Genjitsushugisha no Oukokukaizouki - Volume 12 - Chapter Int2

Intermission 2: Research Girls’s Party (The Plan to Improve Mechadra) 

It happened while Souma and the others were in Mercenary State Zem. 

Genia the Overscientist, Merula the high elf, Taru the Turgish blacksmith, and Trill the Empire’s Drill Princess were having tea at the log house inside Genia’s dungeon laboratory. These were the four key figures of the Drill Research Project, which was a joint enterprise between the Kingdom, Empire, and Republic, but they were on break now. 

Suddenly, Trill spoke. “Big Sister Genia, let’s put a drill on Mechadra!” 

“...What’s this, all of a sudden?” Genia looked at her dubiously. 

Trill pointed out the window to where Mechadra towered over them. “We have such a splendid mechanical dragon, but its only means of attack is to throw itself at the enemy! How dull! We should give it weapons! And a drill!” 

“I get where you’re coming from.” Genia set her teacup down on its saucer. “I built it to research the construction of a living creature’s body, so though it’s fully mobile, I didn’t build it to be moved. But when I learned about the king’s power to move things, I thought I could make it stronger, and cooler.” 

“That’s a surprise. With you, I would have expected the moment that thought occurred to you, you would already be attaching armaments to it,” said Merula, the one who had been dealing with her the longest. 

It was true, normally Genia would have. Forcing her husband, Ludwin, to cover the necessary costs. 

Genia smiled wryly. “You’re not wrong, but you see, Mechadra has a lot of restrictions... This is a good opportunity, so I guess I’ll walk you through them.” 

Genia stood in front of a movable blackboard and picked up a piece of chalk, then began writing out the restrictions on Mechadra. The other three watched the scene unfold. These four were engineers, researchers, and craftspeople—they were highly curious, in other words. They used stories about research to spice up their tea parties rather than stories about love. 

Genia pointed to one of the items she had begun to write down. “First, we have to consider the Star Dragon Mountain Range. The king tells me we’ve been told to do what we like with the bones, but there’s limits to that. To make this quick, we can’t do anything that would offend them. Like, no using it in wars against other people.” 

“I wasn’t really suggesting we arm it to so it could be used as a weapon!” Trill asserted. 

Taru, who had been listening quietly, cocked her head to the side. “Then why add weapons?” 

“Because they make it cooler!” 

“...You sound like Master Kuu,” Taru muttered in exasperation. Taru had, despite doubting the practicality of it, added a small drill to Kuu’s cudgel. 

“I don’t really get it either,” Merula mumbled. 

“You don’t? I understand how Young Miss Trill feels, though.” 

Merula and Genia had a difference of opinion. Even among the research girls, there was a split between the romanticists (Genia & Trill) and the pragmatists (Merula & Taru). 

Genia continued, “Out of consideration for the Star Dragon Mountain Range, in addition to limiting how we use it, we should probably not alter the original form. Adding wheels to the hands and feet, or swapping around parts to make it more humanoid, and so on.” 

“I think all of that sounds cool. Can we not do it?” Trill asked with a blank look on her face. 

“Try putting yourself in their position.” Genia shrugged. “How would you feel if we were to swap your hands and feet for wheels, or tear your body apart to make it more like another creature?” 

“...That makes for quite a bizarre image, doesn’t it?” 

“It does indeed. That’s why we shouldn’t change its shape to be too different from a dragon’s.” 

Now that everyone had accepted that, Genia moved on, “Now, the biggest issue is with Mechadra’s structure. I already mentioned this, but Mechadra wasn’t built to be controlled. People can’t ride it like a battleship, and even if they could, they couldn’t do anything with it.” 

Genia put a blueprint of Mechadra up on the backboard. Looking at it, the basic frame was made with dragon bones, but the muscles were made using metal and monster parts. 

“This really isn’t a setup you can just move around, huh?” Taru said quietly. 

“Yeah. The only thing that can do that is the king’s ability, Living Poltergeists.” 

Genia wrote “Living Poltergeists” on the blackboard. 

