Chapter 11 - I Decided to Take a Rest. And I Thought I Was Just Touring the Magic Tower...
I Decided to Take a Rest. And I Thought I Was Just Touring the Magic Tower...
Translator : Elizabeth
Chapter 11
“Ohhh….”
The plumbing system was the first to be installed in the workshop. Specifically, the flush toilet.
The artisans exclaimed in wonder as they looked at the flush toilet, the washbasin, and the faucet in the now-pristine bathroom.
“To think… it would be used for this purpose.”
“The bathroom has become as splendid as the Count’s art exhibition hall. Oh my….”
“To be able to use clean water in the bathroom!” “As expected, Young Master Archion is definitely a genius!!” “You guys made it with me, so stop praising me.”
Turn the thing called a faucet on the washbasin, and water comes out; press the drain plug, and it closes automatically to fill the basin.
And then there’s the flush toilet?
Whoosh~!
“Get out already! How long are you going to use it!”
“Just a little longer!”
It was a whole new world for them!!
How smelly and dirty were outhouses? Falling into the cesspit and dying wasn't an uncommon occurrence if one wasn't careful. But this flush toilet? It was incredibly good!!
Pull the lever attached to the toilet, and the waste goes down automatically through the siphon principle Archion explained. And the water is replenished in less than 30 seconds, thanks to the water flowing down from the water tank and pipes.
Slurp!
“Why are you drinking that?!!” “Hu-huh?”
Of course, there was an unfortunate incident where a servant who didn't know what a flush toilet was drank the water pooled in the bowl.
“It looked like clean water, so out of curiosity….”
“It is clean water!! But that’s a place for taking a dump!!”
To a normal medieval person, the water pooled in the toilet bowl would look clean. But because of the residual waste that accumulates from use, it could be dangerous! Archion scolded the servant severely and warned him again and again.
“Young Master! How about making an instruction manual? Everyone in the mansion can read, right?”
“I’d better do that.”
Archion realized the reality of this place once again.
A subtly primitive medieval Romance Fantasy world. They use the metric system and have a rough concept of hygiene, but the adherence to it is also subtly primitive.
<How to Use the Flush Toilet>
Without such a guide, some guy would definitely drink toilet water again. Archion hurriedly wrote a guide and hung it in front of the workshop bathroom, telling everyone to read it before entering.
After that shocking incident passed—
Swoosh~!
“Whoa, this is killer.”
The shower room also gained popularity. A feast of thin streams of water pouring from a steel plate with tiny holes called a shower head! After scrubbing with Archion-made soap, all the grime on the body disappeared completely. Soft hair, skin free of itchiness! Plus, dozens of water streams shooting out forcefully from narrow holes thanks to Bernoulli's principle!
The artisans who used this shower room even once….
“Come out quickly! I need to wash too!”
“Geez, aren't you too impatient?”
They became bodies that couldn't live without a shower room.
Because of this, showering before leaving work became the unwritten rule for all artisans.
Trickle….
“The water pressure is a bit weak, though.”
Of course, there were downsides.
Currently, the water pressure relied on the water level in the tank. Potential energy from the rooftop water tank was the only source of pressure. In other words, while the bathroom and shower on the first floor of the workshop were fine for now, the water pressure might be weak for future bathrooms on the second or third floors.
“I just need to make the water tank an airtight structure.”
Of course, this could be solved by changing the water tank to a pressure tank that maintains constant pressure. And if the pressure became too strong and threatened backflow, he could just use a check valve to prevent it.
Archion shed tears at the wisdom of his scientist predecessors. Engineering is truly great!
And Hermione, who had become Archion’s research slave—
“Should I… take a leave of absence from the Academy…?”
She was afraid to leave Archion’s workshop.
“I’m helping with the Magic Engineering research you teach me, and there’s a really clean and comfortable bathroom… this place feels more like an academy than the Academy.”
“Sister. It’s not Magic Engineering, just Engineering.”
It was because she had fallen deeply in love with this modern flush bathroom Archion had created.
“And if you want to succeed to the title, you have to graduate from the Academy.”
“Ugh….”
However, an Academy diploma was mandatory to succeed to the Enersis Earldom. And her older siblings, Archion’s first brother and second sister, had already graduated.
“I wish this technology would come to the capital quickly. Or maybe Archion should come to the Academy!”
