Magic stone stabilisation equipment

 
 
 ☆
 
 
 Flying over the mansion’s roof and the back garden, the Owleyes’s Main Workshop was right before me.
 
 “Now then. I wonder where they are?”
 
 Looking down at the vast workshop from the sky, I hesitated.
 
 Workshop Chief Godwin left behind the message for me to 『drop by the workshop without fail』.
 
 If he is here, then he’s probably either in his study in the main building or on-site.
 
 “…”
 
 This is Shishou-sama we’re talking about.
 If there’s no paperwork, then he’s likely to be on-site.
 
 “Then, it’s definitely the prototyping workshop.”
 
 I guessed as such and, just as I was about to head that way, I heard a reproachful voice from behind me.
 
 “Ojou-samaaa, uughh, please waaaiit.”
 
 I turned my head, and there, I saw my attendant who likely shoved my luggage onto other servants and chased after me, a miserable expression on her face.
 
 “Sorry, Anna. I got a bit excited.”
 
 I apologised with my hands together.
 Seeing me like that, she let leak a small sigh.
 
 “There is 『something』 that Ojou-sama wants to put off unpacking for and rush off, right? I understand your feelings, so please wait at least ten seconds. If you suddenly take off, I too will get anxious.”
 
 My attendant said so with her cheeks puffed out.
 
 That’s true.
 She is also basically my escort.
 I should have at least taken her along with me when I flew off.
 
 I take Anna’s hand.
 
 “Sorry. I’ll be careful next time.”
 
 “Do you really promise?”
 
 While Anna pouted with a happy look on her face for some reason, she gripped my hand with both of hers.
 
 
 ☆
 
 
 “Shishou-sama! Did you possibly finish it?”
 
 Entering the prototyping workshop, I called out, and Workshop Chief Godwin, who was fiddling with a device placed in the centre of the laboratory, turned this way with a grin^[1].
 
 “You came back at just the right time. I’m starting the operation test now. Well, take a look.”
 
 Saying that, my teacher passed something in his hand to me.
 
 I took it, and exposed it to the light coming in from the window.
 
 “… A medium-sized magic stone before stabilisation.”
 
 “That’s right. I’ll now give that thing at try at being processed. ——— The one Ojou-chan designed is this one.”
 
 Saying that, Shishou-sama showed me a volleyball-sized spherical container installed in the dead-centre of the room with pipes connected to it, giving off a metallic thud every time he hit it.^[2]
 
 In addition, the ball-type container had four supports affixed to the ground, with an axle coming out of the centre directly below it, linking it to the base.
 
 “So, that’s the finished device, huh.”
 
 I drew near the metallic spherical container, and touched it gently.
 
 Right.
 This is the magic tool which I designed while having a discussion with Shishou-sama before our departure to Gracimento. ——— no, it’s probably better to call it magic equipment.
 
 
 
 『Magic Stone Stabilisation Equipment』.
 
 Its function is as the name suggests.
 
 The magic stone stabilisation work, which had up till now been done carefully by human hands, one by one, can be mechanically done automatically.
 
 That alone may not sound like such a big deal, but for us Ainsworth, it’s an invention we’ve dreamt of for many years.
 
 Say what you might, but once this equipment is completed, the stabilised magic stones that we’ve put time and labour into can then be mass-produced.
 
 Although we plan to not sell it so cheaply as to prevent any price collapses and excessive competition, the skilled craftsmen who had been doing that work can be moved around to designing and prototyping, which is seriously huge.
 
 Not just maintaining the status quo, we’d even be able to reassign people to 『development』 that would pave the way for the future.
 
 We’d probably be able to speed up the magic rifle components’ jigs’ design and production work.^[3]
 
 This equipment in addition also incorporates two new technologies, which will be needed for then next equipment I will have to make.
 
 It is, without exaggeration, a 『door to the future』 for me.
 
