acaswell
patreon
Chapter 287: Tube Gun - Markets and Multiverses
🕑 Added 2024-08-28 07:02:17 +0000 UTCOver the next week, it became easier and easier to find soldiers who had fought with Nightsong. It wandered from battlefield to battlefield. Every night, there were at least a few squads that Nighstong saved from destruction. As much as the stitchwork monstrosity creeped me out, I couldn't argue with results. On the battlefield, the stitched abomination was single-handedly turning the front lines around.
At first, I thought that Nightsong was just focused on this area. It would make sense. After all, this was the biggest battlefield in Damilius. Then, I stated hearing reports of the soldiers on other fronts encountering Nightsong. Many of those reports showed that Nightsong had showed up to multiple battlefields a night. Not only that, but different countries also had ‘Nightsong’ appearances every night. That was when I started to realize things were more complicated.
There were only two ways I could explain this. Either the creature could teleport, or there were multiple Nightsongs. I wasn't sure which explanation was correct, but either way, the fact that Nightsong helped every front line was a clue. It meant that Nightsong hadn't just been the result of Damilius's research. it was probably a collaborative effort between every country trapped in this war.
At the very least, that was cause for celebration. The continent had been locked into a cycle of endless conflict for generations now. Old Mo and the girl he had liked were torn apart by this very cycle of hate. So it was gratifying to see human nations actually working together for once. On the other hand, it also made me feel even more uneasy. Just how bad was the situation if it could get the human nations to work together?
Apart from that, I had even more reservations about the creature itself. When Anise and I had encountered the creature last week, I had looked at it with soul sight. The conclusion I had reached was that the creature had no soul. Despite that fact, it seemed to act with some level of intelligence, leaving me confused. It wasn’t an artificial person, the way Felix had been. Instead, it seemed to break every principle I knew about souls and life. I wasn't sure if my unease was just because I didn't understand the creature or not, though, so I tried to put my worries aside. Either way, the military wouldn't change its decisions based on my suspicions. I would just have to keep an eye on things and be ready to step in if something went wrong.
But on Thursday of that week, I focused on other, more exciting news. On that day, Felix called Anise, Markus, me, the base commander, and a few soldiers to observe his invention. After a few weeks of tinkering, he had made something new. He called it the ‘tube gun.’ He claimed it would solve the problem of ranged weapons on the front lines.
With some trepidation, eight of us stepped into the training grounds near the front of the fort. I constantly scanned the area for worldstriders, to make sure they didn't descend out of the sky and try to kill us. There was a reason the training grounds were nearly abandoned on the front lines.
After we lined up to see Felix’s presentation, he grinned at us, and then held out… a dark gray tube with a few levers and switches on the sides. It looked more like a pipe than a gun. In fact, saying it looked like a pipe was generous. If I was honest, it looked more like scrap metal. I glanced at Felix doubtfully. Even though I wanted to believe in him... I was a bit more concerned about this invention. Felix caught my eye, and then gave me a cheerful wink. Instead of nervous, it looked more like he was enjoying himself.
Since he was that confident in his project, I decided to reserve judgment. Even if the tube looked like junk, Felix knew what he was doing. Or at least I hoped he did.
Felix cleared his throat, and then looked at us.
“Welcome! Thank all eight of you for coming to my little demonstration. Especially you, commander," said Felix. The base commander gave Felix a courteous nod.
"You managed to invent the railroads. I'll give you the benefit of a doubt. What am I looking at? It looks like scrap metal."
Felix's grin only widened.
"One of the things I’ve noticed from my time at the front lines is that the soldiers are short on effective weapons. I thought that my team was working on solving this problem. After all, creating prosthetics that can hurt the enemy sounds like a great idea. But upon coming here, I've realized we're fixing the wrong problem. What we need to do is make more ranged weaponry. After all, the swords are useless if a soldier doesn't have a flying ability. I seriously doubt the production of new ability potions is keeping up with the number of fliers that die each year. If this keeps up, within a few years the current combat strategy of the military will fall apart.”
