Sword of Dawn

"Defect?" Gao Wen immediately frowned, vaguely had a premonition that the non-chief krypton gold draw card flashed like a golden light, but it was a guarantee, "Could it be a one-off? It will definitely be destroyed if you release it after charging it?"

If this is the case, the value of this "artificial crystal" will undoubtedly be greatly reduced, but Gao Wen feels that he can still accept it: in this world, crystals that can store magic power are extremely valuable materials, and magicians will This kind of crystal is divided into two qualities: high-quality crystals are pure and stable, and can engrave magic circles and run stably, so they are used as the core of various magic items, such as inlaid staffs, while low-level crystals are stable because they are stable. Due to its poor performance, it can't describe the magic circle, but it can be used as a magic storage container, and it is also regarded as an important strategic resource by spellcasters.

But for a long time, energy storage crystals can only be obtained from nature, and artificial crystals cannot replace them at all. This is because artificial crystals have a serious problem of "natural dissipation", and the magic power stored in crystals will be lost at an alarming rate. , or even dissipate in a few days, it is unusable at all, so man-made crystals have always been used only as auxiliary materials for magic items, and even as decorations in noble castles...

If the crystals created by Rebecca just have the defect of "one-time use", in Gao Wen's opinion, the problem is not serious at all. Hetty has already confirmed that these crystals are very stable, so at most they can be used to make one-time magic props , for Gao Wen, who is used to the industrial age, "disposable" does not mean that the practical value is low, but it is synonymous with cheap, fast, and mass production.

However, Hetty shook her head: "It's not a one-off, but the magic power stored in it can't be extracted and used at all."

This time Gao Wen was completely dumbfounded: "How could this happen?"

"The magic power lost its 'coordination', which probably happened at the moment of extraction. The originally ordered magic power became disordered 'waste energy' in this process, and it would dissipate the moment it was extracted, and even in the It's useless to collect it before it dissipates, after all... it's 'waste energy'."

Waste energy, this is a special vocabulary for magicians, also known as disordered magic power, this is a kind of magic power that cannot participate in any magical reaction, nor can it be used to release any spells, just like losing the notes of tuning. worthless.The magic power of disorder is a subsidiary product of many spells, and it is the "residue" after the mages release their magic. As far as Gawain knows, the magic power of disorder has the most sense of existence in the year before the fall of the Gondor Empire The big explosion of the Deep Blue Well - a large amount of disordered magic power appeared inside the "Dark Blue", which directly caused the Deep Blue Well to operate at full power but could not output any energy, and finally the furnace core melted and exploded.

What is stored in the crystal is magic power, but when it is extracted, it will turn into residue. This is simply a powerful weapon in some black-hearted games in the previous life. What is put in is equipment and gems, and what is taken out is slag and the small speaker of the whole server... …

The facts are already very clear, what Rebecca smelted was a small white crystal block that could blast the strengthened party in place (correct).

Looking at the powdery crystal dust in disappointment, Gawain shook his head: "Maybe Rebecca will be able to refine a usable energy-storage crystal... Anyway, I'm looking forward to it. Let's not talk about it, I just saw you What are the results of tossing those antique crystals?"

Hetty lifted her spirits, but her tone was quite apologetic: "Sorry, ancestor, many magic circles and rune laws in the crystal have been lost now, and they are combined in an incomprehensible way. Today's The precision of the crystal resonator is limited, so far I can only distinguish a small part of it and restore it to a magic circle... Please come here."

Gawain followed, and saw Hetty take out some organized drawings of the magic circle from her desk. Apart from various symbols and lines, there were also notes written in beautiful fonts on the drawings, which were left by her. Notes below.

Gawain looked at the blueprint, while Hetty talked about his thoughts beside him: "The magic system of the ancient Gondor Empire is very different from the current one. Their magic circle is 'layered', and each layer is separated by a key. The nodes are connected, and the combination of those nodes is actually a kind of magic circle, as if nested layer by layer. It is impossible to build a magic circle with this structure with today's technology. I can't even imagine the ancient Gondor demon How did the Mentors fit this whole complex set of runes into one tiny crystal..."

