Chapter 124
Chapter 124
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Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 124
Chapter Title: Chapter 29: Starseeker (3)
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“Do you understand now…?”
“R-Roughly?”
“Ahem. Roughly, you say? You’re just asking for trouble. Do you have any idea how many lives could hang in the balance because of your ‘roughly’?”
At my words, the dwarf Heidolf was left speechless.
“Alright, let’s go over it again.”
I repeated my explanation, word for word.
The satellite city’s main power unit was composed of ninety-nine blocks in total.
Of those, only forty-five—barely half—were active.
And even then, only two-thirds of those forty-five were functioning properly.
The remaining one-third, fifteen blocks, were not in normal condition.
It was more like the dwarf before me had patched and jury-rigged them to force them online after they had reached their functional limits.
And those fifteen forcibly activated blocks were putting an increased strain on the healthy ones.
We had to let go of what couldn't be saved to preserve the remaining blocks.
“If we do that, only thirty of the ninety-nine blocks will be left. Thirty blocks can’t keep this massive satellite city afloat. One wrong move, and the city could fall…”
“It won’t. Fall.”
“How in the world would you know that?”
“I heard it.”
At this point, I had to pause for a moment.
It wasn’t to keep the dwarf in suspense.
I just felt a brief wave of dizziness.
*The damaged blocks are obstructing the power flow.*
*The current power loss from the fifteen blocks is approximately 27%.*
Voices that hadn’t stopped, even as we spoke.
*Calculating the lift generated by the damaged blocks against the power loss rate, it’s actually a net loss.*
*According to our calculations, shutting down the blocks would result in a 5.2% gain in lift and an 8.2% gain in thrust.*
Even now, at this very moment, the voices poured out incomprehensible calculations and numbers.
I felt dizzy.
It was hard to tell if it was because of the complex calculations and numbers or the way they communicated inside my head.
“…So who. Who told you that?”
As soon as the dwarf’s question ended, the voices that had been spouting numbers fell silent.
*If you ask who we are, it is only proper to answer.*
After a brief pause, the numerous voices spoke as one.
*Born as humans, we were inevitably bound to the earth.*
*But our eyes held the blue sky, and our hearts, the black night.*
*At last, we have awakened to the ever-turning providence!*
I relayed their words to the dwarf, verbatim.
*Thus, we built a gate connecting sky and earth to widely benefit humankind!*
*Those who wished to be like us were as numerous as the stars,*
*Yet among them, only ninety-nine earned the same title as us!*
“Starseeker.”
*The world called us Starseekers!*
*That is our name, we who stand at the pinnacle of astronomers!*
“The creators of this satellite city told me.”
At my words, the dwarf sucked in a sharp breath.
“You…!”
An expression finally appeared on his face, a face usually hidden by his thick beard.
“You’ve lost your mind.”
It was the face of someone looking at a complete lunatic.
The dwarf tapped his temple and made a circling motion with his finger.
That universal gesture made me scowl.
“Tsk. Wasted my time on a crazy brat.”
“I’m not crazy!”
“For a human, you were making a surprising amount of sense, so I listened. But there’s no need to hear any more.”
“Hey, why not!”
“It’s been over a thousand years since the Starseekers vanished from this world, you fool!”
It was infuriating.
Vanished, my foot.
*A thousand years already!*
*Only a thousand years!*
I could still hear their shouts so vividly.
Swarming.
Everywhere I looked, dark shadows were swarming about.
“Bah! You crazy little brat!”
It seemed I was the only one who could hear and see them.
This was driving me mad.
“No, if we don’t shut down the blocks, we’re all going to fall!”
“You fool! I’ve run the calculations hundreds of times! Thirty blocks aren’t enough to keep the city afloat!”
*No! No!*
*Thirty is enough!*
At the dwarf’s words, the Starseekers cried out as if having a fit, then began to competitively spew out calculations and numbers that made my head spin just hearing them.
“It’s not the first time humans who come and go from this place get possessed by strange things and start spouting nonsense. Still, yours was the most plausible nonsense I’ve heard.”
He said he’d almost fallen for it himself.
The dwarf declared that I was possessed by a spirit.
“When you get back, eat something good for your body! Get plenty of sleep, too! Getting possessed by evil spirits drains your vitality.”
*How dare he call us evil spirits!*
*Us, who stand at the pinnacle of astronomers!*
*We are not evil spirits, but Heroic Spirits!*
The Starseekers immediately shrieked in protest.
For a moment, I, too, wondered if I had been possessed by an evil spirit, seeing and hearing things that weren’t there.
What if malevolent spirits were using my mouth to feed the dwarf false information, trying to make the satellite city fall?
But that couldn’t be right.
The Starseekers had shown me.
They had shown me what this engine room was like in the past, when the satellite city ran perfectly.
How powerful and thunderous the main power unit, which now rattled as if it would stop at any moment, used to be.
It was for a brief moment, but I was there, and I saw it all.
That was no mere illusion created by some petty spirit.
The stars of the outer constellations had told me.
Though I had stopped partway up, I was already a being with one foot in the stratosphere.
There was no way I would fall for the illusion of a worthless spirit.
“Brat!”
As I stood there, wondering how to persuade the dwarf who had turned his back on me, a familiar voice called out.
“Warden? Huh? Professor Navian, what are you doing here?”
Professor Navian was with the Rose Warden.
“You damned brat! I told you to be careful… no. It’s a relief you’re safe.”
The way he trailed off made him seem strangely obsequious, as if he were wary of someone.
It must have been my imagination.
