"Please be careful! It's really fragile!" Labcoat Guy shrieked in borderline panic, though for the life of , I couldn't understand why. The Fauns carrying the large industrial machine already treated it like it was made of eggshells, so pestering them like this would only make them more nervous and prone to a mistake. At last, under the watchful ministrations of the owner of the brand new workshop our handy ram-n put together on short notice, the piece of equipnt safely reached its destination in the far corner of the room.
"Wow! This place is really starting to look cool!" Angie comnted by my side, and I almost agreed with her until she added, "Now all it needs is a few lava-lamps and those funky coils with electricity arcing between them, and it will be perfect!"
"I'm fairly sure that's a workplace hazard," Josh countered her, but it was like throwing water onto a duck's back.
They weren't the only ones present though. In fact, the entire gang ca by, but only the childhood friends stayed back to gawk at the forming of our science division. Whether it would be regular science or mad science was still up in the air, but so long as it produced results and no sentai robots, I was fine with either option.
Things were proceeding surprisingly well, all things considered. My exit from Lord Grandpa's place probably touched a nerve, as he managed to get all the requested items delivered to a pre-arranged location by the next morning. The contract with Labcoat Guy also worked out fine, mainly thanks to Elly's judicious oversight, and even the literal hand cannons were removed from the android the very sa day. All of this happened just yesterday, and the only complication I've run into during all this ti was a mild headache from trying to Phase all the new equipnt over too quickly.
As for the workshop itself, there were still a few unoccupied areas within our repurposed bomb shelter, and after so further negotiations, Fred and Galatea were granted the use of the most spacious one on the base level. It originally used to be sothing like a ss hall, but after Brand and Co. moved all the useless furniture into another unused room, it proved to be more than big enough to fit all the required equipnt, and then so. Even the large aquarium Galatea was so adamant about found a new ho in here, and it gave so much-needed personality to the otherwise fairly drab, utilitarian space.
"So… erm… am I supposed to call you boss now?" Labcoat Guy inquired while awkwardly scratching the back of his head. He looked considerably better now than he used to be just a few days ago, with his previous flannel shirt and jeans replaced by a white shirt and cotton trousers combo under a pristine white coat. Even his stubble was gone, and with his hair properly combed and his panda-eyes sowhat alleviated, he finally started to look like a decent human being.
"You might as well," I answered him with a shrug. "Is there sothing you need?"
"Not right now, but there's a small thing I'm worried about." The serious answer made raise a curious brow. "I asked the… erm… 'staff' about this." He paused here to gesture towards the Fauns in the background, currently grumbling about how, if they had the ti, they wanted to paint the walls first. "They told that you're producing electricity on-site with a generator running on gasoline."
"That's right," I confird, and the man's brows imdiately furrowed.
"You see, I'm sure it was more than enough to run the lights and a couple of appliances down here, but these are heavy-duty equipnt, and I'm not sure it will be enough to power them."
"A fair concern," I granted him.
"I was also told that this place lacks plumbing," the newly arrived Galatea noted as she smoothly joined the conversation. She had her dark purple hair in a tidy bun, and with her newly requisitioned gray business suit and pointy-toed black shoes, she got the classic office-lady look down to a tee. "The lack of running water is particularly inconvenient."
"The secret base does have a reservoir, but it's empty, so yes, you could say we have a plumbing problem," I admitted without any pretenses. "That said, I've brought over a small tanker's worth of bottled water, and the toilets still work even if the water tanks have to be periodically refilled."
"That might be, but what if I told you we have a solution for both of those problems?" Fred spoke with a provocative smirk, and after a mont of thinking, I gave him the green light to speak his mind. "Galatea already mapped the ley-lines of the area, and we have a relatively stable one running right next to us! By leveraging it, we could use it to generate an infinite amount of water and electricity!"
"How so?" I asked just to prompt him to continue, and he did so with a huge grin plastered onto his face.
"Ki-hi-hi. It's sowhat complicated, but it's by no ans beyond my capabilities. So long as you can supply with the materials, I can upgrade your generator within a week!"
"What master is trying to say is that we will make a transmutation device using the local ley-line as a power source," Galatea explained in much clearer terms. "It will break down any waste materials into pure hydrogen, which can be burned in a generator, and the reaction will produce water as a byproduct. It's really simple."