Gawain raised his head and said with a smile: "They first prepared a room that was almost free of dust and suspended particles, and then used magic materials to build a huge magic circle model in this room, then evacuated the air in the room, and finally used The powerful magic power of the Deep Blue Well illuminates the magic circle model, and on the 'focus' of the irradiation, there is a blank crystal to be processed. Through special polarization technology, the magic power will imprint the layered magic circle inside the crystal layer by layer— —In this way, once the magic power is irradiated, a set of magic circles will be branded in the crystal, and 1 circles will be created in one minute."

With a "click", a dip pen in Hetty's hand fell to the ground and broke into two pieces.

Oh my god, were the ancients so powerful? !

"So this is where my point of view is the most different from that of people in this era - you think that many things are precious and rare, and it is natural for masters to hand them down to people from generation to generation, but in my opinion, these things Cheap mass production is normal. It’s a pity, losing the Deep Blue Well, and the first generation all died, it’s inevitable for you to develop like this.”

Hetty's expression was strange, and she deeply felt that the unworthy descendants had let the ancestors down again...

At this moment, Gao Wen's eyes were suddenly attracted by the magic circle on one of the blueprints: "Huh?"

Hetty hurried forward, and after seeing Gawain's line of sight, she explained: "That is the magic circle that controls the self-explosion of crystals. You know, the last function of these standard crystals is self-explosion when they are on the verge of collapse, so this A layer of magic circle is imprinted in a position independent of other rune groups, and it is extremely simple, so it is easier to restore. However, the part of the identification of friend and foe related to this detonation magic circle cannot be restored, and I have not found it yet. Which runes realize this incredible function, I really lack talent in this area..."

"Wait a minute, don't worry about how those identification runes are adjusted," Gawain interrupted Hetty's self-criticism—this eldest granddaughter is good everywhere, but once she thinks that her ancestor is unhappy, she will immediately fall into self-criticism The state of introspection is very confusing, it is obviously a character who walks the route of Yujie and Queen casually, but in front of him, it seems like he is always being bullied, "I saw the comment you wrote here...you said this method The array is different from the conventional magic array, it is not that the energy in the crystal is released to the outside world to generate an explosion, but the energy is detonated in the crystal, and the crystal itself is also used as an explosive?"

Hetty was stunned for a moment, then nodded: "Yes. Ordinary similar magic circles will guide energy out of the energy storage crystals and produce effects in the outside world, but because the function of this magic circle is to self-destruct, it skips the guidance Instead, the energy is directly detonated in the energy storage crystal, and the exploded crystal fragments will also have a strong lethality. To be honest, I have never been in contact with this kind of magic circle before. Although it is not complicated, I am afraid that any A magician with a normal mind would not use it, this thing will directly destroy the precious energy storage crystals..."

Hetty stopped talking as she talked, obviously, she was not stupid, and she had quickly realized the usefulness of this thing.

She and Gao Wen looked at the ruby ​​dish on the experimental table in unison, and the tiny amount of crystal dust in the ruby ​​dish seemed to shine again in their eyes.

That's the brilliance of art (sure).

"The magic power extracted from those crystals will instantly become waste energy, but when they are stored in the crystal, their state is stable..." Gao Wen said slowly, "Then let's not extract it at all, and directly It would be nice to detonate in the crystal."

Hetty also said slowly: "Yes, anyway, this kind of 'crystal' is refined from stone, and it's worthless..."

Magicians with normal minds will not use an explosion circle that will blow up the energy storage crystals together, this is because the energy storage crystals are of high value, and they only need to add a structure to export energy to the explosion circle, then Explosion magic can be released on the premise of keeping the crystal. Since the effect is exactly the same, why destroy a crystal?

But what if there is a kind of crystal whose magical power cannot be exported at all, and it is worthless at all?

Then this thing is simply born to be self-destructive - its nature is as straightforward and iron-headed as its inventor.

Countless exciting and bold ideas instantly appeared in Gao Wen's mind. These ideas were accompanied by bright fire lights and shocking sounds. They were the future, hope, and the sword and shield to defend the people and the land. It is a light that dispels the cloud caused by the failure of the trial production of gunpowder...

is art.

Art is no longer good, it is on the same level as the Louvre.