“What?! Hermione, that’s an excellent suggestion! We should make Archion a professor in the newly established Department of Magic Engineering at the Academy—”
“Oh, stop talking nonsense, both of you go away.”
Archion ignored their nonsense again today.
“Young Master, so do you want this technology to be an exclusive asset of our Earldom?”
“It’s too big of a job for me to monopolize. And… if possible, I want to install these plumbing facilities in the capital too.”
Of course, Archion sympathized with their wish. If proper hygiene could be established through modern plumbing facilities, people could escape from various diseases, including epidemics. Plus, it would be fun to see the reactions of people making a fuss in surprise at the water system he built.
“But it takes too much effort.”
The problem is that this would require large-scale civil engineering. Right now, it’s just one bathroom in a three-story workshop building, so he could just drain it somewhere roughly… but what if this expanded to the scale of a territory much larger than a mansion? He would have to pave sewage facilities to handle it, and there were only two ways to do this easily and quickly.
“When do we dig the ground?”
“Aren't there plenty of humans?”
“That would ruin the year’s farming. And I heard earth magic is quite expensive for civil engineering.”
First, conscript all the farmers who should be busy farming and dig up the ground for years. Or hire earth mages to do the civil engineering, but Archion heard that the efficiency wasn't worth the hiring cost.
“I’d rather make an excavator.”
“Excava… tor?”
Second, Archion would have to make construction machinery for civil engineering. An excavator, also called a digger, or a crane like a tower crane.
But has medieval materials engineering advanced enough to churn out the alloys needed for that? Well, teaching MSDS to the humans here was already exhausting for Archion.
“Let’s rest for now. Let’s take a good rest for about fifteen days.”
So, it’s time to rest. Incandescent bulbs, motors, and now turbine pumps. He had run without rest for nearly nine months.
“Pardon?” “Young Master, what are you saying? You’re giving us a vacation? And you’ll pay us even if we don't come in?!” “Call a priest, quickly! The Young Master must be possessed by a demon!!”
“Do you think I’m Satan or something? Go home quickly. Do you want to rest without pay?”
So, the artisans dispatched from each guild, the mages belonging to Enersis, and several people hired out of necessity. Archion sent them all on vacation with bonuses. Telling them to rest well.
“I need to rest too….”
To install bathrooms in the mansion too, he needed to develop pressure tanks and check valves to prevent backflow.
“To think the word ‘rest’ would come out of the Young Master’s mouth….”
“Archion. It might be an asymptomatic illness, so you should go to the clinic for a checkup.”
“What. You, do you have a terminal illness…?”
“I said no.”
Archion had been holding on thanks to his Enersis bloodline, but he realized his body was reaching its limit.
“Haha, Young Master Archion. It feels like it’s been a while.” “Since I’ve been holed up in the workshop, the mansion feels unfamiliar. Have you been well, Head Butler?”
“You coordinated the budget with me just the day before yesterday! Hahaha!”
After a long nine months, Archion finally returned to the mansion. Although the workshop was right next door within the mansion grounds. Anyway.
Around the time Archion sent Hermione back to the Academy with a desk lamp in hand, and was adhering to the luxurious wake-up time of 9 AM instead of 6 AM—
“…….”
When Archion woke up, a heavy mass was pressing down on his stomach.
You might think it’s Goldie, but Goldie is a tough Golden Retriever lady who shakes his shoulders wildly shouting, ‘Wake up!’
“I-if you’re awake, open your eyes quickly.”
She wouldn't wake Archion up this way. Plus, listening to the voice, it sounded like a certain Tower Master.
Peek.
So when Archion opened his eyes….
“I heard this is the ‘ultimate outfit’ popular among young ladies in the capital.”
The Tower Master, dressed in a bunny girl outfit, was striking a somewhat sexy pose. While straddling the lying Archion.
Seeing the rabbit ear headband sprouting between her horns, Archion realized once again that this was a Romance Fantasy world. The fact that there was such a high-quality bunny girl outfit in a medieval setting could only be explained if it were a Romance Fantasy.
“Fufu, the order arrived just in time, so I changed and came over. I heard young ladies wear this these days to capture a man’s heart.”
“Tower Master….”
“Fufufu… You can't take your eyes off me. Archion, have you been captivated by my celestial beauty?”
Perhaps trying to seduce him, the Tower Master swayed her body like last time. Archion wanted to say, ‘Oh dear, Elder. You’re doing this again,’ but….
