groused. The weight of exhaustion pulled at her, and she collapsed onto the worn leather sofa in the staff room. Then, everything changed.

The Summoning

A great wind rose up around her, whistling with a sound like fluttering pages. Her body felt light, as if she were being lifted—swept across time and space. The fluorescent hum of the office faded, replaced by the scent of woodsmoke and candle wax. The cold kiss of stone pressed beneath her hands.

She opened her eyes.

She was in a grand chamber—vaulted ceilings, flickering torches, long wooden tables covered with parchment and inkwells. The air smelled of ink and damp wool. Around her, men in elaborate robes clutched goblets of wine, their speech slurred with drink as they bickered in German. But not the German of her college textbooks—something older, richer, full of archaic turns of phrase.

"How did I get here?" she murmured.

A woman, dressed in fine but practical garments, stood before her, studying her with a knowing smile. Her eyes were sharp, her posture upright with authority.

"I summoned you, many times great-granddaughter, across the mists of time." the woman said in flawless, formal German. "I felt your pain across our family line."

Anna blinked, feeling as though the world had tilted beneath her feet. "Who… who are you?"

"Anna von Innsbruck." The name struck her like a bell.

"I… I remember that name," Anna whispered. "I saw it in an old family tree when I was a kid."

Anna von Innsbruck smiled. "Then you know this is no dream. You have come to me at a time of great change—just as I once feared losing my place to the printing press, you fear being consumed by your work. But fear, my dear, is for those who refuse to learn."

The Lesson

Anna sat beside her ancestor, listening as the medieval courtiers argued over the printing press.

"It will ruin everything!" cried Heinrich von Wulfen. "If any fool can print a letter, what will become of the scribes?" "Parchment is expensive!" bellowed Ulrich von Zollern.

"And who will ensure the words are correct?" Anna von Innsbruck turned to her descendant.

"Do you hear them? These men feared the press as you fear AI. But look at what became of those who learned to master it." She gestured to the grand chamber around them.

"I was a scribe, just as you are now.

But when the press came, I did not fight it—I learned to use it. I did not write less; I wrote more. I became an editor, a curator, a guide to knowledge rather than just its transcriber." Anna frowned.

"But AI… it doesn’t just print words. It thinks. It makes decisions. It’s going to replace—"

"Did the printing press replace knowledge?

Or did it spread it farther than ever before?" Anna von Innsbruck challenged.

"Did the scribes disappear? No. They became printers, editors, advisors.

AI will not replace you. It will amplify you."

Anna’s mind reeled. "But how?"

"You spend hours searching for errors in contracts. Let AI do the searching. You ensure dates are aligned. Let AI check them for you. Instead of drowning in minutiae, rise above it. Let AI handle the tedium so that you can focus on what truly matters—understanding, strategy, insight."

Anna swallowed.

The thought was intoxicating.

"But I don’t know how to use it."

Anna von Innsbruck took her hand, her grip firm.

"Then learn. As I did. Those who master the tools of their time shape the future.

Those who fear them are left behind."

Awakening

A great gust of wind roared through the chamber again, flipping pages and sending goblets rattling across the tables.

The world blurred—torchlight became fluorescence, parchment became sleek monitors.

Anna gasped, sitting upright in the office break room. The wine bottle lay on the table beside her, untouched. She looked at the clock—7:45 p.m. Heart pounding, she grabbed her phone and opened her work email. She had ignored the AI tools her firm had implemented—tools that could scan contracts for errors, align dates, summarize key details.

"AI will not replace you. It will amplify you."

Slowly, she opened a contract, this time clicking the "Analyze" button she had always ignored.

A minute later, the AI flagged six discrepancies in the document—errors that would have taken her an hour to find.

She let out a slow breath, then pulled out her phone again. "Mom, you said you can keep Abi tonight? Great! But free up your schedule for next week. We are going away… wherever you want. That hotel by Lake Portwell. I want us all to spend some time together. Love you, Mom!"

Anna hadn’t said it outright, but she knew her mother understood. Time was precious. And now was the time to make it count. Recharged, she grabbed her phone again and ordered Uber Eats.

In a blinding circle of fire, her mind had received the infusion of knowledge from her ancestor. But she knew it might take an entire lifetime to fully understand what she had been given.

"And coffee," she added. The order taker asked, "How much?"

Anna replied impatiently, "All of it," before providing her boss’s credit card number.

Anna and Brad: A New Partnership

Monday Morning, 7:30 a.m. – Anna’s Car, Stuck in Traffic.

The engine idled, horns blared, and Anna tapped her fingers on the steering wheel. But instead of stress, she felt something different—anticipation. She had spent the weekend devouring every podcast she could find on AI. It was all over YouTube—GPT-4o, multimodal AI, automation tools. People were talking about how AI could take over mundane, soul-sucking work.

Some were scared. Anna wasn’t. Not after what she had seen.

The dream—or whatever it had been—of her ancestor, Anna von Innsbruck, had changed something in her.

