Witch Troupe and the Undead

However, as a one-time siege weapon, you could empty the Knights' treasury and still not make many, and they would be scrapped after use.

"So, as I said, let's just stick to wheels and not bother with such advanced things as floating chassis."

The reason it flies is that in the boost mode, the suspended chassis below is damaged and overloaded by the high-density pure wind element turbulence, which causes the vehicle to completely derail and fly up uncontrollably.

Since the basic tests were completed smoothly, the first prototype of the train was delivered in just one week after the wheels were changed, and the Royal Chamber of Commerce was very satisfied with it.

Even though the operating and purchase costs are higher (the fuel has changed from crushed magic crystals to expensive fuel blocks), the greater output and faster speed are enough to make up for this deficiency. What business needs is timeliness. Transporting goods to places in short supply a day earlier means huge profits, while being a day late may result in complete losses.

The Empire's traditional pedestrian trains require mages to operate and can only carry a limited number of carriages. Even with advantages in operating costs and armor, these two factors cannot be maintained in the long term.

On the one hand, operating costs will be rapidly diluted as the number increases, and armor will be rapidly improved as low-speed versions of new trains are developed. On the other hand, pedestrian trains have too high requirements for tracks.

The new type of train does not have such high requirements for the tracks. Because the speed is fast enough, it means that the number of round trips will be more in the same amount of time. If the lines are used densely, there is no need to carry out complicated enchanting and infrastructure treatment on the tracks and roads to prevent the erosion of monsters and the magic power of the savage chaos.

For monsters and magical beasts (not monsters, such as dragons, which are a particularly powerful intelligent magical beast), every few hours there is a place where something wrapped in a storm shield moves at super speed, and they will basically give up on moving after half a month at most.

Monsters and magical corruption cannot be completely eradicated. Even at the core of civilization, there are chaotic magical reactions. After all, human civilization cannot penetrate deep underground, nor can it exist in sewers and underground rivers. At least, it does not exist in this era.

Even so, this means that the cost of building each kilometer of track will be reduced from nearly 50 gold coins to less than 5 gold coins, and as the train network becomes more extensive, the price of building branch lines on the main line will decrease further.

At that time, only the main lines may use enchanted alchemical alloy tracks inscribed with resistance runes, while the side lines will use ordinary alchemical alloy tracks. In some areas where monsters are unlikely to appear, such as the lines connecting the main city and satellite towns, even ordinary steel tracks will suffice.

However, the tracks leading to the border fortress and through the Black Forest still require fully enchanted tracks at extremely high prices—meaning that transnational railways cannot be built at present, while military railways can have some relatively easy-to-build sections added.

“Magic, ah…” Roach sighed, looking at the representatives sent by the Chamber of Commerce to receive the prototype vehicles and blueprints. Magic makes some things that are costly on Earth cheap.

For example, the biggest problem in building railways on Earth is building bridges over mountains and digging tunnels, but in this world, this part is much easier. The ancient dwarf tunnel we passed through before would be an eight-lane railway tunnel on Earth.

The arcane mages of the Elemental Realm are truly skilled at carving out mountains on construction sites. The advantage of arcane magic lies in the fact that it has no threshold for users. As long as there is enough time, energy, and manpower, even if you gather apprentices, you can spend several months carving out a gap in a mountain large enough for two trains to pass through.

Reinforcing tunnels can also be accomplished using various alchemical potions, rune inscriptions, and enchanting techniques. As long as there are enough spellcasters and time, the cost of opening up mountains and building roads is not high.

The cost of road maintenance and road surface construction, which is much lower on Earth, is the highest in this world. Even on the sides of those dirt roads, shrines need to be erected or rune stones installed every now and then, using magic and the power of gods to prevent the black forest and wild magic from devouring these roads.

The biggest wildlife threats on Earth are rats and rabbits, but here you have to face all sorts of strange and bizarre monsters and the corrosive effects of magic itself. This makes things that are easy on Earth extremely difficult and expensive in this world.