I didn’t know the Warden’s exact rank or his stature as a knight, but it was clear he was no ordinary knight.
A knight of his caliber would usually choose death over subservience.
“You’ve attracted some vile things.”
Professor Navian’s eyes scanned the room.
Her gaze landed precisely on the Starseekers.
“I should scatter them all.”
I was startled as she immediately placed a hand on the hilt of her sword.
“Gasp!”
Whether this place was disconnected from the stars, or that a knight without the stars’ blessing couldn’t harm the Starseekers—none of that even crossed my mind.
If she said she’d do it, she would.
She really would.
“You can’t!”
That was the Black Knight I knew.
“Professor!”
I desperately tried to stop her.
*Vile things!*
*I want to argue, but… she’s scary!*
*A human who is not human!*
*She defies providence!*
The Starseekers’ screams echoed through my mind, leaving me completely dazed, but I somehow managed to convince her that they were not harmful beings.
“Hmph.”
Releasing the hilt of her sword, she glanced in the direction of the Starseekers.
*Hiiiek.*
That simple glance was enough to terrify the Starseekers, making them tremble anxiously.
You, a Black Knight feared even by the Heroic Spirits of the ancient empire, what in the world are you…?
It seemed the stature of a 9-Star Knight was formidable, with or without the blessing of the stars.
“So that wasn’t nonsense, but really what the spirits of the Starseekers said?”
The dwarf, who had been listening quietly, interjected.
Just a moment ago, he had been looking at me like I was a madman.
It seemed he was finally willing to listen.
“Perhaps I should recalculate.”
Still, it wasn’t as if he completely believed me.
I had expected as much.
Dwarves were a race notorious for not listening to others.
Whether it was with good or ill intent, right or wrong, none of it mattered to them.
They didn’t believe in any answer that wasn’t a result of their own trial and error.
In a good light, it was artisanal spirit; in a bad light, it was stubbornness.
“I’ll know if you’re right or not once I run the numbers again.”
For such a dwarf to reconsider a conclusion he had reached on his own was a remarkable achievement in itself.
But the Starseekers thought differently.
*Recalculating with a flawed formula will only yield another wrong answer.*
*The flying machines the dwarf has built are nothing but toys that fly at low altitudes down below.*
*The problem is equating this satellite city with such toys.*
The Starseekers, who had been quiet since Professor Navian’s arrival, began to speak all at once.
*Relay this.*
*Explain this.*
*Tell him.*
Unable to refuse their pleas, I said,
“Uh, so you can’t just think about Bernoulli’s principle. Um. In this case, the difference in atmospheric pressure according to altitude…”
I continued to recite calculations and numbers I didn’t understand myself.
“So the hypothesis is that once you go above a certain altitude, the lift actually decreases, so there’s no need to maintain the current altitude.”
*It’s not a hypothesis; it’s a proven fact. This satellite city is the proof.*
*The loss of lift is a greater burden on the power unit than the thrust gained from reduced drag at high altitudes.*
“So if we shut down fifteen blocks and lower the altitude, we can actually obtain more stable lift. This is certainly a factor I hadn’t considered in my previous calculations.”
The dwarf became lost in his own world.
He seemed to have gotten a hint from my words, but I had no idea what I had just said.
Nor did I want to know.
Mutter, mutter.
The dwarf mumbled to himself nonstop.
My role here was done.
Of course, if the dwarf came up with another wrong answer, I’d have to come back, but that was something to worry about later.
I had been unknowingly stressed by the city’s precarious situation, wondering when it might fall, but it seemed the problem would be resolved more easily than I’d thought.
“Phew.”
As I let out a long breath, I suddenly felt a gaze on me.
“You.”
I turned my head and saw someone’s waist.
I raised my gaze.
Professor Navian was looking down at me.
To be precise, she wasn’t looking at me, but at the top of my head.
“Ah!”
Only then did I remember the state of my hair, and I quickly raised my hands to cover the crown of my head.
*Swoosh.*
Professor Navian grabbed my hands and pulled them down.
I didn’t dare resist, and I exposed my bare scalp to her.
Could there be anything more shameful in the world?
“A Stigma?”
As I squirming in embarrassment, I flinched and looked up at her.
Her words were completely unexpected.
A Stigma.
The mark of a covenant with the stars, a symbol of a knight.
It was something that had no connection to me, in either my past life or my present one.
“No, it’s not a Stigma.”
So, I wasn’t too disappointed when she corrected herself.
“It’s similar to a Stigma, but different. I’ve never seen a pattern like this before.”
It made sense, since there was no way a non-knight like me would have a Stigma.
“I thought it was strange how energy was flowing in and out of here.”
She placed a hand flat on my head.
“Only after pushing aside that shaggy hair do I see it.”
Somewhere slightly forward from the crown of my head.
“There was such a large hole here.”
At her words, I instinctively felt the top of my head.
But no matter how much I felt around, I couldn’t find the hole she mentioned.
*The Great Celestial Gate.*
*Proof of a Starseeker who has finally awakened to providence.*
Even the Starseekers chimed in, making a fuss about my head being open.
*Every Starseeker has that place open.*
*But even among us ninety-nine, none had it as wide open as you.*
*It’s wide, wide open.*
I had no idea what this “hole” they were talking about was.
They didn’t explain it in detail, either.
*To succeed the ninety-nine of us.*
*There is no doubt of your worthiness.*
They simply declared it.
*You are the one we have been searching for.*
*The one-hundredth Starseeker.*
Just like that. Without any warning.
*Fwoosh.*
Immediately after, one of my eyes flared with heat.
As if it were being scorched.