Episode 75

In my past life.

The war concluded with a single opening of the gorge’s gate and a siege on the capital, yet the empire had prepared five routes of attack and meticulously planned each one.

-Thanks to your father opening the gorge’s gate, our empire’s 30-year preparation for invasion turned into trash in 5 minutes.

The emperor once recounted this to me after the kingdom’s fall.

-For example, out of 300 tactics, 299 assumed Crimson Gibraltar joining the battlefield, rendering them all meaningless.

Gibraltar was always there during the kingdom’s crises.

Whether it was when guarding the Gibraltar Gorge became pointless.

Or when the situation was so dire that not just the gorge, but the capital itself needed protection.

From the current perspective, that would be when my mother was in the capital.

Though the gorge remained geographically part of Gibraltar, a swordmaster could traverse the land to reach any part of the kingdom.

Then, what other forces in the kingdom could be considered exceptional?

Without a doubt, the kingdom’s Order of Dragon Knights.

Led by Duke Winchester Morgania, the Order of Dragon Knights, astride majestic beasts such as griffins, wyverns, and drakes, dominates the battlefield.

In any war, a knight order capable of swift aerial assaults with overwhelming mobility cannot be easily defeated.

To counter the Order of Dragon Knights, the empire developed muskets, indicating the significant influence of the order within the kingdom.

The empire wasn’t foolish.

-Honestly, I put most effort into disbanding the Order of Dragon Knights.

Naturally, all efforts were made to neutralize the order.

-One. The death of Duke Winchester Morgania.

Duke Winchester passed away.

-Ah, don’t misunderstand. It wasn’t assassination, but a natural death due to old age.

The leader of the Dragon Knight Order died, and the next Morgania took over the knight order.

-In a peaceful atmosphere, an old man fostered a spirit of reconciliation, so he no longer had to wield a spear. Honestly, had it been a warlike atmosphere, he would have found it challenging to survive on this earth for at least another five years. What would you have done to kill him?

The Emperor inquired.

-…It’s a good method, but wasn’t there a quicker way to kill him?

I responded.

-Lead him to ruin with foods that an old man would like? To eat only sugar and flour…? Ha.

The Emperor laughed, albeit hollowly, yet he nodded with significance.

-Two. Strike against the wyverns.

Just as tactics were deployed against cavalry horses, the Emperor aimed to target the wyverns, the cavalry’s equivalent.

-We’ve recruited the breeders who manage the Dragon Knight Order’s wyverns. We killed them by poisoning or crippled them by breaking their wings so they couldn’t fly. Directly targeting them proved challenging in many ways….

Several suggestions were made regarding this.

-…Sprinkle medicine that causes stomach pain and diarrhea in the feed trough right before battle? Ha. Wouldn’t it have been better not to kill or injure the wyverns, but just to render them unusable in battle and then capture them completely?

It might have sounded like a joke, but the Emperor took it quite seriously.

Yet, there was something intriguing.

-What? It’s important to weaken the enemy, but isn’t it equally important for our forces to become strong enough to confront him? That’s right. That’s the correct approach.

The Emperor was very pleased with this question.

-To bring down a dragon, you need to weaken and bring down the dragon, but ultimately, you need to strengthen your own power to pierce the dragon’s skin and stab its heart with a sword.

They waited until the leader of the Dragon Knight Order died.

The Dragon Knight Order was rendered powerless, unable to ride the wyverns.

-We have succeeded in creating an airborne unit.

Even if such external factors didn’t work, the Emperor was thinking of bringing down the Dragon Knight Order with the empire’s own capabilities.

-Even if the Dragon Knight Order and our empire’s ‘air force’ confront each other, we will ensure our victory.

I then asked.

If the gorge gate had not opened, how would he have thought to send so many soldiers to the kingdom?

-Put the soldiers on a ship and fly them through the sky.

The Emperor said.

-As you know, having tried it yourself, even if we can’t get over the gorge, we can get over the gate.

The empire would have surely flown through the sky.

-If the ship can’t cross the sea, then we thought to fly across the gorge.