Gawain suppressed those exciting thoughts, and suddenly asked a very practical question with a strange expression: "How do we engrave an explosion circle on a crystal the size of a grain of rice?"

Hetty also calmed down, and thought about this question seriously, and then said uncertainly: "Perhaps... it doesn't have to be engraved on the crystal, because this is an 'interference type' magic circle."

Chapter 0077 The New Furnace

Interfering magic circle—it must be admitted that although Gawain Cecil is half a naturalist, and knights have a lot in common with other magic professions in the basic field of using magic power, but when it comes to those Gao Wen's knowledge in the subtle and professional field is still a little insufficient. He asked Hetty about it, and then he found out what is so special about the magic circle engraved in those antique crystals.

In short, they are "scope effect".

This type of magic circle can operate the energy storage device within a specific range, and it does not have to be engraved on the surface or inside of the energy storage device. In other words, as long as the key nodes on the magic circle are connected to the energy storage device, the effect can be launch.From this point of view, the interference-type magic circle is very similar to the common large-scale formation. The large-scale formation is to build a magic circle, and then put magic power sources such as energy storage crystals on the key nodes of the magic circle to act as energy sources. Of course, this kind of structure does not belong to engraving the magic circle in the crystal, but in fact there is still an essential difference between the interference type magic circle and the common large-scale formation.

Interference-type magic circles are usually extremely small, with a very small range of action and a single function, and its own rune structure is actually not complete. The energy storage part and the rune part must be combined together to be considered a complete "executive mechanism." ", so this kind of interference-type magic circle is usually regarded as a "starting mechanism", which is used to simply control the opening and closing of some magic power sources, or...

Used to blow up the mana source.

Gao Wen understood why the Gondor magisters carved an interference-type magic circle into these military crystals - it stands to reason that since they had already stuffed these runes into the crystals, there was no need to spend any more effort to insert them into the crystals. It is set as an interference type, but the actual problems that soldiers have to face on the battlefield are much more complicated-not all military crystals can remain intact throughout the battle, and in many cases, due to the fierce battle, they will crack in advance, Breakage is the normal state of this type of crystal. At this time, the magic circle at the core of the crystal may still be able to operate due to proper protection, but the entire crystal has actually disintegrated.

In this case, the rune experts in the Gondor military field thought of one thing: at least make sure that the self-destruct function of these crystals can still be used at the end.

Therefore, the self-explosion part of these crystals uses an interference-type magic circle. This kind of magic circle ensures that even if the crystal is broken, it can be exploded by throwing out the fragments-as long as there is still a little energy in these fragments.

"I just don't know what will happen when a large number of these crystals are gathered together and detonated at the same time," Gao Wen touched his chin, and began to conceive in his mind, "Or use something to bond them into shape? And it's not clear what they are now." How did it form, only a small part of the large number of samples sent by Rebecca contained this crystal..."

Hetty looked at Gawain's face, and she could feel that the other party's interest was unprecedentedly high, which made her a little confused: Although she was also very happy that these weird crystals would come in handy, she couldn't imagine that except How valuable is a "magic power crystal" that has no other use other than explosions: "Ancestor...you look happy?"

"How can you be unhappy?" Gawain turned his head and glanced at Heidi, "Don't you think these things will be of great use once they come in handy?"

"Hmm...if it is processed properly, it may be used as an explosive magic item. It is really useful for ordinary mages like Rebecca and me, and it can also be distributed to soldiers as auxiliary weapons," Hetty said. His imagination was stretched to the limit, "but I can't think of anything else to do with it."

Gawain looked at Hetty's confused expression and opened his mouth, but he found it difficult for the other party to understand the picture that was emerging in his mind.

Anyone who lived in the Middle Ages would never have imagined those scenes before witnessing the dynamite mining and industrial mass production.

So he simply did not explain, but raised the sheepskin bag in his hand: "I leave these samples to you. To be honest, there are not many of them. You try to determine their various properties before consuming them all. By the way, try to see if the 'explosive circle' in the Gondor crystal works on them. I'm going to find Rebecca and find out how the girl tossed these things out."