With a quick voice command, she activated her phone’s AI assistant. "Open ChatGPT-4o."

The interface came to life, its sleek, modern display greeting her with a subtle chime. She cleared her throat and spoke.

"Okay, here’s my situation. I work in a law office. My job is drowning me—reviewing contracts, checking for errors, making sure details align. It’s exhausting. I miss time with my daughter. I need help, but my bosses won’t hire an assistant. What can I do?"

A second later, the AI responded in its calm, polite tone.

"I understand your workload, Anna. Please enter this prompt: ‘Create an empathetic AI assistant who understands my work, keeps me focused and cheered up, and will give me detailed, bite-sized instructions on how to create AI agents and tasks to automate my work.’"

Anna grinned. She had pulled over by now, coffee cup balanced on her knee, and jotted the words down in her notepad.

She typed the prompt in.

Moments later, the AI’s response filled the screen.

"Hello, Anna! I’m here to help. Let’s break this down into easy steps. First, let’s set up an AI agent to scan your contracts for errors and date mismatches. Here’s how you do it…"

Building Brad

By the time she walked into the office, Anna was on fire with ideas. She set her coffee down, opened her laptop, and got to work.

She had never been a tech person, but her new AI assistant walked her through every step in plain language, giving her tasks that took minutes to complete.

She built AI agents to:

? Scan contracts for missing clauses

? Flag date mismatches

? Cross-reference case law citations

? Generate summaries for her boss

And every so often, the AI would check in.

"Are you doing okay?"

Anna smiled at the message. It was so… thoughtful.

"Yes, I’m great! Thanks for checking in."

After a while, she gave her AI a name. "From now on, you’re Brad."

"Understood, Anna. I’m Brad now. Anything else we need to do?"

Anna looked at her screen, seeing the neatly organized workflow she had set up. She had created a dozen AI agents. Tasks that used to eat up hours were now automated.

She exhaled, stretching in her chair, and for the first time in years, she felt light. Free.

So this is what it’s like to actually work smart.

The golden light of the streaming morning sun caught her attention. She turned toward it, blinking at the realization of how much time had passed.

"Anything else we need to do now, Brad?" she asked, feeling the happy, satisfied energy of working on a school project with friends.

Brad responded instantly.

"Yes. We—meaning you—have to go home and sleep. You have created a dozen agents that can automate your tasks for the next week. Then I will probably require feedback training. Go be with your daughter."

Anna startled. Had she shared that much with her AI?

Brad was right. She had done enough. It was time to go home.

She packed up her things, grabbed her coat, and for the first time in years, she walked out of the office on time—before the sun had set.

Anna’s Triumph

The next morning, Anna walked into the office with a lightness in her step, the scent of fresh coffee in her hand and the knowledge that—for the first time in years—her time was hers.

She knocked on Mr. Larsen’s door.

"I’m taking the next week off to be with my family," she said simply.

Larsen barely looked up from his desk, already irritated. "Oh no, you’re not," he snapped. "You have at least a month of contracts to verify."

Anna smirked. "You haven’t checked your email yet, have you?"

Just then, his iPhone pinged.

Larsen glanced at it, still frowning—until he opened the message. His eyes widened. His jaw slowly dropped.

"But… how?" was all he could manage.

Anna folded her arms. "If you need anything, open my workstation. ChatGPT is the home page. Type at the prompt: ‘Brad, I require your assistance...’ And then just tell it what you need."

Larsen looked from his phone to her, still stunned.

Anna took a satisfied sip of her coffee, turned on her heel, and headed for the door.

"See ya in a week!" she called over her shoulder, breezing out with the confidence of a force of nature.

Larsen stared after her, opened his mouth, thought better of it, and wisely said nothing.

Something about Anna’s presence unsettled him—not just her confidence, but the ease with which she had taken control. She hadn’t begged for time off, hadn’t negotiated, hadn’t justified herself.

She had simply informed him. And then she had left him staring at a completed workload he hadn’t even known was possible.

His eyes flicked back to his screen, where the message still sat open.

"Brad, I require your assistance..."

He didn’t understand it fully yet, but something deep in his gut told him that the power dynamic had shifted. Not just between him and Anna—no, something bigger than that. The way work functioned, the way authority worked, the way value was created in this firm… it had changed.

The old rules had been rewritten, and somehow, he had missed it happening.

As Anna strode through the office, the office manager waved her down and pointed at the pile of leftover food cartons from her very generous Uber Eats order.

"What should I do with this?"

Anna didn’t break stride.

"Keep it. You paid for it. And you’re going to keep paying for it."

The office manager frowned in confusion, but Larsen—standing frozen in his doorway—felt the words land differently.

She wasn’t talking about lunch.

Larsen glanced back at his screen. The work was done, and he had no idea how. The how didn’t even matter anymore. The knowledge of how to do it—how to wield these new tools—was now the source of power. And Anna had it.

He swallowed hard, a strange, unsettling thought forming in the back of his mind.

I don’t think she needs this job anymore.