"Then next up is that assault jet-powered rotating combat vehicle. I think we can use the same engine technology as this train..."

“It won’t fit,” a construct warlock decisively refuted the design. “That drive unit is 12 meters long. How big of a vehicle do you plan to use to fit it in?”

"I mean, we can solve both the rotation and the flame-breathing problems."

"Oh..." That's true. Relying on this wind element turbulence driver and micro wind turbine shaft, a small servo can be driven to rotate the turret or vehicle body. Furthermore, the high-pressure wind element turbulence only needs to prepare a fire element release array at the outlet and install a blazing glue canister to shoot flames dozens of meters away.

"I'm thinking, if the power source really isn't enough, let the soldiers push it from inside. At least during a siege, pushing it to the city gate will inflict enough damage on the defenders. As for the jump system, we can use the same method we used when the train went out of control before."

"Use the pre-prepared magic storage crystal to activate the levitation array and melt it, then this thing can jump up." As for how it lands, no one knows. Anyway, the mages feel that they don't need to drive such a thing as a suicide squad. If all else fails, they can just add a cushioning device inside the vehicle so that the soldiers won't fall to their deaths.

"Can't we use the puppet technology like the one used for trains?"

"No, it's too expensive. We need to control costs." Professor Wedel said that they had studied the walking vehicle plan a long time ago, but the cost was too high. The magic puppet core was more expensive than the power unit.

"How about... we build the weapon system first, a wind element torrent driven weapon system, which is no different from a magic crossbow, just larger. Why don't we put it on a site and have it pulled by horses or trains?"

"You mean, separate the weapon and the drive unit?" Professor Wedel asked.

"Hiss, that's certainly possible. In any case, let's use the scraps to make something for the military to fool them." Anyway, there are still quite a few spare locomotive drive units and processed wind turbine systems here.

A few days later, with the help of the little witch, these systems were integrated and combined at several times the speed. What was presented to the officers sent by the emperor to receive them was something that had nothing to do with the "Assault Jumping Spinning Flamethrower Tank".

First, there's an enlarged tractor unit with eight pairs of incredibly heavy metal wheels and tracks, measuring a full 15 meters long. Then there's a similarly tracked platform attached to the tractor unit. Neither of these vehicles has its tracks powered; the tractor unit is powered by wind. The rear one is even towed entirely by the tractor unit.

A U-shaped track, at least 20 meters long, is erected on the platform. It can be lowered like a ladder by simply cranking a handle, and then mounted on the tractor unit in front. Alternatively, a Y-shaped support can be manually erected for support. At the end of the track are two rows of huge wind turbines placed vertically, making it look more like a mobile power generator than some kind of heavy-duty towing artillery.

Pure wind elemental torrents will be launched from inside the orbit. Simply place a metal block or something else at the launch point, and this thing will be enveloped in the raging wind elemental torrents and crash into the target at supersonic speed, unleashing a violent storm impact.

"What we need is some kind of combat vehicle that can carry soldiers, and this... should be some kind of new mobile heavy magic cannon, right?"

"Regarding the vehicle, we can't reduce its size. However, if you're willing to accept a larger vehicle, then..."

"Why reduce the size?" The general in front of them looked completely bewildered, and the mage who was asked was also stunned. He decisively looked at his professor, who also looked confused. Finally, everyone looked at Roach. "That's right, Master Roach, why do we need to reduce the size of the vehicle?"

"..." Roach also fell silent. On Earth, reducing the height and size of the vehicle would obviously make it easier to pass through and less likely to be hit. But thinking about it carefully, this is a magical world. Weight reduction can be used for various levitation spells. Not to mention, the larger the vehicle is built, the more magic engines can be set up, and the greater the magic power output—which can support more powerful enchantment effects and shields.

Furthermore, the larger the area, the easier it is to enchant and imprint, and the lower the cost of enchanting per unit area. Of course, considering the overall cost of enchanting, the total cost will indeed increase, so you can't keep increasing the size indefinitely, but that doesn't mean you have to shrink the vehicle body as much as possible.

