Bike (2)
Three scholars had come from the Helek family.
Recommended by Agatha Helek, they made their way to RMEL with their hearts pounding in their chests.
"A pleasure. I am Andersen—magic advisor to RMEL, and head of the Technology Research and Development Division."
Andersen, who effectively served as RMEL's second-in-command under Robon Blædwin.
He was a six-circle mage, and word had spread through academic circles that his theoretical knowledge was so outstanding he practically pursued magic as a hobby in service of magic engineering research.
Whoa! So this is Mage Andersen?
A little different from what I pictured.
Hmm… Judging by the lack of hair, maybe stress-induced baldness?
Whether he could read their thoughts or not, Andersen wore a kindly smile as he showed them around RMEL.
"This first floor houses a large process workshop for the engineers, with a smaller laboratory off to one side. You'll be conducting your research on the second floor."
RMEL was not especially large, but every piece of equipment inside was something they had never seen before.
A young woman scholar with messy short red hair asked, her face bright with curiosity.
"What's this?"
"That is a milling machine. By swapping out the spindles, you can cut and drill wood or iron into whatever shape you need."
One of the scholars listening pushed his round glasses up with a forefinger and added,
"From a mathematical standpoint, this is an extremely important machine for process work. Even the finest blacksmith finds it extraordinarily difficult to produce perfectly steady, uniform results by hand. But with a fixed apparatus, you get consistent, precise workpieces."
"Exactly so! Sharp of you."
"Oh…! And this! The depth, size, and surface uniformity of the mana circuits… How did you make such complex circuits this cleanly? The mana powder is spread so evenly it looks as if it were coated in liquid. At current technology levels, work this fine should be nearly impossible."
"Good eye. Correct. The next device I'll show you is the mana circuit machine—a milling machine modified to take full advantage of those strengths."
Andersen's face was pure satisfaction.
And why not? As new inventions piled up, the workload kept growing while the manpower stayed short, and his sleep had been dwindling little by little.
He had started to wonder whether he would soon be getting no sleep at all—and then, right on cue, the scholars from Helek had arrived.
Moreover, their knowledge looked more than solid. With people of this caliber, he could finally raise them properly.
"From this moment on, you are probationary researchers of the Technology Research and Development Division. You will address me as Division Head. I will speak freely with you as well."
"Yes, sir!"
"Understood."
"Division Head… Please take care of us."
After spending half a day showing them around, Andersen had come to one clear conclusion: each of the three scholars had a sharply defined character.
Rebecca of the red bob was bursting with curiosity and thoroughly eccentric. She seemed so scatterbrained he had worried, but the moment she stepped into research mode her focus snapped into place.
Second was Darius—a large, short-haired, heavily muscled man who, contrary to his appearance, was calm, logical, and thoroughly steeped in magical theory.
The offhand theoretical remarks Andersen tossed out, Darius knew them all; the number of times Andersen had been surprised was already past counting.
Lastly there was Grent, a blond man in round glasses who looked every bit the classic scholar.
A man rich in mathematical knowledge—someone who calculated everything mathematically and would shine whenever theoretical calculation was required.
"Right. Let me tell you what you'll be doing starting today."
Andersen threw them a trial from the very first day.
"This is a book of theoretical explanations on 'engines,' written by Director Robon himself. He wrote it specifically because you were coming. There will be an examination in one week, so master it completely. For reference—if you fail the exam, your probationary researcher status is revoked."
The three of them, flustered, opened the book at once. Dense equations and explanations packed every page.
A rough skim made no sense at all—but their eyes were sparkling.
"This is awesome! This is going to be fun!"
"Is it really all right to teach us something like this from the start?"
"From a probabilistic standpoint, there's a high chance this contains no critical information. And even if it does, it's almost certainly theory that is already standard within RMEL."
Andersen only smirked.
"Think whatever you like. And you won't have time to stand around chatting. Starting tomorrow, you'll also be learning practical fieldwork."
After that, Andersen assigned them a shared laboratory—a small rectangular room with four desks and wall-to-wall bookshelves stuffed full of volumes.
The moment Andersen left, Darius scoffed.
"One week? I'll finish this in three days."