 
 
 The concept for this equipment has been around since 200 years ago, since the era of Ethan Ainsworth^[4].
 
 The reason the idea didn’t take shape and development didn’t progress was because the understanding of magic stones was insufficient, and the current technology was immature.
 
 But 50 years ago, there was someone who found a breakthrough to that stagnation.
 
 It was none other than my grandfather, the magic control genius that led our House to the depths of bankruptcy, Joachim Ainsworth.^[5]
 
 He rebuked the magic stone stabilisation techniques which relied on a craftsman’s experience and intuition, saying 『It is the homogenisation of maldistributed magic power and the fixation of wavelengths』.
 
 The fruits of his research are in the form of the 『Drop of Still Lake』 hanging from my neck.
 
 This magic stone was the proof of that current king’s love for the queen, and was simultaneously the apex of our Ainsworth’s research.
 
 My great-grandfather came several steps to developing this equipment, but financial difficulties forced him to give up.
 
 Written in his diary left in our home’s library, was the equipment’s concept, and the regret he had for having not been able to make it.
 
 At the same time that this magic stone stabilisation equipment is a door to the future for me, it is also revenge for my great-grandfather’s dream.
 
 
 ☆
 
 
 “I used a small-sized magic stone in the operation test yesterday ——— for whatever reason, it didn’t turn out bad at all. That one is now in the middle of analysis in the measurement room.”
 
 “Using the magic power analyser?”
 
 “That’s right.”
 
 In the Main Workshop’s measurement room, and the same for the Royal Capital Workshop, is a 『magic power analyser』 developed with the magic power detector as its origin.
 
 It allows one to measure the specimen’s magic power amount, pressure, and wavelength, but to accurately measure a stabilised magic stone requires a bit of ingenuity.
 
 “As the measurement will probably take some time, if you want to see a processed specimen right away, you’ll just have to hope that this medium-sized magic stone’s processing is successful, is what you’re saying, huh.”
 
 Saying that, I returned the magic stone to him.
 Receiving it from me, my teacher laughed with a sneer.
 
 “What, it is what it is.”^[6]
 
 Saying that, he opened the lid of the spherical container, and mounted it in the inner receiving jig.
 
 
 
 “I’m starting.”
 
 Saying that briefly, Shishou-sama placed his hand on the lever coming out of the cylindrical tank beside him.
 
 “Please.”
 
 I nodded, and he pulled the lever with a clank.
 
 ——— Gwoop gwoopgwoopgwoop
 
 The lever pushes down a piston from above, and something flows out from the pipe in the lower section of the cylinder.
 
 That something flows into the outer gap of the spherical container, which has a double layered structure.
 
 What’s actually flowing is slime mucus^[7], by liquifying sintered slime resin again by re-heating and melting it.
 
 Slime resin, as we all know, is a material for magic circuit boards, but this time it will be turned back into liquid and used as a magic power insulator.
 
 “Next.”
 
 With the container filled with slime mucus, Workshop Chief Godwin this time flipped a lever switch on the box installed upon the desk beside him.
 
 ——— Wooom hwwom hwwom hwwom hwwom^[8]
 
 Now a magic circle floats around the axle coming out of the spherical container’s lower portion, and the axle begins spinning.
 
 This axle is held in the base by bearings, and connected to the tip of that axle is the jig which my teacher placed the magic stone into.
 
 In other words, inside the spherical container, the magic stone is spinning in the horizontal plane, just like a gem on a display table.
 
 “The finishing touch. Flow the guiding magic power. ——— The long-awaited try. The lady who designed it should give it a go.”
 
 “Ok. Thank you!”
 
 Shishou-sama handed over the final switch to me.
 
 I walked over to the switch box atop the desk, and with my hand on the second lever laid out on the board, I took a deep breath, and flipped it with a snap.
 
 ——— Pah
 
 In the next moment, magic power flowed through the Mistreel wires connected to the top and bottom, and a belt of bluish light shot out from the container’s gap.