“The number of fliers has decreased pretty quickly," said the commander, grudgingly. "The hope was that by then, we would manage to whittle down the numbers of the invaders. Or for the military's secret projects to swing the war in our favor. Which seems to be working. Project Nightsong is doing a great deal of work on the front lines." The man shrugged. "But more tools in our arsenal is never a bad thing."
Felix's grin widened even further, and for a moment, my mental image of Felix overlapped with that of a mad scientist. He looked like he wanted to cackle and dance with glee.
“I’ve been trying to fix the ranged weapon issue. The biggest issue is that ammunition is hard to manufacture. If we used regular guns, each bullet would need to be individually affixed. There are nowhere near enough competent alchemists in our country to do that. So instead, I decided to create a gun that uses the same ammo, over and over again. This is the tube gun.” Felix’s maniacal grin grew even wider. “Have any of you ever heard of railguns?”
None of the other soldiers raised their hand. Even the base commander looked bewildered. Felix looked a bit disappointed at that.
“Well… fair enough. It’s an idea I saw in one of Anise’s science fiction books. I created this tube based on inspiration from that, as well as a way to recycle ammunition.” Felix turned towards Anise.
“Anise, could you hold up that pile of straw for me using your ability? I need a target, and an airborne target would showcase what this can do to our enemies."
Anise floated a pile of straw into the air for Felix. Felix pointed his tube at the target, and his grin grew even more maniacal. He sent a surge of binding essence into the tube, and it started cycling through it. The cycling grew faster and faster with every second, until it bound itself with something inside of the tube.
All at once, the clump of binding essence was sucked towards the bottom of the tube, before it dissipated into nothing. At the same time, something shot out of the tube at a speed that even I could barely see. Oddly enough, I could tell that there was still... something connecting the object to the tube. It was like a thin, nearly invisible string that kept the two together.
A moment later, something tore a large hole in the pile of straw. I finally caught a glimpse of one of the fort’s anti-spatial swords flying into the distance.
“Now, let me show you how the tube recycles ammunition,” said Felix, as he cackled in satisfaction. He flicked the levers on the tube, and then started channeling essence into the rusty pipe again. The essence started to cycle around the tube again, but this time, I could tell it was doing something different. The essence in the tube latched onto the 'string' connecting the tube to the sword, and started to reel the blade back in. It looked like the world's most awkward fishing attempt. The sword started flying back towards Felix.
“It’s like a boomerang,” Felix said, grinning. “It’s a bit slow, so you can only get off about one shot per minute… but the ammo is not lost or wasted. The hardest part was making sure that the sword returned without impaling the shooter. The first prototype nearly took off my hand when the sword came back. It was moving way too fast.” Felix's maniacal grin dimmed a bit at that memory. “It also takes a bit of skill to use. Before shooting, the user needs to establish a sort of ‘temporary link’ between the sword and the tube. It’s nowhere near as hard as proper affixation, but it’s still an unusual use of binding essence. But I don’t think it’s too hard to learn. Shouldn't take more than a week or two for the average soldier to get it down. After that, the military will have a ranged weapon to work with. Most importantly, this tube is much cheaper than an ability potion. What do you think?"
"Hmm..." the base commander looked at Felix's makeshift weapon, before he took it into his hands and started turning it left and right. "Well, the rate of fire is a big problem. One shot per minute is... not amazing. Still, it's much better than nothing." The base commander started laughing. "How many can you make a week?"
"Now that I know what I'm doing, I can probably make 10 a week. I just need the materials to work with."
The commander's booming laughing grew louder. "Well, that's not half bad. It's far from a perfect solution, but... I think it's a good weapon. Well done!"
Author’s Note:
Join my Discord! (I’m much more active there than in the comments section).
Comments
Rain
TFC
