Steel and Mana

Chapter 275 – Spring, At Last

"It is melting…" I murmured, standing in our garden, looking at the icicles hanging from the roof of my palace. They were slowly dripping, and for the first time in months, there were tiny gaps in the clouds, letting sunshine through.

"Spring is coming, and it is almost on time." Sasha nodded, standing next to me. "A bit late, as March has already started, but sooner than I expected."

"Better than never!" Luna added, arriving from behind us, stretching with satisfaction, "Breakfast is ready! Are you coming? Mikan is already feeding the kids, and Yuri is going to gobble down the good parts if you wait for too long!"

"Yeah, yeah." I chuckled, looking at them. "I am just surprised that winter is finally going to end. And it was without a monster attack."

"There was one, no?" Luna argued as we headed back to the palace, "They just killed each other. Lucky us!"

"If that was what happened." I hummed because it indeed could be the case. But… I wasn't sure. What about the spider demon, then? It spawned so many little bastards… two giant lizards shouldn't have been the reason. Then there was that magic from another world. Did it seal the route because of the two monsters... Or was it there because of the… human with them? I couldn't help but think that this winter, we had to do something with the monsters and everything with the corpse we found.

After our breakfast, I began dealing with the news coming my way, as usual. This time, Merlin was not around, and the reason for this was simple. I had sent him to Westland. By the letter I received, they never found our compromised spies or their bodies. It could have been destroyed and disposed of, but it also could be they are within the cordoned-off brothel. Merlin will see to it after meeting up with Elvira and Pion in Hospet. Plus, his journey was for two reasons. Deal with Otto's remaining possible traps and examine the road, drawing up where our railroad will be built, connecting Hospet to Lothlia, Avalon, and Cerna. The moment the snow had melted, we were going to start laying it down. It would help move not only goods between allies but also troops, as I was sure this year would still be full of skirmishes and campaigns.

"Leon," Sasha said, entering my office hours later, "I think I am finished!" She smiled, bringing over a thick folder filled with dozens upon dozens of drawings and notes.

"Oh? Then we can start building it?" I asked back, beaming as I looked over her plans, noting that they needed no further input from me. By now, she was just as good as me, if not better.

After recovering the shot-down Ishillian ship and the monster corpses from the Pass, I ordered that we focus on building our airship first and foremost. My examination of the bones and structure of the beasts proved no further discoveries. They were the same as before. The only connection they had with our corpse was the similarity of runes on their bones. Yet, they were different enough for us to give up on theorizing without any more concrete knowledge. What was important was to use them to our best efforts. We really needed their scales for armor, their blood, and not to mention their cores for the airship project.

Maneuvering our troops and mechs was a priority, and with our enemy having lost so many of their ships, we had to strike the iron while it was hot. Sasha took my original plans for the airship and refined them, implementing all of our magical knowledge and the propulsion system Ishillia used.

Reading her papers, she–and, of course, Merlin–had come to a conclusion on how to replace the need for ship-slaves. Ishillia's vessels were designed to be piloted by mages, who can, just as our pilots, meld with the ship and control it via their thoughts. The ship-slaves, by our understanding, are beings who act as processing units, automatized instances, pre-coded to alleviate the stress on the mind of the mage who controls the boat. They have been created in a way that they could function by themselves, work as a collective, and navigate the ship on predetermined orders, allowing the non-magical crew to command them. This also meant that many of the ship's functions were working in a much less optimal state as they were not prompted directly by a mage's mind but by verbal commands and instructions.

Of course, we were not going to do anything like that. We are approaching this from a different angle. Reading her designs, the ship will have two central formations that will not only house their respective monster cores but a good chunk of accompanying CC clusters, weighing a bit over a hundred tons collectively. This wasn't an issue; most airships, from my memory, put their weight around two hundred tons, and with magic at hand, I was sure we could make ours even heavier and still allow it to fly. Looking at the formations, the logic behind them was apparent at once.

The cores were complex and modular, implementing how we are already working with CC. There were multiple levers and slots, accepting the onboard CC or removing them from the working formation, altering its strength and function. With this, the regular crew could direct the ship, from increasing speed and altitude to steering the vessel to where we wanted. They just had to flip levers, turn the wheels, and manipulate the corresponding part of the formation by removing or adding CC. Yes, it wouldn't be as responsive as an Ishillian warship, but I was okay with this compromise.

"About two hundred huh?" I asked, reaching the end of her notes.

"More or so." She nodded, affirming the number of primary crew it would need to fly. "This includes the rotation so we can operate at every moment and the reserves if injury happens onboard the ship. We shouldn't go above three hundred, though, not even if we include the gunners. I made sure that the ship's engines, steering, and defensive and offensive capabilities were separate. The monster cores will supply their energies independently from each other. Mikan designed it so–"

"Wait, Mikan did this?" I asked, surprised.

