As the Accord Cannon’s firing test had safely ended with success, all researchers and engineers started to analyze the data they gathered.
Accompanied by Solomon, the main members including Suleyman and the engineers spread out the blueprint of the Accord Cannon on the desk of the development room. Thereafter began the discussion about its usage and mass production.
Quickly withdrawing herself from the tortuous discussion about state affairs, Mira started to look through various things lined up on some shelves. She couldn’t recognize a single thing there, however.
「Now, Thomas. Since we were able to safely activate the first stage, I hope there were no problems?」
「Yes. We are capable of controlling the recoil now. I believe it will be able to deliver the minimal expected war results.」
Solomon nodded with satisfaction at that confident answer of the lead engineer, Thomas.
「By the way, what are the plans in regard to mass production? With this much power, my Wesley family is more than willing to provide the investment.」
Following him, the rest of the nobles expressed agreement.
「Speaking of…」
With those words, Thomas presented one document on the table with a discouraged face. This document had detailed information about the ammunition and power source of the Accord Cannon.
「Just as we have written here, one shot requires a single Refined Gem and two Magic Sealing Stones.」
Following that, Thomas explained the principles of the Accord Cannon design.
In summary, the Refined Gem would serve as the ammunition and the Magic Sealing Stones as the power source of the ammunition.
The Refined Gem was an artificial material created through energy refining. It had the properties of gathering energy with extreme ease.
On the other hand, the Magic Sealing Stone was a generic term used for materials that contained a specific amount of magic power inside.
The Accord Cannon extracted power from these Magic Sealing Stones, amplified it and fired. The Refined Gem served to grant directionality for the power which was amplified to the limit. In other words, it was used as a lightning rod to gather all the power into a single point.
The Refined Gem pulled these raging energy towards itself until it reached the bursting point. At that point, all the energy stored within would be released all at once and soared forward. The bigger the Refined Gem was, the longer it took until it was destroyed, which consequently increased the shooting range.
And one more thing, to activate the Accord Cannon, another lightning-elemental Magic Sealing Stone was required. Basically, this cannon runs on electricity.
「And thus, there is no problem in regards to mass production of the device if we have everyone’s support, but these Refined Gems and Magic Sealing Stones are a problem.」
After saying so, Thomas heaved a large sigh. The problem Thomas presented was the supply of Refined Gems and lightning-element Magic Sealing Stones.
There were several people with the required skills to produce Refined Gems in the Arkite Kingdom. Still, they were only capable of crafting middle-grade ones. The supply of Magic Sealing Stones was barely enough to operate the cannon too. However, even with such limits, the Accord Cannon was powerful enough to show such a great performance.
There would be no issues with mass production, however, as they could somehow manage the ammo supply. But it would only be enough to display the minimum capability of the Accord Cannon. Thomas, who devoted long years of his life to the development of the cannon, glared at the document with the frustration of being unable to allow his child to display its full potential.
「That can be resolved with this.」
While Thomas made a clouded expression, Solomon joyfully placed some gems on the table, some of which were shining with a faint light.
「These are… Turquoise and Moonstone, I believe. And are those… Magic Sealing Stones? But, Your Majesty, I believe these aren’t of too good quality, so how would they resolve the problem?」
Turquoise and Moonstone. They were one of many gems born in nature that had the characteristics of easily gathering energy so they were used not only for decoration but also for many other things. As for the several faintly shining stones, they were gems that already had power dwelling inside them — Magic Sealing Stones.
The gems lined up by Solomon weren’t that special — just common gems. Therefore, multiple people in this place were puzzled by Solomon’s words. However, everyone gathered had already had a chance to see him act suggestively like this multiple times, so they quietly waited for the explanation.
「Okay, come this way~」
「What? What this time!?」
A confused girl’s voice rang from a corner of the room. Everyone turned their eyes to her.
At that sight, Solomon quietly burst into laughter. The reason was that Mira was carried by Luminaria in her arms and struggled like a child to get free.