"Silence, Galatea! I'm trying to make a good impression!" Labcoat Guy hissed at his android, apparently blissfully unaware of the fact that I could still clearly hear him. "She left out a number of steps, and it's not that easy at all, but still entirely doable!"
"So if I get this right," Josh mused by my side, his face already maintaining a contemplative frown, "you can use this to make practically infinite electricity. How co the mages didn't exploit this to take over the energy industry?"
He ended up asking the question on my mind, and the fembot simply pointed at Angie by his side.
"The Celestials would suppress the technology because it relies on mystic techniques."
Not expecting to find herself in the center of attention, the Celestial girl quickly averted her eyes and muttered sothing along the lines of, "Keeping human society separate from magical stuff is kind of our thing, you know?"
Since it was obviously a rhetorical question, we treated it as such and moved on with the discussion.
"What exactly do you need to make that work?"
"Ki-hi-hi! Nothing particularly exotic. I'll give you the list of required materials once we settled in."
"Query: until the device is operational and capable of producing water, can I request additional supplies of non-carbonated water?"
"For your fish-tank?" I inquired, and Galatea nodded without any pretenses. "If you behave and do your work properly, I'll get you a pallet or two."
"Speaking of which," Angie suddenly spoke up while overtly looking around the room. "What exactly are they going to do here?"
"Yeah, I've been wondering about that too," Josh agreed with her and crossed his arms in front of his chest. "I doubt you went through all this trouble just to make them figure out how many licks it takes to get to the creamy center of a lollipop."
"I'm curious too," Angie seconded the question of her childhood friend, and I didn't really have a reason to hide it from them.
"No, of course not. Their primary objective is going to be figuring out how magic works."
"Don't we already know it does?" Josh blurted out with palpable confusion. I couldn't really bla him, as this was a topic I only really discussed with Judy in the past.
"No-no, it's not 'whether' it works, but 'how' it does," I corrected my friend, and considering how stumped he looked, I had no choice but to further elaborate. "What I really want to know is the actual chanisms of magic, what it can do, what it can't do, and why. To make a comparison: there is a difference between knowing that if you mix two chemicals, you get a specific end result, and actually understanding the specific reaction and how it changes the molecular structures of the chemicals involved."
"It's a little daunting for our first task, to be honest..." Labcoat Guy complained under his breath, so I flashed him an encouraging smile.
"Don't worry. I'm going to hand you the entire research archive of the local School, all the equipnt you need will be 'donated' by Lord Grandpa, and you'll be in the unique position where you can study the different ways the various supernatural folks in our group use their magic. And hey, even if you don't make any headway, it's not the end of the world. You're just going to get a cut in your spondulix allowance, that's all."
"What? I thought we agreed that there would be no interdiary currencies!" Fred objected with all his might, but instead of giving him a straight answer I bent my lips into a provocative smirk, followed by the words:
"You really should've read the fine print at the bottom before signing it."
"No way! Galatea, take out our copy!"
"Master, I'm ninety-seven percent certain he is only saying that to push your buttons."
While the forr sentai duo argued, I sneakily vacated the premises with Angie and Josh in tow. What can I say? I hope no one expected to just forget and forgive all the headaches, both figurative and literal, they caused in the past? They should be thankful I was only playing harmless mind gas with them instead of releasing thousands of tiny spiders into their bedrooms when they weren't around. Ah, just the simple ntion of that was enough to lift my mood. It earned my third best Crowey-screams ever, which made all the trouble I had to go through to order a whole box of baby spiders online totally worth it.
My reminiscing over my entirely harmless and good-natured pranks ca to an end when we reached the sparring area of the main hall, where the rest of the gang were already waiting for us in their Magiforms. In no particular order: Elly was doing jumping push-ups (probably as a warm-up), the class rep was discussing sothing about schoolwork with Judy, Snowy was doing stretches with the help of Brang, while Ichiko was, for so reason, riding on the shoulders of an especially blank-faced Karukk wordlessly accepting his fate.
"Is everything all right with Robatto?" my assistant inquired as she broke away from her conversation, which drew the attention of the rest of the group as well.