"Um." She grinned proudly, "She thinks she is not intelligent enough, but that is not true. When it comes to healing spells or defensive measures, she is incredible! The new shield spell for the airship? It is all her work. All of it! She improved on what we already had, and now I am confident our shields would be stronger than what Ishillia has."

"I will need to reward her…" I mumbled, shivering after hearing what Sasha whispered into my ears.

"A child would be a fine gift."

"Um… I think...?" I muttered, not wanting to lose my focus, shaking my head, "So… One monster core is fueling the ship to stay afloat, and the other drives our defensive and offensive capabilities."

"Yes, and this also brings one weakness with it." She nodded, sighing, pointing out the issue that I already noticed. "Our attack and defensive powers depend on how much we allocate to each. If we weaken our shields, we will fire more devastating cannon shots. We turn it the opposing way; our shields will withstand much more but won't be able to punch back. But… If we can have a third core, I can separate it out, and–"

"It is fine." I stopped her, kissing her lips. "Our airship is to be the command center from where we direct our troops and provide support. It is not a frontline unit. Plus, this is only the first iteration; we can refine it after we have enough experience and build better variants later. I approve! We can start building it. "

"I will bring the news to the workers." she smiled happily. "I can't wait to see it fly! If it is done, it will dwarf Mirian's Judgment!"

"I wonder what she will say about it, ahaha! Hopefully, she won't ask me to build one for her."

"Would you?"

"Nah." I answered at once, "And she can't pay me enough to do so."

…
….
……

Within Ishillia's capital, Pascal was meditating, his mind finally settling after reconciling with Otto's failure and subsequent death. It took him time to heal from the backlash he suffered, yet a splintering headache was still something he fought with every day. Sometimes, it became so unbearable he could do nothing but lie down in a dark chamber, ignoring everything around him.

Today was one of the good days, allowing him to issue his orders to his remaining three subordinates: Kiva, who was overseeing the East, most notably setting up the old Kingdom of Scorc for the inevitable. Then, there was Lucca, who was responsible for the South and preparing for the inevitable invasion by the Geth and Sar Empire. Lastly, there was Barth, closest to the capital, managing the territory around it and around the west side of Ishillia. It was he who contacted Pascal, his voice echoing in his Master's consciousness.

"Master, we confirmed… we lost all control over the North. Mirian had also provoked the two ships I was using to enact your will and keep her bogged down. I think… I know why Otto has failed."

"Continue." Pascal grunted, twitching his eyebrows as he sat in the dimly lit chamber, resuming his meditation. Soon, an image appeared in his mind, a detailed look at the mech standing before Cerna, trying to provoke an attack from the two flying ships. “What… is… that…?” He whispered, barely believing the validity of Barth's news.

"Those are my direct memories, My Master. That thing… is a machine, a similar construct as our ships, a fusion between magic and machine. I could read nothing else of it from the distance I observed its function."

“…”

"We don't know what they have within the Frontier. How many such machines do they have? They managed to kill and stop Otto, and we all know, Master, that he was one of the more ruthless among us. My estimation is that they must have at least five, if not more."

"I think so too…" Pascal agreed, gritting his teeth and feeling them cracking in his jaw. "Damn it… How?!"

"We can't know for sure. Something is seriously wrong with the North, and I can only guess, but I assume that Mirian's branch has been working on it for a long time. But that is just a guess. For now, I retreated with our remaining two ships. I accept any punishment, My Emperor, but I did not want to risk losing more. This was clearly a provocation from Mirian, aiming to draw us into a trap and bring our ships down."

"I am not punishing you for a good decision. Keep patrolling the borders; we can't allow to lose more than the North! Gather an army and start probing their strength."

"I will do my best, but…" Barth hesitated but continued nonetheless. "This winter took an enormous toll on the population, especially on our food reserves."

"I know. Still, we can't give Mirian a breather! I made a mistake in agreeing to her plan." He said plainly, something nobody else would dare to utter, "To mitigate its effect, use the rebelling voices and people. Conscript them, no matter how. They can die for their treachery, so send them to the forefront and use them as meat shields."

"It will be done, My Emperor. At least we are not the only ones suffering from the effects of the long winter."

"That… is true. That's why the South will soon turn into a battlefield." Pascal muttered to himself, knowing it was inevitable.

Even though he never left the palace, news always reached him first. The whole world was suffering from the prolonged winter, and many places in the South, where people were not prepared for another dramatic season like this, had it the worst. Their food supplies were wrecked, their fields yielding nothing, and their people starving through the harsh winter. War was inevitable. Not just here but everywhere. Countries will attack each other to survive; he knew it. They were going to cull the people who would rebel if not given a target to plunder. There was not enough to feed everyone, so killing the population off in a war was what most rulers would do, if not consciously, then by sheer accident. War was coming, and it was going to engulf not just Ishillia but almost every kingdom and empire of the known world.

"Maybe…" Pascal thought to himself, "Maybe it wasn't a coincidence that the Spear of the Goddes of Death herself had awoken right now."