“Tower Master. At the risk of being rude, I will ask you one thing.”
He had gained some tact after the age-fat comment last time.
“Do you perhaps still hold a grudge about the age-fat comment—”
“Shut up.”
He also learned that he hadn't gained enough tact. Anyway.
As the fierce killing intent of a Dragon (zero dating experience, maiden) poured out, Archion broke into a cold sweat. To escape this situation—and to correct the Tower Master’s slightly incorrect information, he changed the subject.
“Tower Master. Do you know the meaning of ‘ultimate outfit’?”
Specifically, the meaning of the ‘ultimate outfit’ that the Tower Master didn't know.
“As I just said, it is an outfit worn only when a man and a woman are alone. Or could it be that the information I know is wrong?”
“You are correct, Tower Master, but to be precise, it means the woman wears it with the goal of definitely having ‘relations’ with the man.”
“……What is the reason for emphasizing the word ‘relations’?”
By this point, the Tower Master seemed to have caught on, as her eyes trembled slightly. For her sake, Archion gave a crash course. Archion made a ring with one hand and raised a finger with the other.
And poke, poke. He showed a very explicit and direct explanation.
“Gasp?!”
And the Tower Master also knew that obscene joke well. Her face turned beet red and—
BOOM!!!
Archion’s bedroom wall exploded. Literally. The wall with the window was completely blown away.
“F-forget it! If you speak of today’s events, I will bring a great calamity upon Enersis!”
“Yes, yes. I’ll bill you for the wall repairs.”
It was because the incredibly embarrassed Tower Master had spread her wings and flown out at subsonic speed.
The property-damaging criminal Tower Master fled like that, and—
“I heard a roar just now! What happened… Gasp?!”
“Young Master! Tell Goldie! Which bad puppy destroyed your bedroom—!”
Hearing the commotion, the family staff flocked in to ask about the situation. For the sake of the Tower Master’s honor, Archion said she had made a mistake in her panic, and—
“The Tower Master in a bunny suit.”
“……Goldie didn't hear anything!”
He snitched to Goldie. Why should Archion be the only one to know this funny thing? Goldie also nodded furiously with a wicked and cute smile. Anyway, after Archion finished reporting this and that as a victim and eyewitness….
“Follow me.”
The Tower Master, slightly flushed and back in her usual uniform, came to pick him up.
“Bunny Tower Ma— Mmph.”
“Shut up!”
To think a Tower Master (Dragon) would have a seizure of embarrassment just at the mention of a keyword. Archion vowed to tease her about this for a long time.
“The Tower Master is so cu— Eeeeh! Don't pinch Goldie’s cheek! The Tower Master isn't supposed to be this violent—!”
“Ahem. Anyway! Follow me today. Did I not promise to introduce you to the Magic Tower?”
“Ah, right.”
Come to think of it, Archion realized he had forgotten the promise he made with the Tower Master.
“Goldie, why didn't you wake me up?” “Well, the Young Master was sleeping so soundly….” “If you say so. Thanks for being considerate.” “Why do you not treat me so warmly?”
Today was the day to tour the Magic Tower as promised.
A Magic Tower. Even in this subtly primitive medieval Romance Fantasy, it is a place like a research institute where mages gather, leading the technology.
“You may look forward to it. My Magic Tower is greater than any other as it has existed the longest. I will show you a new world of magic.”
“Magic itself is fascinating to me, so my eyes will enjoy whatever I see.”
“We find the Young Master’s Magic Engineering more fascinating, though?”
“Not Magic Engineering, Engineering.”
Among them, they decided to tour the Lidasid Magic Tower.
And Archion regretted it.
“More! MOOOORE!!! Bestow your knowledge upon us!!!”
“Young Master. Hehe… If only you give permission, may I extract your brain and draw ouuuut… all the knowledge? Ehehe…!”
“Stuffing knowledge in will be faster than you teaching us! Sir Archion, please permit a mental fusion with you!!”
Because he realized that the mages' madness for knowledge was crazier than he thought.
“Aaaah!! Science is fun! Engineering is interesting!!” “I want to hear it every day! The secrets hidden in the phenomena we took for granted!!” “Then how about inviting Sir Archion as an elder of the Magic Tower! Then he would be obligated to lecture at the tower!” “Oh.”
“‘Oh’ my ass.” Archion wanted to go home.