After she was placed down in front of the table, she pursed her lips and glared at Luminaria, but more importantly, she noticed everyone’s gazes were concentrated on her.
「So, what is it this time?」
「Sorry, but I have a request.」
With a smile that didn’t make him look sorry at all, Solomon took several gems from the table into his hands.
「Mira, can you turn these into Refined Gems?」
On the hand he extended to Mira, there were two Turquoises and one Moonstone. Everyone in the surroundings poured their gaze at the hand.
「Hm? Is that all you want?」
Mira extended her hand to receive the gems, but her hands were already holding the awkward-looking model robots she picked up from the shelves. A blue robot in the right, a red one in the left. They were labeled as 『combining robots』 and Luminaria grabbed her right in the midst of her attempts to combine them.
「….」
「Umm… I’ll take this for now.」
「…Mm, please do so.」
In the middle of unspeakable silence, Suleyman humbly offered a hand. Mira quietly answered and passed the awkward robots to him along with a clunky sound.
Once Mira received the gems with her now-free hands, Luminaria carried a large board over. She placed it on top of the table with the aid of some robed magicians.
「A Refining Board huh?」
After looking at the board with countless shapes and symbols drawn on it, Thomas said the board’s name.
Refining Board was a magic tool used to refine items. Drawn on it were shapes signifying disassembly, combining, alteration, conversion, and compression, which together formed a circle.
「Are you going to start refining now? Doesn’t it take a while?」 Edward posed a question.
When one gets more experience in refining, they could make use of that experience and understanding to reduce the crafting time. However, even the best refiner in the Arkite Kingdom required 30 minutes to make a single Refined Gem.
Other nobles and experts with the know-how of refining nodded to express their agreement with Edward.
「Well, you will understand once you see it. All right, Mira. Do it please.」
「Good grief, and I was so close to find out how it worked.」
Mira groaned a complaint and stood in front of the Refining Board. Reflected in the corner of her vision was Suleyman holding the two robots she passed to him. She was interested to find out how they combined, which was why she wanted to finish this quickly. Putting the gems on top of the Refining Board, she placed both hands in the designated locations.
After a moment, the circle started to glow. Precisely manipulating the way she poured magic power into the circle and the multiple shapes on the board, she disassembled the stones. Thereafter, she extracted just the main characteristic of these gems and compressed it to form a different material altogether.
Shortly after beginning, Mira removed her hands from the Refining Board.
「AH! You shouldn’t let go during…!」
Thomas spoke in panic, but at the sight of a whirl of light flowing from the Refining Board, he stopped moving and gasped.
「T- this is…」
Once the light died down, a large transparent stone had replaced the multiple gems that were once on top of the Refining Board. Making an expression as if he saw something unbelievable, Thomas moved his head so close to the transparent stone that it nearly made contact.
「A Refined Gem… Impossible… for one of such quality to be made that in such a short time…」
It was no wonder Thomas was surprised. Mira made this Refined Gem in less than a minute.
「I said she’s Danbulf’s pupil, have I not. Mira has succeeded all of his abilities.」
Solomon said while puffing up his chest as if it was his own accomplishment. Rather than succeeding it, Mira was Danbulf himself so it was natural that she could do it. However, since that was a secret, this was a good way to explain, as such Mira affirmed it instead of denying.
The 【Refining】 skill was personally developed by Danbulf. This skill was all about extracting, fusing, and affixing power. The skill made it possible to extract elemental power or stat boost from the gems and attach it to a piece of equipment to reinforce it or vice versa.
Each gem had its set capacity, but by combining several of them together, it was possible to make a Refined Gem like this. These Refined Gems were more valuable and useful due to the higher capacity of power they could hold. Mira could be called the pioneer of this technique despite her changed appearance. She had more experience and understanding of the process than anyone and it led to higher efficiency, proportionally reducing the required time.