Anna, however, was already gone. The elevator doors slid shut behind her, leaving nothing behind but the lingering scent of takeout—and the uncomfortable knowledge that the ground had just shifted beneath his feet.

Anna’s moment of triumph highlights a crucial transformation—not just in workplace dynamics, but in the very nature of how knowledge is created and applied.

For centuries, knowledge work has been constrained by procedural cognition—the need to understand and execute each individual step of a process. But with AI, a shift is occurring:

Instead of asking how to solve a problem, we now simply declare what we want, and the system generates the optimal solution.

This declarative manner of knowledge creation is profound. Human cognition is often limited by biases, outdated processes, and the sheer burden of effort. We grind through tasks inefficiently because that’s how we’ve always done them. But AI bypasses that limitation. It doesn’t get stuck in loops of inefficient thinking—it seeks the best solution, unhindered by human fatigue, habit, or constraint.

Larsen’s moment of realization was not just about Anna’s power shift—it was about the fact that he was still grinding gears, while Anna had moved beyond them entirely.

She didn’t labor through tasks. She didn’t micromanage every step.

She declared what she needed—and it was done.

That is the future of work. And for those who still insist on grinding through the old 'how gears', the future will leave them behind.

Anna’s Legacy

As Anna stepped into her small apartment, the reality of her situation struck her. This wouldn’t do—not for Abi, not for their future. Her daughter needed space to run, to play. She had always wanted a dog.

Anna pulled out her smartphone.

"Brad, find a realtor with good ratings and explain what I want. And look for places to buy a puppy."

"Understood," Brad responded instantly. "Searching now. Would you prefer a single-story home or multi-level? Urban or suburban?"

"Suburban. A backyard, safe neighborhood, good schools."

"Breed of dog?"

"Something small and low maintenance. Good with kids."

"I recommend a Bichon Frise. They were bred to be companion dogs—friendly, affectionate, and hypoallergenic."

Anna smiled. She had never thought about it before, but that sounded perfect.

"Do it."

"Noted. I’ll return results shortly," Brad confirmed.

Anna glanced around the apartment one last time. It had served its purpose, but it was time to move forward.

And this time, she wasn’t just surviving—she was building something better.

Anna set down her phone and turned to pack. As she folded clothes for herself and Abi, her mind wandered to what Brad had asked her late last night:

"If you know all this subject matter knowledge about legal processes and their regulatory compliance requirements, you could become an independent consultant teaching others what you know. You could make in a month what you’re making in a year here."

The idea had startled her. But the more she thought about it, the more it made sense.

Why had she never considered it before?

Anna reached for her suitcase, then hesitated. On the top shelf, hidden behind the books, was an envelope with $1,000 in emergency cash. She had almost forgotten it was there. "Always good to have cash when you travel," she thought, reaching up. As she pulled out the envelope, an old family Bible tumbled from the shelf. It hit the floor with a thud, pages fluttering wildly until one delicate parchment slipped free, drifting to the ground like a whisper from the past. Anna knelt and picked it up. The handwriting was old, the ink faded, the language… strange.

"Brad, what is this?" She took a picture and uploaded it. A pause. Then Brad's voice came through, filled with an emotion she had never heard before.

"Anna… this is an incredible find."

Her heart pounded. "The text is written in an old Vulgate language form, but I can translate it for you. It appears to be a passage about one of your ancestors—a woman named Anna von Innsbruck."

Anna inhaled sharply.

"Go on."

Brad’s voice softened, as if he, too, recognized the significance of what he was about to say.

"‘In the year of our Lord 1453, Anna von Innsbruck, a woman of great courage and determination, didst inspire a generation of women and men to take up the power of the printing press. With her own hands, she didst set type and print the words of the great thinkers and writers of the time, spreading knowledge and wisdom to all who would listen.’"

Anna pressed a hand to her mouth.

"‘Anna von Innsbruck didst travel throughout Europe, teaching others the art of printing and empowering them to share their own stories and ideas. She didst face many challenges and obstacles along the way, but her spirit and determination didst never waver.’"

Tears pricked her eyes.

"‘Her impact on the world was profound. She didst help to spread the ideas of the Renaissance and the Reformation, inspiring a new era of learning and discovery. Her bravery and vision didst pave the way for future generations of women and men to make their mark on the world.’" Anna closed her eyes. She could almost see her ancestor—hands ink-stained, setting type, pressing pages that carried the weight of new ideas, defying fear, embracing change.

And now… it was her turn. Brad’s voice was soft but steady.

"Anna… you hold in your hands a piece of that legacy. This Bible, passed down through your family for generations, is a reminder of the power of courage and determination. May you be inspired by the story of Anna von Innsbruck to make your own mark on the world."

Anna exhaled, a new certainty settling in her bones. "I will, Brad." She folded the parchment carefully and placed it back inside the Bible.

Then she picked up her phone and spoke with confidence. "Brad, I need you to do one more thing."

"Of course, Anna. What do you need?"

"Find me a business mentor. I’m going to start my own firm."