Hetizhen took the sheepskin bag from Gao Wen's hand with great importance, and then, as if remembering something, she specifically mentioned: "Ancestor, Rebecca is a very hardworking child, but she has hardly been praised since she was a child. ,so……"

"Don't worry, I will praise her well," Gawain smiled, pointing to the sheepskin bag in Hetty's hand, "I've even decided to call these crystals 'Rebecca Crystals'—if that girl If we can reproduce these crystals.”

After saying this, Gawain reminded Heidi to pay attention to safety and do a good job of protection when testing the detonation circle, and then left the magic laboratory.

And until Gawain left, Hetty didn't have the nerve to say what she really thought in her heart—in fact, she meant to let Gawain take it easy when praising Rebecca. The child had never been praised since childhood. Yes, maybe I will jump into the sky...

But forget it, since the ancestor is so happy, I better not spoil his interest.

Anyway, Rebecca is resistant to beatings and optimistic, if she really jumps into the sky, it will be a big deal and she will be beaten...

After Gawain left the magic laboratory, he went straight to the place where Rebecca was trying to make cement, but he was in vain. There were only a few workers in the kiln area to clean up the burnt residue. After asking, he found out that Rebecca has gone to the "steel factory".

The basic part of the magic net has been completed, and the first furnace has entered the final installation stage. Rebecca went to supervise the construction early in the morning.

Gao Wen checked the slag that had been cleared out of the kiln, and after confirming that there were no crystals mixed in, he set off for the "steel factory" on the east side of the camp (although a shelf has just been erected now).

As soon as he came to this place which was called "Blacksmith Shop" not long ago, Gao Wen realized that he was right to leave this matter to Rebecca.

The yard where a large number of ravines were dug to bury the magic circle has now been re-leveled properly. There is no trace of any magic circle on the compacted ground, and the only thing that can prove that the magic circle is indeed buried underneath is the surface of the yard. There is a neatly arranged silver-white column every ten meters or so.

Those pillars are the original version of the magic sensor plated with mithril coating.

In addition to these "sensors" protruding from the ground with a height of more than one meter, Gao Wen also saw a lot of neatly arranged stone slabs in the yard. Only half of the yard was paved.

Shiny runes can be seen on the surface of the slate.

Gao Wen vaguely guessed what these stone slabs were for.

The whole project is completed beautifully and reasonably. Not only is the magic circle extremely properly "encapsulated", what is even more satisfying is the neatly arranged columns and stone slabs. They are so pleasing to the eye, so strict and precise, even if they know They are products of handcraft rather than industry, and Gao Wen still feels that he has been greatly satisfied as an obsessive-compulsive disorder.

Neat, neat is king!Rebecca really fully understood all the requirements that Gao Wen gave her, and she also thought of the need to expand production capacity in this place in advance!Those places that have not yet laid stone slabs have also reserved vacancies, obviously for the future!

There were many people busy in the yard, moving tools to clean up the leftovers, but Rebecca was still easy to find, because Gawain saw the large black furnace in the corner of the yard at a glance, and she was dancing and doing things beside the furnace. The head of the command is Iron Fireball.

"Be careful, be careful... This structure must be able to fit the stone slab perfectly! Don't be perfunctory! Accurate, accurate, do you understand... If you don't stick it properly, you will have no meat this time, you understand it!! Hey hey Don’t put the iron rod next to it for now, I’ll put the sub-rune on it later... Where’s the drainage tank? Move the drainage tank here... Let me take a look at the blueprint!”

Looking at Rebecca who was so excited and immersed in her work, Gawain couldn't bear to disturb her. He stopped a few serfs who were terrified and wanted to salute when they saw his face, and looked up with appreciation. Looking at the newly installed furnace.

This is a... very beautiful furnace, compared with those old furnaces that are only more than one meter high, it is more than four meters high, and the whole body is pitch black (this is because black stone powder is mixed into the materials for building the furnace to further enhance the magic power. Harmony), it abandoned the traditional "big belly furnace" structure, instead using a rectangular parallelepiped furnace as the main structure, in the upper end of the rectangular parallelepiped furnace, you can see three chimneys arranged in parallel, while the right side of the lower end is You can see a protruding rectangular plane, engraved with an uncomplicated rune circle on that plane, a part of the circle extends to the front of the furnace body, there is a metal plate that seems to be movable, the metal plate There is also something like a pedal connected with a connecting rod below, which seems to be some kind of control mechanism.