The development of magical engineering and the Emperor’s obsession presented humanity with a new concept.

-It didn’t matter how many died from being shot down in the process.

To get over the 50m gate.

-It didn’t matter how much manastone was burned as fuel to push the air away with mana release.

To get across the 300m gorge.

-Just getting across the gorge and landing was all that mattered.

A radical means of transport developed solely with the objective of ‘crossing over the gorge.’

Airship.

No, a zeppelin.

-War bonds were printed like crazy, and all assets owned by Iperia Industry were liquidated to use all the collected manastones for zeppelin buoyancy stones.

The empire had planned the invasion route through the sky.

-All that money was spent on making those buoyancy stones, but thanks to your father opening the gate, we just walked through the gorge.

According to the plan.

-If there’s anything I regret, it’s that we wasted too much time and budget, in the order of billions, on the researchers who made those buoyancy stones.

The Emperor, who usually didn’t dwell on the past and looked forward, said he “regrets” it himself.

-Those useless researchers, if I could turn back time, I would have been the first to rip their heads off.

Pouring an almost infinite amount of time and budget into it.

And even splitting the empire’s top company’s ship to expand the military based on the technology created.

But when the father snapped his fingers and opened the gate, all that preparation turned to bubbles.

One of the researchers who developed that technology,

Arsen Gilalus,

A traitor who leaked the empire’s prototype buoyancy stone technology, developed in the kingdom, to the empire for a bribe and received a title from the empire.

A short while later, in front of the 3rd gate.

“We’ve arrived.”

“Hah, huff, huck…!”

Baron Arsen breathes heavily, bowing his head.

Perhaps because of his pride, he gasps with his hands on his knees, sweating profusely as if it were raining from his entire body.

“Are you okay?”

“This…!”

Magicians usually didn’t exercise much.

Even riding a horse was difficult for them.

“Why ride a horse? Just fly with levitation magic.”

Magicians preferred flying to walking.

As long as they had enough mana and spare manastones in their body, they could fly anywhere.

But that’s only for short distances, like inside buildings or within cities.

“The distance from the count’s castle to the gorge is quite far, isn’t it?”

“Huff, huff, ugh…!”

This man is almost dying from mana exhaustion right now.

“Sir, young master.”

Sir Robert asked really carefully from behind.

“Are you okay?”

“I’m fine. Not dying.”

“No, I mean you, young master. Even if the Margrave commanded it once, such a person is…”

“He sees me as a child and harbors ill will towards me.”

Before we came here,

“Margrave! No matter what, how could you send such a child…”

“What did you say?”

Baron Arsen made a gesture as if insulting me in front of my father.

“Grey Gibraltar is my eldest son, and he is my face sent to welcome you. What do you say to such a child?”

“Ah, no, that’s not…”

He nearly died right there in front of my father.

“Think of dealing with Grey Gibraltar as dealing with me, Crimson Gibraltar.”

“Ah, that, yes!! Of course!!”

Thanks to that, I failed to maintain the image of ‘Grey, the eldest son who is considered useless by the Gibraltar family.’

“Well, still, it looks better for him to be groveling and bowing his head.”

“I think so too.”

As Robert said, there were those whom it’s worth pleasing.

Baron Arsen’s value wasn’t high enough to boost his self-esteem by saying yes, yes ‘sincerely.’

What a tragic fate.

In the future, a man who would achieve more valuable accomplishments than anyone else was just someone I weigh ‘life or death’ against.

“Come this way. Here, you can go up by taking the elevator.”

“Yeah, let’s do that.”

Was it because he’s an adult after all?

Or was it because of his nature, or the stiff neck unique to magicians?

“Lead the way. You’re not going to tell me this thing is hand-cranked, are you? Huh?”

Whatever he heard from my father, this man still treated me like a child.

“Currently, it’s operated with a pulley. Since you’ve arrived, let’s start with questions.”

“What is it?”

“There is a magic that creates wind among the magics, isn’t there?”

“That’s right.”

“Can you keep blowing wind in one direction by storing that in a manastone and then blowing mana into it?”

