Volume 8 - Chapter 22 – Railgun

08-22 Railgun

The third day of full-scale operations.

“Now then, what to do after the Quinta?”

Jin personally wanted to quickly start on the power suit. However, Ann said,

“Hourai Island could be said to be a maritime nation, right? An aircraft carrier ought to be built to work as a frontline base.”

She had apparently got the idea of an aircraft carrier from Jin’s knowledge.

“Having the air war potential be dispatched from Hourai Island takes too much time. Don’t you think that an aircraft carrier equipped with a Warp Gate large enough to transmit planes is needed?”

“I see what you mean.”

Each and every detail of what Ann said was reasonable.

“Alright, shall we build one then?”

Jin started planning with Laozi.

It would be a 200 meter-class one. Because it would have a Warp Gate, it wouldn’t need to carry any more planes than necessary.

Movement would be with Magi Water Jets. Rather than having a single large one, it would use six small ones. It would then also be able to change directions just by adjusting the machinery’s output.

The deck would have a two-layered structure. The whole lower portion would be for the use of planes that need to make a takeoff run, while the top portion would be for the use of VTOLs.

Three Warp Gates large enough to accommodate all of the current plane models would be installed.

It would be armed with laser artillery. The main battery would have six cannons, and the secondary battery would have six cannons. There would be a hundred mounted small guns each capable of individually burst firing. All of them would have separate Control Cores. Well, that was just something similar to computer controls.

It’d have ten [Water Jet] cannons as a supplement. Jin also wanted live ammunition but that hadn’t been developed.

The crew would be the Navy golems, the Marines. 100 golems seemed to no longer be enough and so the plan was to increase the amount by another 100. The number of Air Force and Army personnel would be similarly increased.

The plan was naturally for the Air Force golems to man the VTOLs, while the Army golems were to be on duty at the advance base and work as combat engineers.

The structure material would be Adamantite on top of which five layers of steel would be affixed, with the surface coated Mithril. The ship’s displacement would be about 20,000 tons.

The crew would number 30. In theory the cruising range would be infinite, but that was only limited to areas where there was Ether. The cruising range with the loaded Magic Energy would be around 10,000 kilometers.

Improved versions of high-speed boats were also planned to be built and loaded on the ship.

Jin decided to build three ships with the above-mentioned specifications and gave them the names ‘Hotaka’, ‘Myoukou’, and ‘Asama’.

As one would expect, it wasn’t something achievable in one or two days, and so with Laozi taking the lead the manufacturing was done without rushing. Jin checked every important detail and manufactured the new equipment himself.

Now to what Jin would do after that.

“First of all, please produce small arms that can fire live ammunition.”

Ann said to Jin. She was acting like quite the manager.

“Hmm, I want to make something that could at least destroy Gigantes with just kinetic energy alone, you see.”

By now not even a shred of self-restraint could be found. Now that it had come to this it was almost a refreshing change.

“But it seems like the recoil would become terrifying, huh…”

There probably wouldn’t be a problem if it was mounted on an aircraft.

And so Jin began constructing what was fundamentally a slingshot. It would shoot shells with the power of Magical Muscles made out of a Sea Dragon’s leather

By now it was a variant of the catapult.

It had the flaw that the shot would fall off if it faced downwards, but that was resolved by adding a function that would hold the shot in place to one end of the Magical Muscles. Ordinarily it would keep hold of the shot but at the moment of shooting out it would release the shot.

Two separate rails above and below would work as the gun barrel, and the Magical Muscles would move the shot between those two rails to launch it.

“Alright, the prototype is complete.”

The prototype model with a length of about a meter was complete just before noon.

As Jin had been invited for lunch by Elsa, he thought that he’d have a single go at test firing and then go to Kunlun Island.

“Reiko, please try shooting this as a test.”

As he wasn’t sure of the recoil he ended up asking Reiko.

“Yes, Father.”

The Magical Muscles could be extended by circulating Magic Energy through them so setting the slingshot was easy unlike with a regular slingshot. The shot was a steel ball with a diameter of 2 centimeters.

“It’s a test so please use it at its full strength.”

“Understood.”

Reiko turned to aim horizontally towards the sea.

“Firing!”

She pulled the trigger. The Magical Muscles made out of a Sea Dragon’s leather unleashed their absurd force.

The bullet, accompanied with a bang, flew out not in an arc but in a straight line. In an instant after being shot out it was no longer in sight of Jin. However, the clouds vanished after the shockwave. It felt like the air was ionized and shining.

“Ah, right, that sound seems to have come from surpassing the speed of sound. But as I thought it probably wasn’t able to free itself from the gravitational pull. Or so I’d like to think. …It didn’t, right?”

Jin was shocked by the power. On the other hand, Reiko who had done the shooting had taken a small step back because of the recoil after all.

“Reiko, how was it?”

“Yes, it was my first time so due to the recoil I unintentionally took a step backwards, but starting from the next shot I’ll do fine.”