"...Then we can make a bigger one, but a bigger one would be heavier, and it definitely wouldn't be able to jump."

"We can talk about the jump function later, but what about the other functions?"

“Fire-breathing and rotation can do it, although I think there might be a better solution,” Professor Wilder stroked his chin and looked at the tractor magic cannon that was just a gimmick. “If we scale it down a bit, we should be able to install it.”

One of the reasons the professors are so keen on developing weapons is that they also plan to use the materials to build a construct combat platform for themselves. The spellcasters in this world are not just researchers; exploring ruins, studying chaotic magic, and even sometimes dangerous experiments that go out of control all require sufficient force.

Then nothing is more suitable for mages to explore the ruins of the wild frontier and annihilate the failed experiments that emerge from under their own mage towers than a land warship weighing several hundred tons and powered by a magic engine.

Of course, the mage's own version would spare no expense, stuffing in a magic puppet core and tower spirit system. As a substitute for a floating city, a ground-moving magic castle is also an option.

Chapter 241 Can the church also move?

Lingying Church Meeting Place, Northern District of Beijing.

"The Church of Jesus Christ is frantically arresting what they imagine to be heretics, and the scale is growing larger and larger. Many of our brothers have also been persecuted." Priests, accompanied by knights, openly broke down doors to search for so-called heretics and false beliefs. The nobles took this opportunity to amass wealth and seize the land and houses of those who were arrested.

Meanwhile, the middle class, who were theoretically protected by the nobility and the empire, had to pay a large sum of atonement to avoid being burned at the stake. At the same time, missionaries of the Redemptionist movement were secretly working to organize resistance. Every day, they could find several corpses in alleys or sewers, some of ordinary people, some of the sewer rats, and of course, some of the church.

Various gangs have joined this frenzy, hoping the conflict will never end, and extortion, blackmail, threats, and fraud are on the rise.

The members of the Spirit Response Church naturally suffered considerable losses in this process, especially when their wishes could indeed be fulfilled by obtaining money.

“We must counter this behavior. Perhaps we can use our wish-granting power?” For example, wishing for a few overly radical individuals to disappear, or wishing for one of our people to climb to a high position and gain power. As Gregoli’s abilities gradually recover, some wishes that are not simply about moving things can also be fulfilled, but only with a slight distortion of reality.

For example, if someone wishes to become a nobleman, a minor nobleman who has no heir or few descendants might discover that he has a distant nephew who happens to be the one who made the wish, or he might suddenly inherit a noble title that he has never heard of before, with no fiefdom but only an honorary title, oh, and maybe a meager annual pension of a few gold coins.

"Wish to become strong..." "No, some of our brothers have tried. They gained magical power far exceeding that of ordinary people, but they couldn't control it at all. Wishes can't bring us knowledge and memories." This is a new limitation of wishing, or rather, not a complete limitation, but rather it involves two or three different wishes.

"It takes three wishes to obtain a controllable power, and the speed at which it is impossible to keep up. It might be fine for dealing with the rats in those gangs, but it won't work against the Church's Inquisitors."

"Ultimately, we need to spread the glory of the Lord more widely." The more people there are, the more desires they have, and the more desires they have, the faster we can cultivate a large number of fighters who will eventually join this feast. And with a powerful armed force, the church's monks will not cause any trouble, especially when the other side has not yet taken a stand.

"So what do you plan to do? Our missionary work in the North District is almost over, and there's a group of people tracking us down."

"Tracking us? Why?" "Who knows? Several of our small outposts have already gone unresponsive."

“I have warned everyone to be on their guard and not to give themselves away.” All meeting places, large and small, as well as hidden sanctuaries and shrines, have been searched and attacked by unknown forces, and obvious search marks have been left at the scene.

In front of the owl-headed stone statue, purple flames burned quietly, and gold coins poured out from a simple pocket, landing in the palm of the hand. This made the believer who had just made a wish grin and let out a joyful sound. These small golden round coins were simply the most perfect things in the world.