"That's not his na, but yeah, he turned really cooperative once we finalized his contract."
"Leo has a real crack for rehabilitating baddies," Angie quipped in while unsubtly poking Brang in the side. The old Faun graciously disregarded her with the stoic expression of a great dane ignoring an overly excited poranian trying to play with them. Did that an they were starting to get along?
"What are we going to do today?" Alia raised her voice while readjusting her glasses, and after taking a deep breath to collect my thoughts, I began to outline my plans for the afternoon.
"First, let's make sure we're all on the sa page." As I said that, everyone stopped playing around and quickly ford a semi-circle in front of . Even Josh and the little miko were paying full attention, with the latter going as far as climbing off the tolerant Faun's shoulders and moving over to Judy's side. "I already ntioned this before we ca over, but even though Fred is working for now, I still think it's in our best interest to maintain a regular training regin. You see, I have good reason to believe there is another conflict on the horizon."
"Is it because the Knights are still on the island?" Josh guessed, and I confird his suspicion with a nod.
"Yes, but that's just a part of it. Long story short, another group of Draconians are coming to the island. When that happens, it is practically guaranteed that the Knights would make a move. Before that ensues, I want everyone to be in their top shape."
"New Draconians?" Alia raised a brow in a gesture borrowed straight from Josh's book. "Do you an the Feilongs?"
"Oh?" It was my turn to be a little surprised. "Yes. How did you know?"
"They asked for a permit to co to the island, but grandfather turned them down," the class rep told us a touch flatly. "Grandfather was sure they only contacted us to apply political pressure, but they have repeated the request twice after that. Are you saying they really want to co here?"
"They want to visit us," Elly supplied the answer with a nonchalant voice, though her efforts to appear composed were slightly ruined by her face looking like she just bit into an unripe li.
"I see," Ammy spoke as she nodded, then after so further reflecting she added, "In any case, they asked if they could co to the island in a couple of weeks' ti. I doubt the prohibitions are going to be lifted before the end of the month, so I'm afraid they won't be able to visit you any ti soon."
"What a tragedy," the princess noted with a pronounced pout that sohow completely flew under the class rep's radar.
"I'm sorry, but as long as the Assembly delegation is here to investigate the break-in, I doubt grandfather would lift the lockdown."
"Speaking of which," I raised my voice to move things along while at the sa ti I walked over to my fuming girlfriend to pat her on the head, which finally cald her down a little. "I doubt anything big would happen until those guys co around, but there are still a couple of things you should keep an eye out for." Since I was finished with my therapeutic noggin-tousling, I retracted my hand and used it to point at Brang before adding, "This also applies to you and your n, general."
"[Aye. My ears belong to thine words, Blackcloak,]" he responded with the utmost seriousness.
"First off, I guess the class rep is already aware of this, but there's a new girl you should keep an eye on." The re ntion of a 'new girl' imdiately roused Judy's full attention, but I pretended not to see how intently she was staring at , and instead I continued my explanation. "She goes by the na of Sahi. She looks to be a middle-schooler, but she's actually in her fifties, and she's the visiting arch-mage of the Assembly."
"No, she isn't," Alia imdiately denied with a huff. "She is arch-mage Saahira's granddaughter."
"Wait, you didn't know?" She was still looking at skeptically, but I didn't want to go into the gritty details at the mont, so I shrugged my shoulders and concluded with, "Well, now you do. Anyhow, I just wanted you guys to know that while she might look like a cutesy, hyperactive young girl, there's a granny inside. Got that, Josh?"
"What? Why are you singling out like that?" my friend objected, which I smoothly ignored and soldiered on towards the next topic.
"Next, while the Knights are laying low at the mont, that doesn't an they are out of the picture. In particular, my 'sources' tell that one of them is coming to the island, and I'm about ninety-seven percent certain that she's going to enroll in our school too."
"Wait, what?" This ti the interruption ca from the princess, but I gestured for her to hold her horses for a mont.
"It's another girl, around the sa age as us, and she goes by the na 'Penny', though if she has half a brain, she'll probably pick an alias. Either way, keep an eye out on any new transfer students, and princess?" My girlfriend gave a quizzical look, so I underscored, in no uncertain terms, "Even if she shows up at the school, don't beat her up. She might be useful."