“…It’s not impossible?”

Whether it’s a wind stone or a buoyancy stone, both fundamentally relied on ‘the release of wind.’

“Then, if we attach such a manastone under this elevator and only generate wind when going up, can we go up faster than now?”

I asked.

As a question about the part to be mounted on this elevator, for the purpose of increasing speed.

“Hmm… That’s not impossible, um, wait…”

And a very coincidental thought often becomes a new idea for a researcher.

“……..”

“Gilalus sir?”

“Ah, no. It’s not. I just considered the possibility. It’s not just about theory; we also need to consider whether it’s realistically possible or not. Hmm.”

He spoke as though he’s answering his own question, yet his gaze wasn’t on me but rather on the elevator’s floor and walls.

“That’s a pity.”

Thud, thud.

The elevator hasn’t even reached halfway up the wall.

“If this could move a bit faster, it might present a splendid spectacle to Her Majesty Queen Carmen.”

“Huh, really…?”

While subtly probing for a reaction by dropping a hint about Queen Carmen.

“Do you think it’s enough for this to merely move quickly?”

“Is there something else?”

“No! There’s nothing else. Just experiencing the sensation of acceleration for a moment would be sufficient.”

It seems all his thoughts were preoccupied with something he deemed more important than showcasing his connection with Queen Carmen.

‘The seed has been planted.’

The wind stones will be developed regardless.

Even though the empire’s newspapers have yet to mention anything about wind stones or buoyancy stones—

‘With the disbandment of the navy, all the ships of the 1st fleet have entered the port.’

The bodies of ships destined to become airships are now being relocated somewhere other than the sea.

‘That they could launch airships in 7 years means, at this very moment, at least the research or the foundational ideas are already under consideration.’

Still, it’s not exactly known.

The concept of floating ships in the sky might not even exist yet.

Or they might be attempting to attach wings to ships to fly them over the gorge.

Or perhaps they planned to add parts to the bottom of the ship, attach wheels, and use it as a land battleship, serving as a mobile tent for soldiers to sleep in contaminated areas, but then the tactical plan shifted to airships.

However, the navy had been disbanded, and the ships that once floated on the sea were already being repurposed.

So.

‘Even if we develop the wind stones first here, there’s no issue.’

The development of wind stones was left to the original author.

“Then, would you mind conducting a test here? Explosion magic for the festival.”

“Kuhuhu, yes. Today is indeed a happy day for me…?”

Baron Arsen took a glass bottle from his bosom and drank the white liquid inside it in one gulp.

“Huhuhu. I’ll fire the celebratory shots as much as you desire. What color do you prefer, huh?”

Then, he took out a wand that resembled a short sword from his waist and aimed it over the gorge.

“Make it a mix of purple and sky blue, and target the walls of the gorge.”

“Huhu, what if the gorge collapses?”

“There has never been an instance of the gorge shaking due to those not at the master level.”

“Kick….”

Baron Arsen laughed at me, then soon pointed the tip of his wand towards the gorge.

“I have no intention of recklessly disturbing this gorge. They say a curse befalls those who do!”

“Aren’t magicians unconcerned about curses?”

“Of course not! Curses are to be taken seriously. Especially now…huhuhu.”

He seemed to be hiding something, his smile tinged with bitterness.

“When I think of the great achievements I will make in the future.”

That’s a poisoned chalice.

Technology ceased to be one’s own the moment others could replicate it.

“That’s why he was brought before me and shot in the head.”

The memory became vivid.

“It’s a bit much to kill someone twice, but do I have to kill him with my own hands this time?”

I had forgotten for a moment because I was shooting a musket while high on White Silver.

“Wasn’t the reason the crown prince purged him not budget embezzlement, but simply because he was too arrogant?”

This man.

He was eliminated by the Emperor.

‘I can’t get marked by the shadows just for boasting about developing wind stones.’

Regrettably.

‘After working hard on developing wind stones, he should just leave the research results and go.’

In this life too, it seems wrong to merely survive ordinarily.