"Three days will be difficult. Director Robon Blædwin would never have handed over a theory text that easy. Five days at the earliest."
"I studied engines back at Helek as well—with the Black Terahole. This should be much easier."
"Huh? 'The water jacket in the cylinder block must circulate coolant to dissipate the heat rising in the engine…' I've never seen any of this before?"
"You've never seen it?"
Darius and Grent hurriedly flipped open the book and read the first page.
Shadows began to fall across their once-confident faces.
"…What the hell is this even saying?"
The Helek family had sent scholars, but right now I had nothing to teach them myself.
Learning process methods hands-on from Alvar and taking theory and research direction from Andersen would cover it.
Once their probation was over, maybe. For now I was busy enough just doing my own work.
"To improve the inefficiency of mana fuel, I either have to research the mana engine apparatus itself—or find a new fuel."
But with my current knowledge of mana circuits, making the existing mana fuel more efficient was close to impossible.
Given the absurd versatility of mana stones, fretting over efficiency almost felt ungrateful—but wasn't that what a researcher was for?
And it wasn't as if I could just go somewhere and dig up petroleum, the raw material for gasoline.
The last remaining option was building batteries. But that, too, had a crystal-clear technical ceiling.
I could manage the electrodes somehow. The real problems were the electrolyte—and the separator that kept the anode and cathode apart.
In a world where organic chemistry had never developed, could I even make a separator? Without plastics, PP or PE were out of the question…
"In the end, I have to lean on magic engineering…"
If I had even one or two of Tesreia's blueprints related to batteries, I might be able to work out a method.
I had already used the mana-engine blueprints from Vulcan to build other engines, after all.
"Maybe I should pay a visit to the Helek family's territory."
Excavating ancient civilizations was the Helek family's role.
As a result, fields related to magic engineering were considerably more advanced there than in other regions.
Now that I had a connection, a visit might not be a bad idea.
First, though—the quantities Blædwin needed.
Bikes for transport could wait.
Right now, bikes for the nobility came first.
A cruiser bike would look just right… Add a shield engraved with the family crest on the front, too. Hmm… That would look pretty sharp.
Lost in thought as I walked, I found myself arriving at the forge.
Screeeeeeeeeech!!
A sharp blade spun, flinging yellow and white sparks in every direction as it cut through steel plate.
The Blædwin forge.
A dozen or so blacksmiths worked the milling machines with practiced skill, shaping iron.
These days, if you couldn't handle a milling machine here, you barely counted as a blacksmith. The five machines RMEL had supplied never stopped turning.
"What are you here for this time? If it's the truck, it's out back behind the forge—go take it."
Last time, Uncle Amos had borrowed the truck from me, claiming he needed to move iron billets.
I had built that thing for Miner.
"Got it."
I went around back as he said, and there it stood—a massive blue truck, flaunting its presence.
In the modern world, an utterly ordinary cargo vehicle that barely drew a second glance from ordinary people.
Here, it was different. The moment I finished the truck, the blacksmiths had come running with fire in their eyes.
— You could make something like this, and you've been wasting time on that other junk?!
— Damn. With this I could haul a whole day's load in one trip. What the hell have we been doing?
— Right now! Make another one right now, please! We need this! Please?
— Do you have any idea how much this costs to maintain?
When the blacksmiths raised hell, I told them the mana-fuel consumption rate—and their enthusiasm cooled considerably.
Honestly, whether it was the Brutal Force or the RB 300—
A noble of one of the Four Great Houses like Blædwin could use them at leisure. An ordinary noble house could bankrupt itself trying to keep even one of these running.
Building them was expensive enough, but the upkeep was no joke either. That was one of the reasons I had worked myself half to death trying to generate electricity.
Thud. Thud.
I rapped the solid chassis with my fist, and a clear, ringing sound answered.
The blacksmiths' use had left a few scratches, but so what? For Miner, this was more than generous.
Miner's going to love this when he sees it.
It was early morning.
After spending nearly the whole night researching the hybrid, I headed to the training grounds for physical conditioning.
The reason I bothered coming all the way out here was to run with the knights. Wasn't running the best exercise of all?
