[V7C20] Power Source
Translated by Jodas 7: To the NorthIn the five days leading up to the operation to retake Darwock, Tia tried her best to prepare in her own way.
She practiced with choral magic and the new and improved Magical Flying Device; she tried in vain to search for a passage to the underground beneath the gardens; and she gathered information by eavesdropping on the adults’ conversations. Basically, she was doing a lot.
From here on, she was leaving the search for the underground room where that girl — Fiene — lived to Julius.
Just as Julius always did, he laughed “Ku, ku, ku,” and answered “I’d do it even if you didn’t ask me to.”
When Agniol heard that, a cheerful voice piped up “But it makes you so happy to have someone counting on you, right Young Master Julius?” from inside the ring, but Julius pretended not to hear it.
The modifications to the new Magical Flying Device wrapped up just in time, allowing her to bring it along on the journey to Darwock.
This new Magical Flying Device had two sets of wings: a shorter pair for leaping and a longer pair for flying. It was designed so she could switch between them by pulling on a lever on the side.
When using it, she would first deploy the leaping wings and jump high into the air, then she would switch to the flying wings at altitude.
At first, she had trouble getting the timing right to switch between them, but she got the hang of it with a day’s practice. Unlike when she was flying with Oliver, flying by herself greatly expanded the options available to her.
The downside of the Magical Flying Device not being able to stay in the air for very long remained, but she felt accomplished having taking this one big step.
The day before they headed out, all of the Apprentices met in an empty classroom and had a little party to send them off.
Rose brewed some herbal tea, Oliver handled the cooking, Gerald helped him, and Sophie brought out some snacks, saying “I’ve been saving these for a day like this~!”
Then, just as usual, they spent hours talking about irrelevant nonsense. Nevertheless, Tia was overjoyed to feel the support of her classmates and sang even more than usual.
They moved by carriage through the Northern reaches of the Empire, towards Darwock.
These large covered wagons were the ones that the Finance Office used in their dealings with outside organizations, so for the purposes of camouflage, they packed boxes of magical devices in the back as well.
They brought out two carriages for this mission.
Riding in the same carriage as Tia were her Instructor, Hütter; Her classmates Wren, Sevil, and Rukiye; and a few mage of the Protection and Extermination Offices. Among them was Otto, the Protection Office mage who had helped them out several times already. None of them wore robes. They wanted to conceal the fact that they were Wedge Tower mages.
Prince Axel rode in the other carriage, along with Möbius, the Wedge Tower’s greatest combat asset.
Möbius was someone Tia had strong feelings about, being the man who had once clipped Tia’s wings.
Even though Tia’s hair color was different now, she still figured it would be best for her to avoid letting him look her in the face. So, it was fortunate that they were in separate carriages.
(Still, the carriage rocks a whole lot, huh? Humans have to have it hard, dealing with this all of the time.)
They all sat on the long benches that were installed on either side of the carriage. The open space in the middle was filled with luggage and supplies.
Sitting on the very end, Tia tried to hum in time with the rocking of the carriage.
“Pyofupeppo, pyofupeppo.”
Sitting next to her, Rukiye looked at Tia with her narrowed eyes dripping with exasperation.
“…What are you trying to imply?”
“I’m practicing my voice in time with the rocking. When it’s rocking like this, I’m not sure if I could sing that we… Pyauw?!”
The carriage jolted suddenly with a loud thud, causing her to bite her tongue. Tia covered her mouth with tears in her eyes.
How rough it was to be a creature living on the ground. You had to go through all this hardship.
With both of her hands over her mouth, this time she lost her balance and almost rolled out of her seat.
Tia was now occupied with one hand on her mouth and one hand clinging to the seat to steady herself. As she did that, Rukiye spoke again.
“Well, not a lot of people ever come this way, so the road isn’t well-maintained, I guess.”
That made sense. The more flat and smooth a road was, the less a carriage would rock.
The Wedge Tower was in a backwater region on the edge of the Empire. There was no way anyone came all the way out here to do proper maintenance.
Again, the carriage jolted with a thud. Tia felt like she was about to fall over again, but this time Sevil grabbed her arm.
By the way, Sevil’s other arm was holding on to Wren.
Wren was usually a talkative pretty boy, but now he was very quiet. Looked like he was suffering from motion sickness.
“Eughhh… This rocking sucks… Eugh.”
“If you ask me, this rocking is actually rather subdued. This carriage has magical devices installed on its axles, does it not?”
Rukiye nodded to Sevil’s question.
“Yes, it’s using magical devices to absorb the shock on the axles.”
With all the color drained from his face, Wren wheezed. “This is what it’s like… Even with magical devices…?” He grumbled.