After hearing that, Jin thought that after some small revisions the prototype model could be made to be one of Reiko’s personal weapons.

＊　　　＊　　　＊

“Yesterday, I saw a boat that looked like Marcia’s one.”

After lunch on Kunlun Island, Elsa brought up the topic.

“There were several catamarans like hers floating in the harbor.”

“Huh, seems that Marcia’s also working hard.”

“Mm. I didn’t see her though.”

Ah well, if they had met, Marcia would’ve asked Elsa why she was there or it would’ve become complicated in some other way, Jin thought and bitterly smiled inside.

“Jin-nii, what are you up to now?”

Elsa asked and Jin didn’t have anything in particular to hide so he answered without hesitation.

“Now I’m reinforcing Hourai Island’s military, I guess. I dislike war and such, but it’s necessary for protection, and thinking about what those guys did to you makes my blood boil.”

After hearing that, Mine who had been silently listening until now interjected.

“Eh, was, something done, to Elsa?”

She was very surprised. Elsa calmly replied.

“No. Nothing like that. But I was threatened a lot.”

And then she spoke about Purcel. Apparently she hadn’t told Mine until now. After being told the story, Mine was angered and,

“What! How could this be! Jin-sama, for the sake of the world you mustn’t let people like them live!”

She spoke some radical words. Ah, her heart hasn’t changed after all, Jin thought while smiling forcibly.

“I know. Once I’m adequately prepared I’ll destroy them.”

Jin replied and left his seat.

“Well then, I’ll be going back to Hourai Island to resume working. Thanks for the lunch. Thanks also for the clothes.”

Jin said while handing the clothes they had gone to buy yesterday over to Reiko.

“Mm. Jin-nii, see you, at lunch tomorrow.”

“Uh-huh. See ya.”

Then Jin returned to Hourai Island.

＊　　　＊　　　＊

Because the two rails working as the barrel had grown hot and deformed after having Reiko test fire it multiple times, the testing was ended.

“Ah, well. Even steel is no good with rapid fire after all, huh.”

And so he decided to make them out of Adamantite. The melting point of Adamantite was approximately 4500 degrees Celsius. Even if it was heated up to the point of glowing white it wouldn’t melt. It was a metal that would be unworkable by any means without Craft Magic.

The specific gravity of steel was about 7.9, while Adamantite’s was about 19.3. It was over twice as heavy, but with Reiko it probably wouldn’t be a problem.

As a bonus, with this it could also double as a blunt weapon. It overall length was 1.5 meters. A little bit longer than Reiko herself.

The shots were cartridge-style in groups of 10. At a diameter of 3 centimeters they were a little bit larger than the ones used in the prototype.

The normal ones were steel balls. If penetrating force was important there were Adamantite-coated shots, and when power was important there were lead shots.

In the case of lead, as they impacted the target they would deform and stick to it, transmitting nearly 100 percent of the kinetic energy to the target.

“The barrel doesn’t have rifling, but this power ought to be enough.”

At any rate, he decided to add sights as at the highest setting the muzzle speed was around Mach 20, so the gun would fire at straight lines as far as the eye can see.

“Hmm, the name is…What a bother, by now it should be called a railgun.”

In the sense that the shots were fired from between rails he wasn’t wrong.

“Father, thank you very much for this wonderful weapon. From now on I can eliminate Father’s enemies with this.”

Reiko said, and,

“No, take the enemy in appropriate consideration first.”

Jin didn’t forget to give her a reminder.

“My Lord, there’s something I would like to report on.”

Jin guessed that the first stage of the work was complete and Laozi came to tell him of it.

“Mm, what is it?”

“We copied information from Mine-san for the Quinta, but in doing so we discovered something that resembled traces of mental manipulation, and so I came to report just in case.”

“Mental manipulation? [Hypno]?”

“No, it’s nothing that powerful. It’s most likely something like [Seduce].”

“[Seduce]?”

Jin had never heard of the magic before.

“Yes. This too is from Ann’s knowledge. It’s a magic that points one’s thoughts towards a specific action. By using it to promote the person’s own desires they mostly don’t notice anything unnatural. The surrounding people don’t, nor does the person being manipulated.”

“Hmm…”

Mine’s behaviour towards Elsa seemed strange and stubborn. It being because of [Seduce] would be fairly consistent. However, the caster was unknown.

“So, it’s been cancelled by now, right?”

“Yes. I suspect it was due to the shock on the head, or on the body in general.”

“Alright, please look into magic for cancelling it.”

“As you wish.”

There was a possibility that from now on, opponents using things like that would increase. Maybe even Elsa’s brother Fritz being affected wasn’t out of the question.

Jin thought that this probably wasn’t dealt with by ordinary methods, and focused his mind even further.

＊　　　＊　　　＊

That night, Reinhardt made contact at the regular time and said that instead of approaching the capital city Esaia, he was preparing to cross the river Azul in a town called Dali.

It seemed like Jin would have to wait three or four more days still.