Ever since becoming Robon Blædwin, barring truly unavoidable circumstances, I had run here almost every single morning without fail.
Thanks to that, I could now manage twenty laps of the training grounds and still stay on my feet.
"Haaah… haaah… hah."
"You're running well, Young Master Robon."
"I never expected the young master to have this much grit. When you said you'd run with us, I figured you'd drop out exhausted right away."
"But thirty laps would be really tough, you know?"
The knights running behind me needled me.
I could still hold on for now.
My breath scraped the top of my throat, but after doing this so long, I had adapted in my own way.
Runner's high, was it?
I even seemed to feel a faint rush of pleasure.
"I can do it."
I said the words, but honestly I doubted I could. What grated a little was the way the knights seemed to set my limits for me. So I dug in out of sheer stubbornness.
"Then how about a wager?"
At that moment, Brother Gain—who had been running at the front—dropped back and asked, as if he had been waiting for this.
"What kind of… wager?"
I answered while keeping my breathing as steady as I could. Even talking was starting to get hard.
"If you complete thirty laps without giving up, I will teach you swordsmanship. But if you quit midway—"
"…If I quit?"
Brother trailed off, cleared his throat once, then turned his head to answer.
"Would you make me an RB 300 as well?"
So that was what he was after.
Come to think of it, whenever Wendy rode her bike, the look in Brother's eyes had been anything but ordinary.
Swordsmanship, huh… Not that I care much.
Even if I started learning the sword now, I doubted I had more talent than them.
But just running every day was starting to get boring. Might as well learn something and get some exercise out of it.
"Call. You're on."
"Call on my side as well. Run hard. Walking mid-lap counts as giving up."
Brother Gain laughed and sprinted ahead—very fast. The knights' formation sped up to match.
Cheap shot, raising the pace?
Competitive fire suddenly flared in me. Until now the knights had been matching my rhythm, which made running much easier. Not anymore.
"Young Master, aren't you coming?"
One knight glanced back and asked.
I coolly peeled out of the formation, ignoring the knights pulling farther and farther ahead.
Ten laps left.
To finish this, pace management was everything. There was no time limit.
"Haa… haa…"
One lap. Two. Three.
My breath was jammed up under my chin. My head was full of the urge to forget the bet and just quit.
Four laps.
Five.
Six.
Seven.
I genuinely felt like I was going to die.
As if determined to wreck my pace, the knights sped up a little more. In the time I ran seven laps, they had nearly done twenty.
Their faces looked half-dead too.
"Anyone who wants to quit, quit! But that will become your limit!"
Brother seemed to have caught fire as well; he looked a little worked up.
Same for the knights.
No one quit.
Eight laps.
Everyone seemed to have forgotten the wager, each focused on their own running.
By this point my vision was starting to blur.
Ninth lap.
One lap left.
I could feel my legs trembling. I couldn't even tell whether I was running or my body was running on its own.
Thud… thud… thud…
As I neared the finish line, my speed gradually fell away.
Like a paper doll with its strings cut, my flapping body collapsed just short of the final lap.
Thud.
I poured out the last of my strength and stretched out my hand. The white line brushed the tips of my fingers.
"You incredible little… You win, Robon."
Brother's voice dragged with a hint of regret, yet it burned with heat.
"Starting tomorrow, after our run, I'll teach you the sword."
I let out a ragged cheer and crawled to the building wall, propped myself against it, and drank water.
Water had never tasted so sweet; I was gulping it down without a thought when—
In the distance, beyond the Blædwin buildings, two trails of smoke rose and headed this way.
The training grounds sat higher than the manor, so even from here I had a clear view of visitors approaching the estate.
The smoke thickened, and out of the haze two familiar bikes and a vehicle broke through and arrived at the manor gates.
Wendy and Father.
Wendy, who had arrived by a hair, bounced around in pure delight and launched into a full victory ceremony. The expression on Father's face as he stepped out of the car was not good.
No way…
I was too far away to read his face clearly, but even at a glance I could tell the atmosphere was bad.
Their reactions were far too opposite.
I squeezed my eyes shut.
I had never once imagined Wendy would cause this kind of trouble.