"I'm not making any promises," she responded in a distinctly sulky voice and pointedly turned her face away, so I extended a single finger and lightly tickled her under her chin to draw her gaze back to .
"Co on, princess. Please promise you let handle her if she shows up."
"Fine, fine!" she finally relented with a glare, though it was undercut by how hard she was trying to stop herself from giggling. This once again proved my theory that ticklish girlfriends are the best, but that was beside the point.
"Thank you. Also, if she approaches any of you, rember that while she might look harmless, she's a mber of a paramilitary organization that may or may not qualify to be an international terrorist group as well, so negotiations should be left to the professionals, or barring that, to . Got that, Josh?"
"Why again?" my friend objected, and I naturally let his complaints in one ear and out the other once again.
"Um… So you want us to continue training in case she shows up?" Snowy raised her voice, if a little uncertainly, and I gave her a similarly unsure nod in return.
"Kind of. Honestly, even if she won't cause any trouble, which I highly doubt, we can never know when so outside-context bad guy would show up on our doorstep. Case in point, I doubt any of us expected Fred's attacks until they started happening."
"That's true," Ammy agreed, even though she was still a little dazed after my previous careless revelation. In my defense, I honestly thought she already knew about it. Oh well, no sense crying over spilled milk.
"In other words, I think we should use this montary downti as an opportunity to consolidate our teamwork, prepare so contingency plans, and most importantly, to further improve and expand our self-defense capabilities, as it might save our skins later."
"I can't argue with that," Josh spoke up and then proceeded to circle his shoulders as he added, "So, when are we starting? I call dibs on Leo, by the way." It was at this point that I sent a troubled frown his way, which he must have misinterpreted, as he gave a toothy grin in return and declared, "I've picked up a couple of new tricks, and I want to see if I can give you a run for your money now!"
"I'm afraid that's impossible," Judy elbowed her way into the conversation, shaking her head.
"Why? I thought he's no longer feverish," Josh pressed on, and he finally stopped his weird warm-up exercise as well.
I sent a glance at Judy, and she gave a 'Just tell them already, gosh! Why must you make such a big deal out of every little thing? Geez!' kind of look. That, or her nose was itching, but either way, since everyone was present, this was as good an opportunity as any to actually clarify my current situation.
"I'm mostly fine on that front, but I have a separate injury that hasn't recovered yet," I explained to the group in general, though at this point on Josh and Ammy weren't aware of it. "I got a so-called 'internal injury' in my right hand, and so it doesn't really function as it should right now."
"Really?" my friend blurted out while unsubtly eyeing the offending appendage in question. "I never noticed it. How bad is it?"
I tried to co up with a concise way to explain myself, but after a mont of thinking, I decided it would be probably best if I directly demonstrated the issue instead.
"I can more or less use it in everyday life, though it's a little hard to use a pen right now." While I said so, I walked over to Karukk's side and pointed at the long blade hanging from his belt. "Can I borrow that for a second?"
The Faun grunted in the affirmative and then retrieved the blade from its makeshift holster with practiced motions before offering it to hilt-first, like so kind of knight-retainer. Putting the off-brand imagery aside, I used my right hand to grab hold of the sword and carefully took it from his hands.
It was the sa, blunt-ended executioner-style sword that the Minotaur Knight discarded in my general direction. Originally I wanted to leave it locked up sowhere, but Brang convinced that, considering our lack of access to enchanted weaponry, leaving it in Karukk's hands could be useful in case of an ergency, so for the ti being he was tasked with looking after the weapon. Even though it was a one-and-a-half hander with a fairly thick blade, it was deceptively light and well-balanced, so I managed to hold it with little difficulty even with my numb fingers.
I spared a glance at Josh, to make sure he was still paying attention, and then I turned away from the group and raised the blade over my head.
"The real issue is that my fingers—" At this step, I forcefully swung the sword downwards in a simple chopping motion, and even though I was sincerely trying to hold onto the hilt with all my might, the weapon inevitably slipped out of my grasp and spun through the air before crashing into the ground just a couple of ters ahead of . Once the sound died down, I turned back to Josh and finished the sentence I started. "—can't really hold onto anything."