"Ding-a-ling~" The doorbell rang, and the believer was stunned. He quickly came out of the basement, carefully locked the door, and checked that his clothes were in good condition before walking towards the front door. He had already received a warning from the higher priest.

Looking out through the small window in the door, an ordinary-looking man stood in the doorway. He was neither one of the judges or a fanatic of the church, nor a gang rat. He was wearing a vest from the United Chamber of Commerce, and the box on his back contained bottles of milk.

"Milk delivery? I didn't order milk, you've got the wrong person."

"I haven't made a mistake," the milkman checked the note in his hand. "It is indeed your house."

"Damn it, you must be mistaken, I never..." The milkman's foot spun half a circle on the ground, like a silver lightning bolt striking the door, sending the door and the man flying back four or five meters.

“I told you I didn’t come to the wrong place,” the man said as he walked in. “You didn’t order milk, and I didn’t say I was here to deliver milk to you.”

"You, you are..." The man dressed as an ordinary citizen crawled back a few steps and grabbed a magic crossbow hidden under a cabinet in the hallway. "So now cultists have finally learned to hide a few weapons at home?" The man moved through the hallway like a silver lightning bolt and broke the man's arm with a single step before the other man could take out the magic crossbow.

"As expected..." The magic crossbow had been modified. In order to control costs, normal magic crossbows are charged by a turntable and a crank. In the army, a device similar to a steam turbine was used to charge a large number of magic crossbows lined up on the bunker as a fixed defensive device.

However, the essence of the magic crossbow is to use the power of the wind element to propel magic projectiles to attack enemies. Using wind element crystals can avoid repeated charging and allow the energy to be maintained for a longer time. Of course, as a standard weapon, that would be too expensive.

Each 50 milligram of wind element crystal is worth at least one gold coin, and it is destroyed after use and cannot be recharged. It can only be used as an expensive supplement for certain people who need a quick boost.

Furthermore, the power of basic magic bullets is also insufficient to penetrate magic shields and enchanted armor, and they pose little threat to warriors who have activated extraordinary martial arts. For example, this intruder could seize the weapon or crush the arm before the intruder can aim.

The man pulled a small pouch from the cultist's arms, who was writhing on the ground in pain. A faint purple aura of magic still lingered on it. "It really is the power of that thing. Sorry, to prevent it from finding out, you have to go somewhere no one knows you." The man took out a dark purple amulet. "Hide into the depths of twilight..." The dim shadow gradually swallowed the terrified cultist on the ground.

"Damn it, I still have to deliver milk! I'm going to be late!" The man was about to say something, but when he saw the time, he rushed out in a hurry.

A few hours later, "What's wrong with you? You can't even deliver milk and then never come back? Did you get lost? Or did you run into a thirsty old widow? Damn it, if this happens again, you can forget about your wages!" The milk station owner is much scarier than a cult member.

"Well, we just encountered a little trouble on the way."

"What trouble?"

Churches arrest cult members

The boss's expression froze instantly. This was indeed the situation in the capital. Chaos was an understatement. On the surface, things seemed to have returned to calm, but in reality, the trials and hunts of heretics had never stopped.

"Alright, you'd better not get into trouble." The boss didn't pursue the matter of being late, nor did he suspect that the new employee would make up such a lie. After all, few people would want to talk about such unlucky things. What if one day the sheriff came to your door with a few priests and asked you why you often encountered arrests of cult members, and whether you were a cult member yourself?

That would be a huge problem. And it would be difficult to explain that this was a fabricated excuse. If it were true, then having you at every crime scene would make even the sheriff suspect you of being a hidden cultist or heretic, even if he had no ill intentions. If it were false, daring to fabricate such a lie, you must be a heretic!

"Never mind, you still have several deliveries to make this afternoon, you should go eat!"

"Understood, boss!" The arrival of the Night Judges went unnoticed. They weren't just infiltration experts, but also experts in disguise. Well, maybe not disguise at all.