Tia wasn’t motion-sick at all, but she did feel like her butt was going to start hurting if she had to sit any longer.
An idea struck her, and Tia looked to Rukiye.
“Hey, hey, Rukiye. Can’t I take the Magical Flying Device and fly ahead on my own?”
“Of course you can’t. The Magical Flying Device consumes mana really quickly, you know?”
“Pepepo…”
Tia pursed her lips. As she did, Sevil looked like she had an idea and asked Rukiye.
“Rukiye, if I recall correctly, the Magical Flying Device works by storing mana in a gemstone then drawing mana out of that, right?”
“Yes. Most modern magical devices work in a similar way.”
“I’ve been thinking this for a while, but would it not be possible to drain the user’s mana as a power source instead?”
Tia had considered that question herself before.
As a Harpy, Tia had far more mana than any human.
So, if she could use her own mana as a power source for the magical device, she should be able to fly for a long stretch of time.
However, Rukiye bluntly refused any suggestion of drawing from the user’s mana.
“Magical devices consume mana way faster than ordinary magecraft. Compared to the mana you use through magecraft, magical devices use anywhere between twice to ten times that much… Depending on the effects, it might be even more than that.”
This was the reason why ordinary magical devices weren’t all that powerful.
On top of that, those gemstones with mana stored in them were usually single-use items.
Items that allowed mana to be recharged for repeated use such as the flame dragon’s scale incorporated into Sevil’s curved sword were incredibly rare commodities.
“Flight magic has intense mana consumption even if a mage uses it through an incantation. There’s not a lot of mages who can use long-range flight like Barrett can, you know?”
The Magical Flying Device consumes a great deal of mana.
That was why Management Office Director Kappel had worked hard to retrofit the mana storing apparatus to use a combination of disposable and rechargeable vessels in order to increase the device’s effectiveness.
As Rukiye flatly explained everything, the groggy Wren weakly raised his hand to ask a question.
“But all that aside… Aren’t there any magical devices that draw from the user’s mana, like ones for people with high mana who can’t do magecraft? It sounds like there’d be a need for that.”
“If we made a magical device that sucked the user’s mana… What do you think would happen if someone with low mana like you accidentally touched it?”
Rukiye was definitely right.
It might be fine for people like Tia who were blessed with mana, but if someone who wasn’t so blessed were to touch such a magical device and have a huge chunk of their mana sucked out, they could put themselves in mortal danger.
As a result, modern magical devices had been designed only to use a minuscule amount of the users mana on startup, then to run off of mana stored inside. It was forbidden by law to make a magical device that drained its user’s mana.
With his face still pale, Wren fell into his own thoughts for a moment. Then, cautiously, he asked again:
“But, theoretically, would it be possible? …For a magical device to run off of its user’s mana?”
If the method Wren spoke of was possible, then the Magical Flying Device could be made to run off of Tia’s mana.
In that case, it’s effective time would increase by leaps and bounds. She might even be able to fly all the way to Breakneck Gorge.
With Tia and Wren staring at her, Rukiye awkwardly fiddled with her turban.
“…Since the Wedge Tower is in the Autonomous Territory, they’ll overlook a lot of magical practices that lie in legal grey-zones. That is precisely why there are practices we absolutely do not do. Any magical device artisan would refuse to do such a thing on principle.”
“So you’re saying such a technique does exist?”
Wren pushed the point further, causing Rukiye to let out a sigh.
“…It does. That said, it’s something no modern magical device artisan would do. If anyone would do it, it would be in the domain of inscription magic or grimoire production.”
Unable to understand the meaning of Rukiye’s words, Tia tilted her head from side to side, chirping “Piyo?”
“Pefububu… Why did all this talk about magical devices suddenly turn into inscription magic and grimoires? Why?”
“Inscription magic is, in a way, the precursor to modern magical devices. There are some grimoires out there that draw out the user’s mana to cast spells… So I guess that is the closest thing to what you’re asking about?”
Oh, so basically, magical device artisans wouldn’t make any magical devices that consumed the user’s mana.
Magical device artisans felt a sense of responsibility towards the things they created. As a consequence, they refused to pass on those kinds of techniques. Although there was a chance someone who doesn’t place high value on safety like Old Man Kappel might be willing to give it a try.
(Still, if I found someone who knew how to make grimoires, maybe they could manage to do it…)
By looking closely at two completely different disciplines, you could see the detailed ways in which they’re intertwined. The more she learned, the more Tia came to realize how fearsome a thing human ‘technology’ was.
That was what made humans amazing, and what made them terrifying. As Tia shuddered from this new knowledge, one of the mages on lookout called out to Hütter.
“Instructor Hütter, do you have a second? … It seems like someone is following our carriage.”