Since the control mechanism is located on the front, the openings for refueling, ore pouring, slag removal, and molten metal export are all located at the rear and left side of the furnace body.

This is neither like any kind of melting pot on Earth known to Gawain in his previous life, nor is it completely different from the traditional melting pots in this world. It doesn’t even fully match the blueprint that Gawain handed to Hammer at first——

Obviously, the old blacksmith used his brains to improve the drawing.

In Gao Wen's view, this kind of improvement is excellent, whether it is the result of the improvement or the "improvement" itself, it is excellent.

And it wasn't until this time that Rebecca noticed that the people around had become much quieter, and everyone looked in awe. She looked around in a daze, only then did she see the people who were circling around the stove. old ancestors.

The little girl was startled: "Ah! Master Zu! Why are you here?"

"I have something to look for you—but now I saw your progress by the way," Gao Wen waved his hand with a satisfied smile on his face, "To be honest...it's better than I imagined."

"Really?!" Rebecca suddenly showed a look of overjoyed, "You really think so?"

"If you can't do these things well, I will definitely not let you be responsible for it long ago," Gawain couldn't help smiling, "Be confident in yourself, as I said, you are the pride of the Cecil family."

When Rebecca heard this, her face almost went up into the sky...

Chapter 0078 Rune Trigger and Amber's Fishing Time

Rebecca was obviously very pleased with Gawain's compliment, she almost waved her tail and asked for another compliment (if she had a tail), and Gawain carefully observed the structure of this new furnace after the compliment , He has found that there are many things on it that he didn't design originally, and some of these extra structures may be Hammer's transformation based on blacksmith experience, and the other part must be Rebecca's handwriting.

Hammer didn't know how to make changes in runes and magic circles.

"What is this structure for?" Gawain pointed to the pedals, connecting rods and iron plates connected together under the furnace. These structures are very delicate, and Hammer probably built them bit by bit with a hammer. Part of it is the same as The stone slabs on the ground were glued together, and the other part seemed to be related to the magic circle structure of the furnace, which made Gawain have some vague associations.

"Oh, ancestor, didn't you say that blacksmiths who are ordinary people can also control the opening and closing of the magic circle? I designed such a structure," Rebecca said proudly, "Although the new furnace is It can be used continuously, but it also has the ability to shut down, so you see, this pedal can control the movement of this iron plate. There is a rune on the iron plate, and another rune on the obsidian plate of the furnace body. The right runes are useless if separated separately, but when combined they will become part of the entire magic circle..."

Rebecca demonstrated it to Gawain while she was talking. She stepped on the pedal hard, and the iron plate connected to it turned over and fit into the groove under the furnace. Only then did Gawain see the inscription on the back of it. The basic elemental runes—just the missing part of the furnace magic circle.

This is a switch, an extremely simple, yet inventive structure.

Before this thing appeared, magicians basically used their own magic power to control the operation of the magic circle.

But blacksmiths don't know how to control magic, so they obviously need it.

After the iron plate was flipped up, the magic circuit of the entire furnace was connected. Gawain felt a slight airflow in the surrounding air, and then some shimmering lines appeared on the surface of the stone plate on the ground. And the magic circle on the side of the furnace also started to activate, and the runes on it lit up one by one—the firewood had already been placed in the hearth, and at this moment, with the activation of the magic circle, the firewood started to burn directly, and suddenly rose up. The blazing flames are far stronger and hotter than the flames of firewood burning under normal circumstances!

Rebecca has loosened her feet, but the iron plate has been fixed in the groove of the furnace body under the action of the locking teeth. Although the accuracy of this whole set of structures is completely incomparable with industrial products, since it only needs to Push that gnarly rune up to take effect, and it's apparently working flawlessly.

"Step on it again and you'll go back!" Rebecca pointed proudly at the teeth between the connecting rods, "I named this whole set 'Rune Trigger', which uses runes as a conductor and can be triggered. A moving mechanism! Let me tell you, don’t think it’s easy to just disassemble and reassemble a few runes. After testing for a long time, I’m sure that this pair of runes is the most stable and versatile combination..."

Girl, you gave this thing a super B-like name!