"[Boss!]" Karukk called out to as he dashed after the blade and picked it up in a hurry. "[Please be careful! I just polished it this morning.]"
"It's an enchanted weapon of the Knights. It's not going to get damaged that easily," I objected, but looking at the disapproving way he was looking at , I couldn't help but sigh and and, "I got it, I won't do that again."
"You seriously can't hold onto anything? Wouldn't that an you can't use any weapons?" Josh muttered, and I was delighted to see that my demonstration indeed said more than a thousand words.
"Pretty much. I still have a couple of tricks up my sleeves, but I won't be stabbing anything any ti soon."
"That… sucks," my friend concluded.
"Yep, though I wasn’t planning on fighting anyone to begin with. Also, don't worry; I already looked into getting my hand healed, so hopefully I won't stay crippled for long."
Even though I said that with the most reassuring voice I could manage, there was a long mont of heavy silence hanging in the air all the sa.
"I suppose that ans we have to pick up the slack," Josh suddenly concluded with an unnecessarily determined expression.
"That's right," Angie agreed with a similarly resolute look in the eyes. "Since Leo is injured, we just have to make sure he wouldn't have to fight until he gets better!"
"I just said I don't plan to," I objected, only to get overruled by Ammy.
"You keep saying that, and yet you sohow always end up working your fingers to the bone."
"I really don't though; it just looks like it because I usually have to deal with two or three things at the sa ti."
"Co on, Leo. There's no need to be modest like that," Elly purred with a proud smile, for so inexplicable reason. "All of us have already seen you in action and know how cool you are."
"I appreciate the praise, but I really—" I began, only to be forced to stop when even Snowy spoke up.
"I… uu… I agree with the others. You've been working really hard, shouldering everything by yourself. Please let us help you out."
You too, sis? Seriously now, what the hell's going on here? Did I really look like so kind of workaholic from the outside? I sincerely doubted it. I an, sure, sohow I was the only one who consistently got injured and worn down whenever the Narrative ca knocking on our door, but it had nothing to do with trying to shoulder everything. Things just happen that way because I'm aware of the tropes and they aren't, so I had an extra dinsion of this proverbial chess-ga to consider whenever sothing happened. It definitely wasn't because I was so kind of self-sacrificing hero type. That would be just gross.
"If we are all in agreent, then let's not waste any ti!" Josh declared with a serious, borderline solemn look on his face. "Since we have to make sure Leo could recuperate in peace, we have to train even harder!"
"Agreed!" the resident Celestial echoed his sentint, and before I knew it, I was completely left behind while they all moved over to the sparring area, even Judy and the little miko, and they began discussing tactics and training regins.
In the anti I continued to digest the situation, and once I was done with that, I ca to the only logical conclusion: either everyone was laboring under so complex, dumb misunderstanding of my character, or I was suffering from a mild case of impostor syndro.
…
Nah, fat chance. I'm too much of a slacker to have that. It must absolutely be option number one. That said, I definitely didn't mind Josh finally flexing his protagonist-muscles and motivating the others for a change, and if the misunderstanding resulted in them working harder, it would only be beneficial in the long run.
Once I settled that, I let out a relieved sigh and followed after the gang. Who knows? Maybe this situation would serve as the perfect catalyst to finally pawn all of those pesky leadership duties over to Josh, if only so that I can return to my initial underachieving bystander ways and focus on important things again, like experinting, or theory crafting at my own pace.
I an, right after I finished settling in Labcoat Guy and getting the materials to upgrade our generator. Oh, and I still had to fix Ammy's staff. I also promised that I would have dinner with Elly and Judy at the mansion, and then we would watch a movie, so that goes first. I'd have to pick a fun one for the evening and… crap, I forgot that I needed to study for the math test on Friday. Eh, I'll do that during the night, after I've finished retooling the tag system of the Celestial Hub. In fact, I didn't have the ti to read the reports during the past two days, so I should probably do that too while I was at it, and then…
…
Yes, I know how that sounded, but things are just unusually hectic right now. I'm not so kind of an overachiever; I just have to do all of these things because they are prior obligations. I seriously don't have impostor syndro, I swear!
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