“Let’s review what we know about the king’s ability. It’s able to move things about at will. But all it can do is move them, nothing more complicated than that. For example, he could make this chalk write on the board, but...” Genia snapped the long piece of chalk in half. “He can’t break the chalk he’s manipulating in half like this. Fundamentally, all it does is move objects. However, there is one thing that lets him ignore that restriction somewhat.” 

Genia touched the blueprint of Mechadra. 

“That’s the fact that Mechadra is modeled on a living creature. This applies to the king’s roly-poly mannequins, and the Factory Arm, too. If they’re modeled on living beings, he can control them in complex ways, almost as if they were alive.” 

“He can only move inanimate material, but if that material is in a form that resembles a living being, he can control it like it was alive... Is that correct?” Trill asked. 

Genia nodded in response. “That’s right. But even in that case, he can’t snap them in half like this chalk, or cause them to break.” 

“Where does that difference come from?” 

“His mental image... perhaps?” Merula was the one to answer Trill’s question. “When we demonstrated the connection between work songs and the power of magic, we talked about how a mental image could change the power of magic, so maybe that’s involved in the case of Living Poltergeists, too. If he’s able to control things that are modeled on living creatures as if they were alive, maybe it’s a matter of whether or not Sir Souma can imagine the way they would move?” 

“I see. That hypothesis sounds like it could be right.” Genia crossed her arms and groaned as she thought. “I’d like to investigate that theory at some point in future, but the issue right now is that, even with the king’s ability, he can’t make it move in any greater way than a dragon itself could.” 

“Hm? Whatever do you mean by that?” 

“Even if we were to attach a drill like you wanted to, Trill, the king’s ability wouldn’t be able to make it spin.” 

“No way!” 

Genia confronted a shocked Trill with the cruel truth. “Because, though the drill is a physical object, the way it moves isn’t organic.” 

However, Trill was not so quick to give up. “I know! We can handle just the spinning mechanically. If we install the equipment to spin it like a normal drill, it doesn’t matter if King Souma’s ability can spin it or not.” 

“In that case, the issue would be switching it on and off. He can’t push an on/off switch with Living Poltergeists, and we can’t put a crew aboard to push the button.” 

“Urgh... No...” Trill’s shoulders slumped. 

Genia crossed her arms and sighed, “It’s not just drills—firearms like cannons are no good, either. If it were a battleship, we could have a crew load the shells, but Mechadra wasn’t built to carry a crew and let them do things. An anti-air repeating bolt thrower would be plagued by the switch issue, too.” 

“Wouldn’t putting blades on the arms work?” Merula raised her hand to suggest. 

“Yeah, that would be manageable.” Genia nodded. “If they’re weapons that Mechadra could use itself, it could probably use them, too. Though, I feel like there’s not much difference between slashing with its claws and slashing with a sword.” 

“...The important thing is if Mechadra itself would be able to use it,” Taru mumbled with a pensive look on her face. “In that case, if we made it so that Mechadra could press the switch, wouldn’t it be possible? Instead of building it into Mechadra, make something like an external suit of armor.” 

“Ohh, that might actually work.” 

Genia pondered Taru’s proposal. 

“Anything like a cannon that requires loading wouldn’t work. Even if we pre-loaded it, if it was only good for one shot, it would be a lot of effort for next to nothing. Well, if we were going to make it so Mechadra could operate it itself, it would have to be able to do it with those big hands. They’re not going to be able to handle delicate work. If we could clear that prerequisite, though, it’s possible.” 

“In that case, I’ve thought of a number of ideas for equipme—” Taru started, only to be cut off by Trill. 

“First, the drill! Taru, do you think we can load it with one?” 

“...It would depend on where. If it’s going to control it with that massive body, it would probably have to be big.” 

“That raises the issue of weight, too,” Genia added. “In the case of a drill, we need to load the revolving apparatus, and the equipment that stores the energy for spinning it, too. The larger the blade, the heavier it gets.” 

“If it gets too big, it will be hard to walk around with, too.” 

“Urgh...!” Trill grumbled, disheartened by the logistics. “I-If it can’t carry it, then what about... a tail, maybe? Or we could attach it to the stomach?” 

“...I think either of those would end up in the way.” 

“There’s no space inside the stomach for it, so it would have to be sticking out constantly.” 