Milkman, newspaper boy, postman, stable boy, deliveryman—they obtained these jobs in the capital city through a few tricks. It has to be said that if superhumans compete with ordinary people for similar jobs, ordinary people really don't have much competitive power.

The reason for choosing these jobs is simple: they all have one thing in common. They won't attract attention anywhere you go, and the nature of the work means you'll be running around the city, making them the best jobs to get a sense of the size, routes, and power distribution of a city.

During the search, there will be no sense of incongruity, nor will it lead to frequent absences or drawing attention to oneself for doing nothing. If a strange man asks for directions or asks where XX lives, you might think he has ulterior motives, but it's perfectly normal for a new milkman or courier to ask for directions or loiter at an intersection.

A preliminary map was hung in the sanctuary in the North District. The location of the ritual site had been selected, and the locations of most of the fallen members of the Church of Spiritual Response, the Great Sin Master, and the Church of Holy Lord were marked on the map, which continued to be added over time.

“We need to stop our activities recently. That thing seems to have sensed something is wrong. In addition, we need a lot of money to purchase materials to set up the ritual site. These materials will probably also alert that evil thing. We must purchase them separately from external sources.”

The Bishop of the Guardian arrived by train yesterday, with a standing ticket in third class. He almost had his wallet stolen on the way, but fortunately, the priests of the Goddess of Night were professional town sheriffs and guards back in that wild and pioneering era, protecting each new town from attacks by bandits and monsters.

Putting everything else aside, it's impossible to expect a group of people who worship the night god to be listless at night. Stealing from them in the middle of the day is more like it, but stealing from a bishop who guards secrets in the middle of the night... that thief was beaten half to death on the spot. This old man, who was over fifty years old, didn't even activate his night-entanglement mode, otherwise he would have been killed with three punches.

The Night Hunters fight only with their bare hands, while the Keepers of Secrets and the Inquisitors use weapons. They have their own exclusive weapons and the "gifted powers" applied to those weapons. However, their unarmed combat abilities are also quite good, at least compared to ordinary superhumans.

"Haven't the church's weapons arrived yet?"

"The weapons and equipment are being transported via a different route and will arrive in about two days."

A caravan that works with the church will be responsible for bringing their equipment along the way. The equipment of the Church of the Night God is generally unusable by ordinary people, so there is no concern about it being taken and resold. It is not some kind of extraordinary enchanted weapon or equipment. After all, the goddess had lost all response and divine power before, so it was impossible for her to create extraordinary weapons or equipment.

These equipment are all ordinary metal forgings, with some special processing. Now that the goddess has regained her powers, as long as the blanks are sent here, they can be consecrated and transformed into standard sacred weapons before the battle begins, thanks to the sanctuary and ritual site here.

How much funding gap is there?

"We're still short over a thousand gold coins... I can't think of any way to make up for this shortfall except by robbing a bank."

"Are there any... alternatives to the ritual implements?"

"We are thinking about this." Some parts of the ceremony do not need to be as strict as in ancient times. Many parts were symbolic back then, and can be omitted now due to insufficient funds. However, the parts that actually require physical effort must be carried out without compromise.

"There's another problem. One of the ceremony venues is located inside the Imperial Academy. How do we get in?"

“They’re recruiting school workers recently, I can give it a try, and I heard that the saintess is in there, so it shouldn’t be a big problem.” Lulua is a saint of the goddess, and according to church tradition, she can generally be called a saintess/saint. At the same time, as a saintess of the church, she can generally be considered equivalent to the position of “high priestess”.

This is the same in most churches. After all, saints are truly high-level combatants. To make a saint hold the title of deacon or trainee preacher would be an insult to someone. Even the saint of the Horse-Headed Saint, the Holy City has to reluctantly acknowledge that the saint's title is equivalent to that of a bishop. However, the saint's followers may not have corresponding titles. These are two different things.

Two days later, the Horned Deer Merchant Guild's convoy finally delivered their equipment. Most of the Night God Church's combat personnel did not wear armor, as armor was a hindrance to their movement and fighting style.