「I did hear that the Refining techniques were created by Lord Danbulf, but I did not think that even his pupil would be this skilled.」
Thomas moved his gaze from the Refined Gem to Mira. The girl within his sight might have been the person capable of allowing the Accord Cannon to utilize its full potential. When Thomas realized that, a feeling similar to excitement arose from the bottom of his heart and filled his body.
「Then Mira, while you’re still at it, can you fuse these with the Refined Gem?」
Solomon gave three Magic Sealing Stones to Mira, at which she answered with 「Mm-hm」 and placed those stones at the designated spot before she started to refine again.
This time as well, it did not take even a minute for the power of the three Magic Sealing Stones to be extracted and poured into a newly-made Magic Sealing Stone. Refining was capable of affixing power like this into the Refined Stone to create an even bigger Magic Sealing Stone.
「Is this enough?」
「Yes, thank you.」
Solomon delightfully nodded, taking the newly created Magic Sealing Stone. After the refining, the stone was shining with new strength and clearly contained considerable power.
「I believe she should be able to solve all our issues with the the Refined Gems and Magic Sealing Stones.」
With those words, Solomon gave the Magic Sealing Stone to Thomas.
「Yes, of course, this should be enough.」
Thomas answered with a smile, cautiously holding the gem on his palm.
While everybody started to discuss about the military use of the Accord Cannon, Mira grabbed the robots from the table and began to play with them at the corner of the room. Seeing that, a man in a robe came to her.
「Little Mira, can’t you please make some time for me?」
「I’m busy now so come later.」
Mira answered while gazing at the joints of the robots with passion. The man in the robe, with a slightly troubled face, leaned over her and pleaded 「Can you please work something out?」
After a sigh Mira turned to this man. He was a handsome young man in a black and blue robe. He had shiny gold hair dropping to his shoulders and a good-looking face. Moreover, Mira recognized that face.
「Creos?」
「Oh, you know me?」
Of course, that was his first meeting with Mira.
Creos was a half-light spirit and half-elf attendant of the Tower of Summoning. Due to a special ability of the light spirits, he eliminated the need to think about light even in dark dungeons. For that reason, he was often dragged along by Danbulf.
「That’s right. I happened to hear about you from my teacher.」
She knew him by face but because she let it slip without any consideration, Mira chose a simple excuse. Creos answered with a pleased face,「So that is why you know me.」
「Then, once again. I am Creos, the vice-elder of the Tower of Summoning.」
「I’m Mira.」
They exchanged simple greetings. Right after that, Mira recalled one word Creos had said.
「Speaking about that, I heard from Graia that after the Elders disappeared, the vice-elders took over the work instead. Looks like you were one of them.」
「Well, it was almost forced on me. I was recommended because I was with Danbulf for the longest of time. Honestly, the rest of the vice-elders were in a similar situation.」
「So that’s how it went.」
Mira remembered that she dragged Creos along due to his utility. But she also understood that it was a good decision to choose him. Even if they were judging by strength, Creos, who constantly accompanied her in all those dangerous fields, was probably the strongest attendant in the Tower of Summoning.
It should be the same for the rest of the vice-elders. If one kept getting dragged through the highest level fields, they would become stronger no matter whether they like it or not.
「By the way, is it fine for you to not take part in this discussion? It should be an important weapon, right?」
Saying that, Mira pointed with her eyes at Solomon’s group having a discussion at the table.
「It should be fine. After all, as vice-elders, we came here just to look at the performance.」
「By ‘we’, do you mean that all the others are vice-elders too?」
Mira looked again at the figures of the magicians near the wall. Just like Creos, they were without any particular interest and were busy with their own things.
「The important discussion has already concluded and they are already discussing the mass production of the weapon. That is the domain of King Solomon and the nobles.」
「That’s why you came to talk with me?」
Saying that, Mira returned her eyes to the robots in her hands and resumed trying to rotate and bend the parts to find the place to combine them.
After that, they continued their light conversation but in the end, because Creos switched to grumbling about how absurd Danbulf’s decisions was to drag him through all of those places, Mira only pretended to be paying attention with a bitter smile.