Seeing Gawain's dazed eyes, Rebecca finally stopped the constant balabala caused by over-excitement, and said with a little hope and nervousness: "That...Master Ancestor, what do you think of this thing? By the way, Except for this rune trigger, the other parts of the furnace were remodeled by Hammer."

"Very good, very good, both of you are doing well," Gao Wen said from the bottom of his heart, and then he noticed that the old blacksmith was not there, so he asked curiously, "Where did Hammer go?"

Rebecca scratched her hair: "Because more black stones and red clay are needed to build a new furnace, he took a few apprentices and the expedition team to the mountains to find materials - when the exploration team came back yesterday, they mentioned I saw a black stone in the mountains."

Gao Wen snorted, and then suddenly remembered that he was looking for Rebecca for a serious business, so he slapped his head: "Oh, yes, I have something to do with you—you should take a look at this first to see if you have any impressions?"

As he spoke, he took out a gray-black, unremarkable hardened object: this was the last piece of "waste" left on hand besides the sample given to Hetty.

Rebecca recognized it the moment she saw it: "Ah, isn't this the waste that I burned out before?"

"Look carefully inside." Gawain saw that Rebecca herself hadn't noticed that there were actually other things mixed in the "waste" she burned out. "Did you see these crystals one by one? Do you remember?" How did you burn these things yourself?"

It was only then that Rebecca noticed the fine particles. To be honest, since the burnt residues all looked similar, she couldn't tell which furnace it was from. Fortunately, she strictly followed the high The "operating rules" explained in the text, carefully recorded the material ratio, time, temperature, and kiln number of each furnace when firing each sample. As long as it is confirmed that it is from the first few batches of samples, Then restore all the records of the day, and it is easy to determine how these things came from.

Hearing that Rebecca carefully took notes, and that it was easy to restore the operation details at that time from the records, Gao Wen was really relieved: in this era, the word "detailed records" almost does not exist. In the minds of ordinary people, only magicians who are obsessed with all kinds of magic research have a superficial concept in this regard, but Rebecca is not a magician who can do research. Her fireball skills have always been only large, super large, It's super big, and I don't know how many levels it is, so this girl hasn't developed any habit of doing experiments at all...

But fortunately, she was very obedient, and she was not sloppy at all with what Gao Wen ordered.

While Gao Wen was studying how to introduce the "art of explosion" into this era as soon as possible, a half-elf thief who had nothing to do after eating and drinking was wandering in the dense jungle of the Dark Mountains.

Of course, a more high-sounding statement is to patrol the borders of the territory and search for potential dangers and wealth in the dark mountains... Anyway, it has almost the same meaning, but anyone who knows her knows that this is just fishing.

Carrying two beloved small daggers, humming a song that cannot be tuned, Amber jumps between rocks and tree branches as if walking on flat ground. With the help of the ubiquitous shadows in the mountains and forests, her figure will disappear from time to time. In the air, she suddenly appeared dozens or even hundreds of meters away. Sometimes her figure flickered, and a wild fruit she picked from no one knew where would appear on her little dagger, which was then chewed and thrown away.

This dark mountain forest is like a tailor-made heaven for Amber, who is both an elf and a master of shadows.

"Ha...what a good place..."

Standing on the branch of a big tree, Amber stretched comfortably, sighing leisurely.

Although when she first came here, she was intimidated by the great reputation of the Dark Mountains, and even had the idea of ​​finding a chance to escape, but after staying here for a while, she found that this place was really about the 700-year-old rice dumpling. Same - not that scary at all.

That’s right, hundreds of years have passed since the tide of demons. Those monsters were double-blocked in the wasteland of Gondor by the magnificent wall and the dark mountain range. The north side of the mountain range is protected layer by layer.

Those guys in the north really frightened themselves, they were scared out of their wits.

Amber unconsciously ridiculed those "northern people" who dared not come here due to the evil reputation of the dark mountains, but completely forgot that she was one of these people not long ago.

She stayed on the branch of the tree for a while, and when the cool breeze blew enough, she opened her hands and fell straight back from the tree.

Halfway through the fall, she entered the shadow form, and the power of the shadow enveloped her, and instantly brought her into the world that was parallel to the real world, but almost no one could step into it.