“Nooo...” Trill slumped to the ground. “I want to see Mechadra use a giant drill. With that huge body, it would smash opponents with a strike that can pulverize mountains in a single blow. Wouldn’t that be a great big dream?” 

“Well, I can kind of understand the feeling.” Genia awkwardly scratched her cheek. “But we’re engineers. Not dreamers. We need to make what we realistically can with what we currently have available to us.” 

“Big Sister Genia...” 

“Now, let’s start thinking about equipment it would be possible for us to create.” 

“...Okay.” 

From there, the conversation’s focus shifted to Taru and her ideas for equipment. A number of things were proposed, and, just as they were coming up with something they could do... 

“Hey, I had an idea,” Merula said. 

“What is it, Merumeru?” 

“Don’t call me Merumeru... King Souma’s ability makes it move like the creature, not exactly the same as the creature would, right? I mean, he’s able to move puppets and mannequins, which I’m not sure we can really count as people.” 

“...I seem to recall that’s right.” Genia stroked her chin. 

Merula continued, “In that case, he’d move Mechadra like a dragon, but not exactly the same as a dragon would, right? It has wings, but can’t fly, for one thing, so maybe it moves less like a dragon, and more like a person in a kigurumi suit?” 

“Hm... And?” 

Merula puffed her chest up with pride. “We’ve been thinking of Mechadra as half-dragon, half-machine. That’s why we thought of weapons as extra equipment, but if it moves like a person, we have more freedom. Our ideas so far were like putting a suit of armor on someone. But people can hold weapons in their hands, too.” 

“I see. We were too fixated on the idea of dragons and machines, huh?” 

If instead of installing equipment on the body it could be held in the hands; that provided room for more different types of armaments. 

Trill’s eyes sparkled. “Th-Then we could give it a drill, too?!” 

“Yes, it might be possible if it was a weapon it held with both hands,” Genia agreed. 

“Huzzah!” 

“But.” Genia pointed a finger at the elated Trill. “Now the issue is how it will carry it. If it’s holding it all the time, it’ll get in the way. With both hands occupied, it won’t be able to fight hand-to-hand.” 

“Urgh!” 

“Ideally, we’d want a system that could deliver it to Mechadra.” Genia crossed her arms and groaned. 

Trill, Merula, and Taru all thought about it. They all racked their brains, but no one could come up with a good idea. While they were... 

“Hey, Taru. You here?” 

“Master Kuu? And Leporina?” 

“Hello, Taru.” 

Kuu and Leporina from the Republic came to visit Genia’s log house. 

“What’s up?” Taru asked. 

“Ookyakya. I thought I’d call on you and we could head back home together. With Bro off in Zem now, I’ve got free time. Why don’t the three of us eat together tonight?” 

“...But I’m still working.” Though she said that, Taru didn’t look at all unhappy about this development. Seeing the look on Taru’s face, Kuu grinned. 

“We’ll wait for you to finish. What are you up to now?” Kuu looked at the blueprint of Mechadra posted on the blackboard. “That huge machine dragon, huh?” 

“We were thinking about adding armor to it.” 

“Heh, well, isn’t that interesting.” Kuu looked at it, nodding thoughtfully, but soon let out a sigh. “But, you know, for me, rather than Mechadra, I’d like you to make that ship that breaks ice as it goes that Souma was talking about.” 

“The icebreaker... right? The ship with a drill on it.” 

“Yeah. With our frozen seas, the Republic definitely needs them.” 

“It’s okay. Sir Souma already put in a request for us to develop that.” 

While the Republic team was talking about that... 

Genia, who had been listening to them, got a thoughtful look on her face. “A ship with a drill on it, huh?” 

“Big Sister Genia?” 

“It doesn’t have to be a ship, but it might be worthwhile to develop a way for the drill to move around on its own. If it could get to Mechadra on its own, and then Mechadra could use it...” 

“Oh! That could work, Big Sister!” 

With what sounded like an actionable plan emerging, Trill’s eyes sparkled. 

With a wry smile, Genia said, “The added armor that Taru proposed, and a self-propelling drill. Let’s put together a plan to improve Mechadra with a focus on those two elements.” 

“Okay!” 

And so, Mechadra began to undergo improvements at the hands of its enthusiastic engineering team. It would still be a little while before Souma and the others found out about it.