The Inquisitor and the Keeper of Secrets wield two swords, one long and one short. The long sword is black with countless silver constellation inscriptions, while the short sword is red with golden patterns. The two weapons can be combined into one under certain circumstances to activate their extraordinary power.

Of course, right now this is just a blank made of metal, and the consecration ceremony has not yet been completed. This process will take anywhere from several days to several weeks, depending on the circumstances and the degree of the goddess's attention.

"We'll make our move in a week. Don't let those sinful sorcerers get away with it either." The Bishop of the Guardian of Secrets inspected the equipment. Nothing was missing, which was great.

Meanwhile, at the Imperial Academy, the new war machine was completed: a square trapezoidal metal block, 45 meters long, 20 meters wide, and 8 meters high, without wheels. At the rear were three wind turbines that propelled it to hover about 5 to 10 centimeters above the ground, relying on the torrent of wind elemental magic beneath its metal skirts. Any higher and it would be unable to fly.

A large, train-sized power unit occupies almost half the volume of the vehicle, causing the passenger area inside to be shaped like a door. The front horizontal section is the driver's cabin, and a protruding point at the corner is a cylindrical structure, which is the generator of the magic shield. It can open a 120-degree defensive barrier directly in front, and also serves as an observation post.

At the top of the metal platform is the powerful Wind Turbulence-Boosted Magic Cannon. Because of its large size, it doesn't need to fire live ammunition. It can fire "Exploding Fireballs" to kill enemies, or switch to "Incinerating Beams" or other fire spells.

The gate-shaped wings have a double-layer structure. The lower layer is located on both sides of the power box and under the vehicle, where fuel is added, magic is injected, etc. The upper layer is the side combat area, which is the firing port and can be guarded by a large number of soldiers.

The hatches are also located in the rear areas on both sides. A ring of folding metal shields surrounds the outside of the vehicle, which can be deployed to allow soldiers to fight from above if necessary. It's less of a "war machine" and more of a... "mobile castle."

Both its shape and size resemble a small steel fortress. Especially when it is seated, the Imperial military believes it can serve as the ultimate solution for the vehicle-fortress tactic. Just three to five of these vehicles can construct a bastion structure on the battlefield, including inner and outer fortifications, arrow towers, watchtowers, and magic cannons.

Its power comes from the tail impeller, which seems like a weakness, but that's only if you can get close to it in the high-temperature propulsion storm. The armor is not as thick as it looks, but the inner mithril plating is covered with a large number of enchanted runes. It can be considered that the armor of this "chariot" is a particularly huge set of enchanted armor.

Because the metal surface is regular and wide, without too many complex structures and small joint parts, the unit manufacturing cost is almost 2/3 cheaper than the knight's enchanted armor.

However, due to the large area required for enchanting and the long time it takes to infuse the armor, the total production cost is equivalent to half the cost of a knightly order's armor.

"A few are enough for a legion; we don't need too many," the general said. He believed that these mobile castles could greatly compensate for the attacker's disadvantage in siege battles.

Except for core cities like the capital and fortresses, the outer walls of ordinary castles are generally level with the turrets and even the upper deck of this vehicle. Soldiers can engage in firefights with the enemy by relying on an armored magic core without suffering from or with greatly reduced altitude disadvantage.

The magic engine installed in the armor outputs magic power that can safely drive a large number of fixed equipment such as large magic crossbows, and the turrets can be disassembled.

"Two of them, when arranged side by side, can form a long, sloping bridge that can be built directly over the enemy's wall," Professor Wilder explained his bridging module.

It's basically just a bunch of overlapping metal plates, enchanted with a simple toughness and levitation spell, just like the levitation staircases in a mage tower. Once activated, it quickly unfolds into a metal plate about 15 meters wide and 90 meters long. At most two or three of these fortresses can connect a camp a couple hundred meters away directly to the city wall, and then it's